Contrary to popular belief, no one has yet to die on this adventure, and Nathan did not become a casualty of cannibalism. It has been quite some time since I have updated the blog, but hopefully I will have time tomorrow morning to find some wifi.
Since the last entry Nate and I had a great time seeing my mom, and traveling into San Francisco. My mother came to spend time with my dad for their anniversary. The best part about it is she brought some cookies with her. By this time of the trip I had become very sore and felt constantly dirty. We spent a night about 35 miles north of San Fran in a private RV/camp park. It was close to a town, and so we thought we would have minimal critter activity. We thought wrong.
About 2 AM we were awoke by growling and crashing cooking supplies outside the tent. After I gathered enough energy and courage I shined my light outside the tent to see 4 sets of eyes staring back at me. We had been attacked by raccoons. They had gone to town on all left out food, and apparently they had no decency whatsoever, because they also ate some of our snickers bars. After chasing away the varmints we cleaned up all remaining food in the suburban, and went back to sleep so we could get to San Francisco in a timely manner in the Morning.
My folks made it back from their hotel to see us off that morning, and we tried to push it into San Fran. On our way there we saw some other bike tourists and started to talk to them. Like most other people doing the coast, they were carrying their gear, but as it turned out they were BYU graduates. It was fun to talk to them, and we helped each other navigate around Marin County where the route gets a bit dicey. After we pushed on past them, I took a wrong turn to get onto the Golden Gate Bridge, but luckily was helped and corrected by a very cute female cyclist. She told us that the Golden Gate has two pedestrian paths, but the one was closed during the day and we had to muster through on the one against traffic. We followed her through, and then she helped us find our way over to the Fisherman’s Wharf area. From there we went and met my folks at a parking lot over by AT&T Park.
After I changed at the Suburban, my folk’s took Nate and I out to eat in little Italy for a little carbo-loading. After the meal we drove Lombard Street and went through some of the shopping districts. We didn’t have much time with them, as Jon Stevens was flying in and we had to meet him at the CAL-Train station. My parents dropped us off back at AT&T Park and said goodbye. After we picked up Jon and loaded his equipment in the car we were just 3 more lycra clad men roaming the streets of San Francisco. We decided to be “cultured” and see china town. On our walk over there we asked a guy on the street for directions. He seemed astounded that we would walk all the way to China Town. He didn’t realize that we had biked there … FROM OREGON. We were on the streets of China Town a measly 15 minutes after the encounter, intrigued by America’s resistance to excercise. We ate at the “Floating Sushi Boat Restaurant”, and asked the sword shop for their most dangerous weapon. We took pictures and then walked back to the ball park to catch the game against the Chicago Cubs. San Fran won it 5-4 and we saw it from the second to last row in the stadium. The seats were in far left field, but were actually fairly good because the view was great.
After San Francisco we spent the first night in Sunnyvale with Nate’s Aunt, and that day at Stanford with James Colovos. It was really good to see him and he seems to be doing great, and is definitely less socially awkward than the many other engineering students we met there. I think Jon was amazed by the Stanford Campus given how much larger it is than BYU with a smaller student body. It was a VERY nice campus. After Stanford we picked up Jesse from the airport, and headed over to the Wickstrum family’s home for a delicious dinner of Hamburgers. Their three young children; Isaiah, Dana, and Hannah were probably the highlight of the trip. They were extremely cute and all decided to help us work with our bikes in the morning. It was a very happy household and their hospitality was incredible.
I decided to drive the first leg of the second half, so I could have as many direct miles as possible. So far it has worked because I haven’t ridden a leg since. The first day we came through a small pass of 1300 feet and down towards the Salinas valley. We rode through miles upon miles of farmland and saw some incredible country. My favorite part of the farmlands was riding through strawberry fields because they smelled so wonderful. It really made me want to eat strawberries and cream.
We rode into Monterey and happened across a very unique event. They were having an exotic car auction in Monterey close to the ritzy tourist district. The bike path went right behind the back fence of the auction so we got to see all the exotic cars. The picture I took shows mainly older Bentleys and Rolls Royces. As it turns out we also saw hundreds of other super cars because of a large car show that they were having at Pebble Beach. I never thought I would get tired of looking at Ferraris, but after 2 days of it, I did.
The first night we had a hard time finding a camp spot until we found a place that had mercy on us and gave us a complementary one. It was needed because the next day was the Big Sur, and with its plethora of hills, a good night’s sleep was needed. As we started out the next day we came to the first Vista over the ocean and started to take pictures, when a man from Chicago with a 2010 Ferrari pulled up. I don’t remember the car’s model, but it was a front engine V-8 that was a hard top convertible. I don’t know much about it, but it was an incredibly gorgeous car. I tried to make small talk with him and it worked. So far I think the best way to meet other tourists is to offer to take their picture in front of something beautiful, like an Ocean Vista. After I took the photo, of course I turned the topic of conversation to his car, told him about the epic bike trip I was doing, and asked if I could take pictures of his car. He said yes and told me I could sit in it. I don’t know what he was thinking, but I had no shame and sweaty as could be I plopped down in a brand new Ferrari as my buds took glamour shots of me. I wasn’t complaining.
The bicycle riding was challenging, for the Big Sur has plenty of large hills, but Nate and I were well prepared for them. Since others were not as well prepared, Nate and I didn’t have to drive at all. It was beautiful country and a great place to bicycle. By the end of the day though we were tired and there wasn’t any campsites within biking distance, so Jesse found a spot on the side of the road, and against the wishes of the great state of California, we camped. We had to get to bed early because we had to put in over 50 miles the next day in time for a 1:00 sacrament meeting in San Luis Obispo.
This brings me to today where I got up at 6:30 helped start breakfast for everyone and got on the bike by 8:30. Nate, Ryan and I were the only ones to start out, and Ryan only went part of the way into San Luis Obispo. When it was down to just Nate and I we flat out hauled! We had a wind at our backs and were cruising well over 20 MPH going uphill. One section we were keeping between 27 and 30 MPH and we weren’t going downhill. This might be the strongest I’ve felt all trip. We rolled into town around 11:50 and proceeded to an old gym on the campus of Cal-Poly. (Jesse has a knack for finding little gems that are very valuable to hobos!) We showered and ate a quick lunch of freeze dried food and PB&J’s here and headed out for church. Church was a decent singles branch in a very strongly Spanish themed chapel. It was a newly built chapel, and what I think is one of the best looking chapels that I have seen. We stayed for all 3 meetings, and priesthood was an amazing lesson taught by a convert who has only been a member for 8 months. It was very uplifting.
After church Nate and I rode to a town called Oceana where we are camping for the night. We are in more of a neighborhood than the woods, but it seems to be alright. We are doing laundry and had In&Out for dinner. Life isn’t too bad. I am really tired but hoping for some good sleep because we are probably going to push 90 miles in the morning.
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