Since the rain had stopped, the trip to L.A. was just a little over 200km (2 hours), and I already had found another host in L.A. on couchsurfing.com, I decided to take the opportunity to visit San Diego first.
First stop was in Barrio Logan, a colourful neighbourhood with a strong Mexican influence and history. Rafael had explained to me yesterday about the story behind the paintings – some kind of cultural revolution that led to allowing people to paint and express their cultural difference, but I honestly forgot the details. Instead, here are some amazing photos:
-
- Barrio Logan, paintings on walls
I then rode, as planned, to Balboa Park, to re-discover the great Spanish architectural monuments I had seen once when I was 8 years old… amazing place!
-
- Balboa Park
It was little after noon when I left San Diego and decided to head toward Escondido first, where a fellow rider from the Adventure Rider forum had suggested we could meet. When I reached the small city and messaged the guy, nothing came back though. After a Starbucks latte+sandwich lunch break, I decided to move on and rode back toward the Pacific.
I reached L.A. around 3:30pm and rode a bit through the city to get a feeling of the place and then stopped at another Starbucks downtown for a short break. I know, I should really have Starbucks stocks with all the money I give them 😉
Little before sunset, I decided to travel a bit through Beverly Hills on my way toward the beaches of Santa Monica, where my host was living. Beverly Hills is obviously full of mansions, each bigger than the next, but I didn’t feel very excited by the lack of happiness around the place. It made me think that most of the people living there spend their days earning big money, through hard work I’m sure, but then come to these gigantic wealthy homes and have no real time to enjoy a happy a sweet life. Not jealous at all.
Back on the seaside, I moved southbound toward the Venice neighbourhood and stopped for another latte while waiting for my host to confirm he was home. After getting the green light, I headed in direction of his house when a sudden wobbling surprised me. I stopped on the side of the street to look at what I thought would be a flat tire when I noticed a little worrying detail in horror.
The axle was actually leaving my wheel since I had lost a bolt on the other side. I texted the host that I may be a bit late and drew my toolbox from the case to try and fit the axle back into the wheel. After some 10 or 15 minutes, the axle finally went back in and I drove carefully to my host’s, wondering what would have happened if the axle had started leaving the wheel on the highway between San Diego and L.A., or worse, if I had lost my wheel. I would probably not be here talking about it, I suppose.
My host, Pascal, was a super-friendly French national and we spent some time chatting about various topics in our native language before deciding to hit a place for dinner. I cannot recall the name but we had great sandwiches with a cold beer in a friendly restaurant not far from his home. Afterwards, we went for a delicious home-made ice-cream at another place nearby.
I took my motorcycle for repair the next day to a local Honda dealer and used Uber to wander around and visit, starting with Universal Studios. Pascal had agreed for me to stay more than one night if necessary.
