Go West Young Man!

LEFT: Gilroy Garlic Festival runway

Monday morning, 4am, and I'm exhausted from my recent weekend training activities. But, off I go to the Rochester International Airport (International because apparently some Canadian once got off here) to wing my way out to California. Upon arrival, I fight the Bay traffic (ughh, back in a "big city" again), and head up to Mt Tam. It's actually Mt Tamaupululahiaimkahanamanamaiaiasteinbergshalom, but the locals all just call it Mt Tam. It's kind of sacred ground to us cyclist, as it's considered the place where the first mountain bike race occurred. As I drive up the mountain to go hike, I come across an old mexican man selling produce roadside. I stop and buy some cashews, banana chips, and other assorted fruits. He gives me a handful of cherries as thanks; they were incredibly juicy, so I buy a big bag of them and devour them, singing as I'm climbing up the mountain, and tossing cherry pits out the window at the porsche's driving by. Seems like everyone on Mt Tam drives a porsche (well, maybe the hired help drives BMW'ers). Lot's of money out here. I'm in a jeep (original, not some pansy-ass SUV) and driving over every object I can; bushes, concrete barriers, small children.

I hike a few hours out on Mt Tam, then head to my friends house in Sausalito. Now Sausalito, for those of you who have never been there, is a nirvana kind of place; situated right on San Francisco bay, populated with scores of little touristy stores and restaurants, and, when it's not under fog (which is basically 12-14 hrs/day), has incredible weather. I have dinner with my friends Deb and Ed, and stay at their shack on the bay. It's embarrasingly small (you'd think that they could have something more than a trailer after all these years), and only the addition of the elevator to take you up and down the FOUR floors makes the visit worthwhile. Well, that and the 187 smoke alarms that all went off simultaneously at 4am. I thought a freighter ship was driving right through the house. Ed was his useful placid, thoughtful self, as he ran through the house tearing the smoke alarms out of the ceiling one after the other, and tossing them into the Bay. He must have been a pillar of stability in the San Fran hospital ER working on the hermaphrodites!

Tuesday I head down to one of my favorite little seaside towns, Santa Cruz (SC). SC is kinda the consumate surfer-dude town, with an old amusement park, a VERY liberal downtown (the bookstore sells Al Gore books under "Conservative Manifesto's"), yoga studios, surfing beaches, and, of course, smoked hippies. Not smoked as in "I had some of that smoked jerky this morning", no, smoked as in "shouldn't have done that 27th tab of LSD last night". They were scores of them walking and laying around the downtown area, harmless, but a sorry sight nevertheless. I think this is where the slogan "A mind is a terrible thing to waste" was coined.

There's lots of interesting sights as I troll around SC; low-rider pickups totally crack me up, they seem so totally dysfunctional. Hey, I can put 4 head of lettuce in the back, and STILL have room for my Goya beans. Spanish radio is on full-volume in about half the cars; every other song has mariacha guitars and is about "mi corazon, mira mira" which (for those of you who don't speak spanish as fluently as I do) roughly translates into "My heart, it is exploding from the refried beans I ate for lunch". I eat stuffed burritos every meal (god, I miss real mexican food), and then try to get through the evening without a reverse colostomy. You get the visual.

It's interesting that the weight problem is not as pervasive in CA as it is back East; I'd forgotten how much better looking all the people are, as they actually get out of the house and do activities. Maybe there's hope for the 90% of kids who are going to be diabetics before their 16th birthdays after all. I stop at one diner for breakfast, and they have "not kidding here" the "migrant breakfast" - a 5 (five) (FIVE) egg omlette, hash (eatable, not smokeable), a 6 oz steak, 2 slices of toast, 4 slices of bacon, 4 sausages, and (my favorite) a small juice. I down two...hey, BP is finally under 200 since I've quit working, might as well live the wild life.

Along the culinary line, I also get to stop at my favorite snack shack, In-N-Out burgers. I never miss stopping on any trips to CA; they have the best burgers, fries, and shakes on the planet, bar none. I could live there.

After a few days R&R in SC, I head up to Gilroy, for their nationally famous Garlic Festival. More on that next post...had to be there to believe it

Lumpy