Hopefully a quick update before bed tonight – it was a restless night & early morning. Yesterday was pretty uneventful – read a bit of Mark Twain (thought I better start one day), picked up my rental car – it’s a black Dodge Avenger that easily swallows the bike in the trunk (which is the main thing of course), has some interesting build quality & unfortunately for the size of it, is underpowered (2.4) & mated with a good old jerky automatic gearbox (sure beats riding all over town though)

– & went for another ride. This ride was much closer to home with one of the guys I met on Sunday, generally around Rose Canyon – we crossed railroad tracks, scrambled under the freeway, clambered up & down canyons, bushwhacked where the trail was overgrown, crossed the bottom end of a military base (the Topgun one incidentally) – a good work out for almost two hours & all only five minutes from home.

Monday morning up bright & early (5.30), bike in the car & off for another ride. Surprisingly, it rained a little in the night & I was not expecting that the ride would be cancelled because there was a small chance of rain. Nevermind, there is always Thursday morning!

So the cancelled ride freed up the rest of the day & I was off to Balboa Park to check it & some of the museums out. The park is one of the oldest in the States & 1200 acres, home to numerous museums & the world famous San Diego Zoo. Many of the buildings along El Prado were put up for the 1915 Panama-California Expo (that was to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal) & are Spanish themed & are pretty darn cool.

I went to four museums – the San Diego Air & Space Museum (heaps of cool old planes & space stuff – suits, Apollo 9 command module), I quite enjoyed this as it had a lot of modern history in it; the San Diego Automotive Museum, this was OK – too many hotrods, but the old original cars were quite neat (but I rate the old Te Puke Vintage Auto Barn higher); the Fleet Science Center – was OK also, lots of hands on sciencey stuff; & lastly the Museum of San Diego History – the smallest of the lot, but I loved it & finding out more of the history of the people of San Diego.

Booked a room in Las Vegas for the start of my road trip next week. The plan keeps changing, but hopefully two nights in Vegas, two or three in Southern Utah for riding & visiting Grand Canyon (North Rim), a day riding in Mammoth, riding around Tahoe somewhere, a bit of sightseeing in San Fransico & then come back to San Diego down the coast. I’ll just have to see how much I can fit in & how much driving I can take (that’s getting close to 2000 miles).

Bed & hopefully a better night’s sleep calls – off to the zoo tomorrow.