Day 0: Los Angeles

Monday started with a visit to Nina’s , around the corner from our hotel, for a super tasty Mexican breakfast.

Once we were fueled up, it was time to play mechanic. I needed a new tire to replace my thrice-puncture one. I remembered on my ride down yesterday that back in January, I had reached out to a used bike parts dealer in LA about a rear wheel bearing I needed for my other Futura. At the time, he had told me that he would only sell the bearing along with the entire rear wheel, and that I’d need to pick the parts up in person. Those were both dealbreakers at the time — but now I was nearby and had an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. I looked up the dealer, Serge, and found out that he still had the parts available. So Clo and I took an Uber out to his warehouse in Canoga Park and set to work pulling the wheel and rear axle assembly off of the wrecked bike.

Of course, I needed a special snap-ring plier to get the axle out, so we had to make yet another side trip to Harbor Freight.

With the parts in hand, we Ubered back the hotel, geared up, and headed to Broxton (2-up) for a very quick dinner with Lev and Jess before we had to run to meet the boomer at his house in Orange County at 8:30 on the dot, lest Clo’s BMW turn into a pumpkin!

Luckily, we were able to beat traffic and made it with 5 minutes to spare. The boomer ended up being quite friendly once we met in person, and the bike was beautiful!

We rode back to the hotel, separately this time, but not without a stop at In-N-Out to celebrate!