Day 8: Rim of the World

We were up today for our typical 7 am start.  We stopped by the lobby for some juice and bagels before hitting the road.  After the last several days of carnage free roads, I was beginning to think that roadkill of the day was going to be a bust.  However, this morning we had to go no further than the lobby for our first encounter.

Rough way to start the day

The climb out of Big Bear Valley was quite nice with a reasonable grade and nice shoulders.  It was difficult to choose the best view for a picture. There were several.

Nice wide shoulders

The tourist part of the day

Big Bear Lake off in the distance

Once we climbed out of the valley, we had a nice 12ish mile gradual descent along the "Rim of the World".  This is the ridge line road along the mountains just north of the San Bernardino valley.  Clearly named by folks who don't get far from home.

Maybe Rim of the Valley would  be better

The view south into the valley looked hit and dry.  Fortunately we were still above 5000 ft with temps in the mid 50s.  There is a mini heat wave expected down in the desert valleys this week with temperatures near 100.  I am hoping we will miss most/all of that as we will be in the mountains the next few days before dropping down to the desert again

We stopped in Crestline for lunch and to look for groceries for the next couple days.  There we met a fellow who invited us to go sailing with him on Lake Tahoe.  Maybe we'll see him again in early June when we pass through there.  We also met a nice fellow who gave us directions and drew us a map to get to a better grocery market and a coffee shop.  This sounded pretty good until heading down the hill and seeing what we had just signed up to climb back up. Uh oh!

Paradise Mountain Coffee

After groceries we headed back up the hill to our route.  We had our hand drawn map from Good Samaritan direction guy so we turned at the church which would take us back toour route without climbing all the way back up the hill.  "There is just a bit of a steep spot as you start out".  This means pushing the beast up a super steep hill for about a quarter mile.  After that we had a pleasant ride back to our route and did indeed shave a bit of distance.

The next several miles were very steep descending.  We had to pause to get around about s dozen emergency vehicles just finishing up with a vehicle fire.  Apparently some cars just give up on the climbs and decide self combustion is better than continuing.

Not sure why he was on that side of the road

After a bit more wear on the brake pads, we reached a more moderate grade on the best road ever. New pavement, wide shoulder, nice view, downhill...I wanted it to go on forever. It didn't though.

The lake just goes on and on

After the lovely lake, we crossed a bridge, made a turn and like a mirage, the perfect road was gone.  It would now bit little ups and downs on a bit of a bumpy, no shoulder road while the temperature rose.

We have some big climbing tomorrow so we wanted to try to get part way up the first hill before quitting for the day.  My saddle dore bandage is working well and I wanted to continue while things were okay.  I thought there was an outside chance we might make the first climb and camp in or near the town there with services and water.  The heat proved too much after the long day and final few miles of steep climbing. 

93 degrees is rough for climbing

 We settled for a bit past halfway to the town and found a spot in the desert off the side of the road.  After setting up the tent for a bit of shade, I had a brief nap before dinner and settled in for the evening.  The temperature cooled off nicely as the sun disappeared behind the hills that will wait until tomorrow.

Home again for the night