This day was clearly my last and there was no way to avoid it. I was thirty-ish miles from home in territory I knew well by car.

I was not thrilled by the scenery. Usually I am when I am coming for the weekend from home but after what I’d been through, Marin paled greatly by comparison. Still I did take this shot between Spirit Rock Meditation Center and Fairfax

Sir Frances Drake is maybe the worst ever road to ride and people have created well marked bike routes along parallel roads but each time I do this, I get lost. I wish mapquest had a bike option. Even when you choose the pedestrian option, they’ve got you walking in the highways.

Rather than look at maps or go to any of the dozen (no kidding) bike shops catering to rich guys in tight colorful clothes, I asked people for directions.
I asked this one lady riding on the road with a dog in her basket, if I was going the right way to Sausalito and she said I was going the right way but I was on the wrong road.
As I am at the intersection to turn to what I figure might be the right road I get a yell “Hey! hello” from a guy at the camp last night. He’s continuing straight on the road I am turning from. What was I doing listening to a lady with a dog in a basket anyhow?
Even though at this point I can tell its the wrong road I continue because its going to the Larkspur Ferry.

This is what is on the side of the road here. House after house on the water, most with boats parked in front.

It was a wonderful mistake. The ferry was elegant $9.00 and I missed the big hill up and down into Sausalito and the huge climb out of Sausalito to the bridge and I missed the bridge and the ride from there to Embarcadero. This is all lovely mind you but I have done it before and did not feel the need to do it again whereas I’d never done the Larkspur ferry before!

There was another woman with a bike. I got up next to her and we started chatting. Her name was Sally! It always makes me happy to meet a Sally as that was my sister’s name. This Sally had lead bike tours in Europe and we had a lot in common and enjoyed our half hour ride together on the ferry. She was very cool and felt like a soul sister and I will try to see her again. Even though she was late to work, she watched my bike for me when I went to the restroom which took a long time as there was a huge line.

From there I went to BART and had to keep riding up Market Street until 5th before I could find an elevator that worked. The trains were not crowded and the commute was easy. Even the big hill up to my house with all my gear was easy.

As soon as I was home, my teenage kids and I were out and about. The whole world I live in here seemed shocking. It felt like all of it was just EXTRA, meaning it is stuff you really didn’t need or need to be concerned with. Extra feels like it covers up and distracts from what’s essential and everyone is running around in it being very hurried in a way too over stimulating environment.

I’ll try to keep the trees in sight. They will remind me. Until I get swallowed up by all this again. Until I can leave again.

I was thinking when I started out that today would be my last day but the first thing I did was get a flat. I fixed that with one of my gypsy friends but then my gears started to slip and be funky so I knew I couldn’t push the seventy five miles to home in just one day.

I was glad for a few reasons. The first one was that I didn’t want the trip to end and the second was that I didn’t want to be on BART with my fully loaded bike at rush hour. I knew there was a bike repair guy at Pr. Reyes Station so I wasn’t worried.

I passed by one of the Clover Farms. This is why I always choose Clover over Horizon. Go local. Yea.

This last part of the ride from Bodega to Pt Reyes is as magical as the rest of it. Still there is not much action on the coast; just a town now and then with ten miles between. Often the grocery store is the restaurant and the baked goods at the counter are always made by the mother of the cashier or the lady down the street or the cashier herself and they are good good in that homemade way.

In these towns I’d get to talking with other folk as well. Motorcyclists on the whole are friendly to bicyclists being an offshoot of a similar breed.

Near Tomales I saw my first church with a Mary, Mother of God, image. That’s her in the tiny window. I asked her to take good care of my friend and teacher who has just passed.

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Many bikers have ally animals on their bikes. Remember the Brazilians with their “alien”? River had them on both his front and back fenders and Alaskan Greg had a penguin named Henry. The fellow riding with the Canadian had Alvin with him.

I was open to having an animal but one never presented itself.
On my way again

It was starting to feel more like home. Pt Reyes Station seemed way to big city like. Not in it’s size but in its mentality and it’s chic expensiveness.

The scenery started to have other things in it.

When I got to the hiker biker park, the Scottish couple i was happy to see again and everyone else was new to me. There was a lively young German guy who was doing 110 miles a day and had cycled the Tour-de-France route and such.

I went to my tent under the Redwoods for the last time this trip. I got to sleep with the Redwoods five nights I think.

It is 38 miles to Jenner and I Am told there is nothing in between. I find it hard to believe that I will have to spend five hours awake before I have coffee and I am right.

I’ve gone about ten miles and am passing this resort which goes on for miles called “Sea Ranch”. These are individual houses which one can rent. After a while I say to myself out loud “Where are all these sea ranch people getting their expresso? Are they all bringing their own machines?”
Then I see the lodge which is the first Sea Ranch sign that says “open to the public”; all the rest are very clearly and largely “Private Property No Trespassing”.
Outside the lodge is a couple in their early sixties with a large overly groomed poodle. We start talking and they are from Berkeley. The woman is in a writing class with River’s father but this is the first time she’s heard about this “River business”. Then I think about some of the people I’ve met in the camps and realize he’s not the only one who changed his name, including me. Id expect a writer might be more open to that sort of thing. Then again, I think they flew a plane in from Berkeley (a three hour drive) so who knows what they think. Mostly I thought it interesting to yet again have another connection to River.

As soon as I enter the place it’s very heavy money. I ask the small Mexican waitress if I can get a coffee to go. She gives me one for a dollar and I give her a dollar tip. It is killer strong coffee. Like four times as strong as anything local. I can feel the bay area getting closer.

Next this country store in itself was like an antique. Built in 1868. It was beautiful and also had good coffee.

After that it was more beautiful miles in magical mystical landscapes.

All over the California roads there is construction for one reason or another. There are men and women at either end who have STOP and SLOW signs and walkie-takies. They communicate with each other saying “ok I got four cars going through, the last one being a silver Acura. Over” and such.
I come across this Rastafarian guy that I saw in Garberville a couple of days ago with the sign and the walkie-talkie. We chat for a while. He used to live in Oakland but divorce sent him on his way. We got to waxing very philosophical and as he was lamenting his lack of success with women a hummingbird came out of nowhere and hovered over his head and then went back to nowhere. It was bizarre. What even was a hummingbird doing in terrain like that? I told him I didn’t think he had anything to worry about and we parted ways after charting for quite a while.
Then i see this

As I stop to photo and examine this situation in the middle of the road that the Rasta and the Mexican (at the other end) are controlling, this guy starts quickly walking towards me and he doesn’t look happy.
I want to counteract his aggression and my first thought is to say something like “Hey, we both have on the same colors!” ( hi-visibility day glow yellow and orange) but I say instead “Hi ! Are you the guy at the other end if the walkie talkie?” knowing full well he isn’t as he’s this self satisfied white guy who looks in his early thirties and overly educated. He explains proudly that he is the biologist on the job and tries to convince me that the fiber optic wire being laid the this giant grout line on the road (only useable by Verizon) is ecologically beneficial. I get political on him and talk about the good old days when there was just one phone company connected with the government and greed had yet to run so rampant in the field of communication.
He understands me and yet he is proud of what he does and I understand that and can see that it is sort of cool.

Although that tile saw and grout line were big, they were nothing compared to this next thing I saw by the side of the road. I have no idea what it was once used for.

On I go with no shoulder. The road construction is never about a shoulder.

Parts of the road are so misty that you can not see over the cliff. You can hear the ocean but you can’t see it. All you can see is spaceless nothing like a chasm of void.

Today I climbed an easy hill. By easy, I mean that the grade was gradual but it did go up and up and eventually I was in the clouds!

This of course was followed inevitably by a downhill. One of the many terrific things about Hwy One is being able to see the road far ahead of me.

That does not mean however that you will know what you might encounter on this road. There are always surprises.

On the circular sandbar are sea lions basking and playing. It is very refreshing to watch animals play.

Here is marvelous evidence of humans at play. 1962 British Jag XKE

When I asked this guy if I could photo his car he said, “Definitely! That’s why I have it: so people can see and enjoy it!” I liked that.

More beauty until I arrived at Bodega Bay.

Those colors really were that vibrant in real life. And these.

There is hardly any new building on Hwy One except this one very exceptional house.

Seemed like the entire roof was solar panels. Now there’s a way to spend your money!
I make it to Bodega Bay and find there a spattering of folk I have met from other camps. Here are some.

Sorry that’s so misty. See if you can see the banjo in the front pannier of David’s bike. We meet up first in the pizza campground. I like him even before i knew about the banjo when he brought his camping stove over to the table. Someone said something about cooking and he said, “oh, to call what i do cooking would be a gross exaggeration”. He was super laid back and didn’t have a cell phone and it’s always a plus to have a banjo player at the hiker biker site. We are really like a gypsy camp. Most bikers are solo artists and we all come together around the dinner table comparing our trips and telling stories. People are all ages and from all parts of the world. The folks on the tandem are from Scotland and in their sixties. I met up with them three consecutive nights. I also met an older couple and a younger couple from the Netherlands. Banjo man said she talked about me on her blog but I can’t remember the name of her blog.
Here’s a cool Canadian guy who rode from Vermont to the west coast, up through Canada and was now going to end in San Francisco.

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I met up with Derek again at Bodega. He got his bike fixed but was going to end in SF instead of LA as he'd had enough.
Here's a better shot I hope of Daniels banjo.

After dinner and showers I go into my tent and read. It’s a wonderful end to a wonderful day.

It’s been five days since I’ve had electricity with Internet so I’ll remember what I can.
It

Basically, it’s beauty everywhere. Often I will stop to take a photo on one side of the road and realize that the view on the other side of the road is just as beautiful. I am no longer shooting as I ride. It is not possible as the roads are often bad and there is no shoulder

What made being able to shoot that last photo miraculous was that what’s represented in the image completed a full circle for me. Blue was the only color missing from the supportive cast of wildflowers growing freely by the side of the road. I had seen every shade of pink, red, yellow, orange, purple and now finally blue.
I didn’t photo them much as they were everywhere and to document it seemed overwhelming. It was not their image that was important (albeit it is always perfect and amazing as flowers are when examined) but their presence that had its effect on me.
They were there where they had no reason to be. They were like the artist and the art that doesn’t need to be seen and the art.

The other roadside gift are the abundance of blackberry bushes. If you had to, you could survive on them.

Also there are squeally pigs on the side of the road. Sorry this is so misty.

Getting to Guala was just riding through beauty without much happening.

When you start out at twelve, it’s just riding riding riding to make the sixty or sixty five in time for camp with light long enough.

Twenty fives out of Ft Bragg was the hardest climb I’ve ever had. It is the steepest slope in all of California. It was six quick switchbacks and I started walking by the third and near the top my cleats were slipping on the pavement as I tried to pull the weight of my bike with packs.
In the middle of hills that are hard I’ve started to take breaks. I sit down and eat something or I just look around me while watching my breath. They can be very special moments. Already what I am doing is stepping outside and this is stepping outside of stepping outside.
Also electricity is getting very sparse so I have my phone turned off and only turn it on for photos. It takes one and a half breaths for the thing to be ready to take a photo. Seems like an eternity.

About twenty miles out from camp there was Manchester with its one store
That had everything including these

Four different ones but I’ll spare you. This time over the hardware aisle. I met two young bikers at this store. They were going San francisco to Portland.

Thats going the direction Against the wind. I’ll just say in an oversimplified way, that the wind can mean everything. If its with you, uphill is easy. If its not with you, even downhill can be hard. Sometimes you can not tell on a slight grade whether it is uphill or downhill. I know that sounds weird but it’s true. You’d think you’d be able to tell visually but you can’t. Your eyes can see it either way. If you are next to a river, you can tell by that but usually there’s no river in view.

Finally I make it to Guala but it’s after seven and because this is a Sonoma County park, it sucks (a lot of them have closed even, like no funding in Sonoma for parks go figure) and the camp host is unavailable. The map tells me nothing and I bike around and can’t find the hike and bike Site but I do find a woman with a tiny tent and a bike so I join her. After I’m set up she comes out of her tent and tells that where we are is not the bike site and isn’t very friendly but not overtly unfriendly either and then she goes back in her tent. I just go to sleep with my book and she is gone in the morning by the time I get up and see lots of raccoon tracks all over my towel.