Day 73, August 17
This day started out nicely. The breeze of the night before had dissipated. Inanna had lost whatever was making her feel badly the night before. We had breakfast and packed up. One more glance at the sea reminded us of how different it was here in the west. Back on the East Coast, in Virginia, we would see sunrises if we were at the beach early enough in the morning—but the sun set in the west, behind the hotels and suburbs. Here in California we had nice sunsets each evening, but the mornings were relatively undramatic. The sun was behind the coastal mountains until 8 or 9 in the morning.
We coasted down almost to sea level, then began climbing a long hill. Two-thirds of the way up the grade we came to what we were taking for granted here along the coast highway: a public drinking fountain set up along the road, well-marked. They were really springs that had been tapped to provide water for travelers, and bicyclists were the most appreciative group, I am sure. We drank our fill, filled our water bottles, rested, then got back into climbing that grade.
We climbed 700 feet over three miles, then coasted down 400 feet. It was chilly to coast after working up a sweat climbing that grade, and especially so in the morning shade of the mountain. But after a couple of miles of coasting, we were climbing again, and the grade was even more steep—but not as long as the last one had been. Then we enjoyed a longer coast, down to sea level once again. The sun was peaking over the mountain now, and the road flattened out somewhat, and stayed right on the coast.
We came to the William Randolph Hearst State Beach, which was right below San Simeon, Hearst’s famous castle. We stopped at the state beach and debated what to do next. Inanna wanted to visit the Hearst Castle. She had read about Patty Hearst, of the famous family, who had been kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army, and eventually may have joined them and taken part in crimes. This castle was a few miles up the mountain from Route 1. Tours, once one was there, cost $5 apiece, and supposedly it took a day and a half to see the entire castle. I couldn’t see spending so much money, and even more, spending so much time, seeing what I considered to be a tourist magnet. The castle had been built as a rich man’s whim, however beautiful it might be.
After some debate, Inanna agreed to give up the idea of a Hearst detour. She agreed without any evident animosity. We rode on.
The road remained relatively flat and we rode happily along the coastline. The ocean remained beautiful, but it is funny how quickly you can begin to become desensitized to something. We had ridden all summer to see the Pacific, and now we spent more time looking at the blacktop ahead of us than we did turning to the right to gaze out to sea.
We rode toward the pretty little town of Cambria, feeling hungry, having decided to stop at the first store we came to. We came over a rise and the first establishment of any kind was the Chuck Wagon, which I knew meant “all you can eat”. I was starving, and we peeked in the door. The food trays were loaded, and wonderful smells wafted out to us. That was all we needed. We locked the bikes up, leaning against the front of the restaurant, and went in.
Before we got to a table, the cook came out of the kitchen and took a look at us. I was briefly afraid, because we were pretty ragged and shaggy. Maybe they were going to throw us out for being ragged, or maybe because we looked like we would eat too much. But my fears were groundless. The cook just smiled and went back to work.
Soon we were sitting at a table loaded with food: chicken, roast beef, meat loaf, potatoes, vegetables, bread, and iced tea, with deserts still up on the counter for us when we were ready. Inanna ate conservatively, but I threw caution to the wind. I wolfed down my food, made mental notes about my favorites, and went back for more. Just as I got to the food counter, the cook brought out trays of more food. He enjoyed cooking for hungry people.
I wasted almost nothing, and ate for an hour. When I got up, I could barely walk. We paid $2.35 each—I couldn’t get over what a bargain it had been. Right outside were the bicycles, and although I could swing my leg over the handlebar (there was always too much on the rear carrier to swing my leg over the normal way), I couldn’t reach the handlebar with my hands! I was completely stuffed. I could not ride.
Inanna laughed at me. I was somewhat dizzy from all the food, and the pleasure of such gluttony. We slowly walked around the town of Cambria, with nothing else to do. It began to dawn on me that this was a very interesting town. Partly because of its proximity to San Simeon, it had interesting stores and shops, including art galleries, craft shops, and an amazing store filled with small historic toy soldiers. These toy soldiers were dressed in accurately painted uniforms, and were representative of many historical times: the Civil War, the Napoleonic Wars, the Hundred Years War, the American Revolution. They were lined up in battle formations. I could only imagine about the person or persons who owned and managed this shop—it looked to be more a labor of love than a thriving business.
I was brought back to my childhood, when my bother Jack and I would always succeed in getting our parents to give us soldiers, forts, pirate ships, etc. for Christmas. We would fight imaginary wars. Then I took up war gaming as an adolescent, and finally took a class in war gaming at the Naval Academy, and wrote a major paper which was published in the Academy professional journal in which the reader could refight the Battle of Jutland.
Finally, after perhaps another hour, the food had shifted, I found a public restroom, and we were ready to ride.
We moved on down the coast, and noticed that the wind, which had been from the ocean, and then was calm, was now from the east. This was out of the ordinary. At least it wasn’t a cursed headwind, we thought, and let it pass out of our minds. We continued pedaling south, with the terrain relatively flat.
We saw signs of a forest fire up ahead. There were fire trucks, a bus filled with fire fighters, a few police cars. They were turning off on roads leading eastward, toward the mountains, away from the sea. We never saw any flames, but at one point we rode through thick smoke which was being blown across the road. Then, we were past the fire, and saw fewer clues that anything was amiss. I was more interested in Morro Rock, which I had seen before and which I wanted to show Inanna.
We did pedal along Route 1 to a point from which we could see Morro Rock. From the road you could see the majestic rock, jutting out of the ocean to a hundred feet in the air. It was all the more dramatic because there are not the usual hills and cliffs there, and the beach is flat. The rock just seems to come out of nowhere. We could see many birds making their nests on the rock, which is itself a National Park. It is the only National Park I know of which consists of a single rock.
It was now getting late, and it was time to find a place to camp. We camped at a high school in the town of Morro Bay—nobody was around, and we did find a secluded spot with some grass on which to pitch the tent. I was not hungry that night, and neither was Inanna. She must have eaten more than I thought. We went to bed without dinner, the only time we did that on the entire trip. We had covered 55 miles that day. We were finally beginning to pick up some speed.