It is winter time, so time to go a little slower and be a little more adventurous.  Claire and I have been riding our tandem on road and off road for over 20 years, and we love to share that with other tandemist.  Last week we took out our friends Bill and Debbie and showed them a couple of our favorite roads around the West County.  Last Tuesday we started by parking in Duncans Mills and doing the Duncan Road/Old Caz loop.  This loop is the inner loop of the first Grasshopper Race out of Occidental which takes place in late January.  We were able to get across Austin Creek without getting our feet wet which was a first.  There have been times in the past where the water has been almost up to our waists.

Today we drove out to Point Reyes Station and did a 40 mile loop that included about 12 miles of dirt along the Bolinas Ridge.  It was a tough 40 miles taking almost 4 hours.  Bill and Debbie were very excited about the dirt, I think they are addicted now.  Here is a link to that loop.  By the end of the ride we were all pretty knackered.  At one point, about 5 miles from the finish, we could smell something burning, when Bill commented on the smell, Claire pointed out that it was just her legs.  We really missed having Aaron and Melinda along on both of these rides.