Fortunately, the early morning departure was quiet, and even with all the fog of Bodega Bay, dry due to the thick cover of pines and a steady wind. For the first time ever in the fortnight we had been camping together, I was the first one off. I said good-bye to each of the group just in case, but we promised to meet at the Golden Gate on Sunday.

Another dry day, after a night of racoon infiltrations and intra-racoon fights, two of them stealing a yogurt from John’s backpack that he left on the table thinking everything was out. He got up and shooed them away but his yogurt was gone. We all had restless nights with all the racooning going on. To assuage his yogurt craving and mine for coffee, we rode out together to the Sea Ranch Lodge and John had an Avacado Toast which was quite good looking: two large slices of toast, each with a half an avacado on it. “That will get you through the afternoon for sure,” I said.

John left before me as I knew he would be setting a pace I couldn’t keep. It was a 47 mile day with 3500 feet of climbing and the CA 1 lived up to it’s wind-y and up and down rep. There were some serpentine sections that were long to get up, but fast and fun going down – especially since I now have working brakes!

This morning was a very cold start. I put another couple of layers on and even pulled out my full-fingered gloves and ear warmers. Never thought I’d be doing that on the California coast. John and I were the last out of the campground and rode together for a couple of miles (including a hard climb out of the park, a precursor for the rest of the days) until I turned off to grab some coffee and WiFi.

The ride today was an up and down fest. While the climbs themselves only ranged from sea level to 250 feet, there were 7 that were at least a mile long and many more that were smaller. The worst one was a 10% average grade with some 12 and 13% sections. Even young folks hated that one.

Last one out of the gate today, but that was okay cuz I was behind John in case he had any problems with his wheel.

I left the 101 that I had been basically following since Astoria, and turned right onto California 1. The first climb was hard; a thousand feet over 4 mi, but that was followed by a second climb about half that, and then a lot of rolling hills down the 1 to Ft Bragg. By the time I got the Fort Bragg I was pretty tired.

Monday, September 27. Today’s ride ended up in Stafford Hinckley State Park after another beautiful ride to complete the Avenue of the Giants. Parts of 101 that we were on after the avenue of the Giants was also a reprise of those ginormous trees.

It was nice to have an early start and pack up dry. Can’t say there was any great scenery today and I just noticed that I didn’t take any scenery pictures today. I did stop in Garberville to do laundry, have some lunch, and buy dinner and some food for the next couple days.

Tired start today as I set up my tent under a tree, and while it wasn’t raining, there was a thick fog and the drips from the leaves onto the tent were in no regular pattern. That kept waking me up even after putting my earplugs in. That fog made everything wet, probably even wetter than when we were rained on.

The group started out minus John who was still packing, and we stopped at a very disappointing Walmart to try to rustle lunch and dinner since we didn’t have very many options coming up. I was able to get a phone holder though to replace mine that broke yesterday. John caught up to us at the Walmart and we all started out together, but as usual quickly broke up into different speed groups. It was a damp ride, but The sun finally came out around 12:40 p.m. and the day brightened significantly.

Sunday, September 25. As I mentioned in the last post, I hung around the campground to let the tent and fly in my towel and other things dry off before packing. While waiting, I saw Darius, who I had met shortly the evening before, taking off down the path and wished him well.

This was the first day we had sun at the campground early in the day and I wanted to take advantage of it. After everything was dry and packed I hit the road.

Today started with the bad news that Luke was going to take a rest day cuz his knee was hurting him, but he would ride with us to California border and get photos. We did that and said some sad goodbyes. I gave Luke some of the biofreeze that Lisa O’Hara had given me for the trip, and the four of us remaining continued on the trip to the Redwoods.

The first 20 mi were almost flat, and I rode with John and Harald and we stopped in Crescent City for some supplies and a new air mattress for John. Harald and I were also looking for folding camp chairs as we are envious of the other’s setups, but two stores we tried didn’t have anything light enough, and there are no REIs around here, so that will have to wait.

Today (Friday, September 23) was a relatively short day in riding miles, and I focused on getting to the next campsite at Harris Beach, getting set up early and heading into Brookings for some coffee and groceries. I passed 2,000 miles on the tour today, too.