The Day Before the End

Oh, what a difference a couple of days can make! I’m on the “downhill” side of these elevation maps now, and even tho it still ISN’T downhill all the way, it’s at least downhill MOST of the way to the ocean. And from our past frequent trips to San Diego, I know there will be some pretty impressive long uphills in the outskirts of town tomorrow.

Tomorrow!! It seems pretty unreal that THAT day has come. We’re planning on being at the ocean front by noon, but, more on that when the time comes.

Today was a pretty amazing day all by itself. The winds of the last few days had completely died off, the sun was out and it was wonderfully cool. Real cool, in fact, when we stepped out of STella shortly after the sun was up. The little forced air furnace in STella kicked on and off pretty regularly during the night to keep the low 30’s temps on the outside. The total amount of “up” for today wasn’t like yesterday, but the grades were steeper. The advantage of being on the “old road” is that the traffic is so much less. One disadvantage is that the self-imposed 7% grade on the Interstates isn’t adhered to on these older highways. They built them where they could, and traffic just has to conform to the way it is. On a scale of one to ten, the morning ride was really close to a ten, and that’s really saying something considering the amount of climb.

Our noon stop was planned for Pine Valley, but it was one of those days when the riding went faster than the Motor Homing. Cathy has been lured off the road by a couple of promising looking National Forest Campground areas and found the birding there to be more intriguing than just getting to a noon lunch stop. I had found a congenial coffee shop in Pine Valley, and didn’t mind the wait. When she did arrive, we mosied on down the block to a San Diego County Branch Library and used their free and fast wifi to get out yesterday’s blog. Lunch was aboard STella, and the cell phone netted us a confirmed reservation for overnight camping tonight. We know things will be more crowded and less available the closer to get to San Diego. We have also started working on the planned visits with folks we know in both San Diego and greater Los Angeles.

Our planned stay for the night is again in an Indian Reservation. This tribe also owns a thriving Casino, and is busily building the third expansion of its on site Hotel. I had missed the message from Cathy with its location and rode on into the town of Alpine. She came to pick me up and we even had enough time to “browse” through the Outlet Mall the Casino also has on the property. Pretty easy pace now at the “beginning of the End”.

Check in again tomorrow for the final episode of the Southern Tier Ride. We’ll do a wrap up on Monday to cover our highly anticipated stay at the Hotel del Coronado Sunday night.

It’s been a Real Trip!!

Loved having you all along.