I’ll get straight to the first ride reports. Clever travelogues sometime later this week.

I’m in the city of Calabasas, CA with two friends, and expecting a third whenever his stand-by flight releases him from sleeping at YYZ. They’re all fitter than me and it’s shown in the two days of riding since we arrived late on Friday night.

True to our expectations, it’s warm – over 20C – and sunny – perfect for cycling in the arid, yellow canyons of the Santa Monica Mountains. Yesterday we went out for a short 1h45, followed by today’s taxing 3 hours. All in, 2,500m of climbing in 120km. The ups were hard but relatively civilized yesterday, but today was rather ferocious for a guy who hasn’t climbed for real since leaving British Columbia 2.5 years ago. Topanga Canyon was the shortest, a mere warmup in the shade. Fernwood, also in the shade, was a series of endless twists. But the final climb in the noonday sun, Las Flores, north from the Pacific Coast Highway, caused a ludicrous amount of slow pedaling, squirming all over the bike, moving maybe 1m per second. I’m certain the roadside cacti were laughing at me (those pricks!). I was out of water by then, and knew there would be no more until we got back to the hotel.

But the descent of Tuna Canyon to the ocean took the most concentration. When you’re dropping down 15 per cent grades, picking up speed quickly, negotiating blind hairpin turns, it’s no time to admire blue skies and jagged rock faces unfortunately. My hands started to cramp from braking, but I’ve broken a wrist on a bike trip before and would rather not repeat that.

We’re up very early for tomorrow’s adventure – bedtime now.

At the crest of Piuma yesterday. The smile is fake. What’s real, apparently, is the number of muscles I apparently need to unclip from a pedal