In the Rosarito - Ensenada ride, Shelley and I had tag numbers 199 and 200.

The highest we observed was 10375, but a lot of people didn't have tags for one reason or another, so there's just no way to be sure how many people participated. As you can see from the next two photos, taken at just about starting time, we had to share the road a little!



Looking toward the start line



Looking away from the start line


What an adventure! Most everyone seemed to be having a grand time. The vast majority of people looked like regular cyclists: anything from people with the full kit to those with t-shirts, no helmets, and old-clunker bikes.

But every so often someone wearing a more amusing or interesting outfit appeared amongst the crowd. We saw a guy in a Superman outfit complete with cape, a guy with a "mohawk" of beer cans on his helmet, a group of eight people wearing very bright toy Indian headdresses, a guy with a tandem bike having a naked woman blow-up doll on the rear seat, someone who had taken a kid's rocking horse off its rockers and used it as the seat on his bike (and added a sign saying "Saddam's Camel"), etcetera.



Superman with his whistle.



Most tandem bikes had clothed women on the back seat.



Both of us enjoyed the ride tremendously, although Shelley ended up with much sorer legs than I did (in fact, I thought it was the easiest 50 miles I've ever done). We had the wind at our backs almost the entire time. We both neglected to apply suntan lotion and now have the lines on arms and legs to prove it.



Here we are at the start line! All set to go 50 miles!


It was a joy to ride on roads closed to traffic, however there was little time to enjoy the coastal scenery because not paying attention to people in front or to the sides could prove disasterous if someone took a spill. Nevertheless, there was enough time to enjoy the gorgeously cool, partly cloudy skies and numerous fields of wildflowers along the way.



One of many fields of flowers along the way.


Coastal scrub and beaches made for a great ride.


In many cases along the way, local kids stood along the road hoping for candy to be thrown to them, and holding out hands for a quick slap. In most cases we weren't going that fast, so slapping hands was easy and fun. We saw a lot of people tossing candy and will have to take some next time.

The hill known as El Tigre seemed more like a pussycat to me -- got to the top and still had 10 lower gears available, so I guess I overtrained. Time to try Los Angeles Crest highway or something tougher. Coming down the other side we freewheeled for three curving miles and got up to 37 mph.

At Ensenada we found the festival in high gear, but not being big beer drinkers we just picked up our event t-shirts and then walked into town and shopped there.


One store in Ensenada had some great kites (this one has wings about 8 feet across).


Luckily we found Terri and her Trek friends and had a good introduction. While trying to find them later for a drink, we found two very friendly strangers named Ian and Yvette in a pub and had a good chat with them instead.

Many, many thanks to Jennette and Rubick for driving our car down and picking us up (they also dropped us off in the morning). They put us up in their house in Bajamar, a wonderful place to sleep off the ride, and feasted and storied us the whole evening.