As I type this, I am struck by how quickly my time in Vegas is coming to an end.  The past 6 weeks have been a whirlwind of activity and emotions as we make preparations to move our bodies and our (many many) belongings out of “Sin City.”  Since yesterday was my SAT’s birthday, I had this idea to combine a celebration in his honor with a quasi-going-away party.  So, for the past 2 weeks, I plotted and planned, sneaking into his phone contacts and Facebook friend list and sending out invitations to party!  What I planned was a birthday road ride, followed by a casual lunch gathering at one of our favorite hangout spots.  About 30 friends, both cyclists and non-cyclists, joined us for the day and it was such a fun time.  Beautiful weather, great company, and a very happy birthday boy!  He was very surprised and we were both touched by the number of people who took time out of their weekend to spend it with us.  Here are some pics from yesterday’s festivities:

(Clockwise from top left: the friends who joined us for the ride; other friends who joined us at the restaurant; my SAT with 2 of his “Saturday Starbucks” riding buddies and the cool Vegas-theme clock they gave him; birthday boy with his cake.)

~~~~

This morning, the two of us and our friend Mike tackled the infamous Lee Canyon hill climb.  This climb is just over 17 miles long and gains over 5348 feet (1630 m).  It is one long road that keeps getting higher and higher….before I go into the specifics of the pain, I want to impart a little information about climb ratings.  In road cycling, different hill climbs are assigned a number from 1 to 4, with 1 being very difficult and 4 being easy.  Factors such as overall steepness, length of climb, and how far into the climb the steepness begins influence the overall numerical rating.  If the climb is ridiculously stupidly difficult, it is assigned “HC,” which is a French term for “hors catégorie” (“above category”).  Needless to say, the Lee Canyon hill climb is rated HC (i.e., so stupid and difficult that it is beyond classification).  These climb ratings were originally used for those mountain roads in Europe (France in particular in the earliest years of the Tour de France) where cars were not expected to be able to pass, which begs the question: if motorized vehicles were not expected to pass through these steep mountain climbs, WHY SHOULD PEOPLE ON BIKES DO THESE CLIMBS?

I digress.  Climbing Lee Canyon this morning was not as bad as I expected.  Although many cars passed me and the sun was beating down on me, the overall temperature was quite nice and I had my NPR podcasts for company.  My SAT and Mike were probably in more pain than me because they elected to climb Lee Canyon on their UNICYCLES.  Haha.  Good on them.  Really!  Getting to the top was satisfying, though, and we all enjoyed the feeling of accomplishment and renewed sense of feeling in various body parts whilst soaking in the beautiful scenery.  My cycling computer said I burned over 1000 calories during the climb and I celebrated by eating some fries and drinking some Coke.

(Top left: One-wheelers!  Top right: at the start.  Bottom: Mummy Mountain.)

We stopped a couple of times at designated points to catch our breath and grab a snack.  Mike’s wife was gracious enough to drive the support vehicle (we told her that she would have a LOT of reading time….hiking time….nap time….).

(Clockwise from top left: taking a break; rest stop #1; at the top! Look at the snow-capped mountains!; my Garmin with the official ending statistics.)

So, there’s another little adventure completed.  Now, back to the packing….