Team Teriyaki Donut is Elizabeth Walkup and I, Greg Barnes. We have lived in Seattle continuously since 1998, and off and on for about 10 years before that.
We entered the bike division of Seattle Night and Day, riding separate bikes, and stayed out for 7 hours.
We are familiar with Seattle, having lived here for over 15 years. We live in North Seattle, so we were especially prepared for riding north of the ship canal.
The previous weekend, as a sort of warm-up, we took our kids out (the younger in a trailer, the older on a tag-along) for an all-day bike ride through the north end of Seattle. Of course, we had to stop at a number of playgrounds and the like, so we ended up doing 42 miles in about 11 hours. I had hoped parts of our rambling route might be duplicated during Night and Day, as it's always easier to ride a route the second time, but the only significant overlap was the descent from Loyal Heights into Golden Gardens and following the shoreline from Golden Gardens to the Fremont Bridge.
As for our equipment, I pumped up the tires and checked the brakes and derailleurs, of course. I also attempted to fix our 'map cases'. Mine is just the spine of a 3-ring binder, with plastic sleeves that I can insert maps and other pieces of paper into. I had noticed in previous Street Scrambles that the whole setup is kind of 'tilted' to the right, which is also the side where the sleeve opens (so I can easily mark the answer sheet). This means the maps and answer sheets sometimes fall out. So I tried to tilt it to the left to make the paper stay in. This involved moving a lot of stuff on the handlebars around --- it's harder to make those rings fit than you might think, but I got it to work.
And the answer sheet still started falling out a couple of times. Oh well.
Elizabeth's map case was a more difficult problem. We'd tried the 3-ring binder, but she has drop handlebars, so the maps end up where she wants to put her hands. Previously, we attached a PVC pipe between the bars, and used it to support one of the aforementioned plastic sleeves (attached to the handlebars with string). But the sleeve flopped in the breeze too much. Taking a cue from other map cases I've seen or heard about, we tried something more rigid: a clipboard with holes in the corners. I rummaged through my box of bike parts for mounts that attach to round tubes (you get these all the time: to attach lights to the frame, for example). I was doing this all at about noon on the day of the Scramble, so when I finally found a mount that would secure the clipboard (with a screw through one of the holes) and leave it positioned in a reasonable place, I was happy. Elizabeth then had to fiddle around with it a little more to assure herself that the clip on the clipboard wouldn't cut through one of her brake cables, but that problem was fixable. We were still left with the problem that the clipboard interfered with her headlight. But during daylight at least, she had something that could hold a map securely and allow her to help navigate and answer the questions. At sunset, though, she had to unscrew the whole thing and leave all the navigating and answer sheet reading to me.
Of course, we couldn't plan a route before we got the maps, but we could make some preliminary plans. Given what we had been told about the event maps, I took last year's maps and tried to eyeball how far south we might be asked to go. We had been told we wouldn't go farther north than the city limits, so I assumed the maps would go as far north as 145th, and assumed the 11 x 17 maps would be oriented with the 17" dimension east-west (as that about matches the width of Seattle). Given this, I estimated the maps would only reach to about the north end of Georgetown, which was enough to get you to Alki, but not, say, to last year's event center on West Seattle. This gave us a rough idea of about how many square miles the course covered, but not much else. At least it assured us that we would be bicycling on familiar territory most of the time.
I also tried to come up with an estimate of how many miles we would cover in the 7 hours. We bicycled 46 miles in 7 hours last year, but that is a bad comparison for a number of reasons: I was sick, we were riding a tandem, we took the ferry twice, and we bicycled on Vashon, where there are few stoplights. I decided a better estimate would be to base our mileage on our average speed in previous in-city Street Scrambles, which was between 6-8 mph. So 42-56 miles. My route-planning strategy in Street Scrambles is to plan to hit all the checkpoints (and then subtract checkpoints when this turns out to be too hard), but even at my most optimistic I didn't think we would hit all the checkpoints. I figured an analogous strategy would be to set the mileage goal a little higher than the estimate of 42-56 miles. So I set an optimistic goal of 60 miles.
We had a few other strategic ideas:
We visited 35 checkpoints and got 2170 points. We came in first in our division, against some difficult competition, and had the 3rd highest point total overall, including the 16-hour competitors (although we didn't beat Nikolay Nachev's unofficial score, and it sounds like Erik Brooks was on a pace to beat us if his tire hadn't failed him). I'm very happy with how well we did.
We once again (see the previous two scrambles) had a mechanical problem. After leaving Madison Park (checkpoint 103) around 9pm, Elizabeth noticed she was having trouble with something in the area around her back tire. It turned out the rear tube was slowly leaking. She has a road bike, with a thin tube with a Presta valve, and I was loathe to remove the tube and replace it with a spare, because I was afraid while putting the new tube in, I would create a pinch flat (this often happens when I try to repair these tubes). Whether I repaired the tube or not, I'd have to pump it up, and that presented another problem, as I've had trouble inflating her Presta valves in the past. Just two days ago, when putting air in our tires, I had a difficult time inflating her tubes with the large pump we use at home. And here I had to use a mini hand-pump (which she had given me as a gift after I got a flat in the Crossroads Scramble). So I wasn't feeling good about this.
But it turned out the pump worked beautifully, and, luckily for us, the leak was a slow one and didn't get any worse. Of course, I couldn't pump the tube up to full pressure with a hand pump, but I did the best I could and it held its air for a number of checkpoints, before I had to reinflate it. I think I only had to inflate it twice over the final two hours (and, once more before we left the event center to ride home).
Because her tire was so dicey, though, this modified our strategy. We had left a couple of high-value checkpoints in the NE for these last hours (106 and 82), but even if we could reach them, if the tube failed us that far away from the event center, we were sunk. So instead we stayed closer to the event center, picking up checkpoints in less familiar territory during the last hour.
When planning such a long route, I first start out by picking out some logical segments, and then work to join them up. The first such segment I chose was 81 [Blue Ridge] to 68 [Shilshole]. I knew it had to be in that order, as I didn't want to ascend the Golden Gardens hill. Similarly, I didn't want to go up to Lake City from 106 (in the NE corner), so that naturally led to 58 [Jackson Park], 37 [Lake City], 106 [NE corner], 36 [Matthews Beach], 82 [Meadowbrook Pond]. Note that unlike most routes from the eastern or western shores of north Seattle to the interior, the route from Matthews Beach to Meadowbrook Pond can be relatively flat, as you are following the course of Thornton Creek.
Another simple segment to plan was the one leaving the event center. Bikes can't go clockwise on the Green Lake Trail, so it made more sense to start off counterclockwise: 63 [Parks Yard], 72 [NW Green Lake], 35 [Aqua Theater], 49 [zoo mural]. From there, we were on top of Phinney Ridge, so I devised a relatively flat loop over the NW checkpoints that hooked up with 81 and the segment above. From Shilshole, it seemed logical to hit Magnolia next, and the main question was whether to visit the locks (85) from the north or south side. The checkpoint was near the fish ladder on the south side, I don't like crossing the locks on a bike on a sunny weekend day, and I knew you could get there from 78 [Fisherman's Terminal], so I opted for the south entrance. So from Shilshole I made a Ballard loop, crossed at the Fremont Bridge, and headed along the water to the locks. From the locks, I planned a route that would circle Magnolia, follow Myrtle Edwards to downtown, to West Seattle, then back to 102 [Seattle Public Utilities]. Then cross the Central District to 103 [Madison Park], across the Montlake Bridge and along the Burke-Gilman trail to 101 [Gasworks/Waterway 19], up to Wide World Books (62) before 9pm, north to Maple Leaf (59) and Jackson Park to hook up with the other segment above. From Meadowbrook I planned to mess around near our house, drop down to the Burke-Gilman, climb up the hill at the University, then straight back to the event center. (thus leaving us in very familiar territory during the hours of darkness, as mentioned above).
This route had a number of problems. First, I thought 107 on West Seattle was on the flats at Duwamish Head, but Elizabeth informed me it was clearly up the hill. I decided to skip it. Second, I thought 83 [South Magnolia] was accessible via the Smith Cove marina road to the east. When Eric mentioned in the pre-race briefing that you could access the checkpoint via the beach, I suspected I was wrong. After poring over some maps, it became apparent that unless I wanted to bicycle through mudflats, our only access to 83 was from Magnolia Blvd. This meant we now had to climb Magnolia three times: once from the locks, once from West Point (105), and once again from 83.
But the main problem with this route is that it was just too many miles, even with West Seattle deleted. I measured over 50 miles using my string before even finishing the final NE Seattle loop. While this was in line with my optimistic goal, this meant any checkpoints we dropped would be near the end of the route, and many of them looked very high-value and relatively easy. It seemed to us like the best choice for dropping checkpoints was in the initial NW loop, so we modified our route to go from Phinney Ridge to 81 almost directly. We decided the highest value NW checkpoints (74 [Northwest Hospital] and 84 [Bitter Lake]) could be added to our NE loop fairly easily if we found we had extra time.
Having said all that, here is the route we ended up taking:
63 [Parks yard], 72 [hilltop, NW Green Lake], 35 [Aqua Theater], 49 [zoo mural], 51 [rooster], 81 [Blue Ridge mailboxes], 68 [Leif Erikson], 41 [Bergen Place], 64 [Ballard High], 71 [elephant with tusks], 38 [Fremont Bridge], 78 [Fisherman's Terminal], 85 [locks], 105 [West Point], 56 [SW Magnolia Blvd], 83 [South Magnolia ravine], 104 [Fisherman's pier], 87 [Pink Door], 102 [Seattle Public Utilities building], 77 [Little Saigon house], 48 [apartment awning], 53 [Group Health], 73 [patio statue], 103 [Madison Park], [tire problem detected and tire reinflated], 31 [Arboretum footbridge], 86 [Ship Canal totem pole], 101 [Waterway 19], 55 [Safeco building], [tire rereinflated], 66 [Cowen Park frogs], 44 [Froula], 59 [Snappy Dragon], 75 [Pinehurst mural], 74 [Northwest Hospital], 22 [City Light bench], 26 [Ravenna Blvd school]
I originally estimated that we rode a little under 48 miles, but gmaps-pedometer says we went almost 58. This comes out to 8.2+ mph.
Here are a few splits from the spreadsheet of time stamps.
Our points by hour: 4-5pm: 330. 5-6pm: 410. 6-7pm: 230. 7-8pm: 350. 8-9pm: 260. 9-10pm: 360. 10-11pm: 230.
Our best hour pointwise was from 5-6pm, where we traveled through Ballard, across the Fremont Bridge, and back to the locks. Surprisingly, our second best hours was the 9-10pm hour, when we picked up 360 points despite having to pump up the tire twice and travel in the dark. During this stretch, we traveled from Madison Park to Gasworks and up to Froula playground, on some streets we were very familiar with. One of our worst hours pointwise was the last one, travelling in the dark on less familiar streets, and having to look for things like a book on a mural in a dark playground. We also didn't do well from 6-7pm, when we had to climb Magnolia twice, and from 8-9pm, when we had to climb Madrona, and took a 20-minute break at Madison Park.
We were once again late to start, as I was still putting my maps in their cases as Eric signaled the start. We got out the door 2 minutes late, just as we did at the Uptown Street Scramble. On the other hand, Eric probably got a good picture of us with the camera he was holding as we started down the Green Lake path. And it was certainly less crowded.
Overheard on the Green Lake path on the way to 72 [NW Green Lake]: "There must be something going on."
The route up to 49 [zoo murals] on Phinney Ridge was a familiar one to me, as I took it a few weeks earlier, taking my two kids to the zoo in the car. We'd also visited the murals during last year's North Aurora Street Scramble. This was also the first of many named hills and ridges we climbed during the event. After this one came Magnolia (3 times), First Hill, Capitol Hill, Madrona, and Maple Leaf.
The rooster at 51 may have been the coolest checkpoint I'd never seen before. The totem pole at 74 [Northwest Hospital] and the bench at 22 [City Light building] are also pretty nice. I think the best one, though, is probably the frogs and tadpoles at 66 [Cowen Park], but I've seen that one many times, as my kids love them and their day care visits that park a lot.
Leaving 51 [rooster], I planned to drop down to NW 83rd Street, a route I often take from Green Lake to Crown Hill. But I waited too long, and ended up forced to turn right on NW 8th Ave, first up to NW 85th, then to NW 87th (85th is too scary) then to NW 90th when 87th ended. I had briefly considered going to checkpoint 45 just north of Holman Road, and with each step it got more and more tempting, but we did not give in to temptation and finally dropped back to 85th to cross the even scarier 15th Ave NW. 85th gets less scary west of 15th, but 83rd to 80th would have been a better route: 80th is flatter and less heavily traveled. We took it the previous weekend to get to Golden Gardens. Elizabeth wanted to catch the name of the Mexican restaurant at Loyal and 85th (where 85th ends), but we couldn't see it.
As we learned last weekend, the section of the Burke-Gilman between the Locks and NW 60th is now open. If you didn't make it out there, it's on the south and west side of the street.
I'd only read a few of the clues before we left the event center. As soon as I read the clue to 41 ("Big mural of Bergen, Norway"), I knew exactly where we were going. We had blown by Bergen Place in downtown Ballard the previous weekend, but a few years ago I spent an hour and a half there with our older child on a misadventure. We only had one child at the time, and we took our Nissan over to Ballard on a weekend day to pick up some blinds. After picking them up, we discovered they would only fit in the back seat, and only if the infant seat was removed. So I got to stay with Omar in Ballard while Elizabeth ferried the blinds back to our house. I didn't know how long it would take, so we spent 45 minutes or so in Mr. Spot's Chai House (next to Bergen Place on Leary), then the rest of the time in Bergen Place waiting for the car to appear. I remember Omar losing a few coins in the raised wooden slats in the park (I believe the park has since been remodeled). I also remember that the Bay Theater was playing Sea Biscuit at the time.
Turning on NW 65th toward Ballard High, I was tempted, for the first of many times, by the smells emanating from a restaurant (Smokin' Pete's BBQ).
We met two other teams at checkpoint 71 [elephant with tusks]. I believe this was the last time we saw multiple teams (that we could identify) at the same place until we returned to the event center.
After checkpoint 71, we should probably have skipped 38 [Fremont Bridge] and just headed toward the Ballard Bridge. The distance we traveled to get just 30 points probably wasn't worth it. In my defense, I hate crossing the Ballard Bridge (on bike, foot, or in the car).
We ate dinner at Chinook's on Fisherman's Terminal about a month ago, so I knew how to get to checkpoint 78. I'd never been between Fisherman's Terminal and the Locks (85) before, though. Apparently the port fenced off part of the Fisherman's Terminal parking lot and called it a bike path, and we luckily stumbled upon it. We also stumbled upon a team heading the other way (from the Locks to Fisherman's Terminal) on foot.
After the Locks, I decided to get fancy and skipped the steep bike path up the side of Magnolia to Government Way that crosses the railroad tracks on a footbridge. Instead, I decided to continue down Commodore Way to 40th Ave W and what I thought was a more gradual hill into Discovery Park. This worked fine until we got into the park, traveled past Daybreak Star, and then discovered there was another steep hill to climb (which ended near the Army housing inside the park). I'm not sure, but I think if you approach from the main (eastern) entrance, following the red road on the event map, it's not as bad.
In hindsight, we should probably have just skipped the West Point checkpoint altogether. Most of the other 100 point checkpoints were accessible along flat or fairly flat routes, and it's not clear that our time wouldn't have been better spent picking up the high-value NE checkpoints we missed. This would probably have also allowed us to get the Wide World Books checkpoint (62), but we couldn't have known that at the time.
I do think checkpoint 83 [South Magnolia ravine] was worth doing, though. The ravine wasn't as bad as climbing up to Discovery Park. Also, I learned what was under that bridge (W Howe) that you take when circling Magnolia.
Even after studying my maps, I was unsure how to get to 83 until we got to the bridge. My Seattle street map said you could approach from the north or the east (down from Magnolia Blvd), but the official topo map made it clear that even if there were a street down from the east, it'd be too steep to use. It turns out there isn't, although you can probably go that way if you're on foot.
This left the approach from the north, and I couldn't tell whether there was a street down next to the bridge, or whether you had to go further north. And if you had to go further north, whether to approach from the east or west side of the bridge. Once we got to the bridge, it was clear there was no street directly down (although there was a staircase for the runners). The west side street looked like it went up, so we elected to cross and head north, and this turned out to be the right way, as the next left took you down into the ravine.
As usual, we took the Terminal 91 bike path between Magnolia and the Waterfront. This should probably be highlighted better on event maps that cover this area, as it is so convenient. If it is marked, the map should also note that it closes at dusk.
On the way to 104 [Fisherman's pier], we saw the last team we'd see for a long time, the Cosmopanauts, walking along the Elliott Bay trail. I don't think we saw another team until we crossed the Montlake Bridge at around 9:30 and came upon one of the Gregg's Fat Tire teams.
Bicycling through Myrtle Edwards, Elizabeth joked that we were faster than a speeding locomotive, as we outpaced a freight train. As we approached Broad Street, I joked that it would have been better to have been slower than the locomotive, as now we were trapped on the waterfront by the slow-moving train. I looked up the tracks to the north and couldn't see the end of the thing (it must have been double the usual length --- it had engines in the middle). We had been debating whether to head up Broad for the Space Needle checkpoint, but this pretty much ended that debate. Our main problem was how to get to 87 [Pink Door]. We chose the first available route, the Bell Street Pier skybridge. Bearing in mind that we were supposed to be traveling under our own power, I looked for a staircase up, but could only find an elevator, so we took that. After we were done (and we'd already safely collected our prizes) I asked Eric whether he thought it was okay to use elevators, and he agreed that it probably was. I can't think of any other places where they'd be useful, anyway (except for the similar elevators that take you partway up the Pike Place Market hillclimb).
Another post-hoc rationalization is that we actually did walk our bikes through the ridiculous walk zone around the inactive Olympic Sculpture Park construction area, where I assume most other bicyclists just rode on through. I guess when the Sculpture Park is finished, its skybridge will give us another way to cross the train tracks.
From the Market to the International District, we took the bike lanes on 2nd Avenue. These are (perversely) on the left hand side of the one-way street, because of the bus lane on the right side. Their worst problem, though, is that businesses seem to take them over whenever they please. So we had to dodge buses unloading equipment at Benaroya Hall, and oversized vehicles in the valet parking area of a fancy restaurant (Metropolitan Grill, perhaps?). This was easily the most dangerous section of our ride.
From the International District to 102 [Seattle Public Utilities] was a familiar route for me, as I play ultimate frisbee, and whenever a game is scheduled at Georgetown or South Park, I usually take my bike on a bus, get off at the International District, and ride down Airport Way to the game. This was another instance where I knew exactly where we were going once I read the clue ("what year was the section of pipe by the entrance removed from the ground?"). By the way, do they ever turn that fountain off? Even earlier in the year, when we thought there was going to be a drought, it was gushing water every time I passed.
As previously mentioned, we had a snack here and evaluated our route. We set the goal of hitting Madison Park by sunset, as the route between 102 and 103 was the last remaining one that covered unfamiliar territory. This meant we had pretty much given up on reaching Wide World Books (62) before it closed at 9pm.
The circle for 77 [Little Saigon house] was a block too far north, at 12th and Jackson. I suspected as much when I heard the clue, as it asked about a house on the SE corner of the intersection, and I was pretty sure the SE corner of 12th and Jackson was a strip mall (which features Seven Stars Pepper, an excellent restaurant, btw). Indeed, there was no house on any corner of 12th and Jackson, but it was pretty clear to me that the distinctive house on 12th and King, one block south, was what the clue was asking about.
When we were operating with the north map, I had folded both maps in half, which meant they were oriented with north on the right side. I like having north on top, so when we switched to the south map for good, I just folded it as I pleased so that north was up and I could see the next series of checkpoints. On the way to 102, I noticed that my original route rather stupidly went from 77 to 73 (in North Madrona) by way of 39 (east and then north), when I could just as easily have gone 77-48-73 (north and then east) and picked up ten more points. I think my original thinking was that I knew a good route from 39 to 73, as they are both on the Madrona Ridge. But 77 and 48 are both essentially on the fairly flat 12th Ave, so both routes are roughly of the same difficulty. Elizabeth noticed that from 48 we could then go to 53 [Group Health] as well. 48 to 53 is also pretty flat, but 53 to 73 definitely is not. We headed east from 53 on Denny to Madison, turned east off Madison as soon as we could (on John), and descended a steep hill. At the east end of the valley, we had to ascend another steep hill to top Madrona.
I suspected 73 would be one of our tougher checkpoints to reach, and it was. We don't bicycle on Madrona very often (although we did visit it during last year's Central District Scramble), and it was difficult to see what street the checkpoint was supposed to be on. To make matters worse, I misread the clue ("in whose memory is the statue?") as "in whose memory is the bench?", after I saw a bench that clearly read 'in memory of <somebody who is not one of the answers>'. After determining we weren't on the right patio, we headed down the street and found another patio but it took Elizabeth rereading the clue for me to realize I was looking for a statue, not a bench.
I can recall I was feeling lightheaded at this point. I probably needed some protein or something. Upon leaving the checkpoint and heading for Madison Park, I also took a wrong turn in the curvy streets between Denny and Harrison, and we ended up looping around unnecessarily for a minute or so.
The day before Night and Day, Elizabeth and I planned on bicycling to the tip of Madison Park for some Italian food (carbo-loading). The rain spoiled that, but we ended up there anyway for a sunset 'dinner' a day later. We did make our goal of hitting Madison Park (103) by sunset, with 15 minutes to spare.
In addition to preparing for night riding and eating, we also reevaluated our route. It was clear we couldn't do the whole NE loop, but we planned to pick up 101 [Waterway 19] and 82 [Meadowbrook Pond] for sure, and 106 [far NE corner] if we could. I think our revised route north of the ship canal was 101, the University District checkpoints of 55 and 66, down the hill to the Burke-Gilman to pick up 46 and 36, get 106 if we could, then back to 82, taking Ravenna Ave south to around 80th, up the hill to Froula (44) and back to the event center. This again would keep us in familiar territory after dark, but unless we got 106, it would not have yielded as many points as the route we eventually took.
As mentioned before, though, this all went out the window when Elizabeth noticed her flat tire. We definitely didn't want to venture out to Sand Point, but we could put off a decision as to what exactly to do for a while, since our route was taking us closer to the event center. Since the tire didn't need air until after we left the Safeco building, we knew we could probably avoid repairing the tire altogether, but we still wanted to stay relatively close, so I suggested we just head north and try to get the high-value checkpoints 75 [Pinehurst], 74 [Northwest Hospital] and, if possible, 84 [Bitter Lake] and 58 [Jackson Park].
The clue for Cowen Park ("Tadpole II done in what year?") was yet another case where we knew just where to go, even in the dark Cowen Park. Our kids love the frog statues. The sundial and play structure, too.
After leaving Cowen Park (66), I began to notice how light the traffic was after 9:30pm in Seattle. Normally 15th Ave NE is pretty busy, but it was almost deserted. The route from Cowen Park to Froula Playground (44) was very familiar, as we had followed it during the University District Street Scramble. The course setters just can't seem to resist Froula.
In the past, we've been pretty sure of the answers to some checkpoint questions before we visited them, but 59 [Snappy Dragon] was the first one where I was absolutely certain. Snappy Dragon is pretty popular in the local area. Even though we knew the answer, we visited it anyway, of course.
In last year's Night and Day, we visited the highest point in the city (the aptly named High Point in West Seattle). The Department of Transportation says that a few of the runners-up for highest point were in this year's Night and Day. If you visited checkpoint 84 [Bitter Lake] or 59 [Snappy Dragon], that was probably your highest elevation of the day.
While climbing to Snappy Dragon, I tried to inform Elizabeth that Maple Leaf was one of the highest points in the city, but she didn't want to hear it for some reason. While racing down the hill toward Pinehurst, she was rather upset to think that we'd have to climb back up from the north (a long climb we had made the previous weekend while pulling children). But I was pretty sure we didn't have to, and the rest of the ride would be pretty flat. As I remembered it, Pinehurst is in the Thornton Creek Watershed, and the other checkpoints we were planning to visit are in the watershed that drains (or used to drain) into Green Lake, so all we had to do was climb a small ridge, if that, between the two watersheds. This turned out to be right, thankfully, and Maple Leaf was the last hill of any note that we climbed.
At 75 [Pinehurst], we were confronted with a large, dark schoolyard. Our first problem was figuring out how to get in, as it looked like the fences were locked, but I saw an opening on the side. Elizabeth just marched right in and found a more direct gate. Then we had to find which of the numerous murals had a book on it. Again, Elizabeth found it first. She said at this point her mind was pretty much not working, but apparently it was doing well enough.
After 75, we decided to head for 74 [Northwest Hospital]. The chief difficulty is crossing the freeway, but there's an access ramp marked on the bicycle map that we'd taken during last year's North Aurora Street Scramble. It's at the dead-end of a hard-to-find street (NE 116th), so I was afraid we might miss it, but when we passed by the street, the ramp we were looking for was lit up like a Christmas tree, and we recognized it easily.
It was harder figuring out how to get into the Northwest Hospital parking lot. We approached on N 120th, and expected to find a driveway, but went all the way to the end before we saw a sign that said the entrances were all on 115th. Instead, we cut through a pedestrian hole in the hedge and found the checkpoint, a totem pole creature with a lot of teeth. After answering the question, we decided we couldn't risk heading farther north, and decided to pick up low-value checkpoints near the event center using the rest of our time (and the higher value 52 if we had a lot of time, which we didn't). We did end up taking the 115th exit on our way out.
When we finished, we really needed some protein of some sort. We don't eat beef, so that left the cream cheese provided for us and our leftover trail mix. When we got home, the pickings were just as thin, but luckily there were two pieces of pizza, which really hit the spot. Next year, we should just order a pizza delivered to the event center.
As our prizes, I got a bicycle tool resembling a Swiss Army knife, and Elizabeth chose a cute T-shirt.
In conclusion, we had a great time. These events are really a blast when it all comes together and you don't have a major mechanical breakdown. Our bodies managed to last the whole seven hours pretty well, too, although we were clearly slower at the end than the beginning.
We look forward to next year's events, when we plan on bringing our older son, Omar, along on the tag-along. He lasted 36 miles on the tag-along last weekend before getting too tired, so by next year he should be plenty safe for a 3-hour event (and will probably give us advice on route planning). Tentative plans are for one of us to bike with him, and the other to walk with our younger son, Emmett, in the stroller. We not sure what we'll do for Night and Day.
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gsbarnes [at] drizzle.com