“This is the first and last time I ride the Chilly Hilly. I hate this ride.”

Those were Jane’s exact words as we finished climbing up Baker Hill Road. By the end of the day, she caught the post ride amnesia (randonesia to the old timers) and admitted that it was pretty fun and a beautiful day for a bike ride.

I’ve ridden on Bainbridge Island more times than I can remember, but I always seem to be passing through. When Jane mentioned that she wanted to ride somewhere on Bainbridge in order to get Mora ice cream, I started to look for some routes. The one that kept popping up over and over (for obvious reasons) was the annual Chilly Hilly route that Cascade Bicycle club puts on. Sure, it has quite a bit of climbing, but it is “only” 33 miles. We could just take our time and enjoy the sights. Note: Looking back on it, the elevation gain is about 1 1/2 Seattle to Portland rides, in 1/6th of the distance!

We wrangled a few friends (Josh and Peter) that we knew were interested in a slow ride. We all met for a weekend friendly start time of 12:20 at the ferry downtown. Even though we started so late, Jane and I still had to eat breakfast on the ferry (kids these days…). The off boat ferry staff was as grumpy as always. We were chided for one thing or another both to and from Bainbridge.

The weather was pretty unbelievable. It had been threatening to rain, so we all came prepared with jackets. There was a nice cloud cover than just kept the sun at bay enough to not burn our skin. Whenever the sun would sneak out, we seemed to roll underneath tree lined streets. I was completely comfortable all day in shorts and a wool jersey. You can’t ask for much more than that.

We took our time and chatted quite a bit. I was surprised at how low traffic the route really is. There was only one 2-3 mile section with any real movement on it. Most of my Bainbridge riding experience has been on the highways I suppose. Frog rock came early into the ride and we stopped for many (many) photos. It is nice to get out without a time limit once in a while. I always seem to have this internal clock pushing numbers. I thought that would kick in with ferry times, but my mind was pleasantly clear the entire ride.

Midway through the ride, some of the more serious hills hit us. We took it easy, but Jane’s legs were cramping pretty bad. We took plenty of breaks and did the usual food/electrolyte/stretch routine to stave it off. Still, each time a new hill hit, it seemed to be a little worse than the last, and it repeated itself.

Even the stops were beautiful though. At one point we were picking some fresh blackberries. I would have whizzed right past them otherwise.

We rolled in to Eagledale (the final destination) pretty close to 5:30 when the ferry was scheduled to leave. We sat down at Mora ice cream and ate the holy hell out of some ice cream. I got the biggest banana split I’ve ever seen and just about finished it.

We rode down to the ferry in no particular hurry. Amazingly, it was still there. They had to tow 3 cars off that weren’t able to start their engines. We snuck on to the back of the boat and made it back to Seattle exactly when we wanted to. Thanks to Jane, Josh, and Peter for making it a memorable day in the saddle.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 11th, 2009 at 11:22 am and is filed under bicycling, food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.