It was never going to be a quiet night. I could have thrown a stone over the railway line on to the road in one direction and onto the crashing ocean waves in the other, and I’m rubbish at throwing stones. When the alarm went off at 5 am it was still dark outside, but we were both already awake due to the last train that went by, which literally felt like a minor earthquake. Why an RV owner would pay $40 per night to stay here unless they where deaf is lost on me, but each to their own I guess.
We packed up camp quickly, having unpacked very little last night, before cycling off into the darkness. We re-entered the coastal road just as the sun broke the horizon, cycling past a city of RVs parked up on the side of the road. This was clearly a location on the RV owners bucket list. Maybe the noisiest place to hang out and on the must-experience list just to check out their soundproofing.
As the sun slowly crept up into the morning sky we passed through a succession of small residential huddles (a few houses in the middle of nowhere), gated residential colonies and the occasional seaside town, not to mention a continuation of the roadside RV communities.
Before long we found ourselves entering Santa Barbara, which scored a respectable 7 out of 10 on the seaside town scale. As we cycled along the coastal road through the town we noticed another couple on tour bikes taking the more sensible route along the beach cycle path, not for any other reason than they were not having to stop every 2 minutes at traffic lights. We gave a wave from a distance, then crossed the road to join them on the cycle path.
We quickly caught up to them as they had stopped to take a photo. Aurelia and Tom from Switzerland were on their first cycle tour and weren’t messing about. They had already been on the road for a few months, cycling down from Canada and were planning to continue their tour for another year or so. They had just arrived in Santa Barbara the previous night and while they appeared to be heading in the same direction as us, they were in fact just doing a spot of sightseeing before continuing their journey south, ultimately into South America.
Next stop for us was the pier. Santa Barbara’s pier is much less commercial than Santa Monica’s, boasting a car park at the end. The wooden planks that made up the roadway were quite worn so the going was as bad as the worse Route 66 roads, but as it was only a couple of hundred metres long as opposed to 2,500 miles we struggled along. We parked the bikes up at the end of the pier. Without the crowds and tat shops of the Santa Monica pier all, there was to do here was relax, take photos, and allow the world to go by with us just observing for a change.
Once rejuvenated we braved the plank road once more before continuing along the beach cycle path for another few hundred metres before cutting through the town in search of the frontage road of Highway 101. Just as we passed through the part of the town that all tyre sales appeared to be located, Deborah noticed that she had a flat. Pulling into the car park of Big Brand Tire, Deborah set about changing her inner tube, giving me an opportunity to watch and offer words of encouragement, which I know she very much appreciated even if she didn’t express it in words…
With a new inner tube fitted and back up to pressure we continued along the frontage road with Highway 101 thundering long just a few metres to our left, knowing that before the end of the day we would need to join it for over 20 miles. The frontage road wasn’t very inspiring, with a narrow shoulder and too many traffic lights that appeared to have a tendency to turn red at the sight of a cycle, so when it came to an end and we had no choice but to join Highway 101 with it’s wide shoulder and no traffic lights for once it was a welcome change.
There were three California State Beach Campgrounds to choose from before the road turned inland, so being the heroes we are we decided the furthest away one was likely to be the one with our name on it. The cycle along Highway 101 was as good as cycling along a highway gets, with fast-moving motorized vehicles often speeding past at over 70 mph inches from our left shoulders. While we will never enjoy it, we have done enough highway cycling to now be used to it, so it was just a case of turning the pedals and trying to get it over with as soon as possible.
By the time we pulled off Highway 101, the sun was within an hour of providing us with our daily dose of sunset. The road dropped down to the entrance to the campsite, which had a barrier across the road and a sign stating the campsite was close until April 1st. Assuming this was an early April Fools joke we cycled around the barrier and into the campground, which was empty apart from three large RVs. We cycled over to the farthest of the three as there appeared to be signs of life in its vicinity. We were welcomed by Janet, the campground host, asking how our day had been. I responded by saying it had been great until the point I came across the campground closed sign and attempted to put on my best puppy dog eyes while Deborah put on her knackered look, which is now so finally rehearsed she could win an Oscar for the performance.
Fortunately, neither of our performances were required as the sign was only relevant to RVs. The campground was still open to cyclist and backpackers. Silly us for not knowing that. Surely we should have spotted that the site closed notice was on an A4 sheet of paper, so clearly there was no space to include the cyclist and backpacker exception text. I can only hope that every cyclist and backpacker thought exactly the same as us when seeing the sign, ie. ‘Free Campsite’, rather than just turning away and heading for the next site, 10 miles down the road.
While the site was huge Janet directed us to plot 39, a sad patch of dust as far away from her RV as you could get. I assured her that after a shower I would smell better, but she was not having any of it, so plot 39 it was.
As we were putting up our tent another couple of cyclists on tour arrived and were shown to the same patch of dust. Julie and Imka from Quebec were also on their first tour, cycling from Seattle to San Diego. They were initially considering cycling Route 66 but had been told it was dangerous, so had gone for the busier and more dangerous Pacific Coast Highway instead, but after putting them straight on Route 66 I am sure they will cycle the Mother Road one day, so long as work and Master Degrees don’t get in the way with having fun on two wheels.
With the tent up we headed down to the beach as the sky was starting to turn the particular shade of orange that seems to indicate that we were in for a better than average sunset. By the time we made it to the beach, Julie and Imka were already seated at a picnic bench that appeared to have made its way from the campground to the beach. As there was a pier blocking where the sun was going to take its curtain call we wandered along the beach to get a better angle, turning for the walk back again just as the sun touched the horizon.
As expected, it was another glorious sunset interrupted only for a few seconds as a train thundered across the steel bridge high above our heads. We were wondering what the bridge was for, even when we were saying that for once we have a campsite without a train line near it…
By the time we made it back to the tent, it was already pitch black, so with head torches on we prepared our diner of hot pasta gloop on the MSR Whisperlite, again telling ourselves it wasn’t food but fuel in an attempt to convince ourselves to eat it. This was followed by a dessert of jelly sweets and trail mix, washed down with the finest tepid water straight out of the campground tap.
We were planning another early start, so crawled into our sleeping bag before 8 pm in the hope that we would fall asleep before one of Ivor’s pals made another appearance.
* Ivor the Engine… children’s TV programme from the 1970s starring a talking train!