The moon was still showing in the sky when we woke up this morning. Since we have been talking about going to a buffet with Loic for a while (and we looked online to see if there was one to go to), Joe and I didn't make any oatmeal for breakfast. Instead, we just snacked on the last two cinnamon buns that we got yesterday. Again I was spoiled by having my bike taken down the hill for me. Joey knows I'm a little clumsy and that it would be hard for me to keep the bike up while going down, so he took it for me. We had a fun ride down the hill back to the Pacific Coast Highway. At first the traffic wasn't so bad, but it didn't take long for the morning rush hour traffic to catch up to us. It wasn't too scary since the cars were going pretty slow, but every once in a while a car would be a little closer than we would have liked- definitely not the "3 feet" we're supposed to get. Luckily for us though, not too long into our ride, we found a wonderful bike path that paralleled the PCH, but went right down the middle of the beach! We were surrounded by sand, and the views were wonderful. It was so peaceful riding along the path. We meandered through pine trees and saw a whole bunch of people out enjoying the beach. One of my favorite things to see are the people riding bikes that have a little rack on the side for their surf board. After riding for a little bit along the path, we found ourselves in Santa Monica. We met a really nice lady who loves traveling by bike. She told us stories of some of the places she had ridden bike around and was excited to hear about our trips too. The lady was out on jog, and like most joggers- they don't want to stop jogging. It was a little funny because the whole time she talked with us, which was quite a while, she jogged in place. It really helped her keep her body in the jogging mode, but it was a little funny for us to stand their talking to her while she was bouncing up and down. As we were talking to her, we found out that her Mom is a teacher in Rochester and that she grew up in Brighton. It sure is a small, small world. Not too long after talking with her, the boys saw some guys playing volleyball and decided to see if they needed any extra players for their game. When they asked, one of the guys came over and said that it's no problem if they wanted to join, but the guys playing would want to see some bumps and sets before. Basically, they didn't want the ball to just be flailing around- these guys were serious players. Even though it was a pick-up game, I guess a lot of the players are really hard core and only want the best players to join them. Oh well, I guess none of us will be playing any beach volleyball if everyone playing is as serious as they were. After that, we headed inland and were on a hunt for bike shops. Loic had to check around to try to see if he could find someone good to build him a new wheel and pretty quickly. We rode around to about 5 bike shops all over the Santa Monica area. It was pretty fun because it was like a little scavenger hunt. While we were waiting at the second to last bike shop, I looked down and saw that my front tire was flat. I couldn't believe it, especially since I didn't remember seeing anything in the road to run over. The thing I couldn't believe even more is that we would be FINALLY changing my front tire. The tire that was on there we had gotten way back when we were in Indiana. Even though we thought the tire would wear out before Alaska, it has gone a total of 8,000 miles. It is amazing! The tire was looking pretty worn, that's for sure, but we decided to just keep running it until I either got a flat or we were about to leave San Diego to head back east. There wasn't really a point to take the tire off just to put a new one on, so waiting for a flat was the best way. So, we sat on the chairs outside of the bike shop that we were at and Joey fixed my tire. We put one of the old Panaracer folding tires that we've had for a while on there just because there wasn't a need to have 2 extra folding tires in Joe's bags. We stopped at one more bike shop, where we met a real nice guy that gave us a few tips on gear that we will be looking into (mainly just new cycling pants and which kind would be the warmest). He talked to the 3 of us for quite a while and was really interested in or trips and in sharing trips he's done and what he's planning to do next. Right to the buffet from there. I was so excited and SO hungry by the time we got there. What a wonderful buffet it was, oh how I love Chinese! They had everything (except sweet and sour chicken =( ), and even had a full, all you can eat sushi bar- which we don't eat, but it still was really nice it was all you can eat. We ate so much for lunch- we just kept eating and eating. Since our booth was right next to the window, our bikes were right outside. There were a couple people looking at the bikes and our little sign. It was so funny to watch because they were looking them all over and the guy even tried to pick up my bike (except he wasn't expecting it to be so heavy, so he didn't put much effort towards it at first and the bike didn't even budge). Eventually they saw us watching them and gave us a big thumbs up. After a minute or so, there ended up being a whole bunch of people standing around the bikes and these two that had been looking at the bikes explained our trip (even though they had never spoken with us about it) and showed the new people our little sign. It was really entertaining to watch them as we sat their enjoying our Chinese. When we had eaten so much that we could barely move, we "hopped" on our bikes and rode down the road to find a McDonald's or Starbucks to use the internet. Once we found McDonald's, we figured out our plans with Loic, since he was heading off to stay with a relative of someone he had met somewhere along the coast. With our game plan with Loic all set, we checked email and found out that the Warm Shower's host that we had set for tonight had emailed us and told us that he won't be home until 10pm tonight! So, at a loss of what to do (since there was definitely not any places to camp, we called the host we had set up for tomorrow night to see if he would be able to take us a day early. Sure enough, he said "Sure, come on over!" We were saved! With our directions to our new destination all figured out, Joe and I headed off one way and Loic the other (we will see him tomorrow for some sight seeing). As we were riding along we rode through Beverly Hills- I was SO excited! We could even see a slight glimpse of the Hollywood sign off in the distance! For some reason, the whole LA area was exactly as I had pictured it to be- especially the part near the beach and Beverly Hills itself. It was awesome riding along through the beautiful sunshine and the palm trees everywhere! The weather was perfect again today- not too hot and not too cold. We had a little trouble finding our host's house because the street that he lived on was one that was split in two different areas, without being connected in the middle. Eventually though, once we found it, we pulled in the driveway of the very cute little house and heard what sounded like a lady saying "Hello!" through the open porch door. We said "hello" back, but over and over again we heard "Hello, Hello.... Hello!" Our host, Barry (and his wife Susan), had mentioned that his housekeeper would be over sometime during the day, so we just assumed it was her- but still weren't sure why she would keep saying hello. After getting our bikes all settled in the back yard, we enjoyed some time talking with our host. It turns out, the "Hello" that we kept hearing was from their pet parrot, Guiermo! He was a very pretty parrot, but didn't like strangers all that much, so we didn't get to pet him at all, in fact while he was having is "free time" he would slowly walk towards us with an intimidating look and pretend he was going to attack us. After a while though, Barry put him back in his cage just so that we didn't have to worry about him biting us. Later on, Joe and I each took a great shower, watched a little TV and enjoyed a great meal of hamburgers and a couple sides with Barry and Susan. We had a great time, and are getting excited about tomorrow because our hosts live right in Hollywood, about 3 houses away from Hollywood Blvd! The main Hollywood area, where the Hollywood Walk of Fame and the Chinese Theater are, is about a mile away- it was perfect! Everyday has been so wonderful, and today wasn't any different. We only rode 27.77miles today, but it worked out well having almost all day to navigate the city. I can't believe we're in Hollywood!
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