Day 29 of 33 (1 of 2)

San Diego Bike Tour, Part Deux

I had been hoping to make a trip up to UCSD and La Jolla during my stay in San Diego. My incredible caloric intake on Sunday from the Italian Family-Style Dinner meant that now I was going to do it on bicycle.

I headed out the same way as my past couple of trips - down the big hill into Old Town. This meant the long ride downhil. Hello, old friend, "the hill", I'll be seeing you later.

I took my bicycle down the inland side of Mission Bay. It was a series of sandy islands and calm waters that seemed to be good for water sports. I have always wanted to do whatever it is that this guy is doing, but unfortunately I have no skill for flying kites OR surfing, so I'm probably a ways off.

I knew that this was a long bike ride (15 miles by car, so probably much further for me) so I had wanted to keep it simple. Unfortunately, when you plot a route on your iPhone, it doesn't give you topographical information. I should have bee warned by neighborhoods and streets such as La Jolla ALTA, or Foothill Road, or Mount Soledad... but really that's far beyond my normal deduction skills. I did try to avoid the hills, and several times when the road pointed up a hill, I would turn my bike and go downhill another way. In the end, that only hurt me when I could not deny my cycling masochism and decided to take the high road to UCSD.

In this picture, which is only MAYBE half way up, you can already see that the bay, which is in the previous photograph, is becoming a distant memory One of the reasons I ended up going up hill was the deceptive mountain. It looks as if the mountain will reach its peak right around the corner. And then the next corner. And then the next. I turned my fourth corner, several miles up I believe, only to see another stretch of road, and I had to stop and say an expletive or two. One man in a car overheard me and said "Another half a mile!" Yeah, ONLY half a mile.

Well I finally made it to the top and things leveled out. I found Rutgers road! It matched the t-shirt I was wearing.

















I rambled along a little further, turned the corner, and guess what? Yeah, up hill!

I finally made it to the legitimate top, which is apparently called Mount Soledad. I think it is a memorial for locals that died in World War II. It also provided a 360 degree view of the surrounding landscape. See: