Cycling beach trip

We made the four hour drive today down to Pensacola Beach, Florida for my last stage race of the year this weekend. This was a great race last year, and I’m looking forward to the road race tomorrow morning and the criterium on Sunday. I’m not looking forward to the time trial, but it should be fun anyway. Here’s some pics from my beach pre-ride today.

Pensacola is the cradle of naval aviation and home of the Blue Angels flight squadron. I had my camera out to take pictures of the beach as I was riding when this large plane came flying right next to me.

Cool, clean bike path through the dunes next to the road

The road and the dunes

This section of the national seashore was closed due to damage from Hurricane Isaac a couple weeks ago

Welcome to Pensacola Beach

Rolling across the dunes on the bike path

Sand blowing into the bike lane

The Fort Pickens part of the national seashore

Looking towards the bay bridge from the mainland to the barrier island that Pensacola Beach is located on

Some pretty high dunes along the beach

The huge ferris wheel next to our hotel

Rolling dune on the bike path

View of the ferris wheel and the sound from our hotel room