The romance and reality

1.  Google maps - the shortest route isn't always the easiest route.  Check the topography before you cycle off.

2.  Google maps again.  On the way from Laguna Niguel to Oceanside, I listened, dutifully took the left hand turn and pedaled up the impossibly steep road, stopping a few times along the way.  Then it took me for a loop and told me to go back down the same road I came up.  I'm pleased that Google dropped their corporate motto, "Don't be evil" because that trick was supremely evil.
3.  I packed too much.  I planned to possibly camp along the way, but I decided to be honest with myself.  I don't want to pitch a tent after a long day in the saddle and I'm too attached to running water and power to schlep it out for a night in the tent, so I sent home the front two panniers and my tent.
4.  Ask the locals questions, particularly about topography, water points and food availability up ahead.  They live there and are mostly extremely helpful.
5.  It's okay to stop, take a rest and then get back on the bicycle.  This is meant to be enjoyable, not painful.
6.  Every hill so far has been painful.  Some way more than others, but every hill has hurt and I've had to stop multiple times on the biggies.  And even after I offloaded 11+ lbs of gear, every hill continued to remind me of the Princess Bride - to the pain.
7.  The trip from Oceanside to El Cajon confirmed my hatred for all things with a grade of 4% or more.  The 1.5 mile climb at Torrey Pines with 6 - 8% grade really sucked.  Pedal, stop, pedal, stop, pedal stop, repeat.  And the last 10 miles into El Cajon were pretty much all uphill, some parts of it steeper than others.  If someone was offering EPO or blood doping in the middle of the hill, I would have been their first customer.

Before the real mountains started, I took two rest days in El Cajon.  There is a large group of Chaldean Iraqis here, and I definitely enjoyed being reacquainted with Middle Eastern fare.  And after the mountains in CA, the high desert, and the vast expanses of nothingness between one hamlet and another burg (which, btw have nothing to do with quiet desperation, their desperation is screaming, yelling and flailing about) and the magnificently crappy shoulders on the roads and the continuing hills, I feel great about my decision.  The hills yesterday and today were no problem at all.  Whenever I came to one, I'd just give that gas pedal a slight push and my rental car responded like a champ.  And the miles of nothingness in the desert - the impossible miles of emptiness that I would have been riding?  They just passed by quite pleasantly with a smug grin on my face.

These folks have about 70+ miles of bleakness to ride through.  

It's okay to shift gears when things don't go according to plan.  I am driving the bicycle route, but I saw no reason to continue to inflict unnecessary pain upon myself or my surgically repaired (twice) knee.  The reality of the trip did not meet the romance, and I'm completely comfortable with my decision.

I'm still on for a trip to Thailand/Burma possibly Malaysia in Sept/Oct/Nov, but I anticipate it will be a rental bicycle trip to explore each city/town on a bike after my overnight sleeper train where somebody turns down my bed rather than an expeditionary cycle touring trip.

                               Do you want these guys to turn your bed down?  Didn't think so.

Rest day?

     Yesterday was going to be kind of a rest day, only 20 miles from Irvine to Laguna Niguel.  I've been starting off at the ass crack of dawn, so it felt decadent to eat breakfast, hang out and talk story about Saipan and Afghanistan, eat lunch and then hit the road at 1330.  This time, my old friend Lothar Cramer wanted to do some of the ride with me, and as an avid cyclist, he is quite familiar with the route and area.  I've been using Google maps for cyclists (yes, I know, it's in beta form) and so far, what I lovingly refer to as my bitch has guided me, turn by turn, to my destination.  The ride was fine until Lothar pointed upwards and said, "That's where we're going."  So, I employed my strategy of stopping when tired, and pedaling on when my heart rate slowed down a bit.
     And to channel a bit of Marshawn Lynch, I'd like to give a shout out to my parents, who endured me for 2 weeks while I put my kit together in Santa Barbara, shout out to Michael and Nikki Blair for their hospitality in Culver City, shout out to South Central L.A. for not jumping this white boy as I rode through the neighborhood on a loaded touring bicycle, shout out to Victoria and Brainard Jones in Irvine for their kindness and a shout out to Lothar and Emily Cramer for opening their home in Laguna Niguel.  Also, a future shout out to Sandee Aga and Rod Hepburn, who have offered an overnight stay at their homes - everyone's generosity and kindness is much appreciated.
     My bitch, so far, has been very good to me, guiding me along some fantastic routes through residential areas and finding lovely bicycle paths.  She even took me past the worlds oldest continuously operating McDonalds, in Downey, CA.

     But when I showed Lothar where my bitch was planning on taking me tomorrow (now today) he said, "Oh, you don't want to go there."  And this is coming from a serious cyclist, one who has a set training schedule, one who races, a real MAMIL (Middle Aged Man In Lycra), the man doesn't even stop on hills.  That's the good news, potential soul crushing hills at the beginning of the ride averted.  The bad news is that at the end of my 50 mile ride tomorrow, I was told yesterday that there was one 'mother of a hill' on the way to my next shelter.  But unlike Lothar, I'm not a racer.  I'm a plodder.  And today, I pedal and plod down towards Oceanside, CA, and that mother of a hill at the end of the ride.

                                  Victoria and Celine, then in Thailand, and Victoria now, all grown up.  

Culver City - Central LA - ish to Irvine

     What's a day like?  With a sample size of three days, here it is:  It all starts the afternoon/night before.  Whenever I get to my destination, I wash my bike clothes by hand (taking a nice cold shower at the same time), put on some human clothes, and check/plan my route and take a look see at the weather for the next end point.  This will change slightly once I'm in San Diego and I can rely on the ACA map set for the Southern Tier, for now I'm wending my way through Southern CA towards (cue scary music)...the mountains.  Today, the route guidance gave me the choice of taking the coast road towards Irvine (at a cost of 66 miles) or an inland ride (price = 63 miles) or what I thought was the best bargain of 57 miles.  But it did take me through South Central LA.  Those who know me well know where  I pedaled today.  South Central, yeah, that was interesting.  I don't think they see a lot of loaded touring cyclists pass through there.  I missed a turn along the way, paying the extra 9 mile penalty.
     And ever since I bonked in Kuwait on a bike ride, I'm really serious about hydration.  I do drink a cup or two of dehydrating coffee in the am, but then always try to have a Gatorade to start the day and there will be little to no alcohol along this trip.  You can't drink when you're cycling, you're tired at the end of the day, it's dehydrating and in the places I'm stopping, it would be hard to get just a single decent bottle of beer.  After the Gatorade guzzling, I carry a Camelback Mule that I drink water from the rest of the day.  And this leads to a slight problem.  My wife informs me that public urination is frowned upon in the U.S. and is in fact illegal in certain municipalities.  What do I look like, some kind of dromedary?  When a man's gotta go, a man's gotta go.  In the more rural areas, it's not really an issue, it's pretty easy to pull off the side of the road and take care of business stealthily.  Today, I went through an industrial area and had to relieve myself a few times between when I pushed off and when I finished the ride for the day.  And for that, it's so much easier to be a man.

   
     

The legs

     I have tiny, little, skinny bird legs.  And I'm not comparing my legs to a bird's femur, more like the fibula.  Stick like.  Many moons ago, we were driving back from a heiau somewhere in Hawaii.  I saw an older Asian man and I pointed out the thinness of his legs to my wife (who was from Ukrainian stock) and she said, "Yours are about the same size."  Ouch.  Well, at least that got me to to take a look see at my legs and realize she was right.  I think the only time my legs increased in size was when I was living in Newport Beach and riding a bike every day, sometimes, I'd ride up to Santa Monica, once, I took a completely unplanned trip down to Baja California - I pointed southward and pedaled.  I don't believe my legs will ever get to the point where I'm outside of the bird category, I can only hope for a move from sparrow to chicken to goose to turkey.  There may be a crow between the sparrow and chicken, hopefully before I get to the mountains.
     And today, I rode from Oxnard to Culver City.  There is a surprising elevation gain between County Line and the other side of Malibu that one does not feel much when driving by in a car. Thanks to the google maps gods, I was directed by my voice navigation not up the mountain that leads to Pepperdine University, but down along the rich folks who live on Malibu road.  Winning!  So I got my first taste of hills today and friends, they were entirely devoid of sugar.  Because I am completely lacking in shame, I have a strategy that I think will work - I stop when my bird legs quiver or get tired, take a few minutes, then get back in the saddle.  I think I should have asked the Norwegian guy in India just how long it took him to be able to handle the mountains.

First day

     A slight change of plans led me from Santa Barbara to Oxnard instead of Camarillo.  I had made a booking at the Flamingo Motel.  In a move of sheer genius, I reserved said quite sketchy looking motel for April 5th, and I anticipated I would be a tad bit further east than Oxnard in April.  Whoopsie!  The Gujurati lady shooed me off and waved her hand down the road.  "Let me see your confirmation number, I have no rooms, you will have to go somewhere else, there are other hotels down there."  Thanks to technology I made another reservation (that is a bit of an upgrade from the Flamingo Motel) and I ended up 1.5 miles further down the road.  I had also looked at campgrounds in Ventura, but they wanted $45 - for a tent space.  So I splashed out for running water and electricity.  The Flamingo, btw, is a rather dull 1 star, although they advertise themselves as a brightly shining 2.  Due to the unforeseen  change, I almost planned to do a century on day# 1 and end up in Culver City, but hey, 100 miles on the first day would have been as stupid as walking from More Mesa to Stearns Wharf in Santa Barbara on a high tide.  I did that with my daughter last week, and I'd like to think I've exhausted stupid for a few months.
     I met a guy in Kuwait who did a cross country ride and I asked him at what point he thought he'd made a mistake, he said - without hesitation, "The first day."  After that, it was all right, and he was quite sad when the ride ended.  I'm sure my day of thinking, "Well, THIS was a mistake" will come, but it wasn't today.  Other than being thrown out of the Flamingo Motel (which I suspect is a rather good omen), it was a brilliant ride down the coast. I'd kind of like to get that 'this was a mistake' feeling out of the way and pedal on, but I know it's coming sometime along the ride.  I strongly suspect it will be on the day I turn left towards the Sierra Nevada mountains, not headed to the beer by the same name but the mf mountains.  It's supposed to be a relatively short 57 mile day, but 40 of those miles are uphill.  Here's to hoping I don't discover why the Aussies call them 'push bikes.'

Rincon, Queen of the Coast.          

Where I didn't end up staying.