RAFTING AND SOFA-SURFING: (Kernville, California, USA)

After a really tough slog on the bike in the mountains, we were fantasising about all sorts of creature comforts that might await at the next town…cold beer perhaps, maybe we should splurge on a motel instead of camping, a big nearly raw steak??? Well, we'd spent the morning on a mountain ascent which is tricky on a fully loaded tandem, when you can't even get 'out of the saddle' to get stuck in because the balancing is too hard. We then spent the early afternoon enjoying the transition from desert to forest on a 15 mile downhill! Then it was back under blistering sun, headlong into the wretched wind, miles from water and snacks.

We crashed out on the road side by a river for nearly an hour, poached a fish off of a prison guard fisherman, cooked it with noodles at the roadside, then picked our sorry selves up to do the final fifteen miles to beautiful Kernville. Can you imagine how delirious with joy and fatigue we were when we arrived after a tough fifty miles at a brewery, in the late evening sun, to be able to tuck into a burger big enough to give you liver failure, and meet the nicest people in the world. We were offered a real bed and a warm shower at the home of Andie and Rick, bicycle and motorbike enthusiasts, teachers and travellers.

We spent the next day rafting on the Kern River and getting to know half the town - a bunch of people from the night before, and some new friendly small town faces. The town was like a scene from Back to the Future as we sat in an old diner surrounded by 50's cars, the weekly old fellas breakfast. The following morning, Andie was an angel and dropped us to a northbound train to take us to our next cycling leg in Yosemite.