I rode in a diesel vanagon up Montezuma Grade east of San Diego, Ca..an
average climb of about 9%, 11 miles long and 3700' of elevation gain.  3 of
us aboard with our bicycles.  We were driving over to Mt. Palomar to ride
something different, plus I was kinda interested in maybe buying the Westie
from a Canadian riding buddy.  My wife, a pretty fit 50+ yr old ex. bike
racer started up the hill ahead of us and when we finally caught her in
about 5 miles she put on a sprint and re-passed us easily...on her bicycle,
going uphill..9% climb..50+ yrs old...  I decided that the 1.6 Westie was
just too slow for me...especially in California.
 During that one 40 mile trip we had about 10 really close calls with
impatient vehicles passing us unsafely and  we got flipped-off dozens of
times..Not my idea of a pleasant way to get down the road...
  Don Hanson

On Sat, Oct 24, 2009 at 8:53 AM, Mark Dearing <VWBrain@aol.com> wrote:

> In a message dated 10/24/2009 10:53:11 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
>  rogersisler2000@YAHOO.COM writes:
>
> Did you  get the requisite bumper sticker? How did it go? Are you still at
> it? Did you  ever get out of first gear? Did hikers pass you? Tell us your
> story.
>
>
>
> That is a heck of a climb. I did it in my 66 westy a long time  ago.
> Remember that isn't the highest peak on the east side,but  probably the
> highest
> road. Mt Mitchell in NC is highest peak but no road   later  mark d
>