Goodbye Yosemite...hello Malibu

Well, we finally left the valley. By the last day, we had the climber dirtbag routine nailed. We managed to raft down the Merced for free with our "employee" discount. The rafting was hilarious, our friend greg put it well...it's more like swimming but with a floatation device. Yeah there weren't any rapids, but it was still a fun way to end the trip. After rafting we went to get lunch on greg's real employee discount but managed to find an employee banquet they just happened to be putting on for Curry Village employees. We gorged ourselved on lots of food and then bolted before anyone asked us who the heck we were. To top it off, the girl that worked @ the coffee shop we went to after lunch was Ian's roommate, and thus completed our day of free-ness.

Then off to LA. We stayed @ a KOA in Pomona. This place was not so good. When Chris and Chick found out we were staying in Pomona they were horrified offering to put us up in a hotel, but please no don't stay in Pomona. Many calls of Chris pleading with us that Pomona is a bad town. But we stayed there anyway. And it didn't feel dangerous but was not like the other KOAs we've seen. We got in pretty late and someone had covered our campsite in Ajax??? What the heck we're thinking...so we put down our sleeping bags in the only non Ajax'd spot and crashed. The comes the crazy woman in the site next to us. She wakes us up @ 2am telling us to get off of her site, obviously very threatened by two girls from Ohio. God knows what she thought we would do. We explain to her that we are on our site so please let us go to sleep. But no, we're two feet into her site due to the ajax but she doesn't care so she threatens to report us to the host. Welcome to LA. I ignore this woman and go back to sleep she is obviously CRAZY. Bridgette is way more vexed by the situation and moves towards the Ajax after she wakes us up a second time...now it is war. Then we wake up in the morning and she is talking to herself angrily in the bathroom about a stain on her clothes. Wierd. We leave as soon as possible in the morning.

Then we made our way to Malibu...oh yes. Some down time on the beach. Malibu is way way smaller than we thought. But it is so stereotypical CA that it's hard not to laugh. Everyone surfs and everyone who surfs is ripped, tan, and has shaggy bleached blond hair. The houses are beautiful. We are staying with Dave who lives with 5 other surfers. And when we offered to cook him dinner he politely tried to decline because they have no dishes. Bridgette and I looked at him confused...no dishes? He explained that the house got pretty messy and that after a recent house meeting they just decided to throw everything out and start from scratch, and they weren't kidding...there is nothing! Never a dull moment.

We're hangin in Malibu for a few days, trying to scrounge some surf lessons from Dave. He's super busy though, so we're happy with our few days on the ocean. Then off to Smith to keep crankin.