Well, I got up this morning and decided to return to the beautiful Santa Clar(it)a valley area, and the town Santa Paula, CA. I had three goals: 1) retrieve my ATM card left in the local bank's machine on this past weekends outing; 2) return to Cafe Velo, and visit some more with Cecile & Baron; 3) RIDE.
Reaching highway 126 before sunrise, I felt the strong gusts of the notorious winds that whip down this pretty valley that connects the suburbs out in the Magic Mountain area, with the coast down in Ventura. So I did a 24 mile 'out and back' - wisely doin the OUT against the wind, and absolutely FLYIN back to Santa Paula on the smooth back roads for my way BACK !!
I've been chastised for posts with my slightly 'off topic' 80's rides... so today I dusted out my early (1972 ?) Windsor Pro. Rumor I heard before I bought it was that a manufacturing company down in Mexico created some decent quality frames, styled after the Italian Cinellis. When I first rode the bike, I wasn't too impressed for some reason. Well, I'm not sure if my taste has refined, or perhaps the drive train 'tune up' I did last night (12 days of Bike Christmas project !!) helped out... or perhaps I pumped in just the right amount of air in those sewups - but today that bike just felt GREAT. South Mountain Road has some very smooth asphalt on it - so that could have helped as well. Flying back to Santa Paula, with that wild tail wind and at the max of the 10 speed, the bike felt SO stable and responsive. Boy, guess I need to dig out and ride those dust collectors MORE often, eh?
For a stroll down memory lane (and to kind of chime in on the Masi thread), take a read of the Bicycling magazine reprint I tucked into the bottom of my web page with the bike. Written by Ed Sykes, he draws some Masi theme comments in comparing the rides (who knows if it's a true comparison, eh?).
Todays ride route here:
http://tinyurl.com/
The Windsor Pro here:
http://www-hsc.usc.edu/
Happy New Years everyone. Here's hopin for another GREAT year of vintage bikes and riding in 2009 !
Rich Pinder Van Nuys, CA [hmmm... for tomorrows ride.... maybe that red 72 Paramount thats squished WAY back in the back of my ratty arsed garage..... ??]
Jerome & Elizabeth Moos wrote:
> West Texas isn't so bad.....