Sold! Now, on to Santeeeeeeee!

The next day or so was pretty much spent relaxing and catching up with Papp and Grant.  Then, while I'm there, I find out that Jake will soon becoming to LA for work.  So I try to convince him to talk to his boss and see if he can come to LA a day early.  Long story short, he can and he does.  Then we pretty much repeat what we've been doing for the last day: beer, pizza, beer, sleep.  Its a good recovery routine :)

So, not only did I get to relive a successful college weekend with Jake, but he also offers to buy my hand trike right on the spot.  So we spend the better part of Monday morning disassembling it and packing it up.  Head down to USPS and off it goes, back to Jake's place in Illinois.  We owe a big thanks to Papp for hauling us around from place to place while we get our little ducks in a row.  After a long lunch at Pho 21, Jake and I part from Papp's excellent company and head for his hotel room.  We get Jake checked in, I look up a few things on the computer and then I'm off to Arcadia!!

Part of my purpose for this long and round about way of traveling is to visit my SLS brethren.  Partly because I haven't seen some of them since graduation, and partly because next year will be our 10 year reunion and I wanted to talk to each member of our class individually to see what, when, and how we should make this shindig happen.  I was more than a little slow in gathering up all that information for our five year reunion and I definitely don't want to repeat that mistake, so this time around I'm getting a very early start.  And in Pasadena there lives a good man by the Name of Chris Cariaga and he graciously invited me to stay with him and his uncle for a night.  With a non-trivial miracle and lots of questions, I was able to navigate LA public transit is a mere 3 hours to find myself at Chris' door.  There we spent a few hours catching up on what we've been up to, what the immediate future might contain and what the farther future might be.  I also got his feedback on what our 10 year reunion ought to be.

With our minds and hearts full from one another's company and conversation, we decided to balance out our bodies by filling our stomachs as well.  That is when we went for Pink's.  This historic establishment in LA proper is a hotdog stand to compare to no other.  The list of nitrated, hand held, chili smothered meat dishes was staggering.  Only slightly less staggering than the line we had to wait in to get at one of these cholesterol spiking creations.  It was well past midnight, going on 1:00 am and we still had to wait in line for 45 minutes to order.  But it was well worth it, because of BACON!!!!!!  Yes, dear readers, you are correct, I have missed bacon greatly and now I was about to OD on it.  I believe the specific creation I was consuming is called the bacon burrito dog, but do not let the simple name full you.  This amalgamation of chili, hotdog, tortilla, cheese, and sour cream was teaming with bacon.  I dare say there was the better percentage of a pig wrapped up in that tortilla.  It was good.  Wow!  And when every finger licking morsel was down my gullet, I felt like a pig too.

Chris was kind enough to be driving and it is a good thing too.  As soon as we sat down in the car, my eyes started to droop and by the time we got out of the parking lot I was lapsing in and out of consciousness.  So pork filled was that stretched wheat tortilla that it was now taking all the energy my body had to just to digest its awesomeness.  I fought to keep awake, but it was too much for me.  Thanks for driving Chris, and sorry for snoring :)

The next morning I had all my things packed as I was hoping to see Bao Nguyen that day.  He had just graduated from undergrad with a bio-chem degree and was now busily applying to pharmacology schools.  He and his family live out in Victorville, where I stayed with them one summer several years ago.  By luck, Bao was headed into Pamona college, not far from Chris, to wrap up a school project.  Chris, once again, extended me a gracious ride out to meet Bao for lunch.  Once I was in the capable hands of good Mr. Nguyen, Chris and I hugged and parted ways.  Bao and I spent a very good lunch, pho no less :), catching up on his life and his plans for school.  I have to say that I really like the California coast, but Bao has grown bored with the constant sunshine and lack of temperature variety.  He has his hopes to go back to the midwest for graduate school.  Being from Chicago, I reckon I can't blame his for wanting to return to his home and such.

After lunch, Bao took me to his school where I hung out in Starbucks catching up on all my electronic correspondences while Bao worked with his lab partner on their project.  After working in the library for a several hours, they had succeeded in completing the team work part of it and decided to do the rest separately from their respective homes.  Bao was also kind enough to drop me back in Pasadena.

I had found out through the wonderful social connections device known as Facebook, that my good college colleague, Sam Long, was studying at Cal Tech and working with Jet Propulsion Laboratories.  For those of you who are not enginerds, Cal Tech is one of the best math/science/engineering schools in the country and JPL is one of the most highly sought after research institutions in the aerospace world.  So, well done Sam!  With some quick knocking on the interwebs doors, I was able to arrange to meet up with Sam after work and then head to dinner at the Yardhouse to meet up with my past roommate and good friend David Lui.  Not to mention finally meet his fiance.  The Yardhouse was a particularly fine establishment and most imporantly the fantastic selection of beers on tap came in half-yard glasses.  I don't know how many ounces each glass actually is, but I do know I only remember having two of them.  After that, the night gets a little foggy.  I'm pretty sure I left under my own power, but I certainly didn't navigate.  Lui and his lovely bride to be had a lot more wedding planning to do and so they left a bit early.  Sam and I, however, stayed for... Well, I don't remember.

What I do remember, is that the next morning found me in pretty atrocious shape in Sam's dorm room.  Sam had already went into work, so I took my time resting up and organizing my next mode of transportation.  Several glasses of water later and I was on my way once again.  This time to sunny and beautiful San Diego!

Greyhound was only $12 and I was really happy to see my friends from Peace Corps who have collected in a hippy commune of sorts in Santee, a suburb of San Diego.  The proprietor of this fine little gathering place is Elizabeth Vaughn and she is sharing her childhood home with the excellent company of Jake Larson, Brian Stock (thanks for letting me crash in your bed by the way), Natalie Peters and a friend of Jake's names Nate (I think).

The bus got me in with just enough time to catch the public transit up to the beach where I was to meet my PC pals for a little bonfire on the beach.  It was awesome!  So nice to see everyone, enjoy the breeze off the ocean, eat some brats, watch the fire dance around our fire pit.  Unfortunately, Brian was away for work, so I never did get to see him.  After a few hours, Jake and Elizabeth called it a night.  Jake works as an EMT and had a 24 hour shift coming up.  So Natalie and I stayed with Rob, her beau, and the lovely couple Lauren and Simon (I think that was their names).  After discussing this, that and the other for several hour we finally called it a night around 12:00 or so which was just about the time my hangover released me from its mind slowing grip.  So back up to Santee where I borrowed Brian's bed and was immediately dead to the world.

The next day I had planned on taking the Greyhound to Phoenix and then a shuttle up to Prescott where I would meet up with another SLS graduate, Cher Vang.  But after looking at all the options available to me, it was clear that public transit was not the cheapest way to go.  I could rent a car for 24 hours, put gas in it, and still be slightly cheaper than Greyhound and the shuttles together.  Mostly because I wasn't stopping until I reached Albuquerque.  This, combined with CraigsList classifieds of people looking for a lift, made the total price less than $100.  Not too shabby.  So I spent most of the day with Natalie, jut relaxing.  We went out to the beach, then a long bike ride with Rob, got some delicious carne asada and then beer at a local watering hole.  It was a good day.

The next morning was a slow start for me.  I was in no hurry as my car rental was scheduled for 12:00.  Jake had come back from his shift and wasn't too exhausted, so he and I headed out to breakfast.  We discussed his job and his eventual goal of being a fire fighter.  Apparently, this is the way you work your way up to becoming a good candidate for fire fighting school.  First be an EMT, then work your way up to being a paramedic.  After a few years as a paramedic, then you are ready to begin learning about fires.  According to Jake, most of a fire fighter's job is medical, not pyrotechnic.  Good to know.  I don't want to work as a paramedic, but I've always thought of that as a very good skill to know.

Well, this is kind of abrupt, but I have to sign off here.  More to come though :)

The Map

For those of you interested, here was my entire trip according to Google Maps.  I left out the specific address, but you will get the idea.

The whole trip

Map of travels

After a breakfast of leftovers, (I was told to make myself at home and at home I eat leftovers often) Mrs. McDermut joined me for a bit, in between her miriad phone calls.  She is a very busy woman, but still made time to force some dried blueberries on me (well she didn't have to force too hard) and wish me on my way.  After careening down the hill and scaring an morning motorist I was back on the road for a nice, short leisurely ride to Ventura, my last coastal town before I climbed up the hills in to the beating heart of LA.

And that is pretty much all there is to tell.  I didn't have any problems, the ride was quick and easy, the only hard part was climbing the last little hill to my hosts' place.  Now this is the interesting part.  My host, a couch surfer named Joy, is the mother of two and just recently migrated her family onto to terre ferma.  A week prior to my visit, she was living with her teenage son and daughter on a sailing boat in the harbor.  She is an avid sailor, rides horses, and currently has seen pretty reasonable success in her online business.  She is an RN and (here is the part that I really want to try now) was recently a crew member on a replica of a 16th century galleon!  Apparently, San Diego has a tall ship festival every year.  Joy wanted to take her kids to it as well as a few of their friends, so with her small gaggle of adolescents, they begin touring around these giant wooden vessels.  Being the avid sailor and skipper that she is, she began asking lots of questions from the crew.  So detailed and relentless were her questions about the fine points of rigging and sailing a ship of this size that eventually she was speaking with a captain of one of the three mast giants.  By the time the conversation had concluded, the dialog had turned more into an interview and the captain offered her a position with the crew for the trip from San Diego to New Zealand!  As she was accepting the offer, she suddenly realized that she was supposed to be chaperoning the kids, then she further realized (now brought out of her dream, almost come true) to the fact that she could not take her kids on this three month voyage.

So in a matter of days, she put her work on hold, arranged for the father of her kids to take them, and then headed of into the pacific on a relic of the Armada!  What an awesome story, she was even paid enough to afford the ticket back to the US after arriving.  She said that sometimes they will even take green horns like me to be a night watchman, basically sit up all night and make sure we don't hit anything.  This has me extremely enticed.  She even offered to borrow a boat (she sold hers when she became a terrestrial once again) and take me sailing for a day.  If I had more time I certainly would have, however the offer still stands and so I just might take a crack at this sailing thing next summer and see if I have sea legs or not.  If I do, then there is also a shorter voyage that usually takes on rookies from Baja California up to San Diego.  I haven't investigated this for myself, but Joy seemed to be well versed on the sailing world.

So after lots and lots of conversation, we went to an Irish pub nearby, had dinner and beer, then called it a night.  I had a long day of hill climbing ahead of me and I needed some sleep.

The next morning Joy was happy to whip me up an awesome breakfast, including some chocolate covered raspberries that she had made herself the day before.  Then, I cleaned up my sleeping area, packed my stuff and with a hug from Joy I was out the door and on my way.

The next 11 hours were miserable.  From sea level, it was a long slow gradual climb that took me up 1200+ feet to the pass.  When I was going to Santa Cruz, I am pretty sure I climbed just as much, but is was a shorter distance and so I got off and pulled a lot more.  This time, it wasn't quite steep enough to justify getting off and pulling so I kept plugging away at it until I was right at the foot of the pass.  I pulled the trike the next three miles or so up the last 500 feet.  I was too pooped to care that it was only 500 feet.  It seemed like it was a lot more.  Once at the top, I selected a nice stout branch for my ad-hock breaking system and began my very short, fast decent.  This is the worst part.  I spent nearly 10 hours climbing up the pass, and my decent was just over 30 minutes.  There was a highlight though, all along this route were lots and lots of fruit stands and so I stopped in at one for lunch and feasted on fresh cherries, blueberries, and raspberries.  I'm pretty sure I ate five pounds of fruit.

So after my quick decent, which turned out to be a good thing because all the fruit for lunch was catching up with me and I need to find a toilet, I found the residence of Mr. John Micheal McGuire Papp and his roommate (who was also his roommate in college coincedently) Mr. Grant "The Gentle Ginger Giant" Walthall.  I was greeted with smiles, handshakes and most importantly, beer!  These two young IT specialists were gifted with a brand new kegorator!  So we settled into some delicious beer, I found the toilet and shower, then more beer.  We caught up on all that had been happening in our respective lives and dined on delicious oven pizza.  When that wasn't enough, we swilled more beer and ordered Domino's!  How I miss college.

The rest of the night, was like so many other college Friday nights and I wound up on the floor.