After a fabulous breakfast with Jerry, Tess, and Jarryn (and Rachel playing with Jarryn for quite a while), we packed up our bikes and headed west from El Dorado Hills.  Thank you all so much; it was such a pleasure to meet you!

The route took us through Folsom, which was made famous by the state prison (one of the first maximum security in the country) and the Johnny Cash song “Folsom Prison Blues”.  In addition to the prison, though, the downtown has a fun, old-western feeling, which has been well preserved since the gold rush era.

In Folsom we got on a great bike path that parallels the American River. The path continued all the way through Sacramento, and it was bustling with other cyclists. We were very tempted to jump in the water in a few spots where kids seemed to be greatly enjoying themselves.

 

The path took us around Sacramento and ended at the Old Sacramento waterfront.  We didn’t spend much time there, but it seems like it would have been a fun place to explore.  After continuing through West Sacramento, we crossed a section of elevated roadway called the Yolo County Causeway, which ran for a couple of miles above the Yolo Bypass floodplain.

On the other side, we entered Davis, which was a highly anticipated stopping point for us due to claims that it is the most bicycle friendly city in the world (this is even listed as the motto for the city on Wikipedia…).  Since 2010, it is also home to the United States Bicycling Hall of Fame.

We coughed up more Holiday Inn points for the evening, which means no more camping for the trip, as tomorrow will be our final push to San Francisco.

After cleaning up and relaxing for a while, we were tempted to settle for one of the chain restaurants near our hotel for dinner.  We needed to get out and see the town, though, so we resisted temptation and meandered downtown.  That was the right decision, because we happily stumbled upon a farmers market just before it shut down.  A local restaurant called The Hotdogger had a booth and gave us a free basket of fries, which we followed up with some fresh squeezed lemonade (we also found one of Rachel’s favorites: a chocolate chip croissant, but that will be saved for tomorrow).  Although we probably could have called it a night at that point, we caved for dumplings at the Dumpling House.

While there, we had the pleasure of listening to karaoke from the deck of the bar adjacent to the restaurant.  We topped it all off with ice cream from Jake’s Desserts, which was conveniently located along our walking route back to the hotel.

With over-full stomachs, we waddled back to the hotel.  Surprisingly, we had enough energy left in us to reserve a rental car for San Francisco to Bozeman, as well as flights from Bozeman to Connecticut.  We can’t believe how quickly the end is approaching :-/.

Trip stats, to date (Day 95)

El Dorado Hills, CA to Davis, CA

Daily mileage: 53.8 mi ;  Trip total to date: 5,525.8 mi
Daily riding time: 4hr 25min;  Trip total time: 481hr 41min
Daily ascent: 361 ft;  Trip total ascent: 294,545 ft
Flat tires: Rachel – 4; Chris – 7