This past weekend was a bit of a clusterf^%# as far as road trips go. We are the masters of poor planning, not planning at all, and of just being dumb sometimes.
In all honesty, I just love to say “clusterf^%#” and our weekend really wasn’t that bad. We did have some “issues” with our road trip that could have and should have been avoided.
Mark had to be in Murrieta, CA this past Friday, Saturday, and Sunday for bike races. The loosely laid Plan A was that we’d all go up there in the RV. That was as far as Plan A got, as far as details. And therein lie the problem.
We keep our RV in a storage facility about 20 minutes from our home in the city. The day prior to, or the morning of a trip, we drive out there and swap out our car for our RV. At the moment, we don’t have a bike rack on our little car (bike was on roof rack, car got driven into our parking garage, bike and roof rack got ripped off. oops), so for the time being, after we do the swap, we then have to drive the RV back downtown and load our bikes from there. Reverse the process at the end of a trip. A bit time consuming, but a temporary situation.
Because we failed to plan properly for this little road trip, we were unable to pick up the RV on Thursday evening or on Friday morning. So there it was, Friday morning at 7:00 am and we really needed to get our butts on the road right away. Time for Plan B.
Plan B…We throw Mark’s bike in the back of the car, and drive the car up to Murrieta. The dogs would stay at home. After Mark’s race, we’d drive home, and then go pick up the RV, and drive back up to Murrieta early on Saturday morning. Not efficient, but it would work. Murrieta was only an hour drive away.
Off we went in the car. Me, Mark, Mark’s bike, and my fiddle. Glad I brought Gladys (my fiddle). I had a lot of time to kill as Mark warmed up on his bike trainer (photo up top), and did his race. I had a fun time hanging out and playing by myself. I think everyone else was pretty amused by me as well. I was probably the first fiddler they’d ever seen at a bike race!
After the race, we went to The Mill for lunch. Had one of the best pizzas ever! If you go there, get the “Veggie with a Different Opinion,” substitute red sauce for the white sauce, and add Chicken Apple Sausage (or not). Delicious!
And then we drove home. Actually, we headed right to the RV storage place to do the car/RV swap so that we could head back to Murrieta first thing the next morning. We got all the way to storage, when we realized that we didn’t have the keys for the RV on us. Aaarrggggg.
So we drove home, got the keys for the RV, drove back to storage, got the RV, and drove back home. Luckily we found a parking spot right outside our building…a minor miracle here in the city. Fiona would be safe there until we left again early Saturday morning.
As soon as we got home, Mark threw his cycling kit into the washing machine, to be worn again on Saturday (cycling kit = cool spandexy outfits that cyclists wear). We chowed down on our leftover pizza from lunch. Still delicious.
You’d think we’d be exhausted by all of this, but for some reason, we were both totally energized. This is when we made our next mistake. We both agreed that we may as well drive back up to Murrieta that night. We weren’t tired, and this would save us from having to drive up there really early on Saturday morning.
We gathered up all of our stuff, packed up the RV, and at about 11:00pm, we took off, again, for Murrieta.
All went well. We arrived just after midnight, and parked, for free, in a little parking lot right next to where the race would start in the morning. Can’t beat that! We did get a knock at our door at 6:00am to move our rig, but, we had to get up early anyway, so that was ok.
After we moved the rig, and as I was preparing coffee and oatmeal for breakfast, I heard it. “It” was every expletive known to mankind, coming out of Mark’s mouth (another exaggeration. it was just the F-bomb). Mark had just realized that he had left his cycling kit in the washing machine at home. Remember, he was laundering it because we hadn’t planned to drive back up to Murrieta until the morning. When we made that last minute decision to drive back up Friday night, we both completely forgot about his kit.
OMG….we were going to have to drive back home to get his kit, and then drive back to Murrieta for the third time! This can NOT be happening!!! And really, it could NOT be happening, because there wasn’t enough time.
Mark would have to find his teammates to see if any of them had an extra kit with them. It was a long shot, but was the only option. I’m happy to tell you that, thanks to his awesome teammate, Edwin, Mark was able to race. Not only is Edwin a super nice guy, but he’s also the same size as Mark. The day was saved!
Mark had a fun time racing. I had a fun time watching. The dogs had a fun time hanging out with me and meeting all the other cycling doggies.
After his race, we decided to take the rest of the afternoon to go exploring the Temecula area, just south of Murrieta. This tale is already long enough for one day (my most wordiest post to date, I’m quite sure), and so I’ll save the rest of the little road trip adventure story for manana.
Stay tuned for Part 2 of “3 Perfect Days of Bikes, Fiddles & Wine.”
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