minutes I was on a trail. You can see our apartment building just beyond the bushes in this picture, and I'm standing on the trail. That's how close we are to the Marin Headlands and Golden Gate National Park -- I am standing in the National Park! Pretty freaking sweet. So my ride took me higher and higher in elevation and closer and closer to the southern tip of the northern peninsula of the San Francisco Bay, where the Golden Gate Bridge connects us to San Francisco and the southern peninsula. In between myself and the Bridge though is a series of hills and valleys that I would have to ride across in order to get to. I didn't have a map, so I figured, what the heck! And I struck out to find an off-road route to the Golden Gate Bridge from my apartment.
This is the view North. The water is Richardson Bay, a little inlet from the San Francisco Bay.
The view South from the same spot as above. Sorry about the glare, the sun was really bright. You can see Angel Island, the largest island in the Bay, and the Sausalito Harbor.
The view West. This is the Marin Headlands and the core of Golden Gate National Park. This is how close we live to the Pacific Ocean -- surrounded by it on three sides.
My most prized posession. I love my bike so much, that thing is a STUD.
I eventually found the Bridge, which has a walking/bike route on either side. It was windy but a pretty thrilling experience to ride across the Bridge. The whole thing sways in the wind and you can't feel it while driving, but standing there, you can feel it. Its kind of unnerving, but a thrill for sure.
The Rock (Alcatraz) from the Golden Gate Bridge.
San Francisco, Alcatraz, the Bay Bridge, Treasure Island, and Oakland from the Golden Gate Bridge.
So that was my exciting morning. It's 11:00 PM now, I'm tired and I haven't even gotten to our trip to Point Reyes that we took that afternoon! I'll have to get to that later.
Real quick though, Tamara and I watched a really great San Francisco movie last night: The Rock, with Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage. That was an awesome flick, I gotta say. The only thing was that it was kind of hard not to hope that the terrorists would get one little bomb off to land on San Francisco City Hall... JOKING (mostly). Anyway, if you ever want to see a really cool action movie check out The Rock!
5 comments:
They needed to plant the bomb where the 9th District Court of Legislating from the Bench is; during session. Ya know, that one court where democracy has no respect just personal agenda's for the elite that know better than the general population?
I'm glad you live so close to the bike trails man, that's quite a blessing for you I'm sure! Having the country right off your doorstep is like home for you, that's awesome.
Golden Gate National Park? Tell me honestly Ryan, after seeing Zion, Bryce Canyon, Canyonlands, Arches, and the Grand Canyon, is there anything there deserving of a national park status?
Looks like you had some fun. I'm going to have a better mountain bike than you after my mission. Yours is nice, though.
I decided to look at some pics online to see if I was just blowing smoke just now... whoops. It's perty.
There are some pretty amazing spots -- definitely nothing as awesome as Zion or any of the Utah hot spots, but there are some very different types of things to see here. One thing I am trying to catch in the right conditions is the Golden Gate Bridge from above the fog. I've seen in pictures a low-lying fog sitting on top of the bay and the span of the bridge, but you can get high above all that in certain conditions and see the towers and the city skyline sticking up above the fog. I think that would be pretty cool to see. But really, just like there is a sense of wonder that accompanies a visit to the desert or the mountains, it is the same for ocean vistas and beach-side bluffs. And really, this is all stuff you have to see to really appreciate. The Golden Gate Bridge is unbelievable after you have seen it. It is too big to be real.
And when you get back from your mission, I will be looking for a new bike too. We'll see who ends up with the nicer one :)
Oh you will, will you?
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