Of course, I got the standard photo of me standing in the ocean. Note that the waves did come crashing into myself and the bike, but this was the best picture. I spent some extra minutes looking out at the ocean, enjoying the beach and getting all my gear on my bike, but in short order, I was on my bike and pedaling away on Del Mar Heights Road in San Diego.

Jennifer left me all alone at the beach at approximately 10 a.m., a very late start that I would regret at the end of the day as the 4,000 foot ascent to Julian took much longer than projected. As I began riding along Del Mar Heights Road and other neighborhoods heading towards the suburb of Poway, the reality had set in: The very intense planning and organizing stage was over, and the journey of bicycling long distances by myself on a daily basis had begun!

SECOND: An array of palm trees in a median on Carmel Valley Road. I went through some upper class neighborhoods and got lost as I worked my way east towards Poway and Highway 67.

My other lasting memory of this road is I fell twice on my bike when I failed to unlock my new bicycling shoes from the pedals. The first incident happened at a busy traffic light with numerous cars and shopping malls nearby; The second fall transpired somewhere close to the top photo. While I have been an avid road biker for years, it was only two months earlier that I made the switch to clipless cycling shoes and I did not have enough experience riding with them to fully know the hazards of falling. Ha! Well, I learned twice the hard way (literally) in San Diego and it didn't happen again. Fortunately, I was not hurt.

The weather all day was fairly cloudy with the appearance that it could rain at any given time. That made it difficult to take decent pictures of scenery. Also, because I had started late, I was in a time crunch to arrive in Julian before it got dark - I simply didn't have time to waste. I pedaled the final seven mile uphill grade from San Ysabel to Julian with the skies becoming dark and somewhat dangerous. Not long after arriving in Julian, it was pitch black and I snapped the adjacent photo of my bike. With the days still relatively short in early February, this experience was my warning to start at day break for future rides.

Later in the evening, Jennifer drove from San Diego to meet and have dinner with me. I was totally exhausted, but my heart was very exhilerated with the notion that I was actually doing this dream ... a dream I talked about doing for at least five years. Jen and I had a great time at Romano's Italian Restaurant (www.RomanosJulian.com) and I devoured their huge Italian meatball sandwich! :p)

SPECIAL THANKS to my amazing "San Diego girls" in Krista (center) for generously allowing me to keep my car in front of her home and Jennifer (right - she doesn't like photos of herself) for being an emergency contact for the duration of my ride in California, supporter and coach for this trip.

While I don't think I could ever live in a huge city, I have a lot of sentimental attachment to San Diego. Of course, it was the launching area for my bike trip, but I also had some really nice times during my first visit to the city in 2007. You can see some of my San Diego pages here: Ocean Beach Fishing Pier, California Sunset, San Diego Zoo, Cowles Mountain.