Dream of Californication

Well we've made it to Cal-i-for-ny-a finally! More on that in a bit, but first a recap of our adventures getting here.

We left the booming metropolis of Waterloo and drove for a couple of hours to another barely-on-the-map spot outside of Solon, IA. We stopped in to visit Kelley and Mike, their three boys, and Tatum the Wonder Weimeraner. Kelley and Mike are ex-pat Canadian friends of Chrissy's who have wound up living in a proper farm house in Iowa. They were kind enough to provide us with shelter for the night, which gave us a chance to sneak in a quick road ride before heading out the next morning.

For our first full day of driving, we had Cheyenne, WY as our goal. We spent all day battling the vicious midwestern crosswinds, and at one point had a scary swaying trailer moment when we got caught in some weird vortex amid the wind and the air wake from a semi. As we headed west through the perpetual flatness of Nebraska, we saw the makings of an early Spring storm in the distance. It seemed that we would avoid it, particularly when we noticed that the wind was no longer beating the left side of the rig. Fuel economy went up. The grip on the steering wheel became more relaxed. And then the wind started again, this time from the right. At least we'll get even wear on the tires! We also saw that we weren't going to avoid the storm. In fact we were heading into it. Sure enough the rain started falling and the lightning was suddenly above us. We made another stop for gas, and as we were paying for drinks the power went out, sinking the entire exit area into instant darkness.

We finally made Cheyenne and found a good hotel that still had vacancy. We wearily checked in, got the room keys from Ray at the front desk, read the weather advisory notice taped to the monitor, and headed to our room with only enough energy to fight over who was going to get the bathroom first. We opened the door, and were greeted with this:



New room for us, then...

So, back to that weather advisory we saw...the next morning we woke up to howling wind and snow. The temperature was below freezing, and it was blizzarding outside. The thought of leaving early to miss the storm crossed our mind, but the hotel has free waffles in the mornings. Priorities! Once on the road, we cruised along at a whopping 45 miles per hour so as to avoid becoming like the jacknifed trucks and ditched cars, drivers of which had overestimated their ability to drive in bad conditions, or were just unlucky. We took a nice break in Park City, UT for a coffee/hot chocoate and a cruise in the brilliant sunshine. The storm had provided three powder days to the slopes, so there were plenty of skiiers and snowboarders running around town. We were hoping to make Tahoe, but we needed the break and were happy to make Winnemucca, NV.

Finally, we crossed the state line into California. After stopping for lunch with Bike Magazine's Mike Ferrentino, we headed to San Francisco airport to fetch Chipps (the Chippendale) from his flight across the pond from London. And that brings us to today.

We've hooked up with both the Trek/VW and Gary Fisher/Suburu racing teams and shared in some pre-event catching up and newbie introductions. Tomorrow we head to the Sea Otter venue to set up for the weekend.

Whew! So there you have it. A bit long winded, but lack of internet time means fewer blog updates.

Travelers tip: the buffet at Flying J truckstops is pretty good!

That's all for now...

Chrissy and Chris