West Coast Road Trip 5

www.london-motorcycle-museum.org

A Road Trip

(West Coast 5)

After leaving the museum in Solvang it was only a couple of hours to get to the hotel in Los Angeles. Highway 101 gets close to the coast and near Santa Barbara we looked down on the old road and there were miles of RVs parked up enjoying the afternoon sun. LA was where we met up with daughter and granddaughter who would be with us for the rest of the trip and why we needed a bigger car. Great to have them around but not so sure how the days would go with the little one. We stayed in a hotel on Sunset Boulevard and spent a lot of time going up and down Hollywood Boulevard enjoying the theatre of it all. There are a number of “Military” shops along Hollywood Boulevard and outside one was a particularly looking aggressive manikin. 

Looking closely it did look as though he had a very pained expression on his face. We were having a family breakfast in one of the commercial squares in the LA International market and off to one side was a sauce shop that had some very descriptive brands.    Among them were “Ass in a tub”, “Whoop Ass”, “Sphincter shrinker”, “Butt pucker”, Asbirin”, “Colon cleaner” and a more up market one that I thought was appropriate for this soldier “Anal Angst”. While there we found a Trader Joes and bought an insulated bag to keep baby food in and perhaps a cold beer or two and then off to Santa Monica Boulevard to see a special motorcycle shop.  Its on Route 66 now but used to be on Sunset. 

It is the Thunder Road Motorcycle shop where stars and Henry Cole have visited. I have around somewhere an original Indian Chief motif baseball cap that is now apparently quite rare that was bought for me as a present about 30 years ago. I had to visit the place. Having been to an organic cafe and had steak and salad we walked for, what seemed like miles, and went past Thunder Road. A very pleasant visit but had no LMM fliers with me.

One guy was on an Enfield, the Himalaya and talked about the attributes of this type of motorcycle. It is interesting how things have moved on from those leggy easy rider chops back to more conventional machines. In the evening we drove up to the Observatory to see Hollywood at dusk and the city slowly illuminated as the light went and the dark came in there were students out with “big” telescopes to look at the stars and more than willing to let you see what they were looking at. 

Next day we were passing the Thunder Road Shop and dropped in to leave some fliers and take a few more photos I was given a Thunder Road pin badge. Not many are bought now but as I wear a waist coat when volunteering it will be put on that along with a San Francisco Fire Department patch. I had an idea to keep going along Santa Monica Boulevard to the coast along Route 66 and see the memorial to Will Rogers but we were now on a schedule and needed to get to Joshua Tree for our next stop.