Day 56, September 26th 2007 (Santa Cruz,CA to Los Banos,CA)

It was great to wake up in the morning and be able to learn more about Siobhan. Although she was in a hurry to get to work, she still managed to spare some time to chat with me. She was able to tell me that she had completed an ironman triathlon. Being that I love the competition and the environment of triathlons, I was fascinated to hear this. Then she went on to tell me that the famous Julie Moss and Mark Allen both lived in her neighborhood. Julie Moss only lived 3 houses away and was well known for her crawl through the finish line, as she had fallen exhausted only a few feet from crossing. Mark Allen is a well known triathlete and has won a good amount of the Hawaii Ironman Triathlons. After realizing that I was in a neighborhood of well acclaimed athletes it made sense to me Siobhan said next. She said that her friend, didn't say she was crazy for doing the ironman. Instead, they said, "oh yeah that's great, which one?" It was another beautiful day in California and I was ready to see more of the country. Before Siobhan left for work, she left me plenty of food for breakfast and lined me up with a family to stay with when I left Yosemite. It was so cool to see so many incredible things line up along my trip, I had truly been blessed. I ate some food, showered, and packed my stuff up for the road. I left a little later than I had originally planned, but I didn't think I was going to have a problem making it to where i was going. Using the directions and maps I was given, I made it out of Santa Cruz and headed inland. I was going further and further away from the ocean. It was strange to look down at my compass and see that I was going east instead of west. Before east had meant I was going the wrong way, and now it would be the right direction for a good distance ahead of me. The weather was beautiful again. It seemed like you just couldn't run into bad weather in this area. I was going east for about 50 miles before I decided to take a lunch break. I had some delicious peanut butter sandwiches with a new treat I had been given before I left Siobhans. It was a little piece of apple pie and it was nice to munch on something so sweet and good before I put in some miles ahead. I was looking at a good climb ahead and it was going to be first big climb of the day. It seemed like I had drifted further from the coast and everything was so much flatter now. The climb ahead was a good mountain and it took me from about sea level to the top of the summit at 1500 feet. Some of the parts on the climb were fairly steep and it took me a good amount of time to reach the summit. I had been warned about the steep climb up and even about the downhill. There was an incredibly large reservoir down towards the base of the mountain and it was great for wind surfing. So because it was great for wind surfing it meant that there was a great deal of wind. So as i headed down the mountain, I was expecting to hold on for my life at what the wind was going to throw at me. Instead, I was braking most of the way down the hill just because my shoulder of road I was riding on was in such bad shape. The road I was on was a freeway and was the only route I could take to get me across to where i needed to be so it had to be done. The problem wasn't going up the hill, because the shoulder was in great shape and was fairly clean. Going down the hill they decided to put rumble strips all the way down to the base of the mountain and it left me with quite the descent. I had a foot to the right of the rumble strips that i could ride on, but with the amount of glass, wood, and shredded tires, the rumble strips were almost a better choice. So for a good 1,000 feet down I wasn't able to enjoy much of the hill that I had put so much time in to climbing. Once i reached the base of the mountain the rumble strips still remained, but there was a lot more room for me to ride on and the road had cleared up a lot. I only had a few miles to go before I hit Los Banos and I was glad to see that I was close to the campground. Things were kind of shaky after going down the hill and it was great to have a flat road. The next few miles were completely flat and I was trying to figure out where all of the mountains had gone. I saw some cornfields and couldn't figure out if I was still in California. It seemed like I had made it back to Iowa at this point. It was starting to get dark outside and i was staring at a full moon in front of me, even though the sun was still going down behind me. I was headed for the campground, but I saw a sign for a fairground to the left and figured that it would be a good free place to stay for the night. I didn't even make it a block up the road when I saw a church on my left. I saw some cars in the lot and figured that maybe i could stay on their lawn for the night and have permission from the pastor. I noticed the sign on the door said they had service at 7:30 and it was 7:20 so I figured I could attend church and then talk to the pastor afterwards. It was a large Hispanic neighborhood that I was in and it was different to attend a church where I was the minority. The church was the Victory Outreach in Los Banos. It was more of a contemporary service and the band that was playing sounded great. It was a great service and I was very happy that i had pulled off to attend the service at the right time. The pastor was pastor Chris. I was able to chat with him for a little while and after he found out that I had ridden my bike all the way from Iowa he wanted to do anything he could to help me. I told him that I was just looking to put my tent in the church lawn if that was okay, but he wouldn't have it. He called a pastor from another church and said, "I'm going to hook you up." Those were great words that were very true. After talking to the pastor he told me that I could stay in a hotel only a couple of blocks away called the Relax Inn. I was only looking to camp but now had been given a free room to stay in for the night. It was such a great way to end such a disappointing downhill into this town. I was able to show up at the motel and they knew I was coming and had everything ready to go for me. All I had to do was take the key and carry my bike up a flight of stairs to a hotel room for the evening. It was great to have a nice hot shower and a warm bed to sleep in before taking off on the adventure that tomorrow had in store for me.
Daily mileage: 86.5 miles
Average Speed: 13.8 mph
Total mileage: 3,297.1 miles