not for the faint of heart

We rode our bikes across the Golden Gate bridge -twice!

We got this crazy idea that it would be fun to bike over the Golden Gate Bridge, so this past weekend we did...and we barely survived! If we had known what we were in for we would never have done this but as my mom said, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger!" And in the end, we are glad we did it, but it was a whole lot more than we bargained for. We didn't know about the two massive hills we'd have to go up (which we could barely walk up let alone pedal a bike towing 50 pounds of children); we didn't know how much harder it actually is to remember how to ride a bike after 10 or so years; we didn't know Lexi was going to get an ear ache and cry all the way across the bridge (and back); we didn't know about the crazy wind blowing against us that nearly defeated us; we didn't know we wouldn't be able to make it to the last ferry back across the bay (which meant we had to ride ALL the way back -yeah, I very nearly just sat down and cried!); we didn't know there was no such option as a rescue helicopter when we wanted to give up; we didn't know we'd end up riding almost 12 miles!!!; we didn't know we'd be bruised and aching for days after (I took a few swiggs of the children's tylenol we bought for Lexi to help ease the intensive aching in my legs -it helped!); and we didn't know what a sense of accomplishment we'd have after surviving all that! It truly was breathtaking (not just because of the wind in our face)! We are glad we did it and enjoyed the downhill ride back to the city during which we could reflect on our triumph. I will recommend to anyone with the same crazy desire to bike across the bridge to ride a ferry to Sausilito and then bike back to SF across the bridge from there. It would be mostly downhill and a delightful ride. For us, this trip made the top of the list for both the worst and the best of our many "weekend warrior" adventures.