We left Carpinteria and rode the Ventura Highway south towards LA in the morning fog, which made the ride a bit chilly. It was a morning of contrasting temperatures. As we headed inland the temperatures got quite warm, especially around Thousand Oaks. The traffic was steadily building up the closer we got to Los Angeles. We hit some cooler air again around Santa Monica and then as we came down a hill on the freeway the morning sea fog was replaced by the yellowish haze of pollution over LA in the distance!
We rode the freeway system through to Long Beach and actually arrived at our motel earlier than expected. We managed to check into our room early - around 1:30pm. We were just unpacking the bike when Evan and Maurie arrived on their Triumphs, followed about 15 minutes later by Dave and Mary on their Harley.
We had a catch up with the others and then left them to check in while we took the bike to a nearby car wash to use a self-service bay to give the bike a good waterblasting and a clean. The bike has to be free of any dirt and bugs as there are very strict agricultural controls over importing into NZ. If your bike is deemed to be 'dirty' you can be charged around $400 to have it cleaned to the required standard to enter the country. We had managed to pick up a fair bit of muck while travelling on wet roads - particularly where there were road works.
Later that night we joined up with the others and walked to the centre of Long Beach for a few drinks and a meal.
The next morning Tracee and I rode the Harley to the USA Mainfreight depot to crate the bike up ready for shipping back to NZ. This took a few hours by the time we got the crate moved for us by forklift to a free area, gave the bike a last spot clean, removed the fuse, packed up the windshield, used tie-downs to secure it and then screwed the cardboard packing on with a battery drill.
After we said goodbye to the bike we caught a taxi back to the motel and then caught the metro train and a bus transfer to the Lakewood Shopping Centre for the afternoon. This is a great service - you can travel anywhere in LA for only a few dollars - although you have to be a bit careful where you exit the bus. We were dropped off a few blocks from our motel and the area we had to walk through was a little dodgy - definately not where you would walk after dark!
We caught up with Dave, Mary, Maurie & Evan after dinner and then called it a day.
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