Being on a long road trip often brings to mind ‘Priscilla, Queen of the Desert’, the movie about three drag queens travelling across the Australian outback in a converted bus. Clearly we don’t have a bus and we are not drag queens, (at least we weren’t last time I checked). But we are covering awesome distances. Today was one of those long stretches, 120+ miles and at points, as the Pacific coastline stretched out ahead of us into the distance, my mind flashed back to the scene in Priscilla when they are looking out over miles and miles of desert as far as the eye can see. I have to admit I have wondered about attaching a long flowing piece of pink chiffon to the bike and blasting out opera through a sound system. However, Mike’s luggage weight restrictions have prevented either of these items being available.

Having any additional drag (geddit?!) while struggling against the awful headwinds we faced today would not have been pleasant, so I suppose the chiffon-bicycle-opera combo will just have to wait for another day.

From San Francisco to Santa Cruz (75 miles) was constant headwind, a shame as it distracted our attention from the really pleasant coastline.

We’ve had another Priscilla moment as we passed (twice) a young guy on a bike laden with four bags, a tent and even a guitar on his back. We’d passed him before in the Redwoods and Eurika, but a bit like the Hare and the Tortoise, he keeps overtaking us! Those familiar with Priscilla will recall the women running across the outback pushing some strange ball who keeps overtaking the coach – this young guy is our equivalent.

Thankfully the wind turned after Santa Cruz, but it still meant that we arrived in Seaside after dark – over an hour later than scheduled. Nick our host was just going out as we arrived – to spend the evening mountain biking in the light of the full moon. We were welcomed by his fiancé Katie who chatted with us all evening and gave some good advice on a Mexican take-away. Today’s exertions have left us pretty weary, so we’re off to sleep now. Only 100 miles to cover tomorrow.