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Day Eight, Last Day - 6.6 miles

    It was Saturday and time to head home. I had purchased a one way ticket to Lompoc on the Amtrak bus the day before when we were walking around town. The bus was not due to leave until 11:40 so we took our time getting up and eating a toast breakfast at the Tourist Hostel on Chapala Street.

    We hadn't really seen the waterfront of Santa Barbara so we hopped on the now stripped tandem and rode to the pier jutting out from the shore. The pier is large enough that we could ride the bike all the way out to the restaurants at the sea end. We spent some time looking back at the town and the pier's other sights including a number of people fishing or strolling along as we were. We had still more time so rode the shoreline road from one end of the bay to the other, looking at all the beach activity and the expensive resorts and hotels along the waterfront.

   A van with thousands of small plastic toys glued to the outside was parked in one of the parking lots and its occupant was posing for pictures with tourists passing by. Of course, he had a place for the tourists to drop a, "love offering" into as a donation for his time. An older lady was walking along as we were stopped. She gave us a broad smile and a warm greeting and when I returned it, she came over and started rubbing my back. She told us she had lived in Santa Barbara for over 50 years and was approaching 90. Her husband had passed away a few years before. He had loved back rubs and she gave him one daily. Now she gave out free ones each day as she took her morning exercise.

   The time had come to head for the bus station. I arrived about ten minutes before the bus was scheduled to leave only to be informed that the bus had to wait until a late train arrived since there were passengers aboard the train that needed to transfer to the bus. Jeanette waited a while with me and then took off shopping.

   After almost an hour's wait, the train arrived and I boarded the bus and took off for Solvang and then Lompoc. I was amazed how far it seemed to where we had cycled from only the day before. After dropping off passengers at Solvang, the bus continued on to Lompoc and I picked up the van. There was nothing left to do but to drive back to Santa Barbara, gather up Jeanette, the tandem and the gear and head home. Our fall tour was over.