A new bike path just opened on the Richmond – San Rafael Bridge. 30+ VeloRaptors and friends made the clubs initial ride across the span.
Read more about the ride at here
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Foggy Ride to Treasure Island – Fun but no Sun
The ride on Saturday, Nov 9, was a little different. The ride was a combined VeloRaptor/Rotary ride to Treasure Island. The start time was set for 10 am, hoping the fog would be burned off by then, but no such luck. The temperature wasn’t bad (52 deg), but the fog was thick enough that we couldn’t see the bay. Dennis showed up with his 89 Toyota 4Runner, and was impressed that Mark had a 92 version. Dennis didn’t ride, but decided to meet us at the restaurant on TI.
Seven of us pedaled out into the gloom from the Brickyard pavilion and stopped to give our respects to the Bridge Troll along the way.
I got a call from Dennis just as we reached the end of the bridge path. He wanted to let me know that the power was out everywhere on Treasure Island. While I was taking the call, the others passed me and headed up the Yerba Buena Island hill. Dennis decided to hang around the closed Mersea restaurant for a few minutes until we arrived.
We rendezvoused with Dennis at the restaurant, but realsized that one rider (Mark from Rotary) wasn’t with us. I called him and learned that he was at the nearby Aracely café where Carla (another Rotarian) was waiting to meet us. We cycled the short distance over to Aracely and found that it was open, albeit without power. As we rode up a group of firemen were leaving with what turnd out to be the last few cups of coffee. Fortunately, Aracely still had pastries and hot water for tea. We had had nice snack break and somehow Carla ended up volunteering to SAG for one of our rides!
The return ride was uneventful and several of us stopped for coffee at the Blue Bottle on Broadway. Herb brought Kate along on the ride and I learned that she teaches 6th grade math. I asked was subjects she covered during the year and our discussion led to me volunteering to come to her class and do a brief show and tell about my career. Basically, these kids have little exposure to career opportunities beyond service industries, etc. I think my 3 minute Rotary self-introduction can be expanded to 10-15 minutes and expose them to career paths in science.
-Steve Blair
VeloRaptors plan to ride the Richmond – San Raphael Bridge!
The new bike path on the Richmond-San Raphael (RSR) bridge is scheduled to open soon (Nov 16). VeloRaptor’s inaugural ride on this new bike path is set for Nov 20.
We will start at the Pt. Richmond Social Club in Pt. Richmond, and ride across the bridge for coffee and pastries at the Rustic Bakery in Larkspur. This is a relatively short 20+ mile ride,
Let hope the weather is good and CalTrans stays on schedule.
Meet at 10 am
Please contact the ride leader at Veloraptors@gmail.com if you plan to join our ride.
VeloRaptors Support Bike Tour of Oakland Art Galleries
VeloRaptor Ron Scrivani plans to lead a “Oakland Art Tour” bike ride on each of the Saturdays, May 5 and May 11. The tour will take you to 5 distinct areas in Oakland to visit art galleries that you might not otherwise ever see. Participation makes you eligible a PRIZE! Check out the Visit Oakland Website ( Visit Oakland ) to determine eligibility, and to see the prizes that you can win. The ride will be different on each Saturday. Each ride will qualify you for the top level prize. One of the routes is shown in the following link Oakland Art Route 1.
The rides will start at Warehouse416, located at 416-26th St. Doors open at noon, wheels roll at 12:30, and route maps will be available. You will be riding on City streets, and at a slow pace, easy speed, good for less hearty riders. Participants are encouraged to bring friends and family. Non-bike clothing is suggested, along with a helmet. (Be a hipster for a day). Good idea to bring a bike lock.
Let Ron know if you have any questions after reading the details of the Art Route at visit Oakland.org. Then let him know that you will be riding by sending a ‘YES’ for the ride on your preferred date, along with your name to Ron@warehouse416.com.
Alternatively, you can just do the tour on your own, Maps of galleries are available at all participating galleries. The list of galleries is on the Visit Oakland website.
Thank you, and hope to see you on one of the tours,
-RON
Ron Scrivani,
Warehouse416
Marin Headlands Ride – 2019!
Nineteen VeloRaptors did the Marin Headlands ride on January 12! We met at the foot of Market St, and then rode along the Embarcadero to Fisherman’s Wharf.
We made a stop at the Dolphin Club to look at the vintage boats, and watch the hardy Dolphin members emerge from the chilly water.
Then it was on to the beautiful Marina Green with fabulous views of SF Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge
Biking across the Golden Gate Bridge is always an exhilarating experience, due to being on this fabulous structure, crossing the Golden Gate, and the speeding cyclists, rookie cyclists on electric bikes, going in both directions, as well as the bridge maintenance equipment. Once across, most of the group made the long slog up the Marin Headlands, and posed for our annual picture at the top.
Then comes the truly terrifying descent down to Ft Cronkite. The scenery is fabulous, but the road is STEEP and NARROW with several sharp CURVES.
It was then on to Sausalito where the group splintered. Several riders caught a ferry back to SF. A few others cycled back over the GG Bridge, or cycled out along the headlands for a closer look at the ocean.
Six of us (3 Steves along with Paul, Kevin and Dale) pedaled our way to Tiburon and took a ferry to SF from there.
It was a fabulous day for cycling and riding ferries on SF Bay!
Celebrations! VeloRaptor Christmas Party and 20 Years of VeloRaptors
From Rob:
Hi Everyone –
I hope you are getting in enough cycling to work off all the extra calories that we ingested at the party Saturday night!
For those who couldn’t make the party, we celebrated 20 years of the Veloraptors, and took some time to thank the people who have made it possible.
Click this link to see a list of people that have made the club what it is today:
In the spoken remarks, Rob forgot to mention a few things, that are important to highlight including:
1. Tom Willging’s work with Bike East Bay: Tom devotes a lot of time to making Oakland a better and safer place to cycle. He updates us on important bike infrastructure projects and ways we can support cycling. Tom especially wants everyone to know that all cyclists are STRONGLY ENCOURAGED TO JOIN AND SUPPORT BIKE EAST BAY.
2. Big Sur Trip – May 13-16 – 4 days of cycling: When talking about our wonderful cycling trips, I forgot to mention that there is one coming up in May! This will be a chance to spend a long weekend cycling the Big Sur area without having to plan or do a thing other than show up. Black Sheep Adventures will be running the trip, which we hope to fill with people from our club. Many of us have travelled with them before and they always arrange a fantastic trip.
3. Paul Lattierri: I forgot to mention the enormous amount of time and effort that Paul has spend collecting and curating photograph. Many of you have spent time looking at the beautiful slide shows of Veloraptor rides that he has created.
4. A special thanks to all the important people who I’ve still forgotten to mention!
Happy Cycling!
VeloRaptors Ride For BORP
VeloRaptors have participated in the BORP Revolution ride for the last many years. This year we had a team of 13 riders, and raised over $18,000 for BORP. Steve Blair put together a brief video:
VeloRaptor Jerseys – Right, Left and Center
The VeloRaptor annual meeting was held June 3 at Sibley, and was well attended! Lots of riders toiled up Tunnel Road from Montclair, escorted from behind by Chris S. (who drove as she had to leave early). Two Steve’s went off the board and Kathy and Charlie were added.
Incredibly, all three of our jerseys appeared. On the right, Kevin has his keepsake original ‘VeloRaptors/Royal Grounds Cyclists’ jersey (a very rare item). On the left, Rick has the second generation jersey. Smiling in the center, Kathy brings us up to date with the latest version!
VeloRaptor Update – May 2018
VeloRaptor News!
VeloRaptors looking good – Russ leads our pack, and he looks the part, with his new bike and matching outfit. Here he is on a recent Sunday ride!
Always a good idea to stop at stop signs, especially if it is a New STOP sign. Found this one along the Carquinez Scenic Byway on a recent 4th Saturday Ride.
A few of us attended the Bike East Bay Pig Roast fund raiser and ‘goodby’ to Rene Rivera, BEB director who is leaving. Not shown are Howard and Steve G. who also enjoyed the festivities. https://bikeeastbay.org/
The hills are green and riding in Marin is fabulous right now. Here is Fred, rolling through a meadow on Chileno Valley Rd. We also saw some bovine action along Hwy 1 between Tomales and Pt. Reyes Station.
Finally, we had a Wednesday Outlier ride in Livermore in mid-April. Here is a pic from the top of Tesla Rd. Post ride lunch at Garre’ Winery was fabulous.
VeloRaptors Comment on Road Diets in Oakland
Recently the East Bay Times published a commentary disparaging Road Diets. Below is a link a reply to the commentary, put together by 3 members of the VeloRaptors .