April 22 -- and we're off ... well, tomorrow

We had breakfast with Alice and Peter at this neat little French Restaurant in Pacific Pallisades -- wonderful food, wonderful company, and then browsed through the market outside. After breakfast Sandy and I headed down to Costa Mesa, a one hour drive.

I checked in and had my bike checked over -- the mechanic adjusted the headset -- I signed some papers, promising to be good ... and then we tried to check into the hotel. The rooms were not ready yeat so we went for a drive and found a KMart. I had to pick up another bag, because I discovered that I was not restricted to 35 pounds -- that is the single bag limitation. The overall limit is 50 pounds -- so I'm golden ! I also had to pick up a lock for the bike box for shipping, since we're loading it up with glassware that Sandy picked up in Mexico.

I then started repacking my luggage -- I'm not finished yet -- and will probably do that another couple of times before all is said and done.

.... time passes ....

we just got back from the briefing, which went a couple of hours overtime ... and the worst part was going over the cue sheet for tomorrow -- all sorts of "but ignore that, turn right, watch out for ..." totally useless, since I for one cannot remember that kind of detail spread out over a 120 mile ride. The ride organizer, Mike Munk, says that tomorrow's cue sheet is the worst -- it had better be or I'll end up riding across the country twice from getting lost !!!

We then went out for dinner with Karen Klimas and Bill Reenstra -- Italian -- which from the looks of things will be better than we will eat for the next many many days. Denny's seems to be the order of the day at many stops. yucch.

But we're off. finally. We leave at 7am tomorrow (after breakfast at, guess what ... Denny's) and then dip our wheels in the ocean at Newport Beach and then start riding. I'll cover the route and the results tomorrow.

Oh ... Arlene ... if you're reading this ... we come down the Ramona Expressway and turn up 79, the canyon road to head to Beaumont -- familiar ? I just rode that route two days ago ! I'll call you from the road.