Pismo Beach, CA. 5505 miles.

Woke up to another thick Northern California fog and rode I to Sausalito to grab breakfast. Why don’t more people in San Francisco talk about Sausalito? Really nice little town. A quick ride across the Golden Gate and I was right in the middle of SF rush hour traffic. That’s first rate route planning right there, folks.

Before too long I was back on the PCH heading south down the coast. The morning fog was dreary, but it was warmer than Eureka so I had no complaints and it made for some interesting beachscapes.

Once into Santa Cruz the road gets pretty bleak for a good 50 miles that I wish I had cut inland to avoid, but just as I was wondering why everyone romanticized this highway so much I reached Big Sur.

For the next hundred miles the scenery was simply jaw dropping. It did feel a bit like a Disney World ride as even on a Monday morning the route was thick with busses full of Japanese tourists and minivans driving 15 miles an hour with their doors open so that the kids could take pictures with their iPads without stopping, but it was hard to mind since the view made it hard to keep my eyes on the road as it was. I eventually stopped taking pictures because every single curve opened up to a postcard vista and much like Yellowstone and North Cascades you could photograph every inch of it and not do it justice.

As much as the traffic can make the ride drag, every once and a while it would open up and the twisty roads were incredibly fun to ride. Unlike the upper PCH, the lower stretch has been thoroughly idiot-proofed with wider shoulders and guard rails. It’s not that I relish the idea of hitting a three foot high guard rail at speed like it would actually do anything, but psychologically it is much different from the sheer cliffs of the northern PCH.

After a quick $25 turkey sandwich lunch (thanks, German tourist groups) I rode through Los Padres as the green turned to yellow and the first palm trees started to appear spotted among the pines. The landscape slowly began to turn to the Southern California terrain I remember and after a leisurely day of riding I stopped in Pismo Beach for an early night.

Another really nice vacation town, Pismo sports a beautiful beach and a great Main St. strip packed with surf shops and seafood shacks. I had fish and chips on the pier as the sun set over the Pacific while the surfers made their last runs and turned in for the night.

Tomorrow I ride into LA for Wyatt’s memorial. It will be emotional but I can’t wait to meet so many of the people he touched and make some new friends as we celebrate his life. Very soon I will be making that big left to turn back East for good.

Wyatt Neumann was a phenomenally talented photographer and director, a loving husband and father, and a passionate motorcyclist. On June 11th he was doing what he loved riding in Delaware when he suffered a brain aneurysm which caused him to lose control of his motorcycle. He died shortly after. Wyatt was instrumental in both inspiring this trip and planning many of its routes and logistics. The title of this site was unapologetically stolen from his series of photographs from his own travels. He leaves behind a wife and two young children. A memorial fund has been established to help his family in this very trying time. Please consider donating. Any amount will help. Thank you.

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