Truckee CA to Sparks NV

The temp at the start of today’s ride leaving Truckee CA at about 7:15 AM. was the coldest we’ve had. It was in the 30’s, so we had our cold weather clothing on. The day finished in Sparks NV with the temp at a warm mid to upper 70’s. This was big change. You may wonder what the cyclists do with the cold weather gear when it gets warm. ABB has a neat way to handle that. They have a drop box at a SAG stop so you can leave clothing you don’t need for the rest of the day’s ride, or pick up clothing if you need additional clothing.

We rode 66 miles today. From Truckee we rode to Lake Tahoe. This town is on the lake front and our ride took us along the lake with great views of the snow covered Sierra Nevada Mountains across the lake. The lake is crystal clear water with many boats moored out from the water’s edge.

Goodbye California hello Nevada! Lake Tahoe straddles the border of California and Nevada.

Leaving Lake Tahoe we had an 8 mile climb up to the Mount Rose summit. The elevation at the summit is 8.991 ft. and the grade of the climb was 7 degrees. This was the challenge that most of us were apprehensive about since we had major climbing in yesterday’s ride with little time for our bodies to recover. My thigh muscles were tender to the touch this morning from yesterday’s ride. The climb started at 30 miles into the ride and I decided that I would take it one mile at a time. I rode by myself since riders paces are so different especially when climbing. It was tough. As I ascended I got some great photos of Lake Tahoe.

The sensational aspects of the ride were, the great scenery in Lake Tahoe, successfully riding to the summit of Mount Rose, and finally the screaming 16 mile descent down the other side of Mount Rose into Sparks Nevada. The Lake Tahoe scenery speaks for itself. Arriving at the summit I asked the ABB staff if they had a cot. I just wanted to lie down. After congratulating me on making it, they suggested that I could lay down in one of the nearby snow banks. I decided a better option was to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and get a few photos before the descent.

After riding 8 miles uphill descending 16 miles without have to actually crank a pedal was a fabulous pleasure! It seems like challenges often have their payoff. If you put yourself out there to struggle through adversity there is usually a silver lining. Anyway, to go on, the mountain was as steep descending as it was ascending. Rick and I rode together and we feathered the brakes periodically to slow our decent. I didn’t want to go too crazy. I’m sure we averaged 30 mph, at one point when descending on a straight section of road I was cruising at 38 mph. That was fast enough for me.

We had an awesome meal at the Nugget hotel casino in Sparks. I’ve never seen a buffet that big. I won’t go into the details of what I ate. But I topped it off with Blueberry Pie Alamode.