SoCal Adventure | Motorcycle Road Trip | Documentary

I set out on an adventure to ride my motorcycle to the southern border of the United States and Mexico with hopes of traveling through Baja California and exploring the area south. But once I got through the Mexico border, I was met with paperwork issues, confusion, and dangers that seemed to lurk around every turn. I decided that my best bet would be to turn around and start a new adventure exploring some of the areas in Southern California that I haven't filmed before and even seeing some of the aftermath of the wildfires that swept through California. Hey, what's up? I'm Chris from Shred Vision and I'm excited to share with you my SoCal adventure. This adventure didn't really go as planned and it was really frustrating to me to not be able to meet my goal of exploring in Baja California. This is my first trip being back from Alaska and I'm excited to share with you guys some of my adventures. So prepping for this trip, I had to replace my tires, my chain, change my fluids, so basic maintenance to get my bike caught up after a long trip to Alaska and back. And I'm really excited to be testing out a couple of new products on this trip. Nelson Riggs sent me their Trails and Adventure luggage line with their quick-release saddlebag plates, so I'm really excited to put those to the test. It's different than my Hurricane luggage line that I used from them when I went to Alaska, so I'm excited to check it out. It's a little bit more durable with waterproof inner bags. I'm also testing out the Sizz app. So the Sizz app, it's an application on your phone and a piece that you connect to your bike. It's really cool because it tracks your mileage and route everywhere that you go, gives you your battery life, and it even tells you if anyone's moved your bike, so if you're in a hotel or away from your bike and somebody gets on it, it'll let you know of movement detected, no subscription required, and it's got a bunch of different settings. So I've been testing it out over the last couple weeks, and it's been really cool. So I'm excited to track this adventure and, you know, get my mileage and see the different places that I've gone along the way. And the other product that I'm testing out on this trip is called Hytale. It's a piece that goes on the back of your helmet, and what it does is for guys and gals like me with longer hair, it allows you to tuck your hair so it's not blowing in the wind. And after I got back from Alaska, my hair was totally wrecked. I've been testing this out for a couple of weeks. I'm excited to test it now on a road trip and see if it'll help me keep my hair a little bit more manageable when riding on the road. Excited to get back out on the road again. It's been busy catching up with work and a bunch of different projects behind the scenes, recording music, things like that. So this is my first trip back on the road, and I've got some more trips to come in the future. Day one, I left Fresno bright and early and made my way south towards Oceanside, California. It was a real foggy, cold morning, and I even caught a light sprinkle of rain as I made my way on some boring highways. Left Fresno this morning. Pretty cold morning. Had to pull over and put on the heated gear. Caught a little bit of rain, a little bit of fog, and yeah, made my way south through the really busy Los Angeles traffic. My clip on my chain popped off about three, four hours into the ride. Luckily, I always bring a spare instead of master links and clips. Heavy traffic today. I probably had to lane split for a good two hours straight. I would deal with a lot of traffic today as I lane split through the Los Angeles area. Those of you that have been around the Los Angeles area know how overwhelming the traffic can be. So that was a really tiring period as I kept making my way towards my campsite in Oceanside. Yeah, I kind of made it here north of San Diego on a little beach camp spot. Going to set up here for the night and get ready to cross the border into Mexico tomorrow. I'm going to ride to Mexicali, cross the border there, and kind of make my way south to San Felipe in Baja, California. So, yeah, first day back. A little nervous today. Had a little problems with my chain. I think my chain might have been just a touch too loose where it was throwing the clip or hitting something and knocking the clip off there. So, yeah, just kind of going to be chilling now and relaxing here at the beach and just kind of prepping myself for the next couple weeks as I head south here. I hung out at the campsite for the rest of the night and my buddy Adam came by to say hi before we went and grabbed something to eat before calling it a night. I enjoyed a nice quiet night with the sound of the crashing waves in the background as I prepared myself for crossing the border into Mexico the next day. Day two, I left Oceanside, California and made my way towards Mexicali, Mexico. It was a relaxing morning as I just hung out around the campsite, dried out my camping gear and tent, and even took one last stroll down by the beach before I mentally prepared myself for crossing into Mexico. I took the freeway out of town and made my way through San Diego before making my way east towards Mexicali. I made sure to fill up my extra gas bag with gas so I'd have some extra fuel just in case things went wrong when I was south of the border. I rode through the traffic and made my way towards the eight east where I did a little off-roading and did some exploring of some trails. I made my way towards Calexico, the border town in California that borders Mexicali. As I got into Calexico, I made my way towards the Mexicali border where I entered without getting checked. Crossing into the Mexico border was a surreal experience and I found myself looking for directions to find the immigration center to get my paperwork stamped. The temperature was really hot as I had left 60 degrees on the coast earlier today. It was in the mid-90s and I was starting to feel the heat as I was making my way through some unknown neighborhoods to get to downtown Mexicali where I could try to sort out my paperwork issues. Day two here. I left just north of San Diego and made it to Mexicali here in Baja, California. I made it through but they never checked my passport or stamped anything. Yeah, basically I kind of entered the wrong way and now I'm having problems because if I stay more than seven days like I planned, you have to have a certain permit. And I already had my MMF, I did it online and I have my paperwork already ready to go but I need a stamp in order to have re-entry. So I'm basically, they said I have to go back into the United States and then re-enter through Tijuana is what they're saying if I want to stay as long as I wanted to. So it's, I don't know what I'm going to do at this point. I'm kind of too afraid to go farther into Mexico because I just think I'm going to have a problem farther away from home. Right now I'm thinking I'm going to turn around and that's probably my best bet. And then I'll have to figure out from here. I've already ridden three, four hours today. I had two more to go so that's a really big bummer. But kind of a sketchy situation. I'm going to try to make the best of it and figure it out here. I ended up making my way back into California and I decided to go back to Oceanside, California to rethink my trip and possibly explore some areas in Southern California that I haven't seen before. Today's the end of day two here and I made it all the way back to north of San Diego coast. So I rode from the same campground this morning all the way three and a half hours to the Mexicali border crossing. So I'm going from building to building and different workers are telling me to go one place. Other workers are telling me to go the next. Then come to find out that they don't even stamp in Mexicali. That they only do it in Tijuana. Yeah, really a nerve-wracking experience. For the next couple days I'm going to chill. I think I'm going to go up the California coast here and maybe camp in a few different spots. Test out some more gear and just make the best out of it. See where things go and that's kind of the things with adventures. Sometimes things happen and you have to redirect. You have to reassess what the whole key of doing this stuff is anyways. It's having fun and when it gets to the point where it's not fun and it's getting sketchy, I think that's when it's time to kind of reassess your decisions. Day three I would wake up in Oceanside, California and ride my way north to Malibu, California. It's day three here and I'm back just north of San Diego at this beach camp spot here. Set up my tent, went and took a shower. I'm just chilling this morning. Kind of waiting out the LA traffic before I think I head north and I'm going to go camp somewhere on the coast. Yeah, so I was just checking the SIS app right now. It's been working pretty good this trip. I was just tracking my mileage and kind of seeing the crazy route that I took the last couple days on there. What's really cool about it though, what I've been liking on the trip, is that it actually detects if there's any movement on the bike. So if my bike's parked away from myself or for the case when I was in Mexicali, when I went into the immigration's office, it's nice because it tells me if anybody is moving it or touching the bike. So that's a really cool safety feature that I've liked on this trip. I didn't get to use my gas bag yesterday, my three gallons of extra gas. So yeah, before I leave right now, I'm going to put the gas back into my bike. And it's nice because I can roll up my gas bag and put it underneath these Trails and Adventure saddlebags. On these trips, I like going on roads where there's not a lot of traffic, nice beautiful roads. It's not hectic, it's just really me and the bike. So far on this trip, it's just been heavy with traffic and a lot of stress. So I'm looking forward to having a chill day once I make it north of Los Angeles area. Yeah, no plans, just going to have fun and enjoy myself. Yeah, made it through all that LA traffic and made it into the Santa Monica Mountains, which was a really awesome ride. I got to ride some really twisty, beautiful roads. Got to ride a bit of the Maholan Drive, so that was really cool. I've actually always wanted to ride that area and never have. It was a sobering experience riding through the hills and seeing some of the fire damage as I made my way towards the coast. Seeing some of these beautiful homes and roads scattered with fire damage really reminded me how lucky some of these homes were to have made it. It was a stressful day of driving at first, kind of leaving the San Diego area. I went through LA traffic, had to lane split for an hour or two. So when you're lane splitting in that dense traffic, you're really focused 100% and it's kind of like a white knuckle ride. And yeah, it kind of spit me out onto the Pacific Coast here, where I made it into this Moogoo Point campground. So, really nice. I'm just in the forest here, just close by to the beach. Probably go up to a restaurant here and just have a relaxing night. Make my way down to the beach, maybe catch a sunset for the first time this trip. Yeah, it's pretty sunny here. The last couple of days it's been real cloudy where I was camping at. So, yeah, heck of a three days of riding so far. And I think kind of from here on it'll be nice and chill roads for the most part, so I'm excited for that. But it's really fun to just, you know, book my campsites on the fly. And I was able to look these campsites up the day of my ride and, you know, reserve one and get my ride in to make it all the way. So it's been really nice. I rode into the restaurant Neptune's Net, which was really lucky to survive the fires. The fires were a couple hundred yards up the hill and it just spared this location. So I came by to grab something to eat and drink before making my way back to the beach. It was heartbreaking talking to some of the locals and hearing about how they had to evacuate and some of them even losing their homes. It really shows us how nature can change at any time and we always need to be thankful for what we have. Yeah, I made it down to the beach finally. This kind of made all that crazy traffic and riding back and forth worth it. So, yeah, I'm starting to have some fun and just, yeah, trying to relax and enjoy the waves and have a nice quiet night. But yeah, beautiful here in Malibu area. First time in this particular area, so really nice. Day four here. I woke up right in the Malibu area. Beautiful campground kind of in the forest next to the beach here. Today I'm going to ride from this Malibu area all the way up to Morro Bay and hopefully get a campground around the Morro Rock area. So that should be pretty nice. Yeah, I was just doing some, just breaking down my tent, packing up my stuff. And I was using these Nelson Rig quick-release saddlebag plates. I had to do a little bit of chain maintenance today, so it was really easy to take my panniers off the bike, put my bike on the center stand and, you know, oil my chain, tighten my chain a little bit. So, yeah, just being able to take these things off, I literally did it in about 10 seconds on each one. Another thing to simplify my setup and that's what I'm all about, you know, having a nice easy setup. Last three days of the trip I've been hitting real heavy traffic, so I'm hoping today will be a lighter traffic day and I'll start getting into some better roads. Although the roads through Malibu right here are beautiful, so it actually reminds me a little bit of Big Sur just with a little more traffic. I'm going to make my way north along the coast and no plans, just going to be hanging out and enjoying life. Today was the better day of riding. I rode through some hills, rode through a beautiful lake along the mountainside, finally got to ditch some traffic as I've been riding through San Diego and Los Angeles traffic the last three days or so. Today is the end of day four. I rode from Malibu all the way to Morro Bay today, so met up with my buddy Griff. We went to this Morro Rock campground here, which was pretty nice. Just kind of went into town, checked out some of the sites and yeah, just relaxing today. Day five I left Morro Bay and made my way back home towards Fresno. I rode my way through some beautiful hills and just enjoyed the great weather and the fun roads as I made my way home. Day five here, I'm leaving the coast. I'm leaving Morro Bay this morning. It was kind of a little sprinkly and yeah, decided to take some back roads that I've never ridden before out of town. Rode some beautiful turns and twisty roads through some green hillsides. Kind of made my way back into the Central Valley here in California and yeah, now I'm making my way back home to Fresno. For now, just enjoying this little spring rain and you know, all these trees and plants and vegetations all coming into bloom. So it's been beautiful cutting through these countrysides today. Pulled over here in front of some blooming trees, kind of in some farmland just to kind of chill before I make my final push home here. And it kind of started to rain on me a bit. So I went ahead and threw this waterproof cover on my Trails and Adventure tail bag to protect my cameras and whatnot. And yeah, kind of a good overall trip, just didn't really go the way that I had planned it to. And decided to ride a bunch of roads in Southern California that I've never ridden before. You know, I'll be back out there, but I wanted this trip to really show people the true realities of, you know, motorcycle trips and adventures. They might not always go your way and like this time, you know, it didn't turn out exactly how I wanted, but gave it my best. Just kind of waiting to plan my next adventure and see, you know, what's in store for the future. I made it home safe from my SoCal adventure. Kind of a bummer I didn't get to explore further south in Baja, but made the best of it. Got to explore some really beautiful areas and kind of the last little areas in California that I haven't really filmed on my channel. So I had a great time testing out the different products. My Trails and Adventure luggage system worked great. I'm going to be doing a review on the Trails and Adventure luggage setup on the NelsonRig YouTube channel. So be sure to check that out. My SIZ app worked great on this trip. It was pretty fun nerding out on the technology and checking out the app and seeing all the different progress that I made on the trip. 1200 mile trip according to the SIZ app. 24 hours worth of riding. So yeah, it was a, you know, good time. That's about the pace that I like to do over a five day trip like this. And it was fun seeing my different routes along the way. My Hightail system for my hair worked great on this trip. So didn't get my hair tangled up. I was able to not really worry about it. And you know, the less you have to worry about things on your trip, the better. So great overall experience. And yeah, I'm looking forward to doing some more trips over the next coming year or two. If you guys liked anything about this adventure, leave me a comment. Let me know any of the places that maybe you've been or any ideas for some future trips of mine that you might have. I'm excited to get out there and ride with no major plans this summer. So yeah, if anybody's doing any fun rides or whatnot, let me know. I'd love to join, love to film. Yeah, it was fun. I appreciate everyone's support. And it was nice getting back out here after my Alaska adventure. And being able to give you guys an update on what I've been up to. This is Chris from Shred Vision. Everybody take care and ride safe.