Day 8

Berkley to Santa Cruz

We started off the day a little lazy, heading out of town after morning traffic. While packing the gear onto the bikes Chris noticed there was an o-ring coming out of his chain. Humm, thats not good. We pondered if we should replace the chain immediately or not. We decided if the chain was less that $60 we would just get a new one otherwise we would get one in San Diego. About 40miles down the road in San Mateo we found out we would be buying one immediately when it broke on the freeway.

I lent Chris my bike while he ran to the closest Suzuki store which we found using Google text. Manny helped from Portland too, by now we had started using him as the go to man for questions. Coincidently there was a Suzuki store just a few miles away. Here Chris met some the most generous people we have encountered. Carl the local retired motorcycle guru spends his free hours working the store. Carl located a store that carried the chain a RK520S, which was a bit out of the way down a thoroughfare that resembled Aurura. Once we had the chain we began to realize that quick link was not as easy to install its name implied.

The wrapper explicitly stated that vice grips should not be used to install the part. Not a problem, we didn´t have vice grips anyways. After an hour of creatively using every tool to get more leverage to squeeze the link quick link we gave up. We made a couple calls back to Carl asking for advice, he suggested persistence (squeeze harder!). At 6:00 the Suzuki store closed and Carl offered to have us push the bike a few blocks to his house. He pulled up at the off ramp in his new Corvette with some quick links for the bike chain and a pair of vice grips just as it was beginning to get dark. After giving the chain a squeeze and shake with vice grips he suggested that we drive the bike to his garage without fastening the chain link lock and finish our work there. We ended up limping the bike there slowly following Carl's Corvette and hoping that the chain link wouldnt come apart before getting to his garage. Carl offered us some drinks, fixed himself a cocktail and started to work on the quick link with some large vice grips. After alot of squeezing and shaking the link went on.

After fixing the chain, soon we found our selves with a drink, hanging out in the garage with Carl and his old friend Bobby. Carl would show us pictures of his youth, touring with Bobby on motorcycles. I can remember a few of the scenes depicted: a motorcycle burnt into a molten crisp after a crash, another picture of a motorcycle crash after Carl had just driven it through a barbwire fence, and picture of 1970s versions of Carl and Bobby (full heads of long hair, mustaches and leather fringe jackets) glad to be alive after another crash. Carl showed us his motorbikes: a Suzuki Bandit and a big yellow 1950s Triumph. While Carl asked questions, imparted advice, and told stories about motorbikes he snuck a pair of vice grips and some quick link parts into our panniers. These guys were the real deal and I felt very comfortable being in good company. Eventually it was time to go. We packed our stuff back into our panniers, pulling our gear out of the back of Carls Corvette and putting it back onto our bikes. We left around 7:30 PM, heading south to Santa Cruz.

We pressed on into Santa Cruz in the dark. Chris knew some people there from the Ultimate Frisbee circle. Manzell had told us this his ex-girlfriend Petra lived in Santa Cruz and we made arrangements with Petra and her husband to stay the night at their home. We took our time getting there, filling up with gas at night in Santa Cruz and based on Idahos recommendation eating dinner at the Santa Cruz Dinner. We ate double portions: two Teryaki burgers each. After dinner we drove to Petras place up in the hills of Santa Cruz arriving around 10:00pm, after only getting a little bit lost.