Friday 25 June 2010

US66 Tour - Day 14 - Victorville to Santa Monica

Apologies for blog update being delayed. Hilton wanted to charge $6 for an hour online. Typical of these big chains, nothing’s free.


This is it, our last day of the tour. We have a bit of a lie in today as the journey from Victorville is only 80 or so miles, we leave about 9:45.

Weather, yup, same old, same old.

I manage to get in some internet business before I leave and see England have won against Slovenia, so finally I can wear my Union Jack T-shirt to dinner. And where better than the LAX Hilton!!

For our final rider briefing Gary warns us about the mad LA drivers. We will be travelling on the interstate all the way into LA today, not riding US66, as this will take too long and being quite an arduous journey, due to many traffic lights, he’d rather we don’t have to suffer that in the heat. Plus, there ain’t much to see anyway. We are told to stick close together, keep our wits about us and keep the speed up. Off we go.

Frenetic is how I would describe the journey into Santa Monica. There are cars, trucks, etc, passing on both sides, cutting in front of you, sometimes across 5 lanes to take an exit at the last minute. I’m used to travelling at high speeds in close proximity to other vehicles, so I’m quite comfortable in this environment. Not sure some of the others were. However, despite their best efforts, the locals were unable to claim any biker trophies today and we all arrived safely at Santa Monica Pier.

We park up and walk up the hillside overlooking the beach. Here there are two things of interest. Firstly, the Will Rogers plaque. Will Rogers was a comedian who travelled R66 last century as he embarked upon his career. I think when he made it big he attributed his success to the Mother Road bringing him out West (Google if you’re interested). Next up, there is a sign saying this is the west end of R66. Photos are taken at both before we head back down to the pier and our lunch.

Many of you will be familiar with the film Forrest Gump. Well, lunch today was at the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Apparently it is owned by Tom Hanks. It’s very popular, people queuing to get in but we just saunter in, as like most everything on this tour, Gary has it covered and we have a table already booked. I have a Shrimp Po’ Guy, least I think that’s what it was called. Deep fried shrimps, prawns to us, on French baguette with shredded lettuce and tomato, accompanied by French fries. I wash this down with a root beer. As usual what you imagine will be small turns out to be quite a belly full.



Outside Bubba Gump is another sign for R66, this one claiming to be the end of the trail. And indeed it is. A 100 yards or so further on you would fall into the Pacific.


We take a walk down the Santa Monica Pier, opened in 1909. It’s not a whole lot different from our own piers. Cotton candy (candy floss) kiosks, amusements and the now familiar back home, fairground rides. This is the Pacific Ocean we are staring out at. My first, maybe last, ever experience of it. David and I had said we might take a swim, though having had lunch we decided to forego that ‘pleasure’. We decide though that we must at least have a paddle. In the end David bottles it, not wanting to get his boots wet! Simon, Vivien and I all experience the sea lapping round our feet, some more so than others as a bigger wave catches me out, covering my boots and running halfway up my legs. Simon caught it on film. No matter, it’s warm enough that this will soon dry and at least I can now claim I’ve been in the Pacific.



We head back to the van where we line up for a group bike shot with the golden sandy beach in the background. Such an attraction are we, that 4 or 5 Japanese young ladies want to photograph us too, waving us off as we start our final journey on the bikes to drop them at Bartel’s the LA Harley dealer.

A short ride later, a quick fuel stop (bikes have to be handed back full) and we are handing over the keys. They do a quick check to make sure there is no damage and that’s it, tour over.

Gary takes the van with all our gear and heads off to the hotel. We inspect some shiny Harleys and make more purchases whilst waiting for our transport. An air conditioned 16 seater takes us to the LAX Hilton. My room is on the 10th floor. From my window I can see aircraft coming in to land. With 3 hours to kill before we all meet up again for our farewell dinner I key my blog notes, mugged off that the Hilton want to charge for internet use. I’m hoping that the Mirage in Vegas won’t be so tight!

We meet in the lobby for dinner. This is a freebie, courtesy of California Sun Riders, excluding alcohol. We have a green salad to start and then there is a choice of steak, salmon or chicken, all served with creamy garlic mashed potato and vegetables. Hardly gourmet but nice enough. I have the chicken. After the meal Gary gives a little speech to officially close the tour. He also hands out gifts to us all. These are, a map of the US with the route we took highlighted in gold, a certificate to say we completed over 2600 miles of the route and a framed picture of us doing our graffiti at the Cadillac Ranch. There was an additional presentation to David. He had wanted to ride a Harley Fat Boy on the tour but that had been trashed days before we arrived, so he ended up with a Road King. His gifts were a toy Fat Boy and a T-shirt. I think the slogan went ‘The ride’s not over till the Fat Boy sings’



We then made a presentation to Gary. I had bought a card in Santa Fe and everyone had signed it. We had also had a whip round for him. I gave him the card and made a little speech, then handed him a plastic bag with a few odd coins in it. Small value coins out here are like our 5p and copper coins, too small to be of any real use, so I had just been collecting them in the plastic bag. Not sure he guessed it was a joke until everyone laughed, then I gave him an envelope with the real cash in it. And that was pretty much it.

We all said our goodbyes, hugs, kisses, manly handshakes and backslapping abounding, then went our separate ways to bed. Gary will be away early, as he has to prepare for the next tour. Pat will be off about 10am to meet up with his wife and I’m leaving around the same time to go to Vegas. The others are all booked on the same Virgin flight back to Heathrow, so they can continue the friendship that bit longer.

The tour is over but the blog will continue. I’ll be posting what adventures Cath and I have got up to in Sin City.

Neill

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