Less than 24 hours Overnight by Bicycle

Here's an impressive video of a big climb using a very bike bike. The Xtracycle is a wonderful way to haul a lot of gear and luxury items when you're out camping and exploring by bicycle.

So Long January from the top of the mountain!

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Sweet escape. I ran the halls of the office getting things filed, gathered, ready for a quick escape for an s24o. The usual protocol is to cut work at lunch on a Friday in order to make it to some distant location, but with short days and busy jobs, 4PM was the only choice. Nick was doing his own breakaway from his law office downtown. We checked in via cell phone and I could hear him shuffling papers and logging out of his various work gadgets.

It was 5 when we met up. By chance, the beginning of this ride happened to be at Nick's daughter's pre-school. So we got the opportunity to visit with Nick's daughter and wife before heading up the mountain. 

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Compared to the, say, the Rockies,  the Santa Ynez range is nothing special. But for a couple of guys with loaded touring rigs trying to make it to a friend's land at the top, it it plenty challenging.

Here's a link to the relative zone where we started. You can follow the road up the mountain to get an idea of what our climb was like.

Lucky for us, we have a friend who gives us access to a little piece of land up near the top.

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As the light was starting to vanish and the moon and stars were getting brighter, we tossed our bags onto a bed of clover and surveyed the views that span from downtown Santa Barbara to the Gaviota Coast. The views are magnificent and, with a couple of big gulps from the water bottles and a sip or two of good whiskey, things got better and better.

Doing an s24o with a long and trusted friend is a wonderful thing. We've had conversations going on that we pick up and put down over the decades. A few words and a smile are all the leverage needed to trigger a memory of the great ocean adventure involving Stubby, Gary, and the shark. A few moments of silence and we're both thinking about our families and our roles as fathers. Along with the conversations, we took turns plugging our iPods into some speakers and shared our current life playlists. Two songs for Nick, two songs for Don. This went on for longer than an hour until it became hard to keep the eyes open.

Nick teased me about having my tent and I ended up not using it. We woke up to a curiously warm morning (probably above 60 degrees) and no moisture on our bikes and bags. GREAT.

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Nick, is one who NEEDS nature. He works in a demanding job, he's a good parent, and all this means he needs to get away every so often to "sleep on the dirt" and think about life.

I'm going to invite him out for an s24o. The weather is cold in Santa Barbara right now, but there's no ice on the ground and I'm sure we'll be cozy in our respective tents.

The thing I'm looking forward to on this tour is music. My pal has recently been listening to a LOT of music. We went to college together and were roommates for two years. Among my many great memories is our trips to the music store to flip through new and used LPs. Sometimes I'd take a risk on something in the dollar bin and we'd bring it back to our dorm room for an audition. If it "sucked" we'd actually smash the record against the wall or frisbee it into the night (we were not ecologists at the time, that's changed).

Once in awhile, we'd spin something incredible and sit back enjoying the perfect mix of guitar, bass, drums, and vocals.

I'm looking forward to an s24o with iPods pre-loaded with our current favorites. Nick has been exploring in the area of Country Music (me too -- NEVER would I have predicted this) and I'm looking forward to sharing some recent finds in the genre I like to call "bands trying to sound like Joy Division."

We'll ride out to the one of our sites, plug in some powered speakers and listen to some songs as if it were the early 80s and we were in our old dorm room. For a few hours, our lives will be as uncomplicated as they were back before they unfolded like giant, unweildy maps. We'll ride back to our current, wonderful lives with new energy and new appreciation for our good fortune to be mobile, musical, and in touch.

D

The surf season has arrived in Santa Barbara
The s24o-minded surfer is loathe the fight for a parking space amongst the notoriously over-sized surf vehicles. Why drive to the break when you can do what I did this morning -- load the bike with the board, towel, and a coffee-filled thermos and ride to the ocean. Not all surfers are lucky enough to live within riding range of their favorite spot. But my challenge is this. If you DO live within 10 miles of a break, use your bike rather than your car. It's an easy way to get extra fun and exercise out of your surfing habit.

A bicycle can carry ANY size board. I regularly spot a surfer with a stand-up paddleboard or SUP pedaling along the bike trail to the ocean. He has the board on a simple trailer that looks fit to carry an ocean kayak.

Bicyclists get the best parking. There's nothing as satisfying as riding by the parking lot, down a hill and right to the sand for the fastest vehicle-to-line-up entry short of dropping from a chopper into the take-off zone.

Here's a link that has live video of one of my favorite breaks. If you see a happy surfer on a bike, it might be me.

CowaBikeA,

Don

Dear s24o community,

It's still Thanksgiving but hours after the big meal. I'm out in the garage/office tapping at the laptop beneath a row of bicycles that hang from the rafters. I am thankful for a lot of things. I am very thankful for the natural world and how wonderful it is to experience by bicycle.

Jane (the almost 10-year-old) and I rode the Goleta Beach today. We rode in a good headwind while enjoying clean air and giant clouds left over from yesterday's first rainstorm of the season. We stopped at a picnic table and hat a hot tea from the thermos while looking out over the Pacific Ocean.

The whole trip, including a stop at my office, took less than two hours. But we'll both always remember this fine day.

Happy Thanksgiving to all,

Don

Sometimes a Sub 24-hour overnight bike trip becomes much less than 24 hours.  Don and I wanted to observe the Perseid meteor shower, which peaked August12th.  So after long work days we rode the 8 miles and 1100 vertical feet to the top of San Marcos Road, an old stagecoach route in Santa Barbara, hard up against the Los Padres National Forest.  We arrived at 8:00 p.m., late dusk, but the ¾ moon provided plenty of light.

We laid down a Tyvek sheet and broke out Trader Joe’s delicacies - a sourdough baguette, smoked oysters, exotic cheeses and brandy.  I sat on a stump and Don reclined on a semi-trashed chaise longue that had been conveniently discarded and we toasted our good fortune.

It got darker and we skygazed for a while.  I saw only the heavens, but Don saw an excellent, Disney-esque shooting star. 

We laid out our sleeping bags on top of cheap plastic dropcloths.  We didn’t bring tents because we wanted to go light and we wanted to watch the meteors.  When the marine layer came ashore with its wet mist, we flipped the dropcloths over ourselves like a waterproof taco shell.

After a lot of talking and rambling, I fell asleep, and slept great.  My down bag was damp the next morning when the alarm sounded at 5:15.  It was still dark as we put on our warm clothes and loaded the bikes.  Our headlights cut miner’s-lamp shafts of light in the misty fog as we zipped down the 1,100 feet to a coffee shop for a cup of house blend.

Dawn was breaking as we hit our driveways, just as our families were getting up, and it was if it had all been a dream  [note from Don -- Great post Mark. The pictures didn't come out well, so I won't post any of this adventure].

Dodging raindrops, counting fireflies, the Crane Family takes Five Rivers by long-tail bicycle and, after you read their account here, you'll wish you were a member of the Crane Family.

"In total: 16 miles, 18 hours, 4 happy people!"

Here's yet another curious thing about we Americans. We love things to be instant. We buy a lot of "instant" food; we get mad when our downloaded content does not instantly start; and we demand instant service from every service provider. Why is it that we don't want our vacations and recreation to be instant? We wait in lines at airports, drive for two days, wait at the gates of campgrounds behind a long line of RV campers.

The s24o might the healthiest form of INSTANT gratification in America (and the world, of course). Open door, get on bike, turn cranks -- adventure. It's instant!