A trio of ducks made their way over to my tent this morning, waking me by surprise. I got to work packing up camp and realized how fearless these ducks were. There were two males and one female. They let me get so close that I was able to pet the female. I don’t think the males liked that.
I pulled out of Mary’s place around 9 am. Today I would finally see the Redwoods.
I made my way down the 101 and eventually took the exit for redwood state and national parks. As the road winded along, the trees got bigger and bigger until eventually I was surrounded by trunks far wider than the length of my bike. I pulled off the road and wandered around the trails near “Big Tree.” Fitting name.
This is one of those things you just have to see for yourself. It’s hard to believe how much larger these trees are than the ones you see in the PNW. It was a very quiet trail too. Being the middle of the morning on a Wednesday, there was only the occasional retiree or two sauntering through the woods. I got lost in the trails until I ended up at the visitors center. A mile and a half walk back to my bike and I hit the road again.
When I pulled into city of Eureka I knew I was in a Californian town. The streets, the signage, the people. Things were starting to feel more and more familiar. All of a sudden I felt like a trip to In-n-out was due.
As I waited for them to call order number 18, an older gentleman reading at the table next to me asked how my ride was going. His name was Les and he started riding in 1959, and had been until about 6 years ago when bladder and kidney issues put an end to it.
He reminisced about the good old days where he’d gun it up to Crescent City on his yellow Harley. He says he took the turns so fast that his foot pegs would wear down over time.
We discussed lane splitting and how it was legal here, but Les had a word of warning. He has had numerous accounts of people actively trying to cut him off on the 5. Our hypothesis is that some people get so fed up with the traffic that they cannot bear to see someone else skip it.
I finished up my double double and got up to leave. Les had one more word of wisdom to share. “Keep the rubber side down, Ben.” I told him I’d do my best.
I continued down the 101 until I saw signage for a scenic alternate route - the avenue of the giants. The 101 was starting to look closer to a regular old freeway at this point, so this was the perfect way to get some variety back into the ride. The trees here were beautiful. Eventually it spit me back onto the 101 south which took me the rest of the way to Leggett.
I hope Seven Devils Road enjoyed its one day of fame, because it has been usurped. Highway 1 from Leggett out to the coast felt like a video game map. I suspect whoever was contracted to build that road owned a bike or two or three. The variety of turns, from gradual swoops to tight hairpins took a few minutes for me to get comfortable with. But once I was, I snuck past the Mazda in front of me and had my fill. I knew I was low on gas and riding hard wouldn’t help my case, but you can’t squander an opportunity like this.
And run out I almost did. There was quite a stretch of road with no service. I was imagining how I’d handle things if I got stranded. I figured my best bet was to hitchhike to the next station with one of my water bottles which I’d sacrifice to fill with a liter of gas. Luckily it didn’t get to that point.
As the sun began to set, I rolled into the sleepy town of Fort Bragg. Tonight I’d be staying on an outdoor bed several miles inland.
I headed down the road towards the address provided using Google Maps. It took me to the middle of a bumpy dirt road with nothing around. I figured I needed to check the details of the air bnb reservation. No service.
Okay, screw that, I thought. I’ll just continue down this road and I bet there’s a house at the end of it. It’s getting dark now so I gotta keep moving.
I got to the end of the road which turned into two private roads with multiple properties teed off of them. I got off my bike in the hopes that I’d magically have some service now. No luck.
I took a step back and stretched. At this point the best bet was to ride back up the road to where I had some internet. As I went to get back in the saddle … “what the hell!?” I exclaimed.
My bag was completely lopsided on the back of the bike! One of the straps was gone. Was the road really that rough?
I checked for anything else missing. One water bottle was gone too; the one with water in it.
I took a moment to settle myself. This was all solvable. I squared up the pack, tightened the piss out of the remaining strap, and headed back up the road to see if I could find what had fallen off.
No less than a minute back up the road, I was comforted to see my water bottle resting unharmed. I put it back in the pack, strapped tighter this time, and continued up.
It wasn’t until I got back to the paved section that I found the missing strap - or what was left of it.
Only half of the strap was there on the road, one of the ends frayed. I was puzzled. How did this happen? I had assumed the bumpy dirt road had shaken the strap loose, but this section was paved. Maybe I took a turn too fast? But even then, the whole strap should still be together if it popped off. This was frayed and disjointed from the other half of the strap, which was nowhere to be found.
I kept riding back up the road in hopes of finding the other half. After a few more miles I stopped again to think. This just didn’t make sense.
After some pondering I came to a possible conclusion: The free end of the strap that I had braided must have unbraided itself while I rode along, then caught itself in the spokes of the rear wheel, ripping it from the other half of the strap. At that moment I remembered having felt a bump in my rear shock after having felt nothing in the front and thinking it was a bit odd. That must’ve been it.
This means the other half of the strap must be back by where I found the first half. I headed back up there and made multiple passes on the bike and on foot. Nothing.
I’m still confused by this. My only guess is that the other half broke off so violently that it flew over the side of the road into the bushes. Or someone picked it up.
In any case, it was completely dark now and I still needed to find where I’d be staying the night. Luckily I had service now and the Airbnb had directions listed.
As I rolled into the driveway deep in the woods, I was greeted by Abelin and his girlfriend Fairy Ann. They showed me around and told me to make myself at home. There was a sink, a toilet, a shower, a place to cook, and my bed outside was surrounded by an electric fence Abelin had built to keep the bears out.
Apple trees surrounded my bed and after I cooked my ramen and took a shower, I enjoyed a golden delicious dessert fresh off the branch.
I also briefly met Lora, who lived in a smaller cabin on the property. She had a pit bull named Gooney and a black cat named Indigo. Apparently Gooney is very protective, so she introduced him to me to get him familiarized. He growled as I patted his back. For the rest of the night I carried my knife with me, just in case.
As I went to sleep in my outdoor bed, I got to thinking about why I felt comfortable staying with these people.
I think it’s probably a statistical thing. If 0.001% of people are going to be a problem and you have 1000 people pass by you in a city, you might actually end up having a problem with one of them. Where I’m at now there are like 5 people total, and one of them is me. Just going by the numbers, the odds of someone being hostile are basically zero. That said, if they did want to kill me and steal the bike, this would be the place to do it.
Miles Today: 241
Total Miles: 1,376
Camp: Abelin’s outdoor bed