by Philip

Day’s mileage : 70

Running total : 2,004

 It was an early start this morning as we have a 68 mile day and are due to be picked up from our AirBnB at 6 this evening by friends for dinner – it seems unusual to have a deadline! We were on the road at 8:15 and rode initially past three sides of the Hueneme naval base (huge!), part of it down a lovely road – dual carriageway but with eucalyptus trees lining both sides and the centre of the road. We passed retail centres and industrial areas, and then were out into agriculture again – seeing turf farming for the first time – as ever, enormous fields – of  nicely trimmed grass, some being harvested and palletted up for transport. During this early part of the ride I reached a total of 2,000 miles on my bike’s odometer which feels like quite an achievement – even if a few of those were already done when I took ownership!

This seems to be a large military area as we next came to an air force base specialising in transport – large C-130 planes in the tarmac although the only flying object we saw was a heron. Stopping for a break and to start writing this we saw several fighter jets and missiles mounted on corner plinths – and colonised by starlings, darting in and out of the jets’ air intakes with mouthfuls of food for hungry and noisy chicks. 

Of course having said there was nothing flying, 2 minutes later a fighter jet took off, rather noisily. From the starling nests we joined highway 1 which we’ll be on for most of the day, soon entering the Santa Monica mountains with them on our left with their dramatic geology and the crashing ocean on our right. The sea was creating a mist across the road, and then mountain tops were in fog, which overall makes for pleasant cycling conditions. As we arrived at a vista point Liz too reached 2,000 miles – she always manages to reach these milestones with beautiful backdrops for her photos recording the event!

The day doesn’t have much climbing in it – about 1,700’ total … indeed after the first 20 miles we’d only climbed 200’ – so our batteries are not being used much. The road continued like this for a while, passing through a hamlet of perhaps ten houses, built (it seemed) somewhat precariously on wooden stilts in the sand – it seemed odd to build like that when there is so much land available. They must be stable though! Around a corner and we can across 17 surfers enjoying the waves – I always have to look twice from a distance as a surfer in a wetsuit looks remarkably like a seal. 

We entered the city limits of Malibu and started to pass some huge houses, although it was another 4-5 miles before we got to the town itself. Malibu beach is extensive, but today was almost deserted. Only one of the 14 beach volleyball courts was being used, and the car park was empty. There were a couple of surfers … I imagine on a sunny weekend it is packed and bustling. 

We rode into the hills above the coast, past huge mansions, negotiated a road work detour, and continued along the coast with a snack stop at Malibu Bluffs Park looking out over the ocean, watched very carefully by a couple of hopeful ground squirrels. 

At the park we saw a few charred trees and bushes, and observed they were the first evidence we’d seen of the recent wildfires, and that we’d expected to see more. The next five miles proved sobering in the extreme, as we passed house after house between the road and the sea which had burned down, the debris now removed by the army, and concrete piles the only remaining part. The curiosity of half a mile of houses burned, then one untouched, followed by another mile of destruction. We saw whole hillsides razed, rusted burnt-out cars by the road, and endless construction and clearance teams working. The impact on infrastructure is obvious, with temporary cellphone masts in car parks powered by generators, coils of cable which had melted, official signs instructing owners to clear debris by 1st June, and signs advising not to drink the tap water. We had thought we would see charred vegetation – and were wholly unprepared for the scale of destruction the fires wreaked. The Getty Villa still stands proud on the hill – but all around it is damage – it must have been a terrifying time. 

We stopped for lunch by the sea and wanted to use the facilities, only to find that the ladies (on the west of the building) was burned out while the gents (on the east) had been spared. The vegetation has largely rebounded – the palm trees have black trunks but green fronds, and there is new grass and blooming flowers on the hills. The lunchspot was on Palisades beach where it appeared the golden sand was mixed with black ash, and where there were several bulldozers which had been grading the beach. 

From there we went to Santa Monica beach and then into Venice with its boardwalk (famous, I’m told, from the Barbie movie). The change was stark, and while the beaches were golden and wide, and the cycle path 15’ wide and smooth, I felt suffocated after the devastation we had just seen. A comparison in my mind was driving from East Berlin to West Berlin in 1990, as the Wall was coming down, and the extreme culture shock I felt then.

I was pleased to get away from the coast briefly, then ride along a path next to a rowing lake (think Olympic rowing rather than pedalo) and passed the UCLA boathouse. The path then turned along the coast for many miles, with sparsely populated beaches, empty volleyball pitches, and frequent aircraft from the nearby LAX airport. With 5 miles to go we turned inland up a very steep hill (turbo mode engaged) and meandered through gentle residential areas, stopping for food before finding our AirBnB. We will have a reasonably quick turnaround as we’re being picked up at 6 and taken to dinner.