The Shoreline Highway

10/18/11
At 8am I rolled out of bed. I wanted to make it about 64 miles today and I also wanted to clean and lube my bike before I hit the road...so I had to get moving. In the process of cleaning I made the mistake of fooling with the tension of my spokes and before I knew it my wheel was becoming less and less true. I ended up having to spend about 30 extra minutes fixing my mistake, and ended with the feeling that I still didn't know what I was doing. After washing up and eating breakfast I wasn't actually ready to go until about 11am.

Right outside the Motel I encountered another cyclist from Portland. He was an interesting young fellow named Won Young. I think he said he was 22, had been practicing Taekwondo all his life and was now cycling to no place in particular without any money and few possessions. His overall philosophy at his young age was about doing more with less. He eloquently, and I actually had a very nice conversation with him. He appeared to be wiser than his age in some ways. He pointed out that with my bike and setup, I looked like somebody with money. I guess that would make me a mark in a town like Garberville. Although his suggestion to get rid of most of my stuff and dirty up a bit was appreciated, I just didn't feel like that was the way I wanted to cycle across America. I already feel like I'm walking a fine line between homeless and vagabond. I guess another way to view it is as an adventurer. Well whatever I am, I'd like to try to be comfortable, which for me means staying as clean as possible as I weave in and out of these towns and social structures. What kind of cyclic tourist would you like to be?

I didn't really feel like I had climbed out of the hole that is Garberville until I was about 8 miles outside of the city. Despite the feeling, the ride was beautiful as the roads I was on continued to follow the Eel River. I stopped for lunch about 15 miles out on the side of a road that I hadn't seen any cars on the whole ride. As I ate a motorcycle passed by, but other than me on my bike that was the only other human I saw for about an hour.

As I rolled passed the town of Leggett, I saw a sign that indicated there would be no services for about 28 miles so I decided to turn around. It looked as if the market was closed for the winter, so I stopped at the overpriced gas station to fill up on water and get some snacks. I took about a 30 minute rest as I fueled up for the climb ahead of me. I had been going up an down over hills the whole day, but overall I had gradually climbed about 600ft. I could see from my map that I had about 5 miles of straight climbing ahead me as I would eventually reach about 1800ft elevation...which would be the highest part of my trip thus far.

The climb wasn't too bad, but I could tell the 30 miles that I had already come were catching up with me and I was slowing down. Once over the first hill, I dropped about 1500ft and it was a blast cruising around all the switchbacks at 30mph. At the bottom of that hill I reached another 500ft ascent reaching the coast, and it was slow coming. I was at about 45 miles for the day and moving slower and slower.

As soon as I could hear the ocean I was feeling good. It was completely overcast, so much so that I could hardly see the water. As I headed a few miles down the coast I passed a couple of primitive looking campgrounds, which were only $3 for hikers/bikers. I thought if nothing else I could come back for those, but I wanted to make it to the town of Westport to fill up on water and put something warm in my belly as it was getting cold.

I pulled up to a small one pump gas station with a little store and notice three touring bicycles parked out front. As I walked up the stairs toward the store, I saw three tired faces sitting on the porch looking like they were either waiting for food or the energy to move again. I said hi, but was focused on finding some food and getting some water. After ordering a salmon/bagel sandwich, I walked back out to see how the other tourists were doing. The two girls, Rowan and Jess, had come down from Vancouver, BC and had met the guy, James, in Astoria and had been riding together for the past 10 days. They would be parting ways the following day as the girls were planning to head toward Napa, and James continued down the coast. I couldn't believe it, but here it was 7pm, dark and foggy, and they were planning to ride on about 13miles down the road to MacKerricher State Park. I kind of invited myself along, because I figured it would be safer riding with a group of people with lights than it would be riding alone. They seemed happy to have me and after I finished my sandwich and they finished their pizza, we were off.

Traffic was extremely slow that night, much to our liking, and as James and I led the pack we would stop occasionally so that everybody was riding together. We got to camp around 9pm and I think we were all beat. I had made it to where I wanted to that day, even after leaving past noon, thanks to the bicycle friends I had made at the market. None of us really talked much at camp that night. I headed straight for the warm shower after setting up my hammock cocoon, and by the time I retuned to camp everybody was in their tents and probably fast asleep. I headed straight for bed too, but looked forward to talking to the cyclists more in the morning.

Miles: 64

RRD: A cooler lid

-D
http://www.trackmytour.com/b5k7d