Costa Mesa, CA

Greetings to all from LA! First of all, I would like to say a huge thank you to my cousin Ben. Ben and his wife Lauren live in town here, and he picked my dad and I up yesterday from LAX and drove us down to our hotel in Costa Mesa. Ben and I were entertained by my dad thinking he knew exactly where he was going, because he thought he recognized things from his trip here two years ago. The first time he "recognized" a turn from last time happened to be in Long Beach. For those of you not familiar with L.A., Long Beach is about 25 miles north of our destination here in Newport Beach. He saw a McDonalds and insisted that we turn right at it. We would have ended up in the ocean after about a half mile. As a result, I will be very apprehensive in taking his word for it when he recognizes turns. Before I know it, we will make a wrong turn and end up in Timbuktu unknowingly volunteering ourselves to play knife games with a guy named Raging Bull. Although very adventurous, I would pass on that. But in all seriousness, Ben, thanks a lot, we could not have done it without you, and it was great to see you!!!

We checked into the Ramada in Costa Mesa which is the same place dad stayed two years ago (he was POSITIVE it was a "La Quinta") and it is about 1.2 miles away from the Pacific where we will be dipping our tires tomorrow at about 6:00 am. We had a rest day today where we just hung out after we built our bikes and took them to "Two Wheels, One Planet" bike shop. The guys there were very helpful and helped fix a minor problem on my bike. Everything seems to be in order, with the exception of my speedometer, but I will get that running soon.

Well, not much has happened yet, but I'm sure the stories will start piling up very soon. We just got back from a huge meal at the Outback Steakhouse, and I am ready for bed. Thanks for checking in, and I will see you after 124 miles tomorrow!

Blake