san francisco–monterey

My friend Brian is a cyclist, who, along with a couple fellow cycling enthusiasts, have been riding up and down Southern California for the past 10+ years, traversing between San Diego and Santa Barbara many times over. Having done that, they set their eyes on the California coastline and decided to extend their bicycle reach all the way to San Francisco, one tour at a time.

They were near reaching that goal after successfully completing two major tours in recent years: one between Santa Barbara and Cambria, the other between Cambria and Monterey.

All that was left was a ride between Monterey and San Francisco.

For such an effort to be successful, they need some logistic help: someone to drive with them (and their bicycles) to the starting point and drop them off, then continue to drive to the destination point to pick them up at the end of their ride, so they won't have to ride the same way back to the starting point which would be too exhausting and time consuming for these weekend warriors who need to report back to work the next day.

They had found their driving help, booked the hotel/motel rooms, done the training, etc., when at the last minute their designated driving help had a family emergency and could not make it. They were disappointed and about to cancel the trip when Brian called me and asked if I could be that driving help instead, and I said yes.

So on the Memorial Weekend last week, all four of us–Brian, his two cyclist friends, I–and three road bikes hopped on a Subaru SUV and drove all the way to a little town a couple miles north of San Francisco and started our two-day, 140-mile coastline tour to Monterey.

The plan was simple: While they rode their bikes on the bike paths, which mostly paralleled Pacific Coast Highway (State Route 1), I drove the car on PCH, might stop by anywhere anytime I wanted, as long as I met them at designated lunch stops (Burger Kings, for lack of In-N-Out Burgers which were our favorite in those areas) and hotel check-in and the final destination of their ride the second day.

So here were what a free roaming soul like myself encountered along a beautiful stretch of Golden State coastline on a sunny Memorial Weekend:

I saw:

cliffy beach

​sandy beach

​tide pools beach

​lost pier beach

​busy beach

​lighthouse

​bridge

​wind/kite surfing

I walked on:

wide berm trail

narrow rocky trail

​marshland trail

​railroad track

​At the city of Santa Cruz, where we stayed for the night, I visited the historical Santa Cruz Mission in the morning, a much humbler version of the world famous San Juan Capistrano Mission in my hometown, but a quieter (I was the single visitor there) and closer setting that allowed me to study the artifacts better.

 
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I also took a bench seat at the little fountain garden outside the Cathedral to have a read of a short story from the book I brought with me.

I met and picked up my three amigo cyclists at a McDonald's outside the Fisherman's Wharf in Monterey as planned and we headed home from there. Mission accomplished, we were all happy and chatty. Brian had been my long time friend, but Jason and Liming were no total strangers either. I had ridden with them a couple times before, and both were from Taiwan and of IT backgrounds. We exchanged our life stories and cracked jokes from time to time. What stood out most about them for me was their enthusiasm for the outdoors: Besides cycling, Jason was a seasoned angler, Liming a camper, and both were training (they purposely slept on the floors of the motel/hotel rooms we stayed) for a multi-day backpacking trip in deep Yosemite mountains they planned to take in the coming summer.

But I would be amiss if I did not mention the athleticism and positivity of my dear friend Brian, who–imagine that–was on a hospital bed due to a stroke he suffered just a little more than a year ago! Through grit and tenacity, regimented diet and exercises, he had regained full health and enjoyed the challenge and fun of this long ride just like Jason and Liming did! What a comeback story, what an awesome inspiration for us all!!