DAY 9, Sunday 9/21
Harris Beach State Park To Patricks Point State Park
Harris Beach State Park To Patricks Point State Park
Ride Time: 6h40min
Max Speed: 36 mi/hr (58 Km/hr)
My knee band is nowhere to be found today, so I’ll just get around it through a 'breakfast of champions' (Motrin ‘overdose’) until later. Anyway, today is a big(ger) day as not only we’re riding another 86 miles but we’re also crossing the border… to California. Oh, yeah -no more gray days is my guess, but we’ll see; although today it’s nice and sunny here in Oregon. The route also includes 7,500ft of ascent with an altitude range from 6 to 1575ft, with two major climbs of 1,250ft and 1,575ft. I am looking forward to the respective descents…
Bloxom and I started riding around 8am until we lost each other at the local Safeway, where I luckily found another knee band. That thing helps a lot when riding through knee pain.
Around 8:50am I was crossing the State Border; it’s no big deal if you’re on a bike, but Linda, on her fully loaded Enterprise ‘Gear Truck’, had to go through all the fruit & produce she carried with the Border Inspector. But in the end she was able to clear all those ‘greens’ into California, even those kindly donated by Mr. Bloxom.
Max Speed: 36 mi/hr (58 Km/hr)
My knee band is nowhere to be found today, so I’ll just get around it through a 'breakfast of champions' (Motrin ‘overdose’) until later. Anyway, today is a big(ger) day as not only we’re riding another 86 miles but we’re also crossing the border… to California. Oh, yeah -no more gray days is my guess, but we’ll see; although today it’s nice and sunny here in Oregon. The route also includes 7,500ft of ascent with an altitude range from 6 to 1575ft, with two major climbs of 1,250ft and 1,575ft. I am looking forward to the respective descents…
Bloxom and I started riding around 8am until we lost each other at the local Safeway, where I luckily found another knee band. That thing helps a lot when riding through knee pain.
Around 8:50am I was crossing the State Border; it’s no big deal if you’re on a bike, but Linda, on her fully loaded Enterprise ‘Gear Truck’, had to go through all the fruit & produce she carried with the Border Inspector. But in the end she was able to clear all those ‘greens’ into California, even those kindly donated by Mr. Bloxom.
The first 30 miles, the road was pretty much flat so I picked up a good pace and made it to the first check point around 9:40am. I guess skipping the coffee shop power-down stage today will help keep time under control… but I’m getting a good kick out of a RedBull instead. Pretty much every rider is now at the water stop, hanging out, drinking coffee, eating cliff bars and nuts, refilling water… taking it easy. This is Alan’s check point today (around mile 20), and -once again- he’s not shy at sharing with us, in his own ways, how this Ride’s diet menu has affected his digestion, because he’s ‘just not used to eating so healthy’… good thing we’re in the outdoors…
After taking a short break while teaching a couple on-demand not-so-diplomatic Spanish phrases to Alan and Stephanie and after not finding either Bursley or Bloxom anywhere around, I hit the road for more solo-riding along the agricultural valleys of California; a very different landscape from what I had already gotten used to seeing in Oregon. This part of the route is not coastal as it goes around Lake Earl towards Crescent City, which is back on the coast. And there’s where I ran into Bloxom again, who had been racing to catch up with the group, after burning some time trying to fix his bike computer (that apparently hasn’t worked for years).
After taking a short break while teaching a couple on-demand not-so-diplomatic Spanish phrases to Alan and Stephanie and after not finding either Bursley or Bloxom anywhere around, I hit the road for more solo-riding along the agricultural valleys of California; a very different landscape from what I had already gotten used to seeing in Oregon. This part of the route is not coastal as it goes around Lake Earl towards Crescent City, which is back on the coast. And there’s where I ran into Bloxom again, who had been racing to catch up with the group, after burning some time trying to fix his bike computer (that apparently hasn’t worked for years).
So we rode the streets of Crescent City towards the first major climb of the day, up Redwoods Highway, for a winding 1,250ft ascent across Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park. This was a tricky part of the route: high traffic, no shoulder, and every ascending turn would bring up another ascent, and another one, fact that made it harder to visualize the summit from a distance, so the slopes seemed endless. The Redwoods are imposing and make you wonder why they would be so massive, as they seem completely beyond human scale.
The descent however was, once again, the big reward, going from 1,250ft to 10ft in about 5 miles. While the maximum allowed speed for motorized vehicles here is 30 mi/hr, your bike can easily reach 40 mi/hr and go faster than the freaking logging trucks, RV’s and cars as you fly downhill. I personally feel much safer ripping down the road that fast, being able to leaving vehicles behind, than having them pass me 10 inches away from my left shoulder every 5 seconds…
A few miles past check point #2 (established right at the base of the descent) came the ‘Trees of Mystery’, this (weird) venue with a gigantic “49’-2” tall Paul Bunyan and his 35’ tall friend, Babe the Ox” (from the Trees of Mystery website) at the front yard. I have to say, and pardon my ignorance, that I am not a real connoisseur as far as understanding the importance of such celebrities for the northern culture and those who are in a better position than I am in that regard will have to forgive me, but, ‘with all due respect’ I decided to ignore it and, instead, go for some fuel (Fish & Chips) across the road. Most everyone else stopped at the ‘museum’ so, in case you are still curious about it, here are some illustrative pics I borrowed from them…
Just as I was leaving the restaurant for more solo-riding, I ran into Steve Bursley, who had been missing in action for most of the day, so we rode along the remaining 50 miles we had ahead of us before getting to Patrick’s Point State Park, in Trinidad. But this ride would not happen without a couple ‘encounters’, because, as usual, we would find some peculiar event and/or some character that would spice up the day for us.
Bursley needed some fuel, so we stopped at Klamath Indian Reservation’s convenience store, which was when we realized we were in Humboldt. Along the ride we have been open to any episode happen, but for some reason this spot was more like the Bermuda Triangle of weirdo’s. In alphabetical order, and in 10 minutes, we ran into:
*Mr. Baseball Helmet over a Baseball Cap, was this loony that approached us, who was riding his MTB from Tijuana to Portland… when we asked him for how long he’d been riding, it took him a whole minute to tell us he had no clue!
*Mr. Is that a Carbon Frame?, he actually surprised us with the knowledgeable comment about Bursley’s Trek Madone , (unlocked and leaning against the wall) and maybe we were profiling this dude, but he did seem like he wanted a ‘free ride’…
*Mr. Bragging around his friends waving a massive branch of Cannabis Sativa, in the middle of the street is self explanatory so it doesn’t need further comments…
Given the local ‘wavelength’ and because I had lost my sunglasses and needed new ones, I decided to get these ‘really-kewl-Poncherello-style’ shades from the store and rode along with them on for the rest of the day. Although I did look like a freaking bike-cop with them on, they were much appreciated when ripping down the slopes later on.
The final 20 miles were a drag. Not only we had a head wind, the pavement felt real sticky and at times it was hard to tell if we were going up or downhill, but every time we thought we had gone over the last hill, we would get another one. There were six of them, each averaging 300ft ascents; until we reached the final one, right at the State Park’s entrance, which was, of course, at the top of the hill.
Upon our arrival, part of the Village was already set up inside the roundabout, as this time our campsite is located in a Cool-de-sac; so I set up my tent ‘in the hood’ and put my gear away. At that point, Zeta and Camila showed up at the campsite and stayed over for dinner with our group. Zeta has been living in Arcata for about a year, after spending over 5 in Maui, where he used to be a surfing instructor and Matias, his twin brother, worked in a hotel there also. We go way back, to the age of four, when all three of us (and other chums that I keep seeing and are all over the world now) started attending Craighouse School (a British school in Santiago) and became buddies up until now. Matias is currently living in San Francisco, so we’ll be hanging out there Saturday night, after finishing up the 1,000-mile Big Ride.
The descent however was, once again, the big reward, going from 1,250ft to 10ft in about 5 miles. While the maximum allowed speed for motorized vehicles here is 30 mi/hr, your bike can easily reach 40 mi/hr and go faster than the freaking logging trucks, RV’s and cars as you fly downhill. I personally feel much safer ripping down the road that fast, being able to leaving vehicles behind, than having them pass me 10 inches away from my left shoulder every 5 seconds…
A few miles past check point #2 (established right at the base of the descent) came the ‘Trees of Mystery’, this (weird) venue with a gigantic “49’-2” tall Paul Bunyan and his 35’ tall friend, Babe the Ox” (from the Trees of Mystery website) at the front yard. I have to say, and pardon my ignorance, that I am not a real connoisseur as far as understanding the importance of such celebrities for the northern culture and those who are in a better position than I am in that regard will have to forgive me, but, ‘with all due respect’ I decided to ignore it and, instead, go for some fuel (Fish & Chips) across the road. Most everyone else stopped at the ‘museum’ so, in case you are still curious about it, here are some illustrative pics I borrowed from them…
Just as I was leaving the restaurant for more solo-riding, I ran into Steve Bursley, who had been missing in action for most of the day, so we rode along the remaining 50 miles we had ahead of us before getting to Patrick’s Point State Park, in Trinidad. But this ride would not happen without a couple ‘encounters’, because, as usual, we would find some peculiar event and/or some character that would spice up the day for us.
Bursley needed some fuel, so we stopped at Klamath Indian Reservation’s convenience store, which was when we realized we were in Humboldt. Along the ride we have been open to any episode happen, but for some reason this spot was more like the Bermuda Triangle of weirdo’s. In alphabetical order, and in 10 minutes, we ran into:
*Mr. Baseball Helmet over a Baseball Cap, was this loony that approached us, who was riding his MTB from Tijuana to Portland… when we asked him for how long he’d been riding, it took him a whole minute to tell us he had no clue!
*Mr. Is that a Carbon Frame?, he actually surprised us with the knowledgeable comment about Bursley’s Trek Madone , (unlocked and leaning against the wall) and maybe we were profiling this dude, but he did seem like he wanted a ‘free ride’…
*Mr. Bragging around his friends waving a massive branch of Cannabis Sativa, in the middle of the street is self explanatory so it doesn’t need further comments…
Given the local ‘wavelength’ and because I had lost my sunglasses and needed new ones, I decided to get these ‘really-kewl-Poncherello-style’ shades from the store and rode along with them on for the rest of the day. Although I did look like a freaking bike-cop with them on, they were much appreciated when ripping down the slopes later on.
The final 20 miles were a drag. Not only we had a head wind, the pavement felt real sticky and at times it was hard to tell if we were going up or downhill, but every time we thought we had gone over the last hill, we would get another one. There were six of them, each averaging 300ft ascents; until we reached the final one, right at the State Park’s entrance, which was, of course, at the top of the hill.
Upon our arrival, part of the Village was already set up inside the roundabout, as this time our campsite is located in a Cool-de-sac; so I set up my tent ‘in the hood’ and put my gear away. At that point, Zeta and Camila showed up at the campsite and stayed over for dinner with our group. Zeta has been living in Arcata for about a year, after spending over 5 in Maui, where he used to be a surfing instructor and Matias, his twin brother, worked in a hotel there also. We go way back, to the age of four, when all three of us (and other chums that I keep seeing and are all over the world now) started attending Craighouse School (a British school in Santiago) and became buddies up until now. Matias is currently living in San Francisco, so we’ll be hanging out there Saturday night, after finishing up the 1,000-mile Big Ride.
Some of the riders were really tired that night and went straight to their tents after dinner, early, around 8pm. A few of us stayed up later (as usual, I guess) having beers and wine and hanging out around the fire, listening tunes from my windup radio until we ran out of logs for the fire (including the pallet we broke apart and burned) at which point most everyone went to bed. Zeta, Bill and I, however, moved further away from the campsite so people could get some sleep, took care of the last available beers, honored the Humboldt culture and debated about South American Politics in the 1970’s and our group’s next ride in Patagonia, until midnight.
