24. Apr, 2016

24. Apr, 2016

WEDNESDAY 23-04-08 

This morning The Chef decided to shower in the RV whilst I decided to squander 25 cents on a hot shower in the bathroom block. For this kind of money you get just two minutes. I’m not a two minute person and so I intended to take plenty of coins. To save time I used my rechargeable shaver giving it the opportunity to gradually chew away at my beard rather than have a wet shave under the shower, I then rubbed shampoo in to my hair before setting off for the unisex shower block very close by. There were only two showers cubicles one was occupied and the other was for disabled use, it was a quick 2 minutes, just enough to do what needed to be done, and I made a point of limping badly out of the shower in case anybody noticed I had used the disabled cubicle. 

Afterwards we went for a very pleasant walk up on the cliffs and around the corner of the bay. Small lizards and rabbits scurried around having been disturbed by us as we made our way along the pathway through the undergrowth, and along the side of the railroad (still no sign of the 'Pacific Surfliner'). We reached a point where we could go no further and reluctantly made our way back. I't was a beautiful fresh morning and the air was clear and cool. 

On our return we treated ourselves to a late breakfast of bacon and eggs. One thing we’ve been surprised at in this land of plenty is that they don’t have bacon rashers, not bacon rashers as we know them, and we’ve looked in both cheap and expensive stores, all they have is streaky bacon which looks about 70% fat, no wonder so many Americans are clutching their chests as if it had been put in a vice. 

We made friends of the local wildlife, feeding the birds some bread which has the consistency of Madeira cake, and a squirrel which just loved bread coated with peanut butter. 

We didn’t need to book out until 12:00, and I still hadn’t seen the ‘Pacific Surfliner’ in order to video it. Rather than be defeated I walked all the way up the Rangers office to ask how often the trains came though. The reply was a shrug of the shoulders and a "Dunno, maybe every hour or so" (ignoring the fact we’d been here nearly 24 hours and had seen nothing). This railway line passes about 200ft from the Ranger’s office, the trains are really big, really long, and usually quite noisy, so I had expected their regular passing day in day out to have left some kind of impression. But no, it was not to be. 

We reluctantly left this idyllic spot to continue our journey towards Malibu where we arrived at the Malibu Beach RV Park www.maliburv.com early afternoon. It's just down the road from Dan Blocker Beach, named after the actor who played Hoss Cartwright in the TV series 'Bonanza'. ‘She’ the familiar voice within our Satnav, is often a bit slow off the mark when it comes to giving directions and as a consequence we found ourselves overshooting the entrance to the park, resulting in some careful reversing down the centre of the road with fast moving traffic passing either side of us, much to the amusement of a couple of fellow RV'ers waiting to pull out of the campground in their car. 

We paid extra for an ocean view, the only problem being that our bedroom now overhangs the edge of the cliff, making it tricky to access the rear cargo locker. 

Once hooked up and settled, we got the bikes out and rode towards what appeared to be the local shopping centre. To get there we chose to ride down Malibu Road, containing beach-front homes presumably owned by the rich and famous. They’re nothing special frankly, but I bet they cost a fortune. Most of them are built of timber and look as if they wouldn’t stand up to a good storm. Come the next tsunami, they’ll probably wish they’d bought an RV and lived up on the cliffs. We found the local shops including ‘Ralphs’, which The Chef described as the best supermarket we’d been in so far on this trip. I had to stay outside in disgrace and look after the bikes, as I had forgotten to bring the bike locks with me. 

I got chatting to the driver of a local fire truck. He was waiting for his colleagues who had gone in to do some shopping for their evening meal. I told him that we were planning to use the bus service to get us in to Los Angeles tomorrow, did he have any advice? He said he would never contemplate going to the city on the buses, he hadn’t been on the buses since he was a kid. It takes too long and is far too dangerous. 

Therefore in true Ambulance Service ‘can do’ tradition, we shall be at the side of the road waiting for a bus early tomorrow morning in the hope of arriving in LA later. 

On our return to the campground we had a few drinks and a pleasant evening meal of Spaghetti Bolognese which we cooked and ate alfresco with the Pacific Ocean as our view. 

LOCATION TONIGHT: Malibu Beach RV Park, 25801 Pacific Coast Highway www.maliburv.com (GPS: N34.033492 W118.739839)

24. Apr, 2016

24. Apr, 2016

24. Apr, 2016