Wednesday night I headed north on my way to Monterey and the 2008 MotoGP races.  Kevin and Karen were heading south from Idaho and we planned to meet by Friday.  The first leg took me from San Diego to Valencia where I met Bill, Jenny & Steve.  We all met at the Hyatt in Valencia which was the same place Alison and I stayed at for Darrius and Shannon’s wedding. What was weird is I ended up in the same room we had stayed in.  The evening was pretty fun.  Steve apparently is a great disher out of crap.  Well, so am I when prompted.  We got along great!  We went out for sushi at a pretty good place right across the street then had some ice cream before crashing out for the night.

The next morning we met up at 8 AM to head north.  Bill apparently has pretty good knowledge of the backroads up to Monterey.  Including a pot holed road that takes you up on top of some pretty cool passes.  Bill and I are on dual-purpose bikes but Steve was riding a BMW RT.  He had a to take it a bit slower through the rough stuff.  As for riding partners, we all were about the same pace.  Bill is faster with Steve and I being about the same speed.  A couple of exciting moments of the ride; Suicidal little dog trying to run under our wheels, pot-holed road, and the insidious tar snake.  Of the three the tar snake was the scariest.  Through a tight turn my bars went full right lock and the bike tried to take me off the road.  Made it out but scary non-the-less. Total blast of a ride!  One thing of importance on these long distance rides is properly taking care of yourself.  Stay hydrated, fed, and above all liberally apply Anti-Monkey Bugg powder. I cannot express the importance of this enough.

I have a few other pictures from the ride but I’ll have to upload them sometime this week.  I haven’t had much high speed connectivity along the ride.  I did however figure out that if I buy a Starbucks card I can get two hours of free Wifi per day.  Nice!

Catch you all soon! Monday is the day to follow the Spot Tracker!