Day: 79
SEATTLE.LOS ANGELES.WORLDWIDE
Category / USA
An assortment of posts from the “Land of the Free”
Day: 78
Yeah…. so when I decided to come to Newport Beach I was expecting two weeks of blue skies and hot weather. I’m on my ninth day here and the sky barely spits out any sunshine. At least the beer is cold. Almost ready to get back out on the road to do some more stupid shit and tell you all about it.
This little stop home could have been of the best World Tour choices I could have made. It’s helping me get my bearings and start to once again see the unique and different things I was seeing everyday in the last 75 days of travel. I am starting to feel re-energized and am ready to get back out on the road soon with a fresh outlook on the world.
I spent most of the day (after a 35 mile ride) hanging out with my brother, Joanna, and Cathie having some drinks, posing for pictures on the beach, and going to the second worst movie ever, Poseiden (The credit for worst movie ever still has to be Solaris).
Aarons review of the movie (as the credits rolled);
“I just wasted two hours of my life”
Don’t waste two hours of your life there’s too much to see, It’s my advice of the day.
Day: 75
Today is the first day since I bought my bike that I didn’t set out for a heavy ride to help get into shape. Instead I went to the grocery store with Aaron with a list of stuff that we needed for our family holiday gathering at the beach. Everyone (aunts, uncles, cousins, and Grandpa) was coming out to the beach to spend a day gathered with the family. I spent most of the afternoon talking about my trip to everyone and showing Grandpa a bunch of pictures from my trip so far.
We had a great feast of scallops, seared ahi, chicken and assorted salads, and followed that up with a quest to the pier to get shakes and malts at Ruby’s.
After dinner, shakes and the families departure, Aaron and I went to our room to have a smoke and listen to music for the rest of the night. After a few hours of hours of him sketching and me laying on the ground we turned off the lights and went to bed.
Three hours and thirty miles or bicycling this morning lead to a nice early afternoon nap and phone calls from Alissa and Vito who were coming out to spend the evening with me partying. Everyone came out for the Saturday night party, a bunch of Josh‘s college friends, Ed and Wes, Vito, Alissa and her boyfriend Phil, and even blog-reader/Josh’s secretary Kelly. The entire group of us drank far to much and slept on every available surface in the house.
Sometimes I think these entries just are not as interesting as me alone, but they sure are fun.
Day: 73
This morning I wanted to do my first big bicycle ride of my training for my PCH tour. I got on my bike and headed down PCH from Balboa to Lauguna, had breakfast, and rode back. It was a hilly ride and the roughly 30 miles put a slight(sarcasm; slightly more than slight) strain my legs. I got back exhausted around ten and settled in with Josh to watch Super Troopers while we waited for Aaron and his girlfriend, Nadine, to get here so we could all go out to lunch.
When Aaron and Nadine arrived we all (Mom&Mike, Josh&Sarah, Aaron&Nadine and myself) went over to a Newport Landing and enjoyed a spectacular meal overlooking the bay. This seems to happen to me all the time, the whole family goes out and I am always the loner, not that I mind, but once in every so often…
After lunch, Christine called and I headed over to her house (she lives about a block from the restaurant). We caught up on old times, played some Scrabble, listened to music and talked about my future travel plans. She had plans with her roommate so around seven I went back to the house on the beach and spent the rest of the night with the family.
Day: 72
Up again with the sun, I woke up Daniel, and we got on our bikes for a ride up to Huntington Beach for breakfast at the Sugar Shack (a great local restaurant). We rode back and Dan had to take off to get to work and I just prepared myself for another lazy day. I spent the morning reading and taking in all the beach go-ers walking by on the beach in front of our rented house. Mike(my step dad) brought us chicken teriyaki for lunch and I headed to my bed for an afternoon nap.
I got up around five in the afternoon, my sister and her husband were heading out for a evening out, and I didn’t really feel like spending the night with two screaming girls (who wouldn’t take naps today) I borrowed a car and headed out to run some errands. I stop at the books store and read up on my upcoming trip up the coast, then headed over to REI to shop around for some more bike gear I am going to need. It was still early after my shopping, I went over to South Coast Plaza to see what movies were playing. I watched Sentinal, and headed back to crash around eleven.
Day: 71
Vito, says my life here on the beach is just like the life of a dog. Get up, eat, lay around, eat, drink, take a walk, take a nap, eat, drink, sleep. Now while things might not be exactly like that, I can see the comparison makes some sense.
This morning I woke up early, a little prior to seven, and still excited about my new bike I decided to go for a ride to start getting myself in shape. I rode about 15 miles, from Balboa Pier to Huntington Pier and back again. The only thing this made me realize is exactly how out of shape I am. My goal that I have set for myself is to be able to ride 50 miles a day, with my bike fully loaded, by the 29th of this month. That gives me roughly two and half weeks.
I got back from my ride, ate breakfast, took a nap, read a book (The Shipping News, which I found in a closet here), ate lunch, had a drink (Goose Cape Cod, finally some Goose Nellie!), sat on the patio watching the world go by, had another drink, read some more, took another little ride with my friend Daniel, had another drink, ate dinner with the family, and went to sleep. I think Vito is right, my life is extremely similar to the amount of responsibilities of a dog.
Day: 70
Getting ready for my 1300 mile bike ride up Pacific Coast Highway, I headed over to REI and threw down the credit card for my brand new $650 touring bicycle complete with generated headlight (sweet!). That was the most excitement of my day, the rest was spent having cocktails with my sister on the patio overlooking the Pacific and heading out to dinner with the famiy. I don’t know how much writing I’ll be doing in the next couple of weeks, life is just to relaxing, but I will keep bringing you tidbits of my life.