Biking the Golden Gate Bridge

Sunday morning we woke up bright and early. We rode a cable car down to the bike rental shop and picked up our bikes to begin our 9 mile bike ride. They had a map with points along the way to stop and check out along the way.

Our first stop was the Aquatic Park Pier. We biked all the way out. We had a nice view of Alcatraz, the Golden Gate Bridge and the shoreline of San Francisco.

Our second point of interest was the Palace of Fine Arts. We just took a quick glimpse of the beautiful building and continued on.

We stopped at Chrissy Fields and Ben walked down the beach to feel the water. We got some great shots of the Golden Gate Bridge. All along the way we would stop somewhere and I would think to myself this is the best place for a picture of the Golden Gate Bridge! But, then we would continue on and each stop the view would just keep getting better and better.

Our last stop before riding across the Golden Gate Bridge was Fort Point. 

Fort Point is the only brick fort on the West Coast of the United States. It was built by the U.S. army between 1853 and 1861. It was built to defend the San Francisco harbor against invasion. It defended the harbor through the civil war and an additional thirty years until the 1890's when the cannons were removed. 

In the 1930's the engineers used Fort Point as headquarters while building the Golden Gate Bridge. Then during World War II it defended the harbor against enemy submarines. It is now a National Historic Site. The top of the fort was a perfect view of the Golden Gate Bridge. However, it was extremely windy! It made both of us worry a little about how windy our bike ride across the bridge was going to be.

We snapped one more quick picture before heading up the second big hill of our bike ride. The employee at the bike shop informed us that there would be two large hills. Ben and I were clearly expecting this one to be our last. It was quiet the climb but we made it to the top.

We did not have much time to stop on the bridge to take pictures because there were quiet a few bikers. We also were not biking against the wind so the ride was quite enjoyable. However, when we would turn out toward the ocean to go around the two main towers the wind would hit us and cause our bikes to slightly veer off.

After crossing the Golden Gate Bridge, we started the last portion of our bike ride into Sausalito. Ben and I ended up taking a wrong turn and it resulted in us going up a third big hill and our bike ride ended up being closer to ten miles. We made it in enough time to drop off our bikes, eat a pastry, and stop in a shop before we had to catch our shuttle up to Muir Woods. Ben and I really loved our experience biking across the Golden Gate Bridge.