Deli lunch for two at Eighty Five Dollars?? YIKES!

 All Categories, Food, Motorcycle Riding  2 Responses »
Sep 102012
 

Post lunch at Bren­t’s in West­lake — Nan­cy with her award win­ning home grown tomatoes

I rode my trusty motor­cy­cle down to Nan­cy’s in Ven­tu­ra late this morn­ing. After a nice vis­it with she and her sweet­heart Lar­ry, Nan­cy and I drove on to Bren­t’s in West­lake for a fan­tas­tic lunch of Ruben’s all round.

Post lunch Nan­cy ordered a bunch of stuff to take away, hence the $85 total bill. Bren­t’s has a spe­cial menu with lots of check­box­es for just such occa­sions but one thing that need­ed to be hand entered was Lar­ry’s request­ed slice of choco­late cake.

Not famil­iar with Bren­t’s? Click here to see what they have to say for themselves.

 Posted by at 1:00 pm

Authors on Bikes

 All Categories, Bicycling, Reading  1 Response »
Jul 252012
 

Link the names below with the riders above
  • Leo Tol­stoy, 1895 (Leo learned to ride at 67!)
  • Jef­frey Eugenides, 2007
  • Ernest Hem­ing­way, 1919
  • Hen­ry Miller, 1952
  • Pat­ti Smith, 1999
  • Sylvia Plath at 18, 1950
  • Thomas Hardy, 1888
  • Arthur Conan Doyle, 1892
  • Ten­nessee Williams, 1970
  • Ray Brad­bury, 1975
  • Philip Larkin, 1973
  • H.G. Wells, 1905
To check your identifications click on the montage.
 Posted by at 12:00 pm

The Gang of Four’s post hike/BD breakfast

 All Categories, Food  1 Response »
Apr 292012
 


Car­ol, Mar­garet, Ralph and I met at D’An­gelo’s Bak­ery at nine this morn­ing for a won­der­ful vis­it and yum­my break­fast as part of the week­end long cel­e­bra­tion of Car­ol’l birth­day. It was very nice to catch up and have a pro­longed vis­it with old and dear friends. Click on the din­ers to see five nice enlarge­ments of our get together.

 Posted by at 9:00 am

CB’s annual Sage Hill BD Hike

 All Categories, Hiking  3 Responses »
Apr 282012
 

It being the 28th of April and a Sat­ur­day into the bar­gain many of the “Usu­al Sus­pects” met at Sage Hill camp­ground for the annu­al Aliso Canyon Trail hike. It was a warm and beau­ti­ful day and a very nice out­ing. At trail’s end Cathy O popped some won­der­ful choco­late cup­cakes out of her cute new Fiat and we all enjoyed a birth­day treat with the birth­day girl. Click­ing on the mon­tage above dis­plays some nice shots of our day.

In addi­tion here are two videos from our out­ing. In the first you can view an enact­ment of one of the sev­en dead­ly sins. In the sec­ond I demon­strate prop­er hik­ing tech­niques in the back country.




 Posted by at 4:00 pm

Ten “Fair Ladies” pass thru Santa Barbara

 All Categories, Bicycling  2 Responses »
Apr 272012
 

As I was cycling along the path down near the har­bor I spied ten Dat­sun Fair Ladies parked along Cabril­lo Boule­vard. I remem­ber when these were first brought into the Unit­ed States back in the mid 60’s. See­ing them again remind­ed me what nice sporty cars they were, and remain. Sev­en of the ten had Ore­gon plates with two from Cal­i­for­nia and one British Colum­bia. Click on the image above to see a larg­er ver­sion then click for­ward for two more mon­tages, one dis­play­ing “Fair Lady” logos to advantage.

 Posted by at 11:30 am

Ellen’s for Breakfast then 42 miles to ride it off

 All Categories, Bicycling, Food  2 Responses »
Apr 142012
 

Cyn­thia, Tom, and I drove to Buell­ton where Cyn­thia and I had a won­der­ful break­fast at Ellen’s while Tom met his friend Matt and rode away 45 min­utes before we could stag­ger out to our bikes to follow.

We rode the usu­al Buell­ton, Fox­en, Drum loop. Cyn­thia and I had a great time. Arriv­ing back at the car we loaded the bikes on the Vol­vo then chased after Tom. When we caught him he had added anoth­er 27 miles to his fast ride for the day.

There are two ver­sions of our day. Num­ber one above is the slow, sta­t­ic slideshow with my inci­sive, inter­est­ing com­ments. Num­ber two below is a video cov­er­ing the same ground in 25 sec­onds, so very 2012.



 Posted by at 5:00 pm

Lobsters becoming endangered in Santa Barbara

 All Categories, Food  3 Responses »
Apr 042012
 

To cel­e­brate Carol’s get­ting an A+ on this morn­ing’s exam we trun­dled off to “The Enter­prize Fish Com­pany” so she could relieved­ly enjoy a favorite treat, LOBSTER. The video, I think, says it all.


 Posted by at 12:00 pm

Fun using, learning about my new camera

 All Categories, Bicycling  1 Response »
Apr 032012
 

Along the bikepath by the Bird Refuge, Palm Park, and the Wharf play­ing with my new Canon S100. Most of these video patch­es are using the S100’s “Minia­ture Mode”, very fun.


 Posted by at 3:42 pm

Moto ride to San Jose for a Sharks game with Jeff

 All Categories, Food, Motorcycle Riding  2 Responses »
Mar 232012
 

Jeff and I have had the plan and tick­ets to see the Thurs­day, 3/22 Bru­ins Sharks game for a cou­ple of months so it was very excit­ing when the date drew near. After check­ing the weath­er I decid­ed to ride up on the Suzu­ki, leav­ing Tues­day around 2:00. I rode up to SLO on 101 then turned onto Hwy 1 stop­ping in Cam­bria for two small pies at Lin­n’s (one olal­lieber­ry for imme­di­ate con­sump­tion, one rasp­ber­ry lemon meringue for lat­er — see above) along with need­ed petrol for the bike. It was almost 6:00 as I left Cam­bria, my ener­gy ebbing so anoth­er four miles had me stop­ping for the night with­in the San Sime­on line of motels.

The next day held per­fect weath­er for a ride up the Big Sur coast­line into Carmel and Mon­terey then on to San­ta Cruz for a late Thai noo­dle lunch. After lunch I con­tin­ued north on Hwy 1 anoth­er 35 miles to Pescadero then turned inland and climbed through the inter­est­ing towns of La Hon­da and Wood­side to get to Sky­line Boule­vard for the scenic, ridge­crest cruise back south to San Jose. I had time for a renew­ing show­er and the rasp­ber­ry lemon meringue pie before meet­ing Jeff at 4:30. His and Carey’s high rise, “The 88” con­do com­plex, is only three blocks from my motel so we eas­i­ly joined, had a nice vis­it with Carey in their home then a tour of the build­ing, a walk around down­town San Jose get­ting to see some of Jef­f’s favorite haunts, favorite bike stores, and favorite bur­ri­to places with one each of same for dinner.

Game day I spent explor­ing more of the down­town area includ­ing vis­its to the “San Jose Muse­um of Quilts and Tex­tiles”, “The San Jose Muse­um of Art”, and “The Tech Muse­um of Inno­va­tion”. Jeff and I met around five, he wear­ing his #88 Sharks jer­sey. Then it was off to “Hen­ry’s World Famous Hi-Life” for din­ner and a start on the evening’s and jour­ney’s focus, The Shark-Bru­in ice hock­ey game.

Lots more images and expla­na­tions are in the slideshow.
Click on the mon­tage above to jump to its start.

Or click on this line to jump straight to the evening’s start at the famous Hi-Life

[slideshow­pro type=“video” url=“http://ashecoutts.info/ssp_director/albums/album-48/lg/MVI_0033__640-360__AndroidPhone-360p-Widescreen_29-97.mp4” preview=“http://ashecoutts.info/ssp_director/albums/album-48/lg/2012–03-21__PiedrasBlacasElephantSeals_Video-Image__640-360.jpg” width=“600” height=“337” controls=“true” autostart=“false” ]                A lit­tle video of the Ele­phant Seals fool­ing around at Piedras Blacas

 Posted by at 1:30 pm

Great ride to Jalama Beach

 All Categories, Bicycling, Food  2 Responses »
Mar 112012
 

Cyn­thia, Tom, and I drove up togeth­er to Vista de Las Cruces School, very near the junc­ture of 101 and Hwy 1, to meet some of Tom’s Fast­Track­er fast rid­ing bud­dies. We arrived first. Get­ting all our stuff togeth­er tor­toise’s Cyn­thia and Ashe rode off, around 9:30 PST.

It was quite misty ear­ly on and evi­dent from the wet roads that it had been rain­ing ear­li­er in the night. Cyn­thia and I had a nice vis­it as we cruised up High­way 1 and on to Jala­ma Road. About half way out to the ocean Tom and the oth­er Fast­Track­ers came steam­ing by. 90 min­utes lat­er we were with them at the “Home of the Famous Jala­ma Ham­burg­er” and had a fun vis­it as they were fin­ish­ing their burgers.

The day was increas­ing­ly clear­ing on the return ride with many miles of sun. Cyn­thia and I were both pooped when we got back to the school and car but very hap­py campers for hav­ing such a won­der­ful out­ing in such beau­ti­ful coun­try. Tom had left a note in the Vol­vo say­ing he was rid­ing on. Cyn­thia and I loaded up and drove down 101 about 10 miles where we spot­ted our hero and pulled over to load him in. 56 miles for the Tor­tois­es and oth­er Fast­Track­ers, 66 for Tom. Of course there’s more! Click­ing on the mon­tage will start the show. Tom also has a blog entry for today on his Aid­sLife­Cy­cle 11 site. Click here to go there.

 Posted by at 5:38 pm
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