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Day 0:
Jeff and I took our bikes and two boxes
that were way to small to the shipping department at work. As the day
grew short, we dismantled our bikes and frantically packed them into the
boxes. Our friend Roger was nice enough to carry us and our bikes to
the Burbank Airport. There, we checked in at the South West counter and
paid the extra fees to check our bikes, bags, and my trailer. We took
off on time from Burbank headed for Oakland.
We arrived in Oakland and found our bike
boxes in the corner behind the baggage claim. We asked the nice lady at
help desk, and she said we could assemble our bikes outside. The
security and staff were friendly and understanding. They even offered
to take care of our boxes and trash. During assembly I discovered that
the front axel fork was bent (the rear derailleur was later found to
also be bent). Once assembled, we got directions to the nearest BART
station and began our journey.
We purchased tickets and jumped on the
first train. After a couple of stops, we decided we were on the wrong
train, and we got off at some station on the north side of Oakland. We
then realized we were on the right train and after about a 30 minute
wait, got back on the same train line. We got off at the Market Station
in San Francisco and began our ride to Nick and Lauren's on 17th St.
We arrived at Nick and Lauren's to some thick Juicy
hamburgers. After dinner, we went to the garage to show off our bikes,
at which time Jeff realized his backpack was missing! After a brief
panic, Nick drove us back to the station in Oakland which we had
mistakenly detrained. Jeff found his bag safe and sound in the security
office. Someone had reported a suspicious bag, Oh No! We successfully
retrieved Jeff's bag and returned to Nick's for some much needed rest.
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Day 1
After taking
pictures at the Golden Gate Bridge, I zeroed Trip 2 Odometer. After
traveling 0.18miles from GG Bridge, still in the parking lot, my chain
popped off of my rear sprocket and wedged between the cassette and the
spokes. The chain sheared material off 8 spokes, breaking one.
We tried to fix the wheel as best we could, thinking we had all of the
tools and supplies required, but found that the spokes that Mike
(Performance Bike) gave me were too long. Most of the damaged spokes
had burs that did not allow us to remove them from the hub, and we did
not have proper dykes to cut them. So, we put the wheel back together.
I gave the trailer to Jeff, and we coasted two miles down the hill (in
the wrong direction) to Sports basement.
At Sports Basement we waited two hours for them to replace 8 spokes and
re-true the wheel. They also said that my rear derailleur mount was
bent. They tried to bend it back as best as they could, and tuned the
shifters so they would not pop off again. I also purchased a set of
spokes the proper size. $54.24 later, about 3:00pm, we left sports
basement and climbed back up the hill to the Golden Gate Bridge. We
rode past the view point parking lot and started our forward progress.
Once we were able to
get back onto the road, we managed to make it 19.71 miles from the
Golden Gate Bridge, where we stopped at the Pacifica Motor Inn. We got
the last room for $125. It was a fairly nice room. They claimed it had
a nice view of the ocean, which is why it was an expensive suite. But
the fabulous view was mostly of other buildings, though we could see
some parts of the beach. I guess we were lucky we even got a room, even
though we had to snuggle on a California King bed.
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