On April 11th, I lost my job. All at once I became one of those statistics you read about in the Business section of the newspaper - a casualty of the downturn in the Economy, or so I was told. All I know was that I went to work as usual that morning and three hours later I was back home, unemployed. So what do you do when all of a sudden you find yourself without a job? Well, you plan a solo bicycle tour down the California coast, of course!

Come along on Brian's 2001 California Coast Bicycle Tour.

Last year, while scanning the web for challenging bike rides in California and Arizona, I came across the Orange County Wheelmen's website and a link to a page describing the "Ride Around the Bear". This is a century that takes you up the San Bernardino Mountains from Redlands to Big Bear Lake (hence the name) at 6750 feet, and beyond to Onynx Summit at 8443 feet, then back down to Redlands. In 1987 Cyclist Magazine rated the Bear ride as "One of the top ten most difficult centuries in the country", and after having just completed it, I have no doubt that it has not lost its standing.

Join in on Brian's experience of the Ride Around the Bear.