I attempted a Century ride (100 miles) across two of the San Juan Islands in one day. I did ride on both Orcas Island and San Juan Island for a total of 65 miles. So, it was a Century, but only a Metric Century (100 kilometers).
Riding a Century across the San Juan Islands is something I've dreamt about since discovering the possibility in the winter when researching summer rides. Back in February, right before the start of the pandemic when I was imagining a better summer, I read the guidebook 75 Classic Rides Washington. The author detailed routes on Orcas and San Juan Islands that both clocked in at fifty miles. I got the idea that I could combine the two into a Century ride of one hundred miles total.
Fast-forward to the end of July and I decided it was finally time to peddle around the islands. I took a vacation day in the middle of the work week. I had to ride on a weekday because the timing of the ferries on the weekend wouldn't work for riding fifty miles each on Orcas and San Juan Islands. It wasn't ideal, but the San Juans are a magical place, so it was totally worth it.
I would have preferred to ride on a Friday so I could make Saturday a recovery day. I had to be at work on Friday so Wednesday ended up being the best day for PTO. That meant that Thursday would be a rough day, since I had to wake up at 3am Wednesday morning to make the drive from Seattle to Anacortes for the 5:30 am ferry to Orcas Island. At least I was working at home because of the pandemic so my bed was literally two feet from my desk whenever I needed to lie down.
I'm a fan of the RU-vid channel Global Cycling Network. I started watching a lot of their videos overt the winter of 2018/2019, which got me fired up to get back into road cycling. What you are watching is my attempt to make a video like a presenter on GCN. I now realize how much work it is to make one of those GCN videos. The reason I wasn't able to ride a full Century is because I spent so much time futzing with camera gear which ate into my riding time.
This is only the third video I've ever made. Still have a lot to learn. I edited it with the GoPro app on my iPad. I did a minor re-edited it with iMovie for RU-vid to add some royalty-free music to the video. Definitely frustrated with the limitations of editing on the GoPro app. It's good for what it is, but its best use is for quickly editing action clips to post to social media.
I also used the San Juans ride as a chance to test out the new DJI Mavic Air 2 drone. This is the first drone I've ever used. It was great, but I ended up returning it. Drones are pretty cool, but it was a lot more gear to carry for self-supported adventure sports and I wasn't sure how much use I would get out of it. They ain't cheap either, one grand, so I was worried the whole time about damaging it.
Ride details from my Garmin Edge 530 Bike Computer:
- 65 miles, 6500 feet elevation gain, and 2800 calories total
- Temperature from 50 °F to 80 °F
- Orcas: 7am start, 40.24 mi, 4,888 ft elev, 1,917 C
- San Juan: 2:50pm start, 25.72 mi, 1,762 ft elev, 870 C
References & Links:
75 Classic Rides Washington by Mike McQuaide
www.mountainee...
Cease & Desist - A Friday Harbor Beerhouse
/ fridayharborbeer
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#Cycling #RoadBike #sanjuanislands #orcasisland #sanjuanisland
18 сен 2024
