Sep 21 16:49:00 1992

 From:        Greg (G.A.)  Goodwin            (BNR) 

 Subject:     I'm back (and sorer than before)

All,

 Well, the title says it all. I made it safe and sound: 5 days and 550
miles (880 kilometers for those of us in Canada). It would have been
a little shorter, but I had a few 'detours'! (read: got lost/misdirected).

 I flew down to a wedding in L.A. from Ottawa on Friday, and then flew up
to Oakland airport on Sunday afternoon. $64 for the flight to Oakland and
then another $25 for the bike!! Boy do I feel ripped off for the latter.
Well, I managed to get the bike assembled outside the airport in about an
hours  time. After all was secure I started to cycle to the BART (subway)
station and after about 2 miles, my rear derailleur got sheared off. To
this day, I don't know  what happened, but it ended up in my spokes
somehow. I've been using the  same derailleur for 6 years or so now with
thousands of miles logged on to it, so I don't know why it deceided to let
go then. I suspect that it got bent or cracked somewhere on the flight.

 So, I was stuck in Oakland, where the roads seem to be made of broken
glass with a broken down bike. I removed the derailleur and put the chain
on one sprocket on the back and I was able to pedal for a while. However,
the  chain kept slipping down into a higher gear, and I couldn't use the
front deraileur, since the chain was almost touching the ground at that
point, and a smaller cog would have had the chain just rubbing on the
broken glass. I  made it to the BART station and got on a train to
downtown San Fran. On the train I met a really nice fellow cyclist from
Sausalito. He tried to track down a bike store for me in S.F. with
no luck. So, we got on the ferry across the bay to Sausalito and we were
able to find a couple of guys that were working on some bikes after work
in the back of a bike store. Well, I begged and pleaded my case, and they
sold me a new derailleur right there. 20 minutes and $25 later, I was back
to changing gears without manually lifting the  chain over with my hand.
Wahoo. I never did find out the guys name that helped me out, but to him
I owe a great deal for my trip. It really gives me a warm feeling, when a
complete stranger would take time out of his day to help me out just
because he's a nice guy. This gives me a better feeling about California,
as the last time I was down in the state with my wife, we got our car
broken into and had been ripped off for a pair of shoes as well on the
same day.

 I stayed in the Marin Headlands campground that night. A very beautiful
spot with an excellent view of the Golden Gate bridge and of San
Francisco. It was a full moon that night, so everything was lit up really
well. At first light, I headed south. From there, the trip was
pretty  uneventful. The scenery was fantastic every mile. (with a few
exceptions) and most people were really friendly. I managed to meet quite
a few people in the hiker/biker camp spots. Lots of Germans, Americans and
one Japaneese guy. This guy was carrying a ton of stuff. He had these huge
panniers and had stuff taped all over his bike. I never did see the guy
pedal it, but I ran into some guys who said they would be surprised if he
lived through a week, the way he was wandering all over the road. He was
over to the USA for 6 months to see how Americans lived. I really hope he
makes it. Part of his problem was that he had seen every beach and surfer
movie of California, and he thought the whole state was just on big flat
beach. When I met him in Big Sur, he was one hurting dude. When I showed
him the elevation map as to what lie ahead, he almost fainted. Most
people that I met had the "Bicycling the Pacific Coast" book, and those
that didn't, seemed to be lost. The bikecentenial maps that some people
had were good, but not as good as the book.

 It was amazing to see the different skills of some of the riders that I
met along the way. Some people were going about 30 miles every couple of
days to see all the sights, and then there was me; riding sun up till
about 4 every day. A couple of stops for food and water (to mix the 300
gallons of gatorade that I seem to have dranken). After 3 days I was
pretty sick of power bars and gatorade, so I stopped into a Dennys on
Thursday and bulked up on the breakfast menu. Eat as much as you can, as
fast as you can. Friday's breakfast was in Santa Barbara. This was perhaps
the nicest town that I rode though. I wish that I had more time to spend
there. For those interested, I'll list my camping sites: Sunday; Marin
Headlands, Monday; New Brighton, Tuesday: Big Sur, Wednesday: Morro Bay,
Thusday; Refugio State Beach and Friday in a nice soft bed in L.A. (after
a half dozen beers and some real food).

 So, if I had to do it again. I'd take more time and enjoy some of the
stops along the way. I'd seen them all on a previous drive, but It would
have been  nice to stop in Monterey and some of the better beach spots for
a couple of hours or so. The weather couldn't have been much better. I
had a hazy morning on Monday and Tuesday, and the rest of the time it was
incredibly sunny.



   ,__o      Greg Goodwin
 _-\_<,      "Eat Right, Get Lots of Sleep, Drink Plenty
(*)/'(*)     of Fluids and GO LIKE HELL"

              @BNR, Ottawa, Canada, K1Y 7W6