Day 30 Gaviota Beach to Camarillo CA

This was a long day, here are my miles:  http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/sxpA-X-iBX0
This is one of the longest days of riding, consequently the number of photos I took were few.

Here we are getting started on the ride.

Here is looking back to Gavioto.

Here is an interesting island connected with a bridge, we guess it is a private residence.

There was lots of surfers along the way.

Here is a picture of Jon, who was biking with me.  It is great to have him riding with me.

A long day but we get a rest week-end or rather Sunday.  Then we are excited to have Daniel, Karla and her brother Brian join us for our last week to the Mexican border.

My milage so far is 1565.

Day 29 Pisma Beach Oceana SP to Gaviota Beach SP

Here is my milage: http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/uVH5R9exZ14

This is the first time I have biked this far south.  The route through Lompoc was hot, dry and long.
Last night we did a little more at Pisma Oceano beach.  Here is another try at an awesome sunset, good but not awesome.

Pisma Beach is funny in that they allow vehicles, for a fee, to drive on the beach.  Here is a typical movie.

I also figured out how to get constellations to show up. I used a shorter exposure time of 15 or 20 seconds and here is Saggitarius, the tea-pot.

Now to todays ride, here I am looking back to Pismo/Oceano.

After going through Guadalupe, I left Hwy 1 for a short while on 135 and up Harris Grade.  That was a fun climb and descent.  Here are pictures looking back while I ascended.

The descent to Lompoc was screaming, but I finally got there.

The rest of the ride to Gaviota State Beach was a dry, hot slog.  I was glad when I got there and saw Luetta.

This is a very interesting beach.  It has a train tressel as below.

This Tressel was built in 1900 and is a key railway addition to allow travel to San Francisco and points beyond.

It also has a pier, where many people enjoy fishing and they can launch small boats via  a crane.  In this photo one of the pesky pelicans attacked Luetta when she got to close.  They have been fed left over bait for so long I'm not sure they can fish for themselves anymore.

Here is a close-up.

The highlight of the night was when Jon, Danielle and our grandkids (Dawna, Lawrence, and Naomi) showed up.  We enjoyed showing them around.

As you can see they had dinner at a place that offers pirate hats etc.

Day 28 San Simeon SP to Pisma Beach Oceano SP

Here are the miles for today:  http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/rp6-ioqObBc

Today a fairly easy ride of about 50 miles through Morro Bay, San Luis Obisbo, and on to Pismo Beach.

Here is the entering sign for Morro Bay with Morro Rock in the back ground.

Some of you may remember one scout trip where one scout missed the turn off to our camp site in this city and went almost half way to San Luis Obisbo.  Can you remember who it was?

Here is a photo of the ubquitous, California Poppy.

We finally arrived at our destination city.

We are so excited to have Jon and family join us tomorrow in Gaviota State Park.

Day 27 Pfeiffer Big Sur SP to San Simeon SP

Here are the miles for today:  http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/pD1WPXKAXaY

This day had two good sized climbs, the first right after Pfeiffer Big Sur and the second was a double peaked challange with Gorda Mountain first and Ragged Point second.  It was also a long day with 69 miles.  I left at 7:30 a.m. with google predicting a 9 hour day.

Here I am leaving.

Here are some photos of the scenery, I enjoyed taking pictures of the wildflowers along the rode.  They have changed sustantially from points further north.

The one smells like licorice.

It turned out the first mountain climb was not to hard but the second double topped on was more "fun" aka steeper.  Here a picture looking back at the descent from the first one.

Here is Ragged point almost completed.

With the mountains behind me you now see the flat strait road to San Simeon, after a screaming descent (sorry no photos, I was to busy watching the road and being safe.

It turns out that the google time estimate was way off, that in combination with my early departure allowed Luetta and I to take one of the last tours of the Hearst Mansion. Here is a photo of Luetta by the Neptune pool after this very interesting tour.

And here I am in front of one of the guest cottages, you should see the main house.

Another treat was seeing the elephant seals that are on this coast.  Here is one photo of the many we took.  They had very interesting behaviors.  Here they are pushing each other as they point their heads up, every once in a while taking a nip at the others neck.

All in all a fun day biking and fun activities afterward as well.

Day 26 Monterey to Pfeiffer Big Sur SP

Here is my milage for this:  http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/qOcXMMP-rDY

We were invited to stay with the Tuoiti's at Sally's home in Monterey.  It was so fun to visit with the whole family and meet Sherrie's mother, Sally.  Thanks again for your great hospitality.  We had dinner with them and their Bishop Martinez who is an avid mountain biker, and had Ron Hawkins as his first leader during their missions in Michigan.  Here is a photo of us and the Tuoiti's.

On the way out of Monterey, through Carmel I passed Monastary Beach.  This is memorable since we often had lunch here on my Scout bike trips and now Weston and Jon like to scuba dive here.

I also passed Point Lobos where Jon and Weston like to Scuba.  Joe also dived here and Cheryl gave it a try.

Not very big hills going to Pfeiffer Big Sur campgound, here are some photos of the scenery.

It was a shorter ride today since I couldn't get reservations further into Big Sur.  After the ride Luetta and I were able to visit McWay falls.  Here is a photo.

We had fun with silhouettes in the passageway under highway 1 to the falls overlook.

We also hiked several miles to Pfeiffer Falls and the valley overlook at Pfeiffer Big Sur.

It was fun at the valley overlook, looking at the first big climb I had for the next day and to the fog creeping over the western wall of the valley.

Day 25 Santa Cruz to Monterey CA

Here is my route for today.  http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/vSnSEsTJQkw

We were sad to say good-bye for a week to Jon, Danielle and our Grandchildren.  But we will see them in a week.

Luetta then took me to the location in Santa Cruz where I would have been if I had continued from Half Moon Bay, but the side trip was so much fun.  Here I am starting this day's trek.

My helmut is now improved with a large duct tape extended visor to help protect my nose from more sun burn,  I hope it works.  My face is well shaded in this picture.  This means there was sun in Santa Cruz.  By the time I got to New Brighton beach on San Andreas road the sun was gone.

The strawberry fields are prolific around here and today fog blankets them also.

I rode this route two times duing the Scout Camp we held the week before this bike trek started.  Here is the sign to Sunset Beach where we held our base camp.

At this camp we hiked the skyline to sea trail in the Big Basin Redwoods State Park in addition to biking back along this route we also kayaked in the Elkhorn slough.  Here is a photo of the seals we saw as we turned the corner to the slough.

In addition to biking this route this year with scouts I have done the whole Big Sur to Pismo Beach week long several times in past years with the scouts.  Here is the corner where one scout hit a patch of sand and got good road rash on his legs.  Guess who that was.

I was interested to find a road side stand where I and some scouts were introduced to Insanity Salsa.  I will always remember them tasting it on some chips and running out screaming for water.

As I entered the Monterey area I found the bike paths have been improved here is a section near Sand City that goes near the beach, it was very beautiful.

Luetta visited the Robert Louis Stevenson house in Monterey, but the inside was closed so she toured the garden only.

Another great day of biking.