A peek out our hotel bathroom window within seconds of waking up revealed we were off to a good start. There wasn't a cloud in the skies above Merced and it had stopped raining early enough in the wee hours of the morning for the tarmac (As well as our bikes) to completely dry from Sunday's soggy weather.
We packed up and set out for breakfast to find the entire town closed to honor this country's fallen vets. (Including the Merced Theater. Good to see that even the podunks have a reperatory theater. Support your local rep house, people!) Before all hope was lost, Damian directed our attention to a shining black and yellow beacon of hope on the right...
I suppose I should explain: I've been obsessed with Sonic Drive-In for several years now. The chain has been advertising during college football games for as long as I can remember, but since they don't operate in L.A. I've never been to one, leaving me wondering for years now at what I might be missing. The people on the commercials always look so happy clutching their 96-oz. raspberry lemonades and Super Chipotle Bacon Ranch Monterey Jack Triple Cheeseburgers.
I discuss this with people from parts of the country that have Sonics, and I'm always met with a look that is equal parts confusion and disgust. May not be a big deal to someone who grew up on post-Sunday School Cinnamon Toast Sticks somewhere in the Texas panhandle, but they obviously don't understand the effect years of mass marketing can have on a guy.
I informed the crew for last year's trip about my wish to finally get my hands on some Sonic-style 1,200-calorie goodness, but it never quite panned out. We only passed one, and it was literally two miles up the road from where we had just eaten outside of Bakersfield.
But I am a stranger to America's Drive-In no longer!
Seeing as how they had absolutely nothing that didn't have pork in it on the breakfast menu, I decided to go big and get a super breakfast burrito that had both sausage and bacon. I'd like to tell you that a breakfast twenty years in the making was so phenomenal that it shook the pillars of Heaven, but, as we all know, greasy, fried fast food has its limitations. I do give Sonic huge points, though, for masking the taste of their food's overprocessing with a heaping fistful of diced jalapenos.
With a belly full of grease, we hit a local drug store for ear plugs (Three dudes who snore, one hotel room. Do the math) and ear phones (One of my ear buds didn't survive Sunday's trip.) I only bring this up becuase I discovered the greatest thing I'd ever laid eyes on near the cash register.
Because, deep down inside, don't we all wanna smell like Ace Frehely?
We took Route 140 out of Merced, which began with a long, straight stretch that led us out of the San Joaquin Valley. I took this opportunity to work up the balls to fish my camera out of my pocket and get some shots whilst moving at 85 mph.
The road gradually got greener and twistier as we neared Mariposa, and I howled with delight as we finally, FINALLY got to make a sweeping left turn. We'd put nearly 250 miles between ourselves and home and these were the first proper corners we got to lean our bikes into, but this road was well worth the wait as we were cradled between wooded areas and rock formations through a series of rolling high-speed switchbacks.
We blew through Mariposa -- Our first night's stop on last year's trip -- and turned left at Route 49 and the reason we took a 90 mile detour on our way to the coast...
The Little Dragon is about 15 miles of pristine, twisty bits that carve through the countryside outside of Yosemite and were pretty much tailor-made for idiots on motorcycles. The road attracts gearheads from all over as three other motorcyclists and an older couple in a mind-bogglingly large RV pulled over to join us at the top of the Dragon while I snapped pictures and Damian tried to figure out why his speedometer had called it quits.
One of the riders, a middle-aged guy on a red Honda, had a seemingly GPS-esque knowledge of the local roads and recommended a route West for us that would lead us on a backroad alongside a winding river and, best of all, around Modesto's urban blight. When we greeted him with puzzled looks as he rapidly rattled off a series of street and route names, he offered to draw us a map before we set off.
After stopping to help a girl who, from what we could gather, was tossed off of the back of her boyfriend's Ninja when he took a sharp hairpin too hot (HIM: Road rash. HER: Likely a broken radius & ulna. Nothing that wouldn't heal.), we tore into the Dragon like a fat guy at Sizzler. I was literally giggling into my helmet as I flicked my Kawi from side-to-side through a seemingly endless series of lefts and rights. The road is simply a dream on a bike as it rolls its way down into a valley, over a bridge, through several wooded areas and back into another set of hills that cradle you until the road is all too quickly interrupted by a stop sign and a small town called Coulterville. We pulled over to grab a drink and bask in the Dragon's awesomeness some more before we veered left onto Route 132 and broke toward the coast.
Needless to say, a crudely scrawled map is pretty much useless in our hands, so we failed to make a turn or two where our Honda-riding buddy suggested and stayed on the 132 until it spat us out in Modesto. Fortunately, the 132 was also a great ride that serpentined through the foothills and tiny towns like La Grange (Cue ZZ Top) that look like they were literally carved out of the hillside a century and a half ago.
We pulled over in a tiny town called Keyes where we planned a new super-secret route that would bypass the freeways in favor of what appeared on an area map to be a winding back road through the farmland.
Also needless to say, we wound up lost again and instead limped through two tiny blink-and-you-miss-them cities, Grayson (Which I assume is named after Nightwing) and Westley. Our failed reservoir run led us smack dab into I-5, which we happily jumped onto before we could get lost yet again.
The 5 led to the 580, which in turn led to a road that we were sure would snake around Livermore and circumnavigate a giant reservoir before leading us to the home stretch into Half Moon Bay.
Yep. Lost again. No reservoir, and the bit of switchback that we did ride was spent behind a beat up old camper who refused to either drive faster than 5 miles less than the posted speed limit or pull over and let the line of traffic that had accumulated in his wake pass. When Grandpa did finally pull over, I at least was able to grab another road shot.
We stopped at a Mexican restaurant in Fremont where we planned the final leg of day 2 (Wishful thinking, I know) while I destroyed a plate of huevos rancheros and a massive iced tea. I suggested we should take the San Mateo Bridge, which would not only offer a sweet ride across the Bay but would also then lead us directly into Half Moon Bay leaving us no chance whatsoever at getting lost.
The view from the bridge was amazing, as the low road seems to be floating on the San Francisco Bay and offers a scenic shot of the Golden Gate Bridge to the right as you head into San Mateo. I considered trying for another road shot, but thought better of it when a few strong gusts threatened to blow all three of us into one of the adjacent lanes.
The hills got greener and the air got colder, signalling that we were getting close to the coast. We pulled into the hotel a little before 7, and were thrilled to find a bigger room than the one we were offered in Merced which meant there was no threat of us rolling over into each other's bunks sometime during the night. The hotel was also within walking distance of a taqueria that makes a slammin' shrimp burrito I'd consider having again for breakfast tomorrow if we weren't getting a free one from the fine folks at Holiday Inn.
We're sticking to the coast for the rest of the way home, which I'm excited about because I've never seen Pacific Coast Highway between Santa Cruz and Santa Barbara. I'm doubly excited because that huge freakin' body of water to the West greatly reduces our risk of making a wrong right turn and getting lost.
PLAYLIST (Jack White Day)
The White Stripes - White Blood Cells, Elephant, Icky Thump
The Racounteurs - Broken Boy Soldiers, Consolers For The Lonely
DAY TWO STATISTICS
1: Number of crashes suffered
0: Number of crashes my crew suffered
3: Number of potentially great rides on two-lane blacktops ruined by ridiculously slow Northern California motorists
Too many to count: Number of minutes spent lost and superfluous miles spent getting unlost
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