10/28 Spent the last 2 days riding along the coast on either the 101 or the PCH. Traffic is very heavy at times but I still see the big trucks moving over a little when they whiz by. Since this is also a very popular bicycle route the shoulders are nice and wide and there is almost no debris on it. As far as seeing other riders its been pretty quiet. A lot of spandex-laden speed racers go whizzing by and I always nod or wave but 90% of them are jerks and don’t wave back.
One spandex guy was getting a little crazy with some drifting on a very flat, straight section of road. With his buddy driving, he rode within inches of the back bumper as fast as he could. When I caught up to where they’d stopped down the road the guy on the bike said he got up to 58 mph.
A minor highlight a couple days ago was riding through the University of Santa Barbra campus. My GPS did a great job of routing me along the maze of bike paths so amazingly I didn’t get lost. There were a million bikes and a whole lot of beautiful California girls to admire. 
Spent last night at Carpinteria Beach State Park. This place was a mess. First of all they don’t let you check-in to the hike/bike site until 4pm. Even better, you have to be out by 9am! And they charge $10 to top it off. I ended up getting there at 3pm, so not having anything better to do I rode a couple blocks over the pub/brewery. That ended up being a mistake. The beer was great, the people I talked to awesome but I may have posted at least 1 drunken Facebook update and 24 hours later I still feel a little woozy. Back at camp a couple hours later I set up my tent and lay down. Didn’t even eat dinner. At midnight I think I ate an entire bag of Fig Newton cookies. Sleep was tough because there are train tracks about 100 yards away and some guy in a tent 50 feet away coughed every minute until I finally fell asleep (with ear plugs in whichI hate wearing). Needless to say getting up at 8am was tough but at least I didn’t have a headache.
On the way out of Carpinteria I stopped and had breakfast at the Worker Bee cafe. Great place. The owners were really friendly and they did a great job decorating the store with more bee parafinalia than I’ve even seen.
Tonight I’m at Leo Carrillo State Park CG. $7 with pay showers. No other bikers here except one guy but I think he lives here. There’s a younger guy/girl who hitchhiked up here to camp for a couple days. The guy, David, just invited me over for some barbequed chicken which I gratefully accepted. The hike/bike area isn’t too bad though. I wish every State Park had thing set up like this place– water/bathrooms close by and semi-private camp areas.
Get to see some old friends in the LA area but I’m going to be a day early. Might have to motel it tomorrow night. It’ll be great to see people I know. Its been about 4 months now.
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