Fandango

The California coast is absolutely amazing to look at in magazines. It’s even better from the seat of a motorcycle. I leaned this while taking a trip to the San Francisco Bay area to visit family recently. I had been up and down the coast a few times but had never really appreciated the roads until now. I have been riding street bikes for about a year now. I guess it was a logical (or illogical) progression from riding bicycles pretty seriously for the past few years.

I received a call from my mom that they would be visiting my brother’s family the weekend of September 1^st. That just s happened to be my mother’s birthday, and I hadn’t seen her in a while. Simple decision, yes? I just so happened to have that weekend off from work, and had some time, so off I went. The bike, a Honda RC51 racebike got new tires, and I loaded up the saddlebags for the journey.

The first hundred or so miles were pretty boring. Up the 405 to Ventura, where Andrew “The Map” Lee said I needed to cut out the 33 to Ojai. “Really fun roads” he said. Andrew has a lot of time on both motorcycles and bicycles and has made it his mission to be the definitive source for touring the Western US, so who was I to argue. The 33 was as advertised. Fun winding roads, up to about 5000 feet, then back down into the valley. The only snag was the wildfire that had just been knocked down a few days before. Due to the massive vehicular traffic, there was a bit of gravel strewn about on the highway, which at speed can make a tight corner kind of a nail biter. Thanks for the new tires!

I survived the trip, and on the 166 lucked out and got gas at the brand new fueling station in New Cuyama. “Cash only. Our credit machine isn’t up yet.” The RC51 has short legs, being designed for hour-long World Superbike and AMA Superbike races. I arrived in Santa Maria and headed up the mighty 101 to San Luis Obisbo, one of my favorite towns in California.

After that, the fun really began. Up into the coastal areas, past Hearst Castle (I didn’t go up to say Hi.). Then things got exciting. Windy, twisty, narrow stuff that was seemingly made for sport bikes. The cars were there for the views, and would stop and gawk at the sheer beauty that is the California coastline, which is absolutely amazing to see. Luckily, there are plenty of spots to get around the cars, and traffic was pretty light for a holiday weekend.

I was pretty much screaming in the helmet at the absurdity of turn after perfect turn. I was in heaven and really happy I was not on a fat pig of a Harley. As far as I was concerned, they might as well have been in cars, as the only thing they got out of being on a motorcycle was sunburn. To each his own…

Gas at Big Sur then charged into Monterrey, where I cut over to Salinas. I stopped of at Laguna Seca Raceway with thoughts of sneaking onto the track for a lap, but there was a 24-hour mountain bike race going on. Security in full force. Oh well.

From there it was all business. Over to the 101 then up the 680. Freeway riding at its best. I could feel the flat spot wearing in the middle of my rear tire. Nearly. I got to San Jose, and HAD to stop. Monkey butt had taken over. The long day in the saddle had taken its toll. The RC51 seat is a little softer than the metal they use to drill for diamonds, but not much. The concrete freeways were beating me to death. I stopped, got a coffee and called Mom. They were just leaving the Highland Games, where my teen prodigy niece Amanda was competing at bagpipes. Amanda is absolutely amazing. She is rated a 2, on a scale of 1-4 with 1 the top. She is 15 and regularly beats people with many more years playing. It’s a truly talented family and I was looking forward to the band competition the next day.

I pushed north and arrived in Benicia a bit ahead of schedule. I had not been to my brothers in a few years, and he lives in a bedroom community, so all the houses look alike. I stopped in front “Gary’s” house, where a key was to be hidden for me. Try as I might, I couldn’t locate the key. The side door into the garage was open. I walked in, noted that Gary had rearranged the garage, and into the house. A male, Gary’s age but not Gary said “Hello”. I responded, “ I’m in the wrong house…this isn’t 151 is it…?” Oops.

Out I went, and thankfully to the correct house, where I made my way in, but still through the side door, as the arranged hide-a- key was not to be found. (Gary, lock your garage) A few moments later, the clan arrived home. Amanda had been victorious in her solo events, and everyone was having a good day. I explained how I had wandered into their neighbor’s house so Gary wouldn’t be surprised when he was told “someone who said he was wearing black leather and said he was your brother walked into our house a few nights ago”.

I had some Chinese they had gotten for me (apparently they liked the vegetable egg fooyung, and ate most of it), a beer (two), chatted with my mom, and went to bed. I slept very well.

The next morning the Highland Games continued. We went early, dropped Amanda off with her band mates, and wandered about. Gary had been doing these festivals for several years, so it was old hat for him. He worked Amanda’s bands (Prince Charles Pipe Band) booth selling shirts and hats for a bit, so I was on my own. I listened to the Wicked Tinkers for a while. They are a very talented band that has fused traditional Scottish music and instruments with a modern style.

I watched some of the sheep herding events, where the dogs were on the young side, so they were pretty excitable. Hmmm. Reminded me of one of my dogs. Smart, but easily distracted. The heavy events were…heavy. Large men throwing heavy things over bars, the caber toss where the object is to throw a long pole end over end as straight as possible, and the hammer toss, which is an iron ball at the end of a rod that is thrown. It begins with a foot planted spin that appears as though it makes a lot of money for orthopedic surgeons. An avian rescue group was there, specializing in raptors. They had a Golden Eagle there that had lost several of its talons when it was electrocuted on a power line. The bird was amazingly docile, but I could tell by the look the bird had that it knew it was in charge. The bird has a wingspan of seven feet and weighs sixteen pounds.

Soon, Gary was freed from his sales servitude and we went to get seats to watch the bands. Some of the grade 1 bands played first. Wow. Really incredible. In this particular competition, all the pipers generally are playing the exact same music. There is no credit given for harmonies. The goal is for all the pipes to sound as one.

Amanda’s band played and was on it. Another band was close, but in the end, they came out on top. We went back to the band staging area as everyone prepared for the closing ceremonies. The USMC band of San Diego was to play, and I wanted to see them. A friend of Gary’s had some free seats, so we scored. Otherwise it meant standing, and we had been standing all day. The awards were handed out, and praise (all well deserved) given. The Marine band played, and put on a good show. They started out very spit and polish, but loosened up a lot as they went on. It was a good PR move. Then all the bands marched out. Between 600 and 800 pipers and drummers, depending on who you listened to. The finale was a soloist playing Amazing Grace, then accompanied by the entire group. Absolutely incredible. I took video with my camera, but it doesn’t come close to capturing the power of the sound I heard. I guess you just had to be there.

We headed back to the band compound and packed up. Amanda stayed with the band, as they were headed to SF for the night’s celebrations. We drove back to Gary’s in the Prius, which is a pretty amazing car. It was the first time I had been in one. It is a really well thought out car, and I would like to see the technology in more cars in the future. I guess we are headed that way, as I see Chevy has a hybrid Tahoe out now. We had a nice dinner and called it a night. Everyone was pretty well exhausted by the long day.

The next morning, we took the dogs for a walk and located a cache that Kyla, the younger of my two nieces had hidden the day before with Grandma Jan and Grampa Greg. They are into Geocaching, which is a pretty cool way to add some adventure to a hike. It involves a GPS and the goal is to locate a cache that someone has hidden and posted the latitude and longitude coordinates to on one of several websites. Kinda cool.

We headed back to the house and Mom and Greg packed up and headed up the coast. I packed and headed south. My friend Sol lives in the Bay Area and was having a Labor Day party. I thought about it and didn’t want to fight holiday traffic on the freeway, so I stopped by. The food was great and as expected, Sol has really cool friends and roommates, not to mention a very comfortable couch. I was up by 7 and on the road about 8.

More freeway riding down the 680, but as soon as I hit the 17 to Santa Cruz, the fun began. It reminded me of Buckhorn Summit. Fast and twisty roads. Traffic was fairly light so I was able to make good time. Once I got to the 1, I was back in heaven. Sorry I didn’t take too many photos, but I was so into the riding that I did not want to stop.

Fortunately, I was forced to stop just a bit south of Big Sur. I heard a change in the exhaust note of the RC51 and looked down to make a quick inspection. The right muffler, a really nice titanium Sato exhaust was about to fall off. All the rivets holding the midpipe to the can had broken and the exhaust bracket was all that was holding the pipe on. I stopped immediately and took a moment to take a few photos of one of the prettiest beaches on the California coast. I was able to borrow one of the two springs from the other side exhaust and held it all together. I stopped at a Chevron in Cambria, and the mechanic on duty was able to put some new rivets in. They weren’t perfect, but they got me down the coast. Thanks Dave! On a side note, I stopped in San Luis Obisbo and tried to get some more appropriate rivets put in but none of the three shops I visited seemed able to find the time to do the 10 minute job that Dave, at a Chevron had been more than happy to do.

Aloha report:

Cambria: 1

San Luis Obisbo: 0

Back on the road and into Los Angeles. Remember the seat on the RC51 being less than comfortable? Yeah. Still hurt. The LA freeways were not helping. I want to have a few words with whoever decided to use concrete for freeways. Not good on a motorcycle. I was pretty close to crying the last hour of the trip. There was just no way for me to get comfortable. As I got closer to home, I had to fight the urge to pin the throttle and take the RC up to the 150 I know it can do. I reached a Zen like state from the pain, and rolled southward. As I made the familiar turn onto my street, I was glad to see that the house was still standing. I parked the bike and walked into the house. A quick hello to Crash, the cat, then out into the yard for some time with the dogs. As usual they were thrilled to see me. As I was them. I poured a beer, and sat down to relax a bit and woke up a few hours later on the couch, wandered off to bed and slept like the dead.

Now I need another motorcycle. Maybe one with a little more padding. And next time I promise to take more photos. By the way Dad, sorry I didn't have enough time to make it up to Redding.

Take care all.