Stretch the distance and suffer the consequences!!!

My start was really early which was great as I hoped to do a much longer trip than the Bible suggested and get to McGrath State Park 20 miles past Carpenteria.  I was worried about food as the first 20 miles didn't seem to have any civilization.  But it did have unusual statues on the reflector sign!  I was considering taking it as a souvenir but it was too nice as it was and I don't like to disturb art.

It was a hazy day, and as I looked out to the sea, I could barely make out these two structures which were too big to be boat tankers and I figured they must be oil rigs.  It was a pretty yneventful morning and when I finally hot up the section that took me off the highway, I expected to find a place to buy a snack and something to drink.  My expectations were wrong.  Another 3 or 4 miles before I found anything!  It was a 7-Eleven and I decided not to chance missing what might be my only opportunity to eat something.  I had a couple of yogourts to tided over.  Not long after I hit a stretch of lots of food, but I wanted to save myself for a place I found in Santa Barbara.  But when this place had Tri-Tip burritos, I had to have one.

I was only a few hours from Santa Barbara, but figured I'd be fine since I missed breakfast and it was well past lunch.  It was mucho bueno, but Gordo's was still the only contender for possibly beating Burrito Banditos. I just wish Toronto had Medio Litro Coke and Pepsi.

I got some stares from a bunch of bikers, but unlike cows, they lost interest quickly.

And then it was open road again.  I got a wave from a fellow recumbent rider.

I noticed my first and only road kill of the trip.  I had narrowly missed a little bird when I was careening down a hill in Oregon and it flew just before I ran it over.  But this wasp was not so lucky.  Sorry wasp.  I had hoped nothing would die as a result of my journey.

Santa Barbara was a bit tricky to navigate, as the book was weird.  I felt I could choose a better route and I did manage.  When I got to the main drag I remembered the area I had been the year prior.  This time kids the while length and discovered some cool buildings.  It seemed to have tons of old theatres, and I wondered if it was once a testing town for movies shot in L.A.

There were so many theatres in a small little stretch.  But the town isn't all that big.

I circled around to some other streets because I wanted a good shot of this mission looking building.

I then had to have pinkberry because I love pinkberry.  I texted a pinkberry loving friend this picture.

I really loved the schools in the region which really had architecture which made sense for the area.

There were some great hills in the area and I managed to avoid some by decided, even after my meals, to try the restaurant I had heard so much about.

I ordered my meal at Los Agaves and you could tell from the menu thus was good stuff, and not super expensive.  You ordered and then served at your table.

While I wanted for my food I noticed a guy looking at my trike.  He was part of a biking family on vacation.  The little girl was very cute and they all spoke French.

Although I wasn't super hungry, I got the steak poblano which was served with a chicken enchilada and a few peppers and beans in a taco shell.

I headed to the Santa Barbara waterfront which was the route that would take me to the McGrath campsite.

My earlier suspicion of oil rigs being off the coast was verified here, with a steady stream of them not far from the coast.  

Eventually I had to detour from the waterfront to a bike route that was more inland and on the other side of the highway.

There was a lot of traffic leaving the city and I was happy there was a nice road system with bike paths for most of the way out if the city and towards Carpenteria, where there was a state park.

This was another school with the cool local architecture.  And a really cool Beetle.  There were lots of beetles, mustangs and VW vans along the coast in California.

When I got to Capenteria, I rode down to the beach, and circled around as I wanted to continue on to McGrath state park.  It was only 20 or so miles on and seemed relatively flat, so I figured I'd make it an hour or do before dusk.

There was another state camping area along the beach, and tons of RVs were parked between the bike path and the beach.  I got many approving looks from people having dinner by their RVs.

I was making great time and ended up in Ventura county earlier than expected.

It was always a treat to see the diversity of  welcome signs throughout my journey.  

Looked as thought Ventura was going to have a CNE type fair along the coast.

The bike route took me to the coast again and I was maintaining a good speed.

I really liked this palm tree arrangement in this one community.

When I got to Oxnard, a town I know Jeff B., my friend from Portland, would verbalized as often as possible!  

I should prepare you got the worst.  Things looked great when I was only 500 feet from McGrath Beach and campground!  It's important to note that 15 minutes after leaving Capenteria, I thought about signaling back and staying there.  It was a nice campground.  But I wanted to get as close to LA as possibly to make the next day an early arrival at my cousin's place.

And of course I was thrilled since there was still a good hour of daylight.  I took this picture while moving, and as you can see, the light with the overcast was fading fast.  This would be a bad thing.

Because as I rounded the driveway in the above picture, I was presented with a situation I could only laugh at, but after 65 miles and little daylight left, I figured I would be forced to Freecamp.  McGrath was closed.

And it was closed in a very official sounding way that made me reluctant to Freecamp there.

So what is freecamping? Basically you find a place to stake your tent for free. Usually off the beaten path where authorities won't find you. Practiced by many people I had met, but I was new to it.  Tim mentioned he would start looking at 6pm and give himself the two hours to find a suitable place.  I had limited time as it was already pretty dim.  And there were no small streets to find something.  I had ended up in an industrial park with lots of strict sounding signs reagarding trespassing. As I took this picture of an electrical plant of sorts, a guy on a bike passed by me.

There were no sidewalks and only cars wizzing by.  I knew I had to catch up to him.  Luckily I found adrenaline and pushed as hard as I could to get speed and get close up him.  It took about 5 minutes but I slowly gained in him.  I finally got his attention and he remarked, "I thought trikes were slower than bikes but you caught up pretty easily."  I  replied that I was desperate and motivated by my desperation to catch up to ask him a question.  I asked as we stopped where I would be able to Freecamp.  He said he would show me the best route to see the coast and he'd show me where I might be able to find a place to camp.  We continued as he explained that the next campground was at least 15 miles further on.  We eventually turned towards the water and he showed me a patch of land that was a bit duney but a bit too exposed to the street to Freecamp.  It was here he mentioned about "them" cracking down on vagrants.  He suggested we continue and as we came across a section that weaved between beach area into residential beachfront properties, he suggested that if I wanted, I could stay at his place.  I accepted his offer immidiately and we then began talking about what we do for a living and the area we were biking.

Dave also warned me about his place being small, which was fine with me.  I just needed a patch of floor to sleep.  He lived on the first floor of an apartment complex and luckily I was able to wheel my trike into his patio area from the parking lot as he opened the door from the inside.  He said my trike would get wet as the sprinklers came on at 3am.  We moved it into the corner with the help of a bike lock extension and just to be safe, I covered it with my tent outer layer.  He mentioned what he needed to do that night.  Laundry, and grocery shopping. I showered after him and he Aldo suggested getting pizza.  I said it would be my treat and he said it was unnecessary but that it would be appreciated.  

We headed out but Dave first explained the history of Oxnard to me as we left his place through the back.  He showed me one of the channels that lay on either side of his building.  He kayaked in the area and mentioned that he knew about a secret tunnel which brought him out close to the mall a few blocks away where we would shop for groceries.  He explained how the military took Oxnard from fishermen ages ago with the promise to return it to the fishermen.  When the military decided they wanted to stay, the fishermen were upset so the military bore channels into land, and it kept extending until it went a few miles (as far as I could estimate) and there were two channels.  He lived on the peninsula which apparently was really an island as they connected them eventually at the end.  We then walked to the other channel and explored the dock area.  He explained that many of hundreds and hundreds boats moored there were owned by the wealthy in L.A. and Malibu and many of them go unused for long periods of time.  

He continued to explain the area, including a failed tourist area with a fake lighthouse and buildings made to look like something out of a fishing village.  As we walked up to the pizza place along the channel he pointed out a building that had a pool and hot tub.  He said that it was for boat owners.  The residence buildings, including Dave's, had washrooms and facilities accessible to the dock that were for boat owner use.

The pizza place was a cool converted two-story brick industrial building.

It was the type of place where you placed your ordered At the cash and they delivered your order to your table.  Even though I had eaten do much that day, I managed a small cheese pizza and a 32oz Shocktop beer.  Dave told me about his history in biochemistry and even though he was well educated in the area not once, but twice, having taken a hiatus and then going back to learn it all agsin, he worked for start-up companies which had nothing to do with biochemistry.

We spoke about the fascinating things he learned, and eventually got to talking about Cells and a game he had developed to teach about how cells transform or change.  He then spoke about Intelligent Design and how there was nothing intelligent about the way cell structures change.  They are without logic or reason and change in an inefficient manner.  I'm not well versed in the area, so I might have this all wrong, but it was very interesting and I learned a lot.  After our pizza we walked over to Ralph's, a grocery store, and continued to chat about a variety of things, from biking, to touring, to Oxnard and vacinity.  I bought granny smith 3 apples for the ride the next day.

When we got back to Dave's place around 11:45pm he mentioned that his plan was to wake up at 5:30am and needed to leave by 7:00am. I said it was no problem.  We got organized and I brushed my teeth and got ready for bed. Dave sat down at the table and and sat down with him.  He showed me the image of the cell game he was developing and some history of the universe and things like the earth being made of mostly nickel and iron because of its distance from the earth and I suggested that sequence might occur around other suns and that they might have similar planetary systems.

He then taught about how for 3.5 billion years, cells couldn't form into animals until the mesoderm was created, and life evolved quickly after that.  I learned all about the endoderm, exoderm and mesoderm.  We ended up chatting and discussing all these things until about 2am.  I would have pulled an all nighter to learn more but with a 5:30am wake up call, I'm not sure Dave was really concerned. I wasn't concerned either.  I was going to L.A. to see my cousin and I was super excited, so I knew adrenaline would be on my side.  I was used to little sleep and was happy to have an early start.