We woke at 8:00 not bothered. Good, we made it through the night. This would be our first time using the book we got from Mike and Sean of bicycling the Pacific Coast. We both got ready to leave and used the bathrooms that were property of the marina.
The sun burned through the clouds as we left heading back down the coast. We passed massive fields of strawberries that filled the air with their scent. Emmmm. Man I really envy those evil aliens that are stealing all of our good jobs. This looks like fun. There were many other things growing in this apparent oasis of cultivation as we passed by miles and miles of fields and fruit stands. We stopped at one stand and I got some strawberries while Paul got a peach. They were succulent.
After our break, we had to navigate many small side roads. Thank goodness for the book, we would not have made it through the day without it. We rode for another 15 miles or so into downtown Monterey. We ate at a cafe where the soup de'jour sounded good, so I had it, and Paul got a sandwich. We left there and road on a bike path along the beach. Some aspiring tourist ran into us, and wanted to make sure we did the 17-mile ride along the water around Pebble Beach golf course. He was on bike, and was overly helpful… you know the type.
We heeded his advice and began our ride around the 17-mile drive. Three words. "w", "o", "w". The scenery was beautiful, and the houses were even more impressive. Paul put a down payment on one , which held us up for a bit.
When we made our way all around the course, we headed down into Carmel-By-The-Sea. There were more luxurious homes, and fortunately a Safeway as we approached the 1 again. We stopped in Safeway for a while, and got way too many grapes along with a half gallon of chocolate milk. You know me, I forced down grapes well passed enjoyment, until I was purple in the face. Chocolate milk doesn't exactly sit light in the stomach either. After I screwed around online for a while, we got back on the road.
It was about 6:00, and the days didn't last nearly as long as they did for the past few months. We began pedaling towards Big Sur as the sun slowly descended. As we approached the north end of the Big Sur area (still confused as to where exactly Big Sur is), we came to an amazing vista point. The wind was very strong, and was nearly pushing us up the hill to it. The views from the top were great, and seem to instill a power within us. AHHHH!!!!
After we enjoyed the view with others, we kept on our way. We passed a few potential campgrounds, and came to a grocery store. We got a little more food there, and talked to the locals who suggested we go up the hill about another 1.5 miles to the Big Sur campground where we could camp with the redwoods. "Okay" we said, jaded from our amazing tree experiences in the recent past, as we hopped back on the bikes for our lest leg of the night. It was near pitch black, but there was very little traffic on the road, so we were fine.
We located the campground, and there were no attendants up front, so we would sleep for free. We set up the tent while I played some tunes for us. It was pleasantly warm, and very quiet in the woods.
Life was good.