Deixo algunes fotos del trajecte en tren (en un altre post posare mes fotos d’arbres i de les vistes durant la baixada en bici)

Fent cua per posar les bicis al tren

Mireu les bicis apilades als ultims vagons!

Dins de Santa Cruz (c/Chestnut)

Chestnut and Church st.

Leaving town through a tunnel

Some of the sponsors, Bike to Work day

I went to the site located in downtown Santa Cruz. You could get free Jamba Juice smoothies, coffee, bagels or cinnamon bread, bananas and cereal bars.

Waiting for a massage --leaf pants matching real tree leaf. Check out the bike with a surfboard rack behind me

Nice guys from a bike shop downtown (Spokesman bicycles) tuned your bike –just like this little kids’ bike! Aint’ that cute???

Sweet smile :)

Here we are! Fixing the kid's bike

"cute ladybug socks!"

Ok, now is time to go to school

Massages were offered by amazing massageuses…

My massageuse was Melinda, at the far back. She was great.

  You could also hop on a big truck and sit on the driver’s seat to learn which are the truck driver’s blind spots. It’s crazy! Every bike rider should have that experience… I’ll sure be more careful around trucks (though I always tried to avoid them altogether!)

I took some pictures of bike paths with views over Santa Cruz, CA, yesterday at UCSC. Will upload more in the next few days.

Pinnacles, by Vicki Rogers (from Flickr)

Two weekends ago I went to Big Sur (post 1, post 2)and Pinnacles, but I ran out of batteries and couldn’t take pictures of beautiful Pinnacles.

Montserrat at sundown, by Allesandro Coiro Mas

Pinnacles at sunset (photo not mine, see link)

It reminded me of Montserrat, a very characteristic mountain range in Catalunya, which I visited several times as a kid (getting to the top by car, bus or cable car) or staying down in the rock climbing area called El Vermell, at the bottom of Montserrat, near El Bruc, but have never hiked or climbed.

The park’s official page provides nature and history info, with a final paragraph that adds a couple of reasons why people visit the park:

“In the spring, wildflowers subtle and bold decorate the land, and the bird population swells with migrants. Solitude, dark night skies, and deep quiet are found here, especially in the more than 16,048 acres of federally designated wilderness within the Monument – one of the two federal wilderness areas nearest to the San Francisco Bay Area. Rock-climbers and hikers, both solitary and social, are regulars here. Whether you want to count butterflies, condors or stars, Pinnacles National Monument is likely to reward you with new pleasures each time you visit.“

High Peaks trail, by Vicki and Chuck Rogers

We wanted to see condors, so we knew that High Peaks trail was our first choice. We got to the rangers’ center at around 5:20pm to check out the trails info. The literature in the cabin read that the hike we wanted to do usually takes 3-4 hours (elevation gain: 1,540 feet, 7-8 mile loop). My friend said it would take us half the time, then corrected himself to a “maybe two hours”. I thought he was being a bit optimistic, maybe exaggerating our capabilities (that or the rangers information was targeted to very slow and/or untrained visitors), but I thought that if it was really gonna takes us only 2 hours, or even 2.5, we would be back by sunset and still have light, so nothing to worry about (but we took our flashlights just in case).

by Vicki and Chuck Rogers

Since it’d got a bit late, we decided to put on a fast gear. We climbed very quickly; it was nice and warm and the views were gorgeous. The rock walls were mainly reddish, because of their geological ingredients and also thanks to the late afternoon light. The climb was quite steep, so we soon had high and large views down to the parking lot and the surroundings.

I felt great: was impressed with the beauty of the place and the rush to come back to the parking lot in time was giving me lots of energy. I truly was on a fast pace mode and not only kept up with my friend, but I wanted to go even faster (I don’t always feel that strong hiking! I’m not sure if it was just mental strength or all this surfing and a little hiking I’ve been doing for the last month in Santa Cruz. Probably both).

by Vicki and Chuck Rogers

After getting to the top –having stopped a couple of times to check on the birds flying around, none condors, just falcons I think– we did the first bit of another trail that goes around the northernmost peak (Bear Gulch trail), so that we could take a look over to the east side of the park. That was my friend’s great idea and I really appreciated making that little detour for the views. Back on the High Peaks trail, we begun out descent, which allowed for another gorgeous spectacle of mother nature at dusk.

Balconies (rockslide) cave (photo not mine, see link)

We got back down about 1.5 hours after our start. We were a bit tired from the intense pace we’d followed throughout the hike (plus the driving and the hike in the morning at Indians, Big Sur), but we decided to do the other hike we had in mind so that we’d pretty much covered Pinnacles west side. That second trail is called Balconies Cliffs–Balconies Cave Loop (2.4 mile loop, 1 to 1 1⁄2 hours, which we probably did in 40 minutes).

The cave was really interesting. I got created by humongous rocks falling and getting stuck between two walls or one wall and another huge rock, a long time ago (I know this explanation is not super scientific, but I’m sure you get the general idea. Or do you?)

I immensely recommend visiting and hiking at Pinnacles!!!!!!!

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