LA 2 SD – Ride to San Diego, CA!

Over the weekend, my roomate Adam & I rode our bikes to San Diego. We didn’t get to acurately log our miles but, it was definately over 150 miles.

A ride that was supposed to start at 04:00 was delayed due to waking up late and instead started at 05:00. We woke up up past 04:00 where we quickly got dressed & fueled up and departed to the open road. If you were following us on twitter we officially began our ride at 05:00. Leaving the gate of our residence, we head down Wilshire Blvd. towards Western Ave. A nice morning breeze hit our faces as it woke us up from our what, 5 hour nap? We then turned right on Western Ave. and cruzed til we arrived at PCH. It had already been almost two hours since we left and we were finally on a straight course down PCH(Pacific Coast Highway) towards San Diego. Mind you we were both on track bikes!
Track Bikes: No Brakes, No Gears, Just Legs.

Riding down the PCH was dope! Reminded me a lot of my childhood in Sacramento. Back when I used to ride my bike to Sunrise Mall i’d see small skate/surf shopes all around and it just gave me that same vibe on the PCH. Big ups to 916! xD

The ride down wasn’t so bad, lots of stop and go’s from the traffic and minimal hills but when we rode by the beaches~ Amazing! Can’t help but wonder, GOD must’ve been a chill dude building all these beautiful beaches~ We wanted to just stop and relax on the beach, take in the sights ;) We did make a few stops at them, even rode the beach bike paths.Overall, the beach was my favorite part of this trip.

So we pass Seal Beach and about half an hour later we’re thinking, we goota get some grub. We stop in a Subway and try out the breakfast menu. Not bad, although they wouldn’t let me change my drink from coffee to a fountain drink. So I got the coffee cup and ended up filling it with green tea from the brew station. It’s pretty good, kinda sucked when they took out precooked eggs. Anyway, we were thinking we were about halfway down to San Diego. Yea, big mistake haha. I guess this is where I tell you that we didn’t look up directions to get to San Diego. The night before, I looked on the map and decied to wing it. So we ended up getting a bit lost which i’ll get into later on :)

Again, I just have to say the beaches were just beautiful. I’m moving to the beaches next time for true. And hopefully i’ll open up a store by the beach too and have BBQs with you fine folks! And for you out of towners, you’ll have a dope place to visit when you come out! Newport, I’d have to say I enjoyed the most out of all the beaches. Very clean~ I gotta ride there again sometime. If any of you are down, we’ll make a trip out of it!

The sun started to heat up as we entered into Launa Beach, another beautiful beach. Unfortunately for us, had the most steep hills. With the heat beating down, low on hydration, Adam was the first to cramp up on the first big hill. As the tour passed us on their road bikes, Adam walked the rest of the hill from halfway up. We decided to take a short break rehydrating and stretching our legs. Which was actually where I took the photo of the Laguna Beach Sign.

Well underway, we finally made it to Capistrano Beach where we took a lunch break at a Dominos. I haven’t had Dominos since… highschool maybe? We split an Alfredo pasta bowl and split the Chocolate lava cake which was delicious! I do have to say, Dominos makes a fine crust. Their herbs are just the right mix. As for their pizza… maybe i’ll save that for another post haha.

And then my phone died.

The ride was smooth til we arrived in Del Mar. We got lost a few times because PCH kind of ended and we had to take different routes and even rode on the 5 freeway a few times just to get back on track. But the roads were smooth for the most part. At this point, my shoulder straps on my backpack were stained white from my sweat. Yes, the sweat went all the way through the straps. The sun was brutal through the desert~ We had also started feeling pain in our legs but, we pushed through. By the time we got to Del Mar, Adam was cramping up non-stop and my knees were shot. We still had to make it to Downtown San Diego. I was determined and pushed Adam to follow. OH, and for riders out there, you need a SOLID headlight for the front. I had my knog front light flashing and got pulled over by a cop tell me it needed to be a solid light and that the light was illegal. So a heads up for you riders out there. He did however suggest I had two knogs, one flashing & one solid and that would be “perfect” in his words. Now, I know I mentioned earlier that the hills in Laguna were crazy but let me tell you. This last hill we went over in Del Mar just about killed us. A STEEP hill of about… I dunno 3 miles up? I had no choice but to walk my bike up. Added to all the pain we had I was prayin so hard to get through this hill it was just nuts! So, we were lost again and actually passed downtown San Diego and were headed further in. We also didn’t have enough strength in our legs to stop. There were several downhills which were completely pitchblack and had no choice but to leave it to GOD to survive. We were going down about 40mph? No way to stop, random stoplights which luckily turned green or stayed green while we passed them, it was just crazy! Long story short, we finally turned around, rode past Sea World and finally arrived in downtown San Diego. Just beautiful, simply beautiful! It’s Saturday night, nice cool weather of about 63 degrees, lots of people out and about. Yea, this is life. Amtrack had just closed when we arrived so we had a fattening dinner at Wendy’s and bought tickets at the Greyhound across the street on Broadway. Which by the way was cheaper, and had an express route back to Los Angeles. The staff was friendly and actually, cut custom boxes for our bikes and stored them seperately from the rest of the luggage. We rode around & chilled at the station til 01:30 the next morning and caught the bus back to good ol’ LA. Greyhound station in LA in located on 7th & Alameda. We were trying to catch a cab so our poor legs could rest but noone would take us, not even the taxi vans so we ended up riding another 8 miles back home.

Our legs were putty by the end of the trip. I would recommend you do several short trips before doing one of this scale. I think the most I did was 20-24 miles and randomly chose to do a ride San Diego on a whim! Crazy but definately worth it! Met a lot of good people and just a great vibe. It can’t get any better than California~

Hope you enjoyed the few pictures and videos hahaha
(they were all taken by my camera phone hence the low quality).
Shalom out!

- Joezinho

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