Coast to Coast

Wow it has been an eventful few days.  Kerri took me out for my birthday Friday night.  She did not tell me where we were going until right before our scheduled reservation time.  The restaurant was called C Level and it was amazing looking.  As soon as you walk in the door you are greeted by soothing blue light and video screens all over the place simulating extravagant fish tanks.  The host greets us, Kerri gives our name and they say oh yes, party of 6, odd…..

So we walk down toward the table and I see Juan, Jeff whom I play pickleball with as well as their wives.  I was in shock as I had no clue Kerri arranged this.  She did very well not letting on, even expertly delaying our arrival when she heard one of them were running late.  I was blown away, in a good way.

This was a high end establishment with fantastic food.  Kerri and I wound up splitting a scallops entre which was delicious as well as having some mixed drinks.  All six of us had a great time eating, drinking and laughing.  Juan insisted we all visit the restroom because of it’s unique aesthetic with more soft blue light, peaceful music and a blue spotlight on both the toilet and the sink.  It was such a nice time.  The fact that Kerri put this all together for me was amazing, and much appreciated…..

Saturday morning we got out by 6AM to make our flight that departed at 8:45. We grabbed coffee on the way where I had a funny interaction with the clerk who called me out for mistakenly ordering a pancake breakfast sandwich. I had made a change to get us seated together on both non-stop flights.  I was happy to be able to get us together.  Unfortunately doing so put us in a row with limited leg room and non-reclining seats.  It wasn’t ideal but better than us sitting apart.  I thought a direct flight was a nice bonus and time saver.  I did not think much about the reality of sitting on a plane for 5 hours plus, which was a loong time to sit there for both Kerri and I.  We rotated between napping, watching American Sniper on my phone and talking to a sweet woman next to us who had just lost her husband recently.  She said they were married just short of 60 years, which is incredible. She lives in Marco but was going to California to stay with her daughter over the holidays.  She gave Kerri and I cute compliments.  I think she thought we have been together longer than reality which was very sweet.

We finally landed, standing up felt amazing after so much time.  After making our way to baggage claim I texted Larry who was picking us up.  It was a tight fit with our luggage and the EUC and accompanying gear.  We had a good drive to Downey with Larry telling us a lot of stories along the way.  Larry and Kerri also talked martial arts as he has taught Kung Fu for years and Kerri is working on her 3rd degree black belt in karate.

We were looking for lunch and stopped at a small Mexican place that only had tacos and they were made out of various cow parts like beef cheek, not a great fit so we got back in the car and headed towards central Downey.  We wound up having lunch at this place called Porto’s.  It was busy, very busy.  They have incredible baked goods and conventional food.  I figured it was good stuff based on how busy it was.  I was right.

All three of us enjoyed our food which included some diverse choices including potato balls.  We also snagged some baked goods for us to enjoy in our AirBnB later.  Even though we were a bit earlier than the official 3PM check in we decided to see if we could get in awhile, which we did.  The woman that owns the listing was there and talked to Kerri exclusively because she realized she spoke spanish fluently.

When I saw the picture of the listing online before booking it looked fine, for me, as originally I was coming solo.  It became quickly apparent it was not ideal.  The room has an odd assortment of furniture scattered about which leaves very little practical usable space for someone that is traveling.  This issue was made worse by the abundance of random things scattered around the space including 4 different bibles, Mickey Mouse dolls, a kettleball, fake plants and more.  It was very clear that this room was a DIY project that had corners cut everywhere.  I feel safe in assuming no permits were pulled in the construction of the space.  One of the things the woman told Kerri was that you weren’t supposed to flush toilet paper in the toilet as it could cause problems. Instead you are supposed to throw paper in some can. Really….. I wasn’t renting in central america where this is common practice.

The great thing about Kerri is she can roll with the punches.  Each silly or poorly executed thing we found was just another thing for us to laugh about, like the heater that popped a breaker ever 3 minutes, the barking dog outside our window, the corner of an uneaten sandwich on the counter, and much, much more.  The bed was comfy at least although it had to double as the main place to put our luggage to go through it since no other practical space existed in the room.

Saturday night we were on our own to explore and explore we did.  We utilized Ubers to get around.  We had dinner at a place called Ola.  They had massive margaritas that Kerri and I both enjoyed.  We also made another pit stop at Portos to grab some of their outstanding baked goods.  The Uber driver experience was very diverse.  We had one outgoing very talkative guy that revealed to us he was currently teaching himself to learn German and Russian at the same time.  He is using just YouTube to  do this which I thought was impressive.  We had one guy that evidently spoke next to zero english although he knew how to say seatbelt, which he wanted us to secure.  His app pointed him to a different address than we requested.  He wanted to let us out in the middle of a residential neighborhood.  We refused and got him steered to the correct address.

Our first night in the Air BnB was “interesting” as we got to admire the half assed efforts that surrounded us throughout the room. The bathroom was the most egregious example but the entire space was kind of a mess.  We also had a barking dog next door that thankfully quieted down before midnight.  The bed was comfortable enough but really there wasn’t much more positive to be said about the arrangements.

Sunday morning I was up early as I was supposed to meet Marty to for our big Mount Baldy ride.  I hopped on the wheel that Larry loaned me and rode to the nearby DD AND Starbucks, they were basically side by side.  When I rolled the wheel into Starbucks and put my Dunkin Donuts coffee on the table so I could place my order I got a number of curious glances.  Riding back to the room was a bit hairy as I had one cup of coffee in each hand meaning I had no way to grab the wheel if I needed to.  Luckily I made it back without launching coffee.

I grabbed all my gear, threw it in a backpack and pushed off for Marty’s which was only roughly a mile away.  It felt weird rolling through neighborhoods that I recognized from Marty’s years of videos.  I pulled up into his driveway and saw he was already loading up the truck for the day.  When I saw him I gave him a handshake/hug combo.  Despite never meeting him in person I felt no awkwardness as our interactions over the years made us both feel comfortable.  He gave me a quick tour of the workshop/garage where I had seen him work on dozens of wheels.

For this ride I was going to use Marty’s Sherman since it has a big battery.  The one thing it does not have is suspension which turned out to be quite a challenge for me during the day.  As we rode to the meetup point Marty and I caught up on the latest and greatest in both of our lives.  When we arrived at Mt Baldy there were a number of other local riders already there.  In total I think our group had 13-14 riders.  Many of these people knew me from my YouTube channel and I knew a handful of them as well.

Marty warned me about how cold it could be at the top of this ride.  As a result I had a bunch of layers on that had me sweating very early, however it did eventually get cold enough that I needed every piece of it.  The first 10-15 minutes of the ascent was fine however then Marty pulled off to tell me we were going to hit a brief trail section so I could experience it.  I definitely experienced it.  There was lots of ruts and washboard areas that were beating the hell out of my lower body.  With no suspension your legs/knees become the shock absorbers, my body simply was not accustomed to this type of abuse. Most of the riders had suspension wheels allowing them to gobble up the off roading with minimal issue.  There were even some riding seated while off road, crazy. By the time we came back onto the main road to ride my legs were already feeling way too spent for being this early in the ride, it only went downhill from there.

On the ride up I was consistently towards the tail end of the pack which is not surprising.  I really didn’t care, my goal was to simply survive the ride.  During the last half hour of climbing the cold really kicked in with icy snow by the sides of the road. My hands were frozen by the top.  My GoPro battery died early thanks to the cold as well so I only really recorded the first half of the ride.  At the top was a ski lodge where the group enjoyed a nice meal along with warmer temperatures.  I sat with Marty most of the time.  Some riders were charging their wheels over lunch just to make sure they had enough juice to continue their high speed descent down the mountain.

The ride down hill was brutal, for me.  My knees were already screaming along with quads that felt burned out.  When you are going downhill on a wheel for long periods of time you are doing nothing but pushing your weight back, using primarily your quads.  It was a shit show.  I now fell far behind most of the riders.  I have never ridden long, steep, extended downhill sections before.  Because of my lack of confidence I tried to keep my speed down.  As I was trying to brake downhill I was consistently experiencing wobbles which can result in a crash if not managed.  The issue was my legs were so tired I just did not feel safe trying to push speed, so I didn’t.  I kept my slow and steady pace all the way down.  The group would stop along the way to allow me to make up distance as needed so it was fine.  I felt badly being the anchor of the group but the last thing I wanted to do was go down hard, on Marty’s wheel no less.

When we finally exited the mountains it was a major relief.  I was wiped out. When we returned to Marty’s truck I tossed my gear on his truck bed and just stood there, trying to stretch a little bit.  Marty was very surprised I felt as beat up as I was as he said he felt next to nothing.  Of course he wasn’t factoring in that he does 100 mile rides routinely.  He has ridden these routes for 5 years or more.  I don’t think any flatlander would have done great in those conditions.  Some of the riders in the group were extremely fast like Roger and Dawn, they flew by me again and again.

When I got back to the AirBnB I was very tired.  Kerri and I were going to the party hosted by Larry that night.  After showering I laid down for at least a few minutes although it did very little to recharge my batteries.  Marty offered to pick us up and drive us to the party which was much appreciated since he was also going.  Larry lives right by LA, his house is in a beautiful area.  When we walked in we were treated to just fully decorated space that really gave you no choice but to get in the holiday spirit.  Kerri and I wasted little time before heading to the wine room, as alcohol is a near necessity for me when it comes to socializing in this type of scenario.

Larry had a company providing fresh tacos for the party, including the fish variety which I appreciated.  For most of the night we hung with the fellow EUC crowd, Marty, Roger, and Dawn primarily.  We also got to talk to Larry some but since he was the host of the party he was pulled a million directions.  Kerri and I found the desert room that had a huge table covered in baked goods.  We took a few small samples back to the table we were hanging at.  Within a few minutes I managed to spill some desert on Kerri’s pants, Kerri’s white pants.  Despite her being totally cool about it I felt terrible.  We tried to clean them up the best we could with napkins and tonic water.  Kerri got along well with Roger and Dawn as all of us chatted through the night.

Originally we were going to head out about 10:30 but I was told we needed to stick around a little for reasons unknown to me. It turns out Larry had a birthday cake for me, even though we were a few days after the event.  It was a unique combination of flavors that I enjoyed.  I even got everyone that was in the local vicinity to sing me happy birthday which was much appreciated.  After we finished our cake Marty, Kerri and I headed out.  I was really appreciative of Larry’s efforts.  He had gone out of his way to accommodate me as much as possible during the trip.

On Monday I woke up feeling extremely sore as expected.  Kerri and I decided to get out and walk to Porto’s, our eating establishment of choice during the trip.  It felt good to move my legs.  Kerri and I planned to go visit her half brother in Ventura on Monday.  The thought was we would go there, stay the night and then come back Tuesday.  Well after two days of Ubering around we realized that our original idea of not renting a car would be a cost savings was just not true.  Our original plan was to Uber to a train station, take a train to Ventura and then Uber again as needed.  This had two big disadvantages, cost and lack of flexibility as there were only two time slots for the train, neither being ideal. So I told Kerri we will just rent a car.  I reserved it Sunday night and we picked it up after breakfast on Monday, a Rav 4.

We went back to the room and headed out to Ventura early afternoon.  I recalled from my trip to Cali 20+ years ago how unfun it was driving in the state due to immense traffic.  The nice part was I got to drive with Kerri who can be very entertaining.  Even being stuck in bumper to bumper traffic is more bearable when she is the co-pilot.  The drive to Ventura took roughly two hours.  Kerri had not seen Tom and Rob for a very long time and was excited.  We pulled up to their beautiful house and got a very warm greeting from both of them as well as their adorable dog Oliver.

After catching up for a bit we made plans for the evening to go to a restaurant downtown that Tom and Rob have enjoyed many times.  Neither Kerri or I had packed a coat, thankfully we were able to borrow a couple as the temperatures had dropped significantly as soon as the sun went down.  We actually sat outdoors for our meal which I thought at first would be problematic but the place had strategically placed heaters around the seating area so none of us were bothered by the temperature.

The food was outstanding, all of us enjoyed our meals while the conversation flowed.  Afterwards we decided to walk the nearby main street.  Most of the establishments were closed at that time but a few were open, one of which we snagged this sweet charcuterie book that Kerri really liked.  We also had a cute picture of us taken in front of the big Christmas tree in the street.  With no space heaters to save us the cold air made our main street tour on the brief side as we fast walked back to the car. We had a great night.

On Tuesday I had even worse second day soreness.  Originally I had ideas of meeting up with Larry to ride during the day but his available time slot and my location being two hours north of LA would have made it logistically difficult to impossible so we instead planned to meet up on Wednesday as part of Marty’s group ride.  After hanging with Rob and Tom for a little while in the morning Kerri and I headed out to grab breakfast at a cozy little place.  Her and I often share meals which is something I never realized that I liked, until her introducing me to it.  After eating we went to a nearby Patagonia store, it seemed like their HQ location.  Kerri likes their clothing so we figured we would check it out while in the vicinity.  They had some nice stuff but we didn’t buy anything.

We then cruised up to Santa Barbara to look around.  It was beautiful but most of the places we thought to check out were not really doing much until evening, we were there around noon.  It was still a beautiful day so we just took some time to walk around and enjoy it before finding the car and heading back south.  Kerri had suggested that maybe we could find a nearby pickleball court to play when we got back.  We found a supposed good one about 6 miles away.  I strapped on my knee braces and took a fresh dose of Advil before heading out.  The courts were in the middle of beautiful park but there was a hitch.  There was no fencing, anywhere.  Instead the three courts were side by side, in the open.

The court itself was nice but the lack of barriers meant you had a lot of interruptions by balls coming from the adjacent courts and you were chasing balls down constantly as they rolled unobstructed for 10-20 yards on many points.  We both had fun playing although we probably put in a couple thousand steps chasing down balls along the way.  We could not play that long because I had a date to go live stream with Marty at his place, something we always thought we be cool but never had the opportunity to do in the more than 6 years we have known each other.

I rode Larry’s Hero over to Marty’s place.  In my backpack I had my laptop and webcam, the basics needed to stream.  I got us up and streaming pretty easily.  Despite the limited notice we had pretty good turnout once word got around that Marty and I were streaming together.  We were on live for almost two hours.  It was easy  streaming with Marty because we had done it before many times, just from other sides of the country.

After the stream was over Marty let me test out a few of the wheels in his collection that I had never ridden before.  The most extreme wheel was the Master Pro with a $4000+ price tag and a battery big enough to easily take you 100 miles or further.  It was a great stream, IMO.

Kerri was waiting for me to eat dinner.  She got creative and went to Trader Joe’s to get us some food and wine that she could prepare dinner in the room, which I appreciated big time.  The shitty microwave oven would pop the circuit breaker every 30 seconds or less but it fit in with the rest of poorly laid out room.  Eventually we wound up sitting down and enjoying a meal that I found totally satisfying.  I loved that she was able to come up with it on the fly.

So just like that it was Wednesday, our last full day in California.  The plan was for me to go ride with Marty and Larry for a good portion of the day while Kerri took the rental car to do whatever she wanted.  I got up early enough that I could run and go get coffee for Kerri and I before I rode the Hero back over to Marty’s.  Marty said the say she take us until maybe 4 or 430 so I used that info to tentatively plan with Kerri that we would go out for a nice dinner for our final night which we were both excited about.

The ride for Wednesday was originally pitched to me by Marty as easier than what we did Sunday.  It was broken into two parts, the 11 mile Fullerton loop and then the Queen Mary ride which goes along the river and beach trails, ok, great.  Well it quickly became apparent that the Fullerton Loop was no joke, it was 11 miles of primarily trail riding.  Having a suspension wheel surely helps in this scenario but I knew this was still going to have a lot of suck involved, it did.

Much like Mt Baldy, the downhill sections were the worst.  This was exacerbated by how washed out and rutty certain sections of the trail were.  There were multiple times I was right on the edge of falling.  I did come off the wheel once but luckily it resulted in only a minor fall.  After those 11 miles I was still beat, even with the suspension assist.  The suspension eats up some of the impact on the knees but it does nothing to help the load on the quads when you are going steep downhill, at least not for me.

So when we got back to the truck after finishing the loop I see a text on my phone from Kerri, telling me she ripped the room apart looking for the car key.  As soon as I read it I reached in my pocket and felt the key residing there.  Instantly a wave of anger and frustration washed over me.  I was so pissed at myself.  I was rushing to get out of the room after picking up coffee and simply forgot I had the keys.  We were way too far away to have Marty take me back.  I scrambled for ideas to remedy the situation.  The only tangible thing I could come up with was perhaps contacting the local rental office and see if they have a second set of keys.  However by the time I saw her original message time had passed and she just Ubered over to a nearby mall and was burning time there.  The rest of the day I felt badly that she was stuck because of my mistake.  To add insult to injury I got a text from the lovely Air BnB hosts that the car had to be moved because it was street cleaning day.  Well of course that didn’t happen either so I was rewarded with a citation for that as well.

Kerri did tell me about an altercation she had with the woman that runs the BnB.  There was a washing machine and dryer right outside our room.  Kerri had thrown a load of laundry in the day before.  Evidently the owner did not like this and posted a sign in spanish (all the signs were in spanish) that the laundry wasn’t for guest use.  Well on Wednesday Kerri wanted to do one more quick load, feeling like with all of the rigged accommodations we had been dealing with, doing laundry should not be a big deal.  So she started a load but then came out later finding the woman pulling out the wet clothes and telling her to go to a laundromat.  The end result was an argument where Kerri pointed out just how lacking and misleading the room was in reality compared to the online description.  In the end Kerri was allowed to finish washing the clothes, score one point for the good guys.

The second part of the ride was along river and beach trails to the Queen Mary.  It was flat which I enjoyed but I realized that there was no way this was going to get done in the time guidelines Marty gave me.  It was a little after 4PM and he still wanted to go another few miles to get us right in front of the ship.  Larry had time constraints as well so we turned around and hauled ass back.  The guilt I felt about the key in my pocket was now amplified by the ETA I gave Kerri in the morning being totally inaccurate.  Thanks to rush hour traffic I didn’t get back to the Air BnB until something like 6:15 or 6:30.  I am the type of person that puts value in being on time, doing what I say, being responsible for outcomes, all of that went out the window that day.  We wound up actually having a nice meal at a place named BJ’s, which Marty suggested.  The pink cadillac martinis helped melt some of the stress and frustration from the days events.

So I had been trying to make arrangements to return the rental car to the airport instead of the local Downey office.  It would greatly simplify our logistics.  I called and tried to do it earlier in the week and they said no.  However I got a response from a text I sent to the location saying I could do that for a $50 charge.  I okayed the charge but never got a response that they actually made the change so I was unsure if we were still good to drop at the airport or not.  Kerri suggested that since we have the text stating they would do it we should have our asses covered if it’s questioned.  I liked her logic so we went with it.  I was all ready for an argument about it with Enterprise staff but it never materialized as the final bill included the extra $50 with no additional questions asked.

We got to the airport with time to spare and chilled for a couple hours before getting on the flight.  We had the benefit of a tailwind that made our return trip at least 45 minutes faster than the ride to LA.  It also was nice that we had seats that actually reclined this time.  We got back to Florida a little before 9PM.  The 3 hour time change made it feel less late but we when we did fall asleep it was like a rock, we both were tired.  Ever since the Baldy ride I have had a persistent runny nose which has been a little maddening.  The Nyquil I took last night helped my sleep further.

So looking back on the whirlwind 5 day trip it is with very fond memories.  This was my first time traveling with Kerri which is always a good way to get a sense of how a couple interacts in an extended one on one situation.  I expected that the end result in our example would be positive, and it was.  Time and again she made me laugh and smile, even when things were less than ideal.  I really appreciated it, and her.

Today I have been playing catch up both doing things around the house and online including editing the three videos you see below and completing this blog entry. I am looking forward to one of the best holiday seasons I have anticipated in a very long time and feel lucky in being able to say that.