London – Downiville / Downiville – Single Speed Worlds / more coming
Stepping off the plane, and conveniently finding ourselves near the front of the very long and slow-moving queue through US customs, we were looking forward to hitting the road and cruising the highways of the Western States, most probably with the wind streaming in our hair and classic American ROCK blaring from the radio. Hitting San Francisco on Columbus Day Friday at 3:00 PM wasn’t the best plan however and the first few hours were spent sitting in the most immense traffic jam I’ve ever seen. It put the M25 to shame. Eventually we gave up and stopped in one of the many Wendy’s Diners along the route and waited for the traffic to subside.
don’t click on this unless you have broad band or want to see yourself …. 393k big
Back on the road again around 7 o’clock and the mayhem had subsided. We headed off once more through the dusk to Downieville where the Singlespeed World Championships (SSWC, or as the North Californians insisted on calling it, the NCSSWC, which made it sound a bit like the baseball “world series” which only Americans were allowed to enter) were to be held the next day.
Interstate 80 began to rise into the mountains as darkness fell and we left the cities of San Francisco and Santa Cruz far behind us. Truckers seemed to rule the world round these parts, every truck in America is a massive gleaming monster of chromed exhausts and polished body work that looks like it’s come straight from a movie set. Even the Safeway’s and Walmart trucks looked cool, and we kept passing signs at the side of the road as we headed up and down the steep slopes¦ “TRUCKERS: Upgrade ahead, crank up”, and “TRUCKERS: Downgrade ahead, let ‘er drift”. Eventually we arrived at the turning off the Interstate (actually we managed to miss it and had to go back a few miles), and headed off along the twistiest road ever. The hire car had an annoying habit of making a “donnnng” noise every time the driver did the slightest thing wrong, up to and including going round corners at more than 15mph.
Many donnnngs later we arrived in the tiny, classic wild-west style town of Downieville, a one-bar, one-market, one-horse, multiple-sherrif town. There were singlespeeders crowded around, inside and outside the bar (obviously), mostly from the UK or USA, but a few from Australia and Ireland. They were all having a fairly merry time but as we had just spent the last 24 hours awake (6am UK time to 10PM Pacific Time) we pooped the party and went off up the road in search of a camping spot after just one small beer each.
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