From Worn and Frayed to Slick and Shiny

 

Pt. Mugu on the PCH Northbound

Always make sure your rubber is up to the task.

How are your tires? Are they good for taking the long way home with the few twisties you like? Always take a peek before you throw your leg over, make it part of your own circle of safety as you walk around your bike to make sure there are no loose ends and everything is shipshape for your ride. Planning a long trip? Do more than peek, inspect everything. Who needs to be halfway between Bass Lake and Yosemite when a tire goes or your battery gives up the ghost?

The last few weeks I’ve been planning a 1500-mile ride that includes, a run up the coast from Santa Monica to Cayucos, over to Walnut Creek to visit my best friend Jim and take in a Giants game with him, then ride through Yosemite to stay in Lee Vining before riding through Death Valley to Pahrump (a scene visit for my book) before heading home.

I made a checklist for myself:

• Q  Check battery and replace as needed
• Q  Ensure tire wear is in line for a 1500-mile ride
• Q  Inspect helmet, replace if it is time (okay, I’ve wanted to make a change anyway)
• Q  Check brakes, belts, electrical cables, and nuts and bolts
• r  Wash the bike, especially the windscreen
• r  Change the oil and filter
• r  Check tire pressure

The battery was a no brainer because I suspected it was at its end. The helmet was easy too simply because I’ve wanted to make a change and upgrade my helmet cam/communications unit anyway. Brakes, belts, and such I do regularly. The tires on my Victory Cross Country? I needed help. I suspected the rear tire needed to be changed because it appeared close to the wear marks. The front tire I thought might be okay for my trip.  The receipt from the last tire change was not to be found and I wanted to go back to the same place. They were/are very good and being a repeat customer is a good thing to be. There is something comforting about having someone you trust work on your bike. My friend Jed gave me a recommendation and bingo, it was the place. Jed was likely the person who sent me to M-C Tire Works in the first place.

My grand plan for the day of the tire change was to arrive promptly when they opened at 9am, kill time while they worked their magic with a little reading and writing, and then ride up to Santa Barbara via the coast route to catch my grandson’s freshman football game. It was a brilliant plan that needed a bit of tweaking with Jeremiah’s game being pushed back a couple of hours. It turned out I would need the extra time and extra tweaking.

I was a few minutes early and was there to watch Tony open up the shop for the day and greet the technician who would work on my bike. Tony and I walked around the bike so he could assess my needs. It turned out that I really needed his practiced eye. My front tire was due, there was no maybe about it. The rear tire had some miles left on it and Tony said I could have the 1500 miles left on it but couldn’t make anything certain as every bike and rider wear tires in their own way. I opted to go with the safe and secure option. Finding a lift and getting a new tire in Death Valley at 120-degrees with a blown tire is dicey thing, we’ve already lost a couple of riders this year to the heat out there.

They were done with the work at just under the estimated time and I was ready to roll out by 11am or so. This is where I found the need for more tweaking for the ride up to Santa Barbara. Tony reminded me that the new tires are slick and need 100 miles of careful riding. I remembered the slick part, just not the 100-mile recommendation. I had to watch for water, tight turns, and be mindful of my throttle. He pointed out a sign on the counter warning about the slickness, the 100-mile recommendation. The sign ended with, “Too much gas and you will be on your ass.”

I am a big fan of M-C Tireworks! 5 of 5 ês!

I took these things seriously and altered my route to use as much surface street mileage as possible from North Hills to Malibu Canyon. Traffic wasn’t bad, thankfully. I left plenty of space between me and the next guy and maintained a good safety bubble. I made the most of the ride up Venture Blvd. When I was a Communications Technician for the phone factory I had offices all throughout the valley and good memories accompanied me along the ride.

Malibu Canyon presented the big challenge and was a cause for some clinching and I’m not talking about my teeth. I thought it would be okay since there would likely be traffic to hold me in check and I was correct. Traffic up PCH was reasonable with only one or two cagers trying to run up my tailpipes. I had enough space on the 101 Highway from Oxnard up to Santa Barbara and simply bided my time until I got off the highway at Cabrillo Blvd. to ride along the coastal part of Santa Barbara. I came to a stop at Milpas and Cabrillo and hit the 100 miles dead on. Now, I didn’t immediately start slaloming through Santa Barbara traffic and hitting the gas on every turn. Not my style. However, I breathed a bit easier.

I made it to the game to watch an improved San Marcos High Royals’ team play with my grandson at center, the prize at the end of the ride. This made it a night ride home which was fine by me, though it had been a while since I’d taken a long one at night.

As an epilog of sorts to this post, I took my wife’s car in for a quick oil change and added on a change of break fluid while we were at it. During the process to change the fluid the tires were removed and I was treated to their technician rolling a tire over to me and pointing out some damage, pictured here. At some point, one of us hit something sharp and we were close to having a blowout at any time. Too close.

Inside edge of an otherwise healthy tire...

My takeaway from this is whether bike, car, truck, with or without a trailer – check the rubber and make sure it is up to the task.

Keep the iron side up my friends!

Jerry ‘Shakespeare’ White

Paradise Remembered

 

Jerry White heading down the pier for the next boat...

The Sandcastle Restaurant, what is now known as Paradise Cove Beach Cafe, has been a mainstay of Paradise Cove in Malibu, California since before WWII when it was first set up as a club house. James Garner in The Rockford Files had his mobile home just up the beach from the cafe. Mel Gibson had his trailer just down the beach from the café in the Lethal Weapon films. Cindy and I celebrated our 48^th anniversary at the café with our feet in the sand and an excellent meal.

Cindy's and my Paradise Cove Beach Cafe Brunch. What a view!

The place played a key role in my recovery after my dark days that included the breakup with my fiancé and the dashing of my hoop dreams, if playing Division II college ball could be called a dream. One likely hastened the other and ushered in a period of wandering. Doug Clark got me a job with him working as a Pier Coolie running the boat hoist on weekends, maintaining the rental fleet of fiberglass boats and their 5-hp motors, and other pier related duties. During the summer of ’74, I ended up living in his parents’ single-wide mobile home while working full time just after my parents moved away and left me. Okay, I had the option of moving with them to Concord, California but opted to stay since I had a new girlfriend and was getting my college life back on track. Yes, it was Cindy and that was the best decision of my life.

 

Doug and I would arrive at the locked gates of the pier at 5:30am after a fine breakfast at the café ready for a hectic morning of launching boats. The first person in line was nearly always someone from the mobile home park who’d slept in their car so they could catch the first fish. The weekend line would often stretch along the entry road and wind up and out onto PCH.  

 

After checking that all was ready and with the nod of Bob Morris, who ran the pier and now owns the restaurant, we opened the gates. Doug and I each towed a boat behind a golf cart and up to the hoist where another Bob ran the rig. While one boat was hoisted over and into the water, one of us would pull a red fiberglass rental boat to be third over the side. In two hours or so we would launch around 100 boats. By 6pm, all but one boat would be retrieved, the one holdout rocking at anchor for their weekend of fishing.

 

The cabin cruiser at anchor was owned by a middle-aged couple with no kids to worry about and was easily the biggest boat we would launch as the hoist groaned with the weight. They went out nearly every weekend except when they pulled the boat south and fished out of San Diego. These folks always brought us the best smoked yellowtail or tuna from their southern trips in appreciation for us getting them on the water and out again.

 

On days when the water was nearly flat and glassy, we would drop Tex Clark’s boat over the side of the pier and ski. I was never comfortable with the idea skiing with sharks that far out but Doug convinced me that we would be inside the kept line and everyone knew sharks stay out. Right? The first time we out was after we closed the pier. Earlier, a boat came in with two blue sharks draped over the bow of their boat. Doug’s argument was they were fishing up around Point Dume and off Zuma Beach, a known breeding ground for blue sharks. I acquiesced. Then a competition skier came in after training for a race out to Catalina and back. He was shaking and told us how he just missed skiing over a big shark. Doug argued that he was training well beyond the kelp line. Later, to top off the shark parade, a pier fisherman caught a leopard shark, those popular sharks then populating Marineland. It was not uncommon for me to yell “hit it!” as Doug tossed me the rope. I couldn’t get on top of the ski fast enough. Good times though.

 

When we were dating, Cindy would come down to the cove and visit. While I worked, she read, tanned, and swam. The L.A. County Lifeguards maintained a Baywatch boat at the end of the pier and they had a one-person hut with a nice telescope. I could find her almost all the time unless she hiked further up toward Point Dume. Paradise Cove is a special place for us.

 

Paradise Cove Beach Café has its walls nearly covered at every conceivable point with black and white photos of the glory days of the Malibu area with the cove featuring heavily. Some of them date back to the 30s and cover every decade since. Autographed movie star 8X10 glossies festoon the soffit above the bar.

 

We would see celebs who walked to the end of the pier sometimes. Barbara Streisand who didn’t last too long because she got swamped by fans; Sony Bono who had chartered the smaller fishing boat but wasn’t too friendly we think because it was during his divorce with Cher; and others. Our top though was Vincent Price who was there to go fishing out on the Gentleman with his 11-year-old granddaughter. He came by and talked with Doug and I about fishing and introduced his granddaughter. One of the regular pier-fishermen, a trailer park resident, came over and asked if Mr. Price would mind going over to say hello to the man’s mother over in a wheelchair, fishing pole in hand. He went over, squatted down to get eye level and proceeded to chat like they were old friends. One class act.

The Gentleman that Vincent Price and his granddaughter went out on a half-day excusion.

I love looking over the photos and, on this day, I struck gold. As I was walking out through a walkway little used by the public as there is a wait-station there for cutlery and cups I saw the photo below hung on the wall above the entry. I laughed out loud as I recognized myself driving the golf cart and shared my joy with the busboy boy busy putting service groups together.

The pier, now a stubby remainder, then with the hoist, boats waiting for launch and me heading down for the next one.

 

It was a great day to fondly remember Paradise Cove.

 

My hope is that you have your own version of Paradise Cove.

 

Peace.

A Tale of Two Rides

 

I am an old-guy biker and so occasionally someone will ask me how much longer I intend to ride. It is a fair question and one I ask myself now and again. I’ve pretty much settled on the idea that I will ride until reverse gear gives out. That is a concern as I have had aging knees for half my lifetime. When I was 35 my orthopedic surgeon told me he would replace my knees by the time I was 55 if I didn’t quit playing basketball. I wept. Then I took steps to fix the problem on my own by ceasing my city league playing and not playing anymore pickup ball. But I kept running with the teams I coached and as many CVHS Alumni games as I was in town for.

The main thing I did was to ride my bike to work three to five days a week at 11 to 14 miles each way depending on the route I chose for the day that added up to 120 miles a week plus recreational rides like taking my birthday off and riding at least as many miles as I was old. I have Cindy to thank for her insightful suggestion. Thanks, love! The company moved our office from Pasadena to Alhambra and that ended my bike commuting but other forms of exercise took over though once my Lauren grew out of youth basketball. Life got busy with other pursuits and regular exercise waned. My knees recently started complaining daily even though, or because of it, I was walking with Ollie between three and five miles three of four days a week.

I dusted off my bicycle, got it going again, had the gears tuned up and started riding a few times a week around the Rose Bowl and have worked up to 15 miles on any given ride, occasionally popping up out of the bowl to add some hill work. Then I added a nice set of knee supports with more a thoughtful design than my old neoprene braces. It has been as close to a miracle as I will claim for myself. I am busy extending the life of reverse gear.

I decided to ride a bike trail I hadn’t ridden since some long-ago birthday ride, the San Gabriel River Bike Trail. My goal was to take a little break from my routine rides to help keep my interest up and extend myself to an 18-mile ride. I thought I would show up at the Sante Fe Dame Recreation area close to their opening, pay for the parking, then peddle around to find the start of the bike trail. My GPS took me to what ended up being the back gate into the park. Shit. I drove around and found the line into the park. I am unfamiliar with this park but was okay with waiting in line until I came around a corner and saw the line heading off into the horizon. I pulled a quick 180 and hunted for a marked entrance to the bike trail.

I ended up driving right by the place the GPS aimed me for and came upon the Whittier Narrows Recreation area, parked and rode around a bit to warm up, and headed back the way I’d come. I found the ‘marked’ entrance at a ‘nature center’, a pocket park of sorts. I rode through, found a sign pointing the way to the bike trail which is loosely packed dirt and not great for my road tires. I found the entry – it was locked. Shit.

I decided to ride by the seat of my pants and using the tried-and-true method of dead-reckoning found a way onto the trail. The marine layer was still in effect and I couldn’t see the mountains for reference and took a guess as to which way would take me back to the Sante Fe Dam. Ten miles later I was proved correct and was looking up at the back side of the dam. By the time I returned to the car I had exceeded my 18-mile goal by two miles and learned a couple of lessons for the day – don’t bother with the Sante Fe Dam until school starts back up and then on a weekday and always verify the GPS.

I haven’t quite gotten to the point where my bicycling is second nature so those rides have not leant themselves too much in the way of introspection. There is a lot going on for me to keep the cycle going without crashing – skinny little wheels that can’t be over corrected, keeping the legs pumping, eyes out for obstructions, worry over speeding cars while sharing the road with them, etc.

It is different for me while riding the motorcycle. Even though vigilant to all the obstructions and cagers on the road, a part of my brain can work through an issue I’m facing or return to that thing I’m thinking about without much effort when the circumstances of the ride allow for it.

I haven’t been riding much lately due in part to several of the people I have enjoyed riding with moving away from riding and on to other pursuits. One of riders from our group decided on a ride for July 4^th. We were to meet for breakfast and then ride the Angeles Crest Highway west to east, ending at Highway 138 around Victorville in the southern end of the Mojave Desert. I’ve done the ride before and it is a twisty-lover’s paradise. But cooler heads prevailed and we decided to avoid the 120 degrees heat we would have ridden into. Greg and the love of his life stayed around the coast for a little ride and I took an early solo run up the Angeles Forest Highway, down the Sierra Highway, and finished up the loop on the 14 freeway to home.

Wind therapy. There was little traffic to worry about and I could take the twisties at my leisure. I let my subconscious work through a couple of nagging issues to the point I that I now have a path forward I am at peace with. The path stretches through the year and likely into 2025 so I am well prepared for course changes as things arise. With my reverse gear improving I should be able to take a ride or two to effect acceptable course corrections without jeopardizing my long-range goal.

Find your center, work to maintain it, and don’t hesitate to invite others to help.

Keep the iron side up,

Jerry ‘Shakespeare’ White.