In the fall of 2010 (back when I still had my trusty BMW K75C), I had to go to Seattle for a work conference. I decided to take a few days to ride up the coast, then try to complete an Iron Butt Association Border-to-Border Insanity ride on the way back – Canada to Mexico in less than 24 hours. Follow along to see how it went!
Day 1 – Los Angeles to Sacramento, ~520 miles
I needed a new front tire and a once-over of the motorcycle, which a quick stop at Valdi’s MotoZone took care of.
Baby Jack and I are all packed up, ready to see new sights and add more stickers to my luggage. Day 1 commences!
Testing out my new method of taking photos while moving – I tied my point and shoot to a string and made an impromptu necklace with it.
Hundreds of miles on flat straight highway is a horribly boring way to break in a new tire. Luckily, that was about to change.
Interesting cloud formation.
God’s gift to fruit stores – Casa de Fruta! Not only does it sell tons of delicious goodies, it’s fun to get to because it’s on the 152, a road full of high-speed sweepers that connects the 5 and the 101.
I didn’t realize that Recaro makes baby seats – turns out they make plenty of accessories, too.
A peacock becomes friends with Baby Jack.
A friend of mine recommended that Cafe Brasil in Santa Cruz, but they were closed by the time I got there. This was actually a good thing, because I discovered…burger. Weird burgers and 37 taps of delicious beer. Perfect.
The menu at burger. Many of them are named after celebrities, so you get a picture of said celeb and then the ingredients. The Luther looked gross. I settled on a Chuck Norris, which featured jalapenos, monterey jack, and jalapeno aioli. Yum.
The road was a little slippery, which mean I eventually encountered someone who had spun out in a car. There was probably a 300-400 car line because of this accident. When I finally split up to the front, someone a couple of cars back got really pissed that I split lanes – to the point that he got out of his car and started yelling at me. I understand his frustration cause I’m sure he had been there for a while, but it’s legal in California. One of the cops eventually made him get back in his car.
A little bit later I was in Sacramento for the night, ready to get an early start the next morning.
On to Day 2 – Sacramento, California to Crescent City, California, ~420 miles
Want more ride reports? Check out my Travel page!