Stank

So I woke up in Toledo, OR hoping that my clothes, gloves and boots would be dry. They weren't. I picked the driest things I had to wear and got back on the road. There are few things worse, I've found, then putting on wet gloves. The fog and rain were still there so my driest clothes didn't stay dry for more than about 15 minutes. At least it wasn't quite as cold as yesterday. Eventually the fog did clear (about 3 hours after I had hoped it would). Fortunately when the fog burned off, it left some pretty amazing views and even a bit of sun that started drying my clothes.









As the evening approached, I passed the border into California and shortly after that came on the Redwood's National Park. Very cool place. I did get to see the tree that you could drive through. In reality, you could only drive through it if you had a really small car. I'm not really sure this picture was worth the $5 it cost me to get in but that's life I guess.



I did't take any pictures on the road, mostly because I was concentrating on the winding road, maintaining a good speed and not getting run down by one of the many RV's going through the tiny road that clearly wasn't meant for RV's. I stopped for the night in Eureka, CA, had a quick dinner and hung up my clothes to dry some more (the one's that were in my bag were still wet, gross). I was exhausted but at least my gloves were dry again.

The next morning I found out that my boots were still not dry and my backpack was still damp. Things were starting to smell musty. Gross. At least the weather was nice. On a side note, I paid extra to get riding boots that are waterproof, thinking that they would be good if I ever had to ride in the rain. What I've since discovered is that the boots do keep the water out but only until my pants legs get soaked through. At that point, the water just drips down into the boot from the top and since the boots are waterproof, there is nowhere for the water to go. It just puddles in the bottom. So once again, I put on wet boots and started heading south.

I got to go through the Humbold Redwoods State Park this time. More redwoods and another small winding road. Still very cool but pretty much like the one yesterday. After the park, I got off 101 and onto highway 1. 101 had veered away from the coast a bit but now 1 took me right back too it. More scenic views and more winding roads. Actually the roads were really getting hard to ride on. They would follow the coast and then come to some gorge or valley and then have to wind down to the bottom, cross some little bridge down there and wind back up. Winding roads are fun on a motorcycle but require a lot of concentration. It gets tiring after a while. Also, it was taking a lot of time. I noticed I wasn't making very good progress at all. My plan was to make it into San Francisco for the night and hang out with my cousin Albee. Just as I was saying that I needed to hurry up, I ran into more fog. Here it is just rolling in.



And a couple shots when it cleared enough for me to find a place to pull over.








This was just fog, no rain with it so at least I wasn't getting wet but the road was just as bad as before and it was getting dark too in addition to the fog. I was getting more and more tired as I went along. I was also running out of gas and the only gas station I could find was closed. They had the credit card things on the pumps, but none of the pumps were turned on. How messed up is that. I pushed on hoping that I wouldn't run out of gas. At one point I got stuck behind a van that was going about 20 MPH most of the way (I wouldn't have been going much faster myself). The guy driving clearly wasn't very good at it. He kept braking really hard during the first half of each curve and then accelerating through the second half. That might be fun in a sports car but he was in a fully loaded mini van. I'm pretty sure if I had been in the van, I'd have gotten sick very quickly.

I was able to make it to the outskirts of San Francisco and to a gas station. I filled up and crossed the Golden Gate Bridge. It was well after dark at this point and the fog was still there so I didn't really see too much. Fortunately, Albee's apartment wasn't far from there. I found parking and met Albee. We went out to dinner at a little cafe where I had a kobe beef french dip sandwich. Quite good. I also found out that Albee commutes 2 hours each way to work and hadn't gotten home until shortly before I arrived. How crazy is that? Back at her apartment, she gave me her "guest box", a little box filled with hotel size soap, shampoo, lotion, a sleep mask etc. Albee claims she's really not that neurotic but when I told her I'd taken a picture of the box she said "Oh, I really which you had let me arrange everything in there first. It's all messy." I love it.



I crashed on the couch and when I got up Albee was already gone (2 hour commute remember). After my shower I realized that my still wet boots and bag had stunk up the apartment. I lit one of her scented candles but I'm not sure it made a dent in the stank. Hopefully it all clears out before Albee gets back from work. If not I'll feel kind of bad. I got back on the road and headed south to LA to see Shaun (my brother) and Maria (my cousin).






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Location:Northern California Coast