Category: Pacific Coast

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Disbanding the Group

Just a quick note to say that i’m camping outside of San Francisco and did a dry run through the city today with Jay to make sure tommorow we can get through the city easily. So this basically means today is a rest day for me.

Today marks the end of the group that I had been travelling with. Alistair is staying with friends of his in San Francisco, Tanya left this morning to catch a grayhound back to Vancouver and should be back in Germany in a few days, and Wolfgang left to visit friends of his in Petulma which leaves Jay and I to make it to Half Moon Bay tomorrow. After that i’ll be by myself again until I meet the next group of people. It was a lot of fun camping with these folks and if they read this remember to keep the rubber side down.

Today also marks the first time i’ve eaten it off the bike this trip. Due to riding without bags my bike handles completely differently so flying down a hill a corner came up too fast and I braked enough to control the hit but still scratched up a bit. Fortunately the bike was just fine.

Some numbers for you. My odometer ticked past 1,000 the other day. It should be higher but it wasn’t working for the first few days and it also has some miles that I added in Seattle and St. Paul. My high speed for the trip is now 46.56 miles per hour. My average speed for yesterday was 13.03 miles per hour. My goal for average had been 12 miles per hour but I clearly surpassed that.

Last night was extremely cold and I decided it was finally time to get my first pair of long underwear, I hope it makes a difference.

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Getting Pushed Uphill

I realized today that I’ve been mostly writing about the bad things that happen to me so I thought I’d write in a more positive light today.

Today finds me in a little town called Point Arena and heading for Salt Point State Park. It’s an absolutely beautiful day with a mean tail wind that can literally push me up some of the hills. Which is a very nice change since I’m usually the one complaining about head winds. I don’t think I’ve seen a cloud in the sky all day and it’s really nice to bike along the coast. It’s not the coast as it was in Oregon where the ocean just churned and was bleak. Instead here it’s blue and fades into the horizon like it does in Hawaii.

We camped in Van Damme State Park last night (unfortunately no relation to Jean-Claude) and made smores, I felt it was my duty as an American to educate the foreigners to the wonder of them. In hopes that through smores we can achieve world peace.

I’ve tried to upload some pictures but don’t have the time to comment on all of them, and resizing them takes a lot of time. I’ll try and add more later so they will probably end up out of order.

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The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

This post was supposed to be titled Sleeping in the Forest of Endor but after yesterdays events it had to be changed.

The day started extremely well, camping in the Avenue of the Giants has got to be a highlight of the trip. I knew before going to sleep that I had broken a few spokes and that I would have to make it to a repair shop to try and get it sorted out. Instead when I woke up that morning Alistair and I went to the Founders Grove which was really something to see and worth the backtracking. After that we went in search of the Tallest Tree (in the world?) which meant more backtracking for us and getting my shoes, which were blissfully dry, soaking wet (as we had to cross a stream.) In all we biked 20 miles that morning only to arrive where we started. That was the good.

I then start off in search of the bicycle shop in Garberville (I had heard that it wasn’t the greatest bike shop, but at that moment anything would do) As i’m flying along on some of the larger hills I actually hear a PING as another spoke breaks and I learn to control my downhills. I make it there at 3 oclock or shortly thereafter and the guy agrees to look at it. Come to find out that there were 6 broken spokes out of 38 and he can only fix 5 of them because my wheel is too large. That was the Bad.

I got out of the bike shop shortly after 5 oclock and camp is another 25 miles away and mostly uphill which puts me in camp around 7:30, far after the sun has set. I started peddling for all I was worth only to hear more spokes breaking, which by now is utterly demoralizing (this is all happening in that cursed rear wheel again.) The sun sets behind the mountains I have to climb and things start getting dark and i’m afraid to ride my bicycle because I think the wheel will just cave in on itself with all these spokes breaking. Word of caution to the wise, it’s not prudent to walk along the 101 in the middle of the dark, you tend to get angry truckers honking their horn at you. That was the ugly.

The conclusion to the story ends a bit better. I started thumbing it with no luck when the sun set for quite a long time but kept on hiking the bike and keeping the thumb out just in case. Someone finally stopped and got me to the campsite which was 4 miles away, but felt like an eternity. As i’m reloading my bike to get the 100 ft to camp, Alistair and Tanya (both of who i’ve been camping with the last several days) are walking up to the bar where i’d gotten dropped off, it was great to hear them and quite the coincidence. We went back to the camp where I show off how easy and fast it is to set up the camping hammock (even in the dark!) We headed back to the bar and had some, read lots, of beer and burgers. Listened to some live music, and generally had a good time. It was a great way to end a bad day.

The postscript to the story goes I am now in Fort Bragg, California where i’ve just gotten another new rear wheel, I guess at this point I really should just hope it gets me to San Francisco but I can hope it lasts longer than that. I hitched a ride into town this morning because there was no way I could do the hill on that wheel. Such is the way the story goes.

I also wanted to post another cyclist that is doing a Pacific Coast tour. Fernando camped with us for about 5 days but left us at Harris Beach State Park when we took a break.

We’re all camping at Van Damme State Park tonight, and i’m making smores for the brit and the germans in camp with us to give them a taste of America

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Third Tires a Charm

I broke another wheel the other day, well almost broke. The guy at the repair shop was surprised I peddled the thing for the last 100 miles, he thought I had the legs of an amazon because you couldn’t even turn the wheel with your hands. I had been wondering why my downhills were getting harder and harder. It seems that the last mechanic that worked on my rear wheel didn’t tighten things enough and the drive mechanism in the rear wheel basically ate itself. So I once again find myself on a french hub with 3 less gears which leaves me with 15 gears instead of 18. I just hope this is the last wheel I have to buy, it’s getting to be and old gag at this point.

I decided yesterday after arriving into Harris Beach State Park to take the day off today which is exactly what I did. I think I’m only about 7 miles from the border to California which means tomorrow I’ll officially have finished Oregon. On the downside it poured on us today and a lot of my campmates woke up literally in puddles which makes for a dreary way to start the day. The hammock held up well again though a little wet. Tomorrows forecast is 100% chance of rain, I didn’t think they gave 100% ratings so I guess tomorrow will be cold and wet. On the upside I managed to get laundry done today so everything is clean and warm (except me, I’m still cold.)

I’m not sure where I’ll end up tomorrow, as California camping is a little more spaced out than it is here but I’m very close to the Avenue of the Giants which i’m really looking forward to.

I’ll try and upload pictures when I get to a computer terminal that allows me to access my camera.

Oregon has really been a neat place to tour, it’s not that hard on bicycle and the vistas that you encounter are something spectacular most of the time. The say that they save the best for last is no different here, the last day in Oregon was spectacular, lots of lookout points and nice coast, but I must admit towards the end of the day I just wanted to be done with the hills and in camp.

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Beware the Animals

I went to sleep last night listing to the bark of sea lions and woke up to raccoons having eaten just about all my food. The tally of things they got to

  • 3 bagels
  • 2 packages of trail mix
  • 3 power bars
  • what little bit of ham I had left
  • roll of ritz crackers

They were quite noisy while eating all my food but I wasn’t sure what was going on and just wanted to sleep. The other thing I had to ask my camp mates is if anyone had touched my arm the night before, because I swear something grabbed my hand. We all had a good laugh and cursed the raccoons in the morning. Fortunately they didn’t find my oatmeal so I still had some breakfast to eat.

From now on the food goes in the hammock with me.

Damn Raccoons.

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Moving Faster

I find myself today in North Bend, Oregon once again at a library computer terminal. The plan for today is to make it either to Sunset Beach State Park (which is only 10 miles away so it would be a short day of riding) or to Bullards Beach State Park in Bandon. I think the deciding factor will be how nice Sunset Beach park is.

The last few days have kinda slid by and things are ceartainly moving a bit quicker for me. I tend to get started around 10 now and ride until 5 or 6 at night which makes for some longer days. The hills are not as difficult as before and my average speed is getting better as time goes on. The weather is also playing in my favor for the time being so i’m trying to make as much out of it as possible.

I’ve managed to camp with the same set of people the last several nights. Alastair is a fellow from the UK who started up in Vancouver and is going all the way to the Mexico border. I met up with him on the barge from Washington to Oregon. The other guy is Fernando from Spain. We usually set up camp and share food around a table and talk about the days ride and where the plan for the following day will be.

On the topic of camping, i’ve been doing a lot of it in Oregon for several reasons. It’s cheap for hiker/bikers to camp for only $4 it’s a hard deal to pass up. The other reason is theres so many places to camp it would be foolish not to and the hammock has once again been holding up handsomely. And on sage like advice i’ve refrained from hanging it on trees that also have vines.

I’ll probably be in California in 2 or 3 days, the easy hills of Oregon will soon come to an end.

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Riding Wet

Just a quick note that I’m in Tillamook at the library. I’m super paranoid that my bike will get stolen as it’s outside. Spent the day yesterday riding in the rain so I decided when I got to Manzantia to get a room and warm me up and dry off my clothes. I really liked Manzantia, it’s a quiet little hollow right on the beach of Oregon. Took a walk on the beach this morning with my shoes off, I must have been the only person without shoes on but I did put my feet in the Pacific just to say I did, quite cold. I can’t believe people surf ocean on this side, I just want to tell them to go to Hawai’i and try it there.

On another note I’ve just about given up on pronouncing Hawai’i and just moving to Hawaii, nobody understands me when they ask me where i’m from. The progression usually goes “Hawai’i, the 50th State, an island chain in the middle of the Pacific Ocean” If they still don’t get it at that time I tend to give up.

I’m off to Cape Lookout state park tonight for some camping, I hope it stays dry. Biking is getting a lot easier after getting rid of weight and being vigilant on tire pressure.

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False Start

I really did write this up on Sunday but it seems that I forgot to hit the Publish button so I’ll just amend to it what i’d already written. I’m currently in Astoria, Oregon. I left on Monday morning and made it here last night in a nice rainshower. I ran into a fellow traveler like me and it was nice to swap stories and compare bicycles and the like. He’s the first I’ve run into the entire trip.

I got on the 10:00am ferry to Bremerton. Steam puffing out of my mouth, a thin layer of water covering the ground and a steady stream of drizzle falling on the ground. An ominous sign after 10 beautiful days in Seattle. The course is set and I can only go forward at this point. It started getting colder a few days ago, a sure sign that it’s time to move on to warmer climates. I’m pretty nervous and excited to get going on this trip, I hope to make it as far as Centralia today and that’s quite the ambitious goal.

Today is also the first i’ve ridden with the bike fully loaded and it’s damn heavy, i’ll have to reconsider a lot of the things I’m carrying. I should have got fenders too, my shoes are already soaked. And the first thing on the list of things I’ve forgotten is a lighter, which means I can’t start my stove.

Once I got through Bremerton the trouble started. I literally broke a wheel, which isn’t to mean that I got a flat tire or broke a spoke. Instead I broke the drive mechanism in the rear wheel. I had a suspicion that it wasn’t up to snuff but it had held together the last 250 miles of riding I did the week previous so I figured that it should be okay. So I hobbled the bike back to Bremerton and found a bike shop where the mechanic told me he never saw a drive mechanism so old, he wanted to save it to show to a co-worker. So I decided it was best just to throw on a new wheel with a new gearset. By the time this was all done it was 3p and I knew I didn’t have a chance to make it to Centralia so I tucked my tail and headed back to Seattle to lick my wounds and try again.

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The Plan

I’ll be leaving Seattle tomorrow for what I expect to be a 20 day ride (that’s assuming I take a few break days.) Plan a has me going all the way to Los Angeles while plan b has me going to Fresno, if Fatty and Janice go to the Fresno – UH game on the 4th I might be able to meet up with them and catch a ride back to LA. I’m guessing I can do about 80 – 100 miles a day hopefully, but we’ll have to see how I do with a fully loaded bike, up until today I’ve just been riding 60 miles with the rear panniers attached with stuff to weight it down a bit. As for accommodations along the way I’ll just be roughing it, which means I most likely won’t be able to update this until I hit LA.

I’ll spend today paring down the rest of my belongings down to the bare essentials which means the laptop finally has to go. I think if I brought it i’d regret the extra weight somewhere in the trip and toss it in favor of a lighter bike. I got my front panniers yesterday so that’s basically the last piece of the puzzle in terms of the bike.

Seattle has been a lot of fun, the house I live in now reminds me a lot of the Frank St. house where we had 10 people living in it at it’s height. Before that it was good food and good beer with Matt and Angie who recently moved up here.

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The Plan

I’ll be leaving Seattle tomorrow for what I expect to be a 20 day ride (that’s assuming I take a few break days.) Plan a has me going all the way to Los Angeles while plan b has me going to Fresno, if Fatty and Janice go to the Fresno – UH game on the 4th I might be able to meet up with them and catch a ride back to LA. I’m guessing I can do about 80 – 100 miles a day hopefully, but we’ll have to see how I do with a fully loaded bike, up until today I’ve just been riding 60 miles with the rear panniers attached with stuff to weight it down a bit. As for accommodations along the way I’ll just be roughing it, which means I most likely won’t be able to update this until I hit LA.

I’ll spend today paring down the rest of my belongings down to the bare essentials which means the laptop finally has to go. I think if I brought it i’d regret the extra weight somewhere in the trip and toss it in favor of a lighter bike. I got my front panniers yesterday so that’s basically the last piece of the puzzle in terms of the bike.

Seattle has been a lot of fun, the house I live in now reminds me a lot of the Frank St. house where we had 10 people living in it at it’s height. Before that it was good food and good beer with Matt and Angie who recently moved up here.