The Results Are Clear...

Thursday, July 5, 2007 - Day 14

Distance Traveled - 0 miles

I'm hydrated! My pee was clear today, for the first time that I can remember since starting this trip. That's a good sign - my body is doing well. Today I decided to take a day off, after over 7 days of biking. I think I needed it.

I stuck around Big Sur, camping another night here. My friends from last night have taken off this morning, heading south for San Simeon. I hope they make it that far today. It's not an easy ride, going up and down those cliffs for at least 40 or 50 miles. It's good that they are going to Cambria to visit Cambria Bike Outfitters. Mark needs to have his bike thoroughly looked over, as he has had some incidents on his trip so far. Now the guy at the bike shop will know that I am spreading the word. Everything comes around. I'm so glad I could pay it forward a little bit.

So most of today was spent on my computer, catching up on my journal, loading pictures from my camera, and figuring out where I can make it to tomorrow. I'm also trying to get ahold of people to stay with in Santa Cruz. I think it's about 70 miles there, but I want to go that far. There's not much inbetween to stop in. I'm hoping to get ahold of Georgia, a girl that went to Chapman my freshman year. After that she transferred to UC Santa Cruz. She's a great girl, and I haven't seen her since January of 2004, which was incidently the last time I was through Big Sur. That was a great trip, from what I can remember.

I was hoping to do some laundry and take a shower today, but that's not going to happen. It's getting dark, the laundry is way on the other side of the park, and I think I'll be fine going another day and just doing all that in Santa Cruz. I do smell pretty bad, though. Every now and then I catch a little whiff of my funk. It's not horrible, I think, but I've had fresher moments. Oh well, it keeps the bugs away, or something like that.

Tonight is going to be a lonely night. My new friends are gone, and there doesn't seem to be anyone too terribly friendly here now, or at least no one that I really have any interest in talking to. I guess it will be good reading time.

Other than that, I don't think much else happened today. I thought about going for a hike to the falls, but as I was sitting in the lodge writing on my computer, everyone and their mothers and their brothers were inquiring about the trailhead. I decided I didn't want to go admire a fall with 800 other people standing next to me. It's just not the same, and it really ruins it for me. It was fun to ride my bike a bit without all the weight on it, but I found it surprisingly harder to balance at first. I actually missed the weight. It stabilizes things, and it's what I'm used to at the moment.

On to Santa Cruz tomorrow. I'm going to try to get an early start for once. I'll let you know how it goes.


Adrienne, Mark, Amy - good people, for sure. Good luck on the southward journey!

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Mark

Otis! You'll be happy to know that Amy and I made it into Mexico on the 13th. I'm exhausted and have not even begun to sort through pictures. I'm back home now so I'm going to do that in the upcoming days. I'll let you know when they're all set.

Best of luck with the rest of your trip!