Operation Salad Bowl

This summer, seven of us set off on a 13 day trip in California. The main objective was to see the MotoGP race at Laguna Seca. But because of a cabin my cousin has up in Shaver Lake CA, we headed out a week early and did some riding around the Sierras. The plan was to trailer the bikes to Shaver Lake CA and then ride until it was time to come home. We referred to this trip as operation Salad Bowl. This is because the Salinas CA , where our hotel was for the MotoGP weekend, and Salinas Valley is referred to as "the Salad Bowl of the World"

The people that went were my wife Stephanie, my kids Alex and Ashley, two friends from work Gerry and Paul, and Paul's wife Cindy.


Day 1: TX - NM

Today started with a 100 mile ride for Alex and myself. We had to ride from Plano TX to Bowie TX in order to get to where the trailer was. We arrived at Paul's about 9:00am and loaded up the bikes and bags. We had to do some fine tuning on the trailer for the tie downs, but alias we got underway about 11:30am

Once on the road, we ran into a short delay as there was a wild fire burning and they had traffic slowed and one lane closed.

It was a long day of driving, but we made it to Albuquerque NM to end the first day.

DAY 2 - NM to CA

Day 2 was another day of not much more than driving in the truck. We id make the most of it with a couple of stops. The big one of the day was Winslow AZ. We had to stand on the corner!!

While standing on the corner, we could hear an Indian festival going on a few blocks away. lots of drum beating and what sounded like "ahhhwhaaaaa ooooaaahwaaa" etc... lol

Finally making to California, crossing into Needles, we met to guys on sport bikes that had been riding for a week. They were headed to San Diego from Maryland. They had gone south and rode the Dragon then worked their way west. 

We stopped in Bartsow CA for the night. This would allow us to get the Shaver Lake at a decent hour in the afternoon.

DAY 3 - Barstow Ca to Shaver Lake CA