A long weekend in San Francisco (Jul., 4th - Independence Day), great weather and nothing to do?

I smell an opportunity! An opportunity to do something that I always wanted to do: Explore the bay area on a motor bike.

The Nitro CEO was kind enough to introduce me to Wolfgang and Wolfgang and his team helped me to get my hands on a BMW R1200 RT and off we go.

Motorcycling in San Francisco (SF) can be tricky. You want/need to find the right kind of roads (fun and not too hard to navigate), you need to manage the weather and you need to beat the traffic.

The traffic/weather thing needs to be figured out, because early in the morning there is no traffic, but there might be fog (in and around SF).

Lucky enough, we got 3 out of 4 right. Here are the four rides that we did over the weekend.

Day 1 - Morning - Silicon Valley: Down and up again.

That one was perfect. I started at around 8am and to escape the fog I went down 280 to Los Gatos and took 35 North to go back to SF. Make sure to make time for a cup of coffee in Alice’s (at the intersection of 35 and 84).

Day 1 - Afternoon - Half Moon Bay: Seeing the Pacific

That was the weakest ride. We started at 2pm and it was still foggy and cold. Getting in and out of Half Moon Bay can also be tricky (lots of traffic on 1 and 92). But … you get to see the Pacific :).

Day 2 - Morning - Coffee in Dublin

We could not resist to have a coffee in Dublin. Again going south was a good call. By the time we arrived in Dublin the sun was out. On the way back we went through Castro Valley up the hill (Redwood Rd) and found 20 miles of road with no two turns being further apart than 500 feet.

Day 2 - Afternoon - The Golden Gate Sprint: Stinson Beach to Muir Beach

That is a tricky one, because early in the morning it is foggy and later in the day you will meet a lot of tourists. I decided to live with the traffic. The ride is very accessable and you get to go over the Golden Gate Bridge.