I'd been wanting to ride to Lake Del Valle for the past couple of weeks now, ever since it was recommended to me by a friend.  I finally set off yesterday, though it was rather late in the afternoon, as I wanted to stretch my legs a bit.  Sunset was just an hour away, but I told myself that I could always turn right back, if I needed to.

I took this pic, just before I set off.

Armed with my GPS route, I set off at a fast clip, riding down Greenville Road, till I hit a 7% grade, just before reaching Tesla Road.  The incline had come without warning and I was wondering whether I should turn back, when things got smooth again.  The weather was quite cool, which allowed me to recover quickly, and I decided to push on.  Tesla Road was pretty flat and soon, I was on Miner's Road, riding towards Del Valle.

After I hit the 10km mark, I found myself on a low grade but long incline which was increasing slightly, but once I hit the 14.5 km, I found myself at the beginning of a 7+% grade which lasted nearly three kilometers.  I found myself dropping gears till I found no more gears to drop! My speed had decayed to just over 6 kmph and my cadence must have been quite low too.  I was huffing and puffing and thinking about how Anil Kadsur aka Truck Driver or Opendro Singh would have tackled it, even as I was admonishing myself for not being in better shape.  "Jai Truck Driver Baba", I muttered to myself and found myself smiling, despite the exertion, when I was able to eke out another kilometer or so of pace out of myself! The sun had already gone down completely and I'd turned on my new Bontrager Ion 700 on it's lowest steady light output of 200 lumens which was more than sufficient to see the road ahead quite clearly, particularly at the low speed that I was crawling at.  Though it no longer made any sense to continue to the lake, as it was completely dark, I continued till I completed the climb, my first 200+m climb since September.  Having reached the top, I simply turned back, promising to return the next day, to complete the ride to the lake. http://www.strava.com/activities/229580897