Another Perfect Week

as june wanes away it occurs to me sarah and i’ve been up to many tomato mountain style activities. the long days of spring and summer have been treating us deliciously and we’ve been trying to make the most of the 14 hours of sunlight we’ve been afforded. i thought it appropriate to make a general post about the last few days.

sarah, in the style of the Old Masters, took the oral storytelling approach, so enjoy her account below:

friday/saturday

for the weekend of sarah’s birthday we drove out to sunol to backpack in the same site we rocked in march. this time the climb up was just as difficult as the last, except it was about 90 degrees in the dead middle of the day when we made it there. we stripped the tent of the fly and slept under the stars high on the cliffside. dinner was our usual beans and rice, except this time with beef jerky, avocado, frito style corn chips, lime, and fried garlic. it was a filling dinner, fit for our beat, starving asses, immobilized by the withering heat. through the night we heard an owl hooting, and were comforted by the clear sky, made luminous by a field of stars. in the morning we enjoyed coffee and stroopwaffles, and leisurely walked downhill to the trailhead. on the way home, we stopped at mama’s royal cafe in oakland as a callback to our first sunol trip, and the food was so so good as usual. after resting a little while at home, we ended the day with a bike ride up to the peak of buena vista park, and onto the pho spot on irving. the restaurant was pretty empty, featured no music, and hardly anyone speaking above a soft whisper. most restaurants, for some ungodly reason, are so loud we can hardly talk to each other. some peace and quiet accompanying a bowl of nourishing soup was a perfect end to a truly awesome day.

sunday

hawk hill was discussed the day before. sarah and i tried it with our friend last summer when we were getting started with our bikes and we got absolutely killed by the time we reached the roundabout, and rounded our asses about toward home, leaving the peak incomplete. months after, i worked my way up to the summit a few times but only alone. having gotten a lot stronger and more confident, and in the spirit of doing hard shit, sarah wanted to take it on.

we woke up around 6 and got ourselves together, crossing the cold and miserable bridge, up through the fog to the peak. another milestone down. we did a little exploration at the top, and then rode down and enjoyed the rest of the beautiful day, during which we biked with our buddies around town. a full day of riding is so fun, wish we had more time to do it!

we did manage to sneak a Fancy Dinner for sarah’s birthday in on this day too.

wednesday

the night before we planned an early morning coffee ride, not to a cafe, but to the observation bunker on top of sutro heights. not a wild ride, but a fun, early morning misty one before i had work, enlivening the spirit. brought along the camp stove and my favorite beautiful pot, and some luxury instant coffee. sarah had to climb the tree…

thursday

on a solo mission, i biked to bones bagels to meet up with angel, and from there we chatted about life and all the normal good stuff before heading out to twin peaks, taking the dirt trail as far as we could up, bolting back down towards glen canyon where i’ve been wanting to explore on bike. the trails around there are definitely designed for hikers only (signage reminds us) but we carefully worked our way through, dismounting to traverse roots and rock formations and hikers-by. it was beautiful but i won’t be back on my bike lol. from there we kept the day rolling with a trip to mcclaren park, and finally onto san bruno park. the climb was a bit hard after a day of climbing, but the road had not too many cars, and it’s great fun trying to keep up with angel, whose mutant legs should be preserved for scientific research.

look at him go!

we took the trail through the park to a lookout and peeped the city below us. i felt thankful to hang with my friend and do something difficult and rewarding.

all that said, i did in fact look insane when we got to the top.

bike looked awesome though…

and the view was epic.

the week was awesome, and we’re lucky to be able to do all of these things. it feels great to take inventory sometimes of all of our good fortune and put it down somewhere into words. long live tomato mountain. peace and love.