Made it to Sunny Southern California

Yesterday was a loooong, fantastic day! It started with a great flight that went smoothly except for a brief, unexpected delay in Houston. I gotta say, I was prepared with iPod games, a movie and other random stuff to keep me occupied on the plane, but I ended up just staring out the window most of the time. It was one of those days where visibility was unbelievable and looking down at the constantly changing landscape from 26,000 ft kept my attention. Once in San Diego, I met up with a few of the other crew and the work began. We got all our vans (6) and RV’s (4) rented, picked up 4 full vanloads of bikes (25), wheels (25x2), tires, tshirts, nutrition items and other stuff that had been shipped out to the local UPS store. Let’s just say the UPS store folks were glad for us to get all our stuff out of there because they didn’t have room to turn around! Then we spent the evening planning what we need to get done today. And let me just say, there is still A LOT to get done. Our 3 mechanics worked late into the night getting a jump on all the work they have ahead of them over the next 2 days. Bikes have to be ready for inspection tomorrow so they still have a quite a bit of work to do to get ready for that. As for the rest of us, there is building trailers, stickering-up the vehicles, getting more provisions and still more stuff I ain’t gotta clue about. But I feel like I have much better handle on things now and I already feel connected with all my new friends the RAAM crews. I am working with a great group of folks from all over America and it’s going to be a fun bunch of days to come. I know, this isn’t the exciting “racing stuff” you were hoping for…but that’s coming. Just keep reading, asking questions and I will keep posting. The race starts Saturday morning but I am sure I will post more before then. I also have some pictures I will post to flickr today, so look for those. Will tag them #2010raamtt1 and #jeffraam2010. Later!