Started well after first light at 7:40AM. Willie was kind enough to set an alarm for me and get me up at 6:30AM, which gave me 4 hours pretending to be a corpse on the floor. I did my best with foodling-doodling to avoid getting started, but eventually shoved off for the 10 mile and 3,300' climb that meets you after about 1.5 miles of warmup through town. (FEITS 6.39; avg grade 6.3%) The climb was fine, and I was feeling quite good, everything considered. I basically had a Cup of Noodle Soup with a Sprite for dinner, and I knew I was going to need calories, but the size of breakfast I had in mind was probably not going to be a good idea just before launching up Montezuma Grade, so I ate some potato chips, drank a Coke, and got on with it. The temperatures were climbing fairly fast, and it was a relief to near the top of the grade where there was a cool breeze down to Ranchita. I passed Foster near the top, and found Linda waiting for him at the Ranchita Store. There is only a store there, no cafe, so we asked the locals gathering there (maybe they serve coffee..) where the closest breakfast was. One guy said there was a place at the Lake Henshaw Resort (which I recalled from the rest stop there on the Borrego DC), and my mind was made up to go directly there and chow down. It was going almost all be downhill to breakfast, so I could wait. Linda was of the same mind, and I thought they were going to join me and I had a table with a nice view of the lake, but I began to worry as the 11AM deadline approached for ordering breakfast. I think they ended up stopping at a biker bar kind of place I saw to the left just off the main road a few miles earlier. I had the Farmer's breakfast, biscuits, scrambled eggs and potatoes under gravy, and a side of bacon, of course, plus plenty of coffee. I saw another rando come by, and I gave him a yell and he told me that Foster and Linda had stopped back a ways for breakfast, so I began getting ready to move on again at a reasonable pace to let all the great food digest some. One thing, a major thing, about cycling that stretch of road (San Filipe Rd not long after leaving Ranchita, the 4.4 miles southbound on CA-79, and CA-76 to Pauma Valley): it can be bloody dangerous for a cyclist. I came away with the conviction that the only safe way to go through there is by using a very bright taillight, using a mirror to watch for traffic approaching from behind, and being prepared to take the lane and making a LOT of motorists extremely angry. At no point when climbing during this 600k did I really feel in danger from the traffic, regardless of how much of a shoulder was present (or wasn't). But I had 4 very uncomfortably close calls, 3 of which were in the 1 hour it took me to get to Lake Henshaw from Ranchita, and the worst of them was after breakfast on CA-76. I was scared, and then downright livid when I was forced off the pavement onto a narrow band of dirt and rocks at the base of the hillside. I was expecting a blow out or cut tire, and thought the chances were good that I would go down, but, thankfully, none of that happened. The problem is not the cars and motorcycles. It is the trucks pulling trailers with their off-road toys coming from the desert. The problem is not so much when climbing, because there always seems to be a little bit of room to the side of the fog line. However, on a very slight descent when my speed will be, say from 20-27 mph, I am not able to keep so very close to the fog line. The worst of the frights was when a large pickup was pulling a very large livestock trailer, and was taking up pretty much the entire width of the lane. Yet, he was in a string of 4 vehicles that were all tailgating like they were drafting in a stock car race. The cars were able to get by me without too much of a problem, but a car was approaching from the other direction and the driver of the truck evidently saw me too late to brake in time, or the thought never occurred to him. Regardless, when he saw he was apt to hit me, he just layed on his horn. I was watching the string of vehicles approach me, and I thought I was going to get hit, so I bailed. Without the use of the mirror, I probably would not have, and may not have been here to write this. The only thing to do to protect from being hit in an accident is to take the lane and force the string of vehicles to all slow down to my speed, and then move over to let them get by when I deem it is safe. I had almost decided this from the 3 prior incidents before breakfast, but I didn't have the guts to inconvenience so many motorists when the vast majority of them can get by without significant risk. I just don't see how there is any choice, though, because prayer will not be sufficient. I lost some data (about 4.1 miles) when I failed to restart my Garmin right away after stopping for breakfast at Lake Henshaw. The total time I lost was 1 hr 16 min, which included the amount of time I had been stopped to eat. The rest of the ride was not eventful, and is fairly well known to me with the exception of a couple of nice segments on bike paths that I had not previously been on: the start of the San Luis Rey River Trail (around mile 73), and the San Juan Creek Trail, which heads inland from Dana Point. The temperatures were not an issue today as I made it out of Borrego Springs before it became too hot. It did reach 100F out by Rincon Reservation (Harrah's Resort) and Valley Center, but then it slowly decreased the closer we came to the coast. Ah, yes, speaking of Harrah's. I stopped at the 7-Eleven there, and bought 4 Advil, a 5-hour Energy, and a Coke. I felt like a new man while climbing out of that valley! The 5-hour Energy seemed to be more effective than the Red Bull I had tried (2x) on Saturday, but maybe the 4 hours of sleep helped more. Anyway, I was finally able to shake off the malaise from being sleepy. I caught up to (Eric?) in Valley Center at the information control (the turn onto Lilac Rd). We were looking at the time and distance to go, and I realized I needed to pick it up if I was going to finish before dark. I had not kept my headlight, nor my usual "rando" reflectivity things. From there for about 60 miles (to the end of the San Juan Creek Trail which started from the ocean in Dana Point), I managed a fairly creditable pace of 16.7 mph on average. Thereafter, I was having to check the route sheet regularly and climb a couple of nasty rollers on Marguerite Pkwy, etc., and was also not very motivated to hurry because I had plenty of daylight to spare by that time.