August 1-2nd - San Francisco, CA

Mileage: 15ish miles
Terrain: Riding around San Francisco. It is very hilly with streets that go straight up and ones that go straight down.
Temperature: Not sure but it was cold!!
Woke up at the youth mission this morning. It was nice to not have to blow my matt up for a change due to bunk beds that they had to sleep on. Got everything packed up. The night before I had removed everything from the trailer to try to get somewhat organized and get everything into two bags that I brought. After throwing away my pillow and towel along with a few miscellaneous things the bags finally shut. I had decided to go in on a hotel room with three of the other riders that were not flying out until the 2nd as well. The hotel was one of the cheapest in town and if you know anything about San Francisco hotels are not cheap. It was located about 5 blocks from the youth mission that we stayed at which had tons of homeless people outside of. I think there was a soup kitchen across the street or something. However, in this area of the city there are homeless everywhere. It really is sad! So at about 7:30 am I drug my over packed, stuffed to the top, very heavy bags to the hotel to store there until the afternoon. We then walked back to the youth mission where I got on my bike and rode it 2 blocks to a breakfast place. We had to sit by the window to watch our bikes so they wouldn’t get stolen. This is rather common to have to keep a close eye on them as we have found out that cable locks really aren’t a deterrent. We then hopped on our bikes and rode a few miles to Crissy Fields which is at the bottom of the Golden Gate Bridge. However, as I was looking up directions to Crissy Fields I realized that we were going to be going down Lombard Street which is known as the curviest street in San Fran so we stopped at the bottom and took some pictures!! It was not an easy task getting to Crissy Fields as San Fran is VERY hilly with streets that go straight up and straight down, probably some of the steepest climbs on the trip however, they were very short!! Got to the water and took some pictures and chilled out then we did the official dipping of our front wheel!! We then got on our bikes and headed up to the access to ride across the bridge. However, there were tons of pedestrians and others people on rental bikes so it was slow and difficult to cross on our bikes however I am glad that I had done so!! Came back across the bridge and hung out by the trailer, saw many off and said some sad goodbyes!! I am going to miss these people SOOOOOOOO MUCH!! The trailer then drove off. I then rode with two other riders to a bike shop to get my bike boxed and shipped back to Ohio. We stopped to eat on our way to the shop. Then took a cab to the hotel. Got into the room to realize that there wasn’t a shower or toilet in the room, thought it was odd but decided to just go with it. There was a toilet and a shower down the hall both in basically closets. Before this trip if I would have had to stay at a hotel like this one I would have probably thrown a fit and wouldn’t have done it. However, after having the experiences and staying at some of the places we did just decided to go with it realizing that everything would be fine and work out fine. Chilled out at the hotel for awhile, took a nap and then went to dinner with two of the others staying in the room. Came back and chilled out at the hotel room for awhile finally went to bed and got up at 3:45 this morning west coast time.
Got the shuttle to the airport and went to check my bag which weighed 61 pounds. Found out that this was too much and it had to be 50 pounds or less otherwise there would be a $100 charge. Started going through my bad threw out all of my liquids and put some things in my carryon bag in order to get it to 50 pounds. Got on the plane to Chicago. Slept most of the way there as I feel like now I can sleep anywhere and through anything!! Then got my next plane to Columbus where my sister, Renee picked me up. The whole thing is so surreal as it still doesn’t seem that I rode my bike across the entire country!