Monday, July 26, 2010
WFO-9
I left Wednesday for WFO-9 in Eureka. Justin rode with me on the 101 as far as Las Posas, and I kept going to CA-154 in Santa Barbara. Foxen Canyon was cool — as always — and I stopped at Pappy's for Tri-Tip and Enchilladas, with a scoop of vanilla ice cream for dessert.
Originally I planned to ride between the lakes from Paso, up the Jolon road to King City, then west on Carmel Valley Road and up PCH all the way into The City. I got a late start, and had already missed the cancellation time on my motel in Petaluma, so I adjust the route to only Jolon Road, then a quick blast up to Petaluma. The GPS routed me up I-280, and it seemed fast. It was really cold once I got onto surface streets. The Golden Gate Bridge was really cool in the dusk and fog.
I left Petaluma early Thursday, and broiled up the 101. I rashly decided to ride the Lost Coast, which was scenic and all, but the road surface made it a little too much of a chore. The short section right along the coast is a great ride, and almost made up for the 85 other miles of crappy conditions.
Fairlaner teased me about my Subway dinner, but I was tired and just wanted to chill in the room with my book.
Friday was an off day, and I walked around Old Town Eureka all morning. There are a couple of nice used book stores, and I found an Anne Perry that I'd been missing at the smaller of the two. When I got back to the hotel, my room still hadn't been made up, so I walked east and found a big new Target. I bought some granola bars for breakfast and on-bike snacking, some medical tape to help protect Dr. Voron's stitches on my right fore-arm, and the latest Jack Reacher novel, 61 Hours - my only one of the series in hardback.
Friday's dinner highlight was a talk by the Forum's James Burleigh - which worked out great.
On Saturday, my buddy Doug and I rode over to the Samoa Cookhouse for the Vintage Riders Breakfast. Afterwards we decided to ride a big loop of famous roads - CA-299 to Weaverville, then south on CA-3, then west again on CA-36 back to Eureka — about 245 miles total. The ride was really fun. We stopped for lunch at the Burger Barn on CA-36.
Saturday's dinner included a preview of Hard Miles II, a video about the 2009 Iron Butt Rally, with an introduction by Dean Tanji himself. I sat with Terry/Tel at dinner, and we talked a lot about rallying, riding, and English football — very cool stuff.
I had to get back to work on Monday, so Sunday meant the long ride home. Doug joined me, and we drove quickly down to the Bay Area to meet up with Justin, who had ridden up to see his friends in the south Bay. Justin and I made quick plans to meet at a logical landmark, which turned out to be the Motel 6 in Fremont. (It was something we could both find easily on our GPS's...)
We met Justin in the motel parking lot. Doug graciously bought all of us lunch at a surprisingly good Mexican restaurant next door, and we gassed up and hit the road. Justin had come up I-5 on Saturday, and said the heat was close to unbearable, so we decided to stay close to the coast, at the cost of some extra miles.
Terry had told me on Saturday that he was going to take CA-25, as a fun compromise between the heat of I-5 and the traffic of US-101, due to the MotoGP race at Laguna Seca and the Garlic Festival in Gilroy. At lunch the three of us decided to use his advice, and we found some great riding from Hollister down to King City.
From there, we took US-101 to CA-154. An accident at the south end of the 154 stopped us for 5-10 minutes, but we made it to the gas station at State and La Cumbre unscathed. Doug was going to peel off down the 405 to head home to El Segundo, so we said our goodbyes in Santa Barbara, and hit the road. Traffic was bad, and we lane-shared into Carpinteria before it broke up.
Doug headed south at the 405, and Justin and I slogged the rest of the way home, tired but happy.
Posted by bnc at July 26, 2010 9:58 AM