The Adventure Girls be back! After crippling Natalie and Kira on last year’s Solstice Double Century, we decided to do a half double century this year. 😂 I was worried about the wind today and for the most part it wasn't too bad until around mile 80 when we had some pretty bad headwind any time we were heading west or north. I guess the wind was coming from the NW. It was another case of the wind making it feel colder than it was. When I first opened my garage to go, I wasn't wearing much but ended up putting on layers because of how cold the wind felt. But as soon as I got out into the sun, I realized, I didn't need them. I took them all off when I met up with them and never put them on again. Kira put on road wheels for the ride and as we were passing Sequoia High School, Natalie asked her how the new wheels felt. I was in front of them and heard Kira say, "It's like a cemetery in there.". Natalie and I figured she didn't hear the question. Sure enough, she was looking over at the big open lawn of the high school when she made that comment. The huge dips in the Bay Trail near Bedwell Bayfront, across from Facebook have gotten bigger since Kira and I did the DoughWeiMe ride a few months ago. The first one is kind of dangerous now, both for how deep it's gotten and because it's no longer smooth pavement but broken up and loose. On the way out to Coyote Hills, Kira was saying that the cough I still have from my cold sounds like the old dog in Howl's Moving Castle. I've never seen the movie so and we were unable to find a clip of it so I'll have to report back later when I've finally found it. Update, the dog doesn't even cough, it just wheezes. I'm going to say it doesn't sound the same. There were a decent number of people walking on the trails and Natalie cracked me up since she lowers her voice to call out our presence. I can't remember if it's because people hear her better that way or because they respond better to a lower voice. We saw Chris Corona going the other way on Alameda Creek Trail. Pretty funny since the last time I ran into him was also with Kira. Natalie brought along a bag full of gummies for encouragement. At one point along Alameda Creek Trail, after she had some, I was behind her and could fully smell them as she was eating them. I don't think I've ever had that happen before and it was pretty amazing actually. I was saying how she was losing calories and she thought I was gaining them by breathing them in. I said, "I don't think that's how it works. It's not called the 'GIR tract'." I got her good. We stopped at Burger King in Dublin for lunch. The last time I was at Burger King was last year on the double. Natalie likes it since they offer the Impossible Burger. I got BK while they went to Tous les Jours for some pastries. I was eating my lunch outside, waiting for them to return when a homeless guy came up to me. At first he asked if I had a soda. When I said it was, he asked if he could have a sip. I was like, I'm sorry, no. He turned away to go inside to get a drink and his pants at the back were half off and somehow the back of his short and his pants were stained with poop. After lunch, on the way to Sunol, we came across a field of llamas. One of them was running next to us and eventually there was a dirt pullout/driveway where the gate opened up so we stopped to check them out. At first that one running llama stood at a distance but then came closer. I walked to the opposite side where there were more of them. All of a sudden, Kira told me to look back and when I did, that llama was pretty close to me. Turns out I had walked over to the food. The llama kept looking down at the food and then looking back at me. Clearly it was motioning towards the food but there was a big sign asking people not to feed them. It was the only one that came up to us and seemed really friendly. One thing I liked about this route is that it was doing a lot of roads I normally do in the reverse direction. Niles Canyon and Palomares are better in the direction for sure. Niles Canyon has more of a shoulder and Palomares seems like a shorter climb even though it's actually longer this way (but less steep). I still prefer Calaveras in the other direction though. We just did it a couple weekends ago and the Santa Clara County side has been chip sealed. Wasn't loving the loose gravel in the corners but it's mostly up hill from this direction (which is why I prefer it in the other direction). Natalie definitely has Italy legs. I remember coming back from my DuVine trips with amazing fitness. On both Palomares and Calaveras, she was going harder than we would normally go. On Calaveras, I was like, let's go for it but I was still much slower than my PR. I was fully expecting terrible headwind after coming down from Calaveras but luckily it was okay. Calaveras Blvd, which I've never done before was not great, especially with all the freeway on and off ramps. The terrible headwind started after we got off Calaveras Blvd. weirdly. Because of it we decided not to take Bay Trail. After filling up water at Sunnyvale Baylands Park, we decided to give it a try figuring it would be windy but off the road only the gate was closed and we couldn't get on the trail. It was probably for the best as the wind picked up and riding through the industrial park, we were a bit protected from the wind. We met Noah at State of Mind for a yummy dinner and then fought the headwind home.