Day 14

Day 14 brought a great sense of excitement when I opened our motel room door and saw bright sunshine! It was still cool around the coastal areas but as soon as you ventured inland at all it heated up in a hurry.  In my pre-trip planning today was supposed to be a short haul into San Fran but we still had 300+ km to cover to our hotel after falling short a few KM over a series of days.

As we pulled out of the hotel parking lot this group of a dozen bikes rolled by, mostly Sport Touring bikes with two Wings and a Harley Road King.I fell in behind the group as we hit Highway 128 and followed along for several miles, felt just like I was at home riding with the good folks of CMC Chapter 023 Winnipeg.  As Highway 128 became very tight and twisty their group began to stretch out to the point it became apparent the Road King rider couldn't maintain the pace set by their road captain. Their tailgunner waved me through but I didn't want to break into their group, on his second invitation I blasted by and grabbed back onto the tail end of the lead group and enjoyed the ride until the turned off toward Ukiah where Char and I waved out and headed on our way.

Our ride today covered a lot of Wine country, it seemed like there was another vineyard around every corner.

We had the Lions Gate earlier in the trip and now the big brother the Golden Gate bridge.  Got a bit of a surprise coming off the bridge when I learned it would cost me $6 to get off the bridge.  Don't think the Mercedes behind me was real pleased with the amount of time it took me to get my gloves off, dig some cash out of my riding pants and then put my wallet away and get set.

While crossing the bridge Char snapped this photo of Alcatraz.

After we crossed the  bridge I pulled off on a side street to get our bearings, take a break and check a few things on the gps.  That led to an adventure we likely would have missed without my unplanned detour.  The street we ended up one was Divisadero and to this prairie boy it felt like it was about a 45 degree slope.  Every cross street had a stop sign that had you stopping on the slope.  It is a challenge riding 2-up on a 900 pound cruiser loaded with luggage on this street.  All that was missing is flying cars in a car chase ala The Streets of San Francisco.

 I wanted to get an oil change while were in San Fran and with a day off planned for tomorrow I had hoped a dealer could squeeze me in for next day service.  A quick call to Wendy in service at Mission Motorcycles in Daly City and she told me to come on down as soon as I hung up the phone.  I got my oil change on less than an hours notice and a new battery as well as I had been having some issues at start up the last week that had me concerned.  While waiting for my service the nice folks in sales chatted me up and offered all sorts of tips for our day off Friday. My experience would certainly have me recommending Mission Motorcycles to anyone.

Mileage covered today was 328.9 km bringing our total to 4624.9 km