Day: 63
Date: 04/06
City: Morro, California
Miles ridden: 184
Cumulative miles: 5439

This morning we looked how far we had to go today, with San Fracisco being the target. We decided to have an easy day and avoid the interstates and travel on highway 1 instead, which would be much quicker. After discovering that the Luxor in Las Vegas charged us more than 300 US$, it took us a while to figure out where most of the charges are coming from. The 300$ charge we couldn’t figure out all, so we sent an email to them to request a detailed bill. Booking the accommodation and writing the email took us until 11 AM, so it was a late start. After packing the bikes and filling up it was noon and the weather was still cloudy. We rode to the beach and keept riding, but the temperature was rather cold. After a while I decided to stop at a beach restaurant, the Neptune Net.

 

There were multiple bikes parked and the restaurant looked rather busy, indicating it was the right place to be. We had some average coffee, chauder and fish and chips. It was averagely tasty (except the coffee, which was worse than average… It was close to bad and burned, which might have something to do with it was sitting there since the morning, or maybe even the morning yesterday).

At the restaurant I got my heated liner out and connected it, so did Sigrid. The ride after that was windy but rather pleasant (and warm). We continued until we came to a State beach, the sun came out and I thought that would be the right place to have a break. Since we were not willing to pay 10US$/bike for the entry, we used the bench on the entry of the park to have a quick rest. Sigrid got rid of her heated liner while I left my on, just in case. After riding for another hour, it became rather cold again. We stopped and Sigrid got her jacket on again. The landscape was great, the hill keep the clouds back and there were plenty of fields. Some of them had Strawberries, so we stopped at the next stall and bought a punnet for only 2US$. The strawberries were huge, after a short test if they glow in the dark we tasted them. They were huge and sweet, like somebody planted sugar in the strawberries, but just the right amount.

We finally arrived at the hotel, the owner upgraded us to a suite and put us at on the ground floor. The room was great, even better for a budget price (50US$/night including tax, breakfast and WiFi). On the way down we could hear some seals making noise. When we entered a restaurant we could see them as well. The food, the red and the sunset was nice.

 

Day: 64
Date: 05/06
City: Morro, California
Miles ridden: 0
Cumulative miles: 5686

We added a rest day, slept in, bought some stuff that we needed and planned our trip up to Seattle. Had a long nap, upgraded our software for the communication equipment, had a look at the Venus transit (with a sort of pinhole camera), had Mexican for tea and went to bed. Nothing exciting to report, but a nice and relaxing day!

Day: 65
Date: 06/06
City: San Francisco, California
Miles ridden: 210
Cumulative miles: 5896

We got up a bit earlier. And had a look at the Morro rock were the seals and the otters could be seen.

We saw some otters close to the shore, tied up with seaweed to stay stationary and one seal on the other side. We put our heated liners on, and we were happy that we did it. After a while it got windy and cold. We road towards San Francisco and stopped at the Fernwood Motel, had some ice cream and a coffee.

 

After that we continued to San Francisco. On our last stop we filled the bike up, but this time is was a car wash business. We realised this after starting to fill the bikes. Anyway, the supervisor gave us the receipt and directed us out of the queue. After the loo break we had a coffee and while drinking the coffee we started to talk to the supervisor about our plans. He talked to his work collegues and after a while we gave him our last card and took a picture of the two.

Then we continued to San Francisco, to see the Golden Gate Bridge. The GPS guided us over the bridge and at the other side it told us take the next possible exit. It turned out that we turned around, when I noticed it, it was too late, and there was no way to turn back. Anyway, in the middle of the bridge, the GPS told us to go ‘off road’ and turn right for 500 feet…  That would be off the bridge (@#$%!!). When I was setting up our route, I selected the Golden Gate Bridge as waypoint and I must have missed it by a couple of mm, so the GPS thought it would be a point 500 feet off the bridge. For this it calculated the route, we had to pass the waypoint first, then turn around and then go off the bridge 🙂. How considerate. I guess Garmin has some room for improvement there. Anyway, on the way back we had to pay 6$ for each bike (the other way was free). So we paid and passed the bridge and turned around to have a look at the Bridge Centre. There was a nice view onto the bridge and there we met as well Glenn. He is from Humboldt County, California. He saw our map and we started talking. He was fascinated by our journey and he would like it if we could meet some of the kids which were just walking the bridge.

We did our own thing, took a couple of pictures, went to the shop and came back to the bikes. It just happened that the kids arrived and we had a brief talk about our plans

From there we rode to our accommodation, this time the GPS didn’t ask us to jump off the bridge. It turned out that I booked it one day too early, so we agreed to pay the non-internet prices and forget the booking from the previous day. So we did. After getting into our room and parking the bikes (rather difficult with the carpark on a steep hill). We had a nice meal, talked to Wombat and Val and planned our trip for tomorrow.