Me and my big mouth...

Just as I make special mention of those nice people of the California Highway Patrol in yesterday's post for their kindness in leaving us alone for the past two weeks, look what happens...

What I can say is that there were no sarcastic 'who do we think we are then, Barry Sheene... ha bloody ha' comments as one might expect from the boys in blue back home. I can only liken getting nicked by the CHP to buying bananas from Sainsbury's. Very matter of fact, very chatty and was more than willing to let me take photos just to prove I wasn't making it up. 92mph didn't seem to faze Officer Dibble and I was soon on my way. To make matters worse, Andy, riding probably the slowest bike of us all (and an American one at that) also picked up a speeder today. However, as we have ridden a collective 15000 miles it's not a bad result bearing in mind the speeds we've been riding at.

Our last day on the road took us from Yosemite to San Francisco. Despite some beautiful scenery as we headed south from Yosemite the trip thereafter was more highways than byways. The highlight must be riding into SF over the Bay Bridge which is longer and more impressive than the Golden Gate we traversed nearly two weeks ago in the rain. Fortunately also, we were able to locate the bike rental shop in much less than the four hours it took us previously and we are now established in the Whitcomb Hotel in downtown SF for a final night of beer and food and no doubt recounting some of the many stories of the past two weeks.

A word for the bikes which we waved a sad farewell too earlier... without exception they have been superb. The BMWs have been impeccable whether whizzing around tight mountain roads or cruising the highways at over a ton. Pete's GoldWing has, probably as expected, been faultless and proved very agile on the tight stuff. Now then, Andy's Harley... I think by his own admission he would have preferred not to be doing 2500 miles on a bike that could shake your fillings loose when ridden over 50mph and if you happen to talk to him over the next few weeks and he ignores you (which i know sometimes can occasionally be the case) please put it down to deafness as his Hog is one noisy bugger. That said, it's made it round and the worn down foot steps are testament to the fact that he was able to throw it around too.

We travel home tomorrow, look forward to seeing y'all Sunday afternoon where we hope to convene you know where. But like any good story, it ain't over til the fat lady sings and though she may be clearing the phlegm from her throat at this moment I won't draw a line under our adventures til we're back in England's green and pleasant land.