Ride the West Sep 09--Day 7 Rest Day in Gold Coast
Hello Blog Readers,
The rest day in Gold Coast came as a welcome treat for all the riders and the staff. Most of us slept in a little later, ate a leisurely breakfast and washed our dirty riding and hanging around clothes. I arranged with Karen Bauer, one of our ride leaders, to ride a couple hours around the local countryside.
We headed down a country road for a couple miles and then up the side of one of the nearby hills. This hill was about 50 percent steeper than anything we had climbed in the last week and after about a mile up, up, up, I needed a snorkel with my biking jersey I was sweating so much. We pushed up , up, up for about another mile until the road went from good pavement to dirt. Subsequently, we decided to glide back down the hill and head out of town back toward the north and west, kind of in the vicinity of our inbound route to Gold Coast. We rolled along smoothly for a couple hours, enjoying the quiet of a Saturday morning with few or no cars and lots of laid back dairy cows. One of my favorite signs along the way was "Seeds, hay and DVDs."
We finished up our ride again along Pebble Beach and the overwhelming beauty hit me right in the face again. Crashing waves, prominent rock outcroppings, sloping sandy beaches, surfers, seals, sea lions, and rolling fog that comes and goes and comes and goes. I could easily work for the Oregon and Northern California tourist commission as I truly love this area.
Refueling with a "$5 dollar, $5 dollar, $5 dollar foot loooooong!" at Subway while simultaneously washing my clothes and watching college football. I don't even remember what game I watched but it was sure fun! On second thought, I did see Michigan come from behind to beat Notre Dame.
Later in the afternoon, I borrowed a bike lock from my roommate, Brian Cox, and went on a mission to find a battery charger for my Sony TSC-5 camera. I left the official charger at home because I mistakenly thought I could charge the battery with the same cable that I download photos. As my hero Maxwell Smart says, ". . . missed it by that much." I rode to Walmart, Radio Shack and Walgreen's and went 0-3. With no luck finding a charger or new battery, I dropped back and bought a digital throwaway as a backup.
I then raced back to join Bill Bergen and about 4 other guys for dinner at the Larry Fariss recommended Chart Room restaurant located just minutes from the hotel and on the water. Suffice it to say, Larry was exactly right--this restaurant had the freshest, tastiest fish and the portions were huge! But as they say on TV, ". . . but there's more!" After ordering, Bill and I walked out to the piers behind the restaurant and saw the highly tauted sea lions and seals hogging more than their fair share of the piers. I counted 30 overweight and out of shape sea lions and seals on one pier and about 6 of the same on another. Bill was much more bold than I, walking to about 10 feet of these big boys and girls. About the time he got within the personal space of these amigos and amigas, that gave him several "Arg, Arg, Arg's!" Bill moved a bit farther away and I snapped his photo, and soon thereafter he reciprocated and took mine, although I remained well outside the personal space of the residents.
After dinner, we hoofed it back to the hotel and I watched USC come back to beat Ohio State late in the game. Larry borrowed my computer and listened to USAFA narrowly lose to Minnesota. I also cleaned up my bike for the big ride on Sunday through the redwoods and on to Eureka, CA. One week down and one week to go to San Francisco.
The rest day in Gold Coast came as a welcome treat for all the riders and the staff. Most of us slept in a little later, ate a leisurely breakfast and washed our dirty riding and hanging around clothes. I arranged with Karen Bauer, one of our ride leaders, to ride a couple hours around the local countryside.
We headed down a country road for a couple miles and then up the side of one of the nearby hills. This hill was about 50 percent steeper than anything we had climbed in the last week and after about a mile up, up, up, I needed a snorkel with my biking jersey I was sweating so much. We pushed up , up, up for about another mile until the road went from good pavement to dirt. Subsequently, we decided to glide back down the hill and head out of town back toward the north and west, kind of in the vicinity of our inbound route to Gold Coast. We rolled along smoothly for a couple hours, enjoying the quiet of a Saturday morning with few or no cars and lots of laid back dairy cows. One of my favorite signs along the way was "Seeds, hay and DVDs."
We finished up our ride again along Pebble Beach and the overwhelming beauty hit me right in the face again. Crashing waves, prominent rock outcroppings, sloping sandy beaches, surfers, seals, sea lions, and rolling fog that comes and goes and comes and goes. I could easily work for the Oregon and Northern California tourist commission as I truly love this area.
Refueling with a "$5 dollar, $5 dollar, $5 dollar foot loooooong!" at Subway while simultaneously washing my clothes and watching college football. I don't even remember what game I watched but it was sure fun! On second thought, I did see Michigan come from behind to beat Notre Dame.
Later in the afternoon, I borrowed a bike lock from my roommate, Brian Cox, and went on a mission to find a battery charger for my Sony TSC-5 camera. I left the official charger at home because I mistakenly thought I could charge the battery with the same cable that I download photos. As my hero Maxwell Smart says, ". . . missed it by that much." I rode to Walmart, Radio Shack and Walgreen's and went 0-3. With no luck finding a charger or new battery, I dropped back and bought a digital throwaway as a backup.
I then raced back to join Bill Bergen and about 4 other guys for dinner at the Larry Fariss recommended Chart Room restaurant located just minutes from the hotel and on the water. Suffice it to say, Larry was exactly right--this restaurant had the freshest, tastiest fish and the portions were huge! But as they say on TV, ". . . but there's more!" After ordering, Bill and I walked out to the piers behind the restaurant and saw the highly tauted sea lions and seals hogging more than their fair share of the piers. I counted 30 overweight and out of shape sea lions and seals on one pier and about 6 of the same on another. Bill was much more bold than I, walking to about 10 feet of these big boys and girls. About the time he got within the personal space of these amigos and amigas, that gave him several "Arg, Arg, Arg's!" Bill moved a bit farther away and I snapped his photo, and soon thereafter he reciprocated and took mine, although I remained well outside the personal space of the residents.
After dinner, we hoofed it back to the hotel and I watched USC come back to beat Ohio State late in the game. Larry borrowed my computer and listened to USAFA narrowly lose to Minnesota. I also cleaned up my bike for the big ride on Sunday through the redwoods and on to Eureka, CA. One week down and one week to go to San Francisco.
Labels: America By Bicycle, cycling
posted by Steve King at 9:15 PM
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