Day 29: Refugio to Santa Barbara

September 23, 2013. 28.4 miles.

Today was an easy, relaxing day. I knew I only had 25 miles to go so I took my time getting ready in the morning. Did a lot of sitting and watching the waves. It was nice.

I biked a few miles down the freeway past El Capitan State Park and saw their hiker/biker right up against the road. Ours was better, glad we stopped at Refugio!

A few more miles down the road and I stopped at a large shipping area in Goleta. There was a farmers market going on, but I went to a small bakery for some treats and a Starbucks for an iced coffee blended thingy and then sat at a shaded table for quite a while eating and drinking and interneting. I was almost in Santa Barbara, really, and didn’t want to get there too early.

I followed the bike paths through UCSB (bike round-a-bouts!) and on to Santa Barbara proper. I didn’t feel any particular compelling attraction to the place (I was born in the area), but it does seem quite pleasant.  I ate some tacos at a taco place that came highly recommended by the fellows at the campsite last night.  Then I attempted to call Bill and Barb, my parents friends who had offered me a place to stay.  This ended up involving switching my sim card back to my old phone, since the calling abilities of the new one seemed… broken.

I got to their house just before Barb left for a prior commitment. Bill offered to take me on a driving tour, but he was tired as was I. I preferred to hang out in their hammock, anyway. It was quite a comfortable hammock. In fact, their house is quite comfortable in general. Later Barb and I went out for pizza while Bill napped (he had been pretty ill until recently and was still getting over it. I got a pizza that sounded like it would come with all sorts of interesting things on it. This was true, sort of, but each thing had it’s own section of the pie. So I had a slice of olive pizza, and a slice of mushroom pizza… it was still quite tasty.