41AGP – Touring the world

Today we have to ride over the highest hill on the entire route: about 2000 feet.  We’ve had a fairly rubbish night as the hiker-biker site is very small, and there were quite a few of us in it, so it was noisy, and we were driven into our tents early because of the flaming mossies.  Anyhow, we decide to get up at 6am to try to beat the heat over the big hill.  We roll at about 7:10, and have 15 miles or so before the big one starts.

 

Those 15 miles are fairly hilly all by themselves, but eventually we say goodbye to 101 and turn onto California Highway 1 at Leggett, to climb Leggett Hill.  The road winds up through trees, and so is fairly unscenic.  Being a Sunday, it’s quiet apart from motorbikes of various types and the odd car.

 

 

We drop over the top and down back almost to sea level.  Then we have to climb another hill, which we think is worse than the first, probably because in our minds we thought it was all over.  Eventually, this drops us on the coast, and we head for our destination, the KOA campground at Westport.  Alas, it’s a weekend, and all of their tent sites in the main area are full.  So, they have to put us in overflow at the top of the bluff.  This proves to be probably the most scenic campsite we’ve ever been on, and completely away from everyone else !  Just the seabirds for company.  Result.

 

 

The views are excellent in each direction.

 

 

 

And finally, here’s a picture of Diane looking pensive, thinking how different this is from camping in Porlock in August.

 

 

For dinner, we ride up to Westport and eat at the Inn, a thoroughly lovely experience.  And then we have a great night’s sleep.

 

The next day, we decide to ride to Fort Bragg and try to get a motel room to catch the last day of the Tour de France.  After packing up in the fog, we cycle off and the visibility improves.  This coastline is particularly stunning, easily the best since Oregon I think.

 

 

We encounter a couple from Stanford up for their wedding anniversary, so here’s a picture of the two of us for a change.

 

 

Anyone else think we’ve lost weight ?  My clothes are distinctly looser around the waist, despite all the calories we’ve been eating.  And all you have to do is ride every day for 5 weeks, give or take, on a bike weighing 25 kilos.  Simple.  On the coast, we pass a load of turkey vultures sitting on a log, like in The Birds.  In fact, we’ll be in Bodega Bay, where it was filmed, in a couple of days.

 

 

Finally, we drift into Fort Bragg and get a room at the Travelodge.  We don’t have the right cable channel to watch The Tour, but hey, there we are.  We spend the afternoon researching and booking somewhere to stay in San Francisco, and then stroll into town to eat.  We choose an Italian restaurant, and it transpires that they’re having an acoustic gig there that evening.  So we rock out to the Steven Bates band until we’re too tired to care any more, then go back to the motel.

 

 

The following morning, we have a leisurely start, as we’re having another easy day.  It doesn’t start too well as the toilet in our motel room overflows.  I remedy this by plunging my arm into the bowl and unjamming it.  The manager looked appalled when I told him.  Our first stop today is Mendecino, a nicely preserved little town.  Lot’s of buildings have these things on the roof.  Some seem to have little tanks on them, and some are just decks, with chairs and whatever.  They look like repurposed windmills, but I guess they aren’t.

 

 

Here’s one near the Didjeridoo Dream Time Meditation Center.  They have vacancies.

 

 

After what, I have to admit, is a not very long ride, we haul into Van Damme State Park, hopefully not named after the Muscles from Brussels.  It’s a top spot, and the hiker-biker site is nice.

 

 

After setting up, we set off to look at the pygmy forest.  This involves a three-mile ride up Fern Canyon.  This starts well enough, but then turns into a bit of an obstacle course.  Ok on mountain bikes, not on tourers.

 

 

We gave up shortly after this.

 

 

After showers, we walked up the hill to the store, bought some beer, and sat on the beach drinking it and looking at the view.

 

 

Then the Jesus Loves U t-shirt bus turned up.

 

 

Taking this as a sign, we had our dinner and went to bed to read and listen to music.

No particular rush today, so we get up and cycle into town for breakfast, which we have here. Not in the guns and ammo place, but in the Hot Brew.  Very nice too, especially the blueberry pancakes.  Then we split up: Diane buys food in Safeway, and I cycle up the road to buy a spare tube in a sports shop.  I was trying to pump her front tyre up this morning, and the end of the valve broke off.  Ok for the moment, but needs to be swapped at some point.

 

 

Then we’re off up the 101 again, which is a freeway here, passing humungous wood processing places until we reach our turn-off for Avenue of the Giants  This is the original US 101, now a scenic route through the big redwoods.

 

 

There aren’t many towns around here, so you tend to get the very local and the long way away on the same sign.  We’re going through all of these anyway.  We should be in San Fran in about ten days.

 

 

All the local attractions are log-related, including this cross-section through a giant redwood.

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They are beautiful, though, so we meander slowly along the road, which is mercifully flat, following the Eel River.

 

 

 

We reach our campground and set up.  It’s really quite hot, and the sunlight filters down through the trees.

 

 

 

We’re not planning to go very far tomorrow, so we can linger in the trees a while longer.

Up late as we’re not going far, and we watch the day’s Tour de France stage live on the box.  We leave at about 10:30: it’s kind of grizzly and overcast again.  During the early part of the ride we hit 1000 miles ridden on Diane’s bike computer.  According to the gps, we’ve done about 930 miles, but Diane’s figure includes social mileage, riding around in the evening and so on.  Either way, it’s quite a bit.

 

 

Fortuna is a lovely little town, just off the 101.  It has real shops and a happy air, as well as a cinema.  As we are quite early, we decide to go and set up camp and then pop back into town to catch a film: Harry Potter 7, as they call it.  We fancy doing some different for a couple of hours.

 

 

 

Our camp site is nice too, although it’s quite close to our old friend, US 101, again.

 

 

We watch the film, very doomy I thought.  Probably would have helped if we’d seen any of the last four, but there we are.  Then we walk back and eat at the Eel River Brewery and Grill.  For a description of the food see the five options described previously.  Nice beer, though.

 

 

Note the Triple Exultation at 9.7% bloomin’ percent !!  Not for me, thanks.  Off into the Redwoods tomorrow.

 

We decide on another long day to get us to Eureka for a rest day, so we’re on the road by 8:30.  Diane is up at 6:00 to look for Elk, but again there aren’t any around.

 

 

On the way out, though, we do see one, peeking out from the tall grass.  Only one though, and no antlers (apparently they shed them in spring).  No picture as it was far away.  Anyway, the rest of the day consists largely of us riding down US 101 South.  It’s mostly a tedious, hilly ride, interspersed with moments of terror caused by logging trucks.  There are some pretty bits, though.  Diane says this is a good photo, so she must have taken it.

 

 

This is Trinidad, a small town not far from Eureka.

 

 

And then, we’re detoured off the 101 because they’re renewing the Mad River bridge.  This bit of the ride is quite like Britain, with knackered roads following field boundaries and the roads coated with cow muck.

 

 

Back on the 101, we continue to ride towards the KOA campground outside Eureka.  101 is a freeway at this point, kind of like a large dual carriageway in Britain, with a lot of traffic.  Perversely, freeways are busier but safer than normal roads, as they have a massive shoulder for us to ride on.  The KOA looks unpromising, as it’s very close to 101 and a lumber yard.

 

 

Eureka in the background.

 

 

It rains most of the evening, and Diane does some cooking.

 

 

Actually, we both sleep brilliantly, despite the traffic noise.

 

Here’s a random photo of a logging truck, taken from a safe distance, as I keep referring to them.  They really haul ass, and often pass within feet of us at fifty-plus miles an hour.  Sometimes, they honk at us as well, perhaps to point out our impending doom, or through sheer exuberance at their power and speed.

 

 

 

We’re off to Jed Smith State Park today.  It’s off the route, but a couple staying at the camp recommended it.  Off in the rain with the tent wet again.  Over the California border, where we’re waved through the fruit and vegetable check without stopping.

 

 

The rain continues off and on, and there’s not much in the way of towns or what-like, so we end up eating lunch at Ray’s Food Market.  Hopefully the weather will look up before San Francisco.

 

 

When we pitch up, Jed Smith is a nice camp.  The hiker-biker is well away from the rest of the camp, right in the redwoods.  The scarf isn’t an affectation: it’s there to stop me being eaten to death by the insects.

 

 

The park is on a river, also rather lovely.

 

 

The night is dark, and silent.  We have to put everything in a bear locker, a large metal box which stops animals getting at it, so I spend some time imagining things are wandering about outside before falling asleep.

 

 

Predictably, it’s raining in the morning, so we pack up wet again.  As you can see, the footprint of our tent is coffin-shaped.