5,000 ft of climb. Some vicious climbs in the first half, the rest is steady uphill grinds until you turn away from Lake Berryessa, then it's a number of miles of super high speed descents. If anyone ever tells you it's 15 miles to Calistoga from the intersection of Knoxville and Rt128, he's lying. You could, possibly, reverse the route, but this would mean a long climb away from the Lake, and put Ink Grade near the end. Ink Grade's as brutal a climb as anything anywhere, but it's also fast, scary, brake-eating and bumpy going down, too. You pays yer money, as they say. The final slog up 128 to Calistoga's not very interesting, so I'll have to work on that.by quarterjack