My legs hurt.
But it's ok because I
found myself a couch. And couches are basically a wonder drug. After
all they can cure any thing from every day weariness, the cold, upset
tummies, snoring.....well at least for the person who kicked the
snorer out of bed.
Across from me is a man on
another couch who's girlfriend broke up with him after 11 years. I
hope he finds solace on his couch.
Couches: how grossly
underestimated are your powers.
This particular couch is
inside a hostel, inside Fort Mason which is in San Francisco. Which
is a big city with 779 000 people in it. I saw some of those people
yesterday, no one seemed to be wearing flowers in their hair.
I rode across the Golden
Gate Bridge last night and I have to say, they did a great job
rebuilding it so quickly after Magneto destroyed it a few years back.
It looked great.
[Ok for those that don't
watch comic book films: in X-Men Last Stand, Magneto tore the bridge
from it's moorings dumped it on Alcatraz Island. So they could have a
big mutant/human/mutant battle.]
But where was I? San
Francisco.....
yes but that is the end
of the story Kym. You need to start from the beginning of the week.
But I don't want to.
Well it's not going to
make any sense if you go backwards is it?!
It might.
Now you're just being
awkward.
I don't remember asking
you for an opinion.
That's the advantage of
being part of you, you can never truly shut me up!
Argh!
You're so annoying. Fine!
Here
follows an account of my bike trip for the last week in order of
events.
Happy?
Yes.
Now
Bugger off.
After you.
I was
at the Immortal Tree in the middle of the Red Woods last time I
typed.
The
weather has improved dramatically since then. I saw the sun!
In
fact I saw the sun too much. I got a little cooked. Truly I was
corrupted in Canada, there is no need for sun cream in Whistler.
And
there were hills. Dear God there were hills!
Hence
the sore legs. Though gratefully no sore knees as yet.
All the other
cyclists I talk to have sore knees. Or all the other, 'first time
bicycle tourists' have sore knees. This is my second bike tour
technically speaking. I did the Great Victoria Bike Ride back in 2009
and I had riolly rioolly sore knees then. I could barely walk after
that ride. But I learned two very important things from that trip:
Don't push a high gear, ever when doing long distances.
Always
spin spin spin. High gears are fine if you are riding into town once
a week. But not if you are riding for hours everyday. Knees wear out
and fall off very quickly if you push high gears.
The
other thing that saves your knees is 'If you're tired....slow the hell down!'
But no one is keen on that because they all have flights to get to,
or jobs to return to. The foolish folk they are. Cycling on a
schedule....ergh!
Unemployment:
Saving Kym's knees' since May 2011!
Because
if your knees do fail, well then you have the inconvenience of having
to steal other peoples knees while they're asleep in the camp-ground
at night. Then you have mismatched knees and their owners setting the
knee theft police after you.
Random
knee checks are well....knee knocking experiences.
Or you
have to abandon the trip altogether.
Met a
young guy the other day who had cycled maybe 300 miles in six days
and had to catch a bus home because his knees gave out.
Ok
enough about Knees! Hopefully I haven't just jinxed myself. Touchwood
Touch wood touch wood.
So Red
Woods, leafy cathedrals, towering columns of dark wood looming on
either side of the road.
But
I've told you about that. The sun came out and I took my rain proof
pants off. Eventually I took off my knee warmers as well and was
instantly blinded by the stark whiteness of my legs. They hadn't seen
the sun since September last year.
I came
to a little town up in the hills that instantly reminded me of
Barrossa Valley in South Australia. Garberville;It was cute and hot
and full of smiling happy people. It had a barber shop that also sold
guns. I suppose if you didn't like the haircut you could shoot the
barber.
After
filling up my saddlebags with more good things to eat at the super
market I got back on the Delinquent Caribou and headed as always:
South.
The
101 was getting antsy again. Keeps turning into a Freeway on me. The
Adventure cycle map I got in Eureka directed me to plunge off the 101
and onto a back road.
I
might have mentioned this, but back roads are great because there is
less cars. And it is peaceful under the trees with the birds and
deer. But because they are back roads there are no big obvious signs
saying things like: 'Kym you're going the wrong way'. So I end up
stopping because there is a barricade in front of me with no way
around it. Then I have to turn around and backtrack for two miles up
hill. That sucks.
On the
Garbarville day I got passed by every motorbike in California. Or so
it felt. The sound of great big bikes rumbling by sent vibrations up
through my tires and made my mouth water in envy. Groups of roaring
bikes and leather clad folk roared by me two abreast and ten deep all
day long. I'm not sure which club it was. They were a social club not
a prostitution, extortion, drug dealing and money laundering club.
I
pulled over outside a petrol station [sorry gas station] to figure
out where I was going to stay for the night. One of the old geezers
came over to admire my bike....which was funny considering that I was
surrounded by gleaming Harleys. Anyway he asked if I needed any
advice for the road ahead. He'd cycled down the road a few years ago.
I'm always up for info on what to expect and he seemed harmless
enough.
Alas I
hadn't really considered that I was down to my spandex layer. I'm
usually wearing far more layers so it didn't occur to me to be more
wary of old men until he seated himself down, pressed right next to
me on the bench. Then he was off spouting all whole lot of 'advice'.
Things like; when the wind is coming at you it's harder to ride'.
Well
duh!
And:
'There is a hill here.' Gee thanks mister you're real helpful.
I
smiled an nodded. I should have hit over his fuzzy grey head with my
D-lock. He knew nothing and just wanted to sit too close to a young
girl and maybe get lucky.
He
kept mentioning that I was a 'pretty young thing, travelling alone'.
Which got my warning bells jangling.
I set
my teeth and told I must get on. He took my hand, swept his hand from
his head and kissed my cycle gloved hand.
I took
some satisfaction in knowing that he had just kissed a glove I'd been
wiping my nose on all morning.
Ah the
dirty old men of the world. They better be careful, the next old man
who wants to offer me advice better be genuine. Or they'll find my
D-Lock lodged somewhere they'd forgotten existed.
That
night I ended up in Standish Hickey. I have no idea where that name
comes from but it is a terribly awesome name. There under the trees
in the Hiker/biker camp-ground I met Gandolf the Grey.
He had long grey hair, weather weary lines on his face and bright
blues eyes. An old hippy from the Woodstock area. He said his name
was John. John [aka Gandolf] had spent several years in India and we
got chatting. We talked until late into the night. About the world,
the coast, the road, India, America, Australia, his ten year
vacation, my month cycling. He was hitchicking north. We talked so
long that it got dark and the mosquitoes came out and then went to
sleep. Eventually I went and had a shower but the lights in the
bathrooms were off. I had a shower in pitch blackness and wished I
had a sonar.
The
next morning John cooked me some amazing breakfast. He went on and on
about his type of weird hippy foods and the virtues of each. Offered
me some more weed.
I
don't think this part of the world has changed very much in the past
fifty years. Life is slow, buildings moulder in various stages of
dilapidation on the sides of the road. People on ride on mowers wave
to me as I drift by, kids use the streets as playgrounds, neighbours
lean on fences and talk for hours. Strangers are welcomed with a
helpful smile and time floats by softly, rather than being broken up
and lobbed aggressively into the trash like it is in the city.
And
everyone smokes weed!
The
sixties and seventies never left this place. Not three days goes by
that I'm don't sm.....get offered weed.
John
calls this area 'the Emerald Triangle'. We spent all morning talking
again. He was good company and I hadn't camped with someone for a few
days. Eventually I got on the road at the early time of 12:30pm.
Considering
the terrain that was most likely a mistake. I went up the Leggot
Hill. That no one talks about despite the fact that it is twice as
big as the Crescent City hill. 2000 feet of slogging, almost two
mortal hours in my lowest gear. I made the summit and celebrated
with half a bag of trail mix and a piece of bread and cream cheese.
Such
are celebrations on the bicycle tour.
The
unfortunate thing about cycling up that hill was the amount of blind
bends and no verge. Several times I heard logging trucks coming and
had to throw myself off the road and up against the hill. They
rattled by with inches to spare.
The
descent was mildly scary. Two hours up, five minutes down. I avoided
looking at two things on the way down: my cycle computer because it
was telling me how fast I was going, once I hit 50ks an hour I didn't
want to know. And my mirror. I didn't want to know what was behind
me, whoever it was would just have to bloody well wait. The road
ain't big enough for the pair of us!
All my
sweat soaked clothes froze on the way down.
I
thought I'd done well. The road flattened out. I smiled and felt
good. Then the road went up hill again. The first hill was fine. The
second hill nearly undid me. It was pure and simply: mean. Unkind and
uncalled for. An unnecessary evil.
When
finally I dragged my sad and sorry carcass over that lesser hill and
out of the forest, into the chill air of the sea and beheld before me
the Pacific Ocean I could have wept.
And
there in the turn out, over looking the sea, was a little figure who
yelled out: 'You Made It!' As if I were a friend she was waiting for.
Her
name was June. She had passed me coming up the hill in her car. I
cycled up to her and she made me feel like a champion with her
praise. Bless June for people like her I'd cycle more mountains.
The
closest camp-ground was where I made my bed that night. I'd cycled a
scant 19miles. But I felt everyone of those miles in my soul.
I rode
15 the next day. After Leggot hill the terrain changed. Suddenly I
was on Highway 1. Not 101. The 1 is a wiggly, giggly little road that
winds and weaves up and down the coastal farmland of northern
California. Through clumps of gumtrees that clogged my hayfevered
nose with the smell of home. Little weatherboard villages overgrown
with grass and flowers. All rolling hills that drop suddenly into the
mist shrouded sea.
With
all the weaving and winding there is still a disturbing lack of
anywhere for me to ride. The verge was inconveniently full of thigh
high grass. I sat out on the road elbows out and the promise of
violence in my posture. If there was no room to pass me, then the
cars waited. Do you know how exhausting it is to cycle up a steep
hill with a truck still on your tail with no where for either of you
to go?
Bah!
Cars, highway 1 would be so much improved if they all drove off into
the sea.
The
road kept dropping down into these tiny bays then shoot sharply out
of them.
My
map's altitude measurement looked like the heartbeat of squirrel on
caffeine tablets. As much as I could I used the momentum of the
descent to shoot me up the next hill. Alas a fully loaded touring
bike is sort of like hauling an obese eight year old around on the
back of your bike. So as soon as you are going up, you better be
pedalling like crazy or gravity will grab you and drag you down.
Damn
that obese eight year old.
I
cycled slowly for a few days, up and down these short little hills
all day.
Through
Fort Bragg where an attractive bicycle mechanic put new brake pads on
my front wheel. I know I know, brakes: they only slow you down.
Got
the third book in the Godspeaker trilogy. I've demolished the series
on this tour for all that they are all nine hundred pages a piece.
“Why
do you have bike tubes on the front here?” the bike mechanic asked.
“They
hold my panniers on tightly.” I explained.
“But
they add a fair bit of weight.”
“I'm
carrying a laptop and three novels.” I said, “If I was worried
about weight....”
“Are
they hard back books?” He asked laughing.
“No,
but that's a good idea.”
Me and
overburdened bicycle trundled off into the sunlight.
That night at Van Dam State Park I met
Nimrod and Quiedo. Nimrod is a middled/youngish man who looks like a
member of the Russian mafia. Quiedo is a tall thin Italian cycle tour
guide from Canada. They were an unlikely duo. Somehow I ended up
being invited to a dinner at an Inn that stood above the Camp site.
There followed a fun evening with my
two new friends. Nimrod was on his first bicycle tour and Quiedo was
pushing him pretty hard. I told Quiedo that if he had pushed me the
way he had pushed Nimrod that he'd probably be at the bottom of cliff
somewhere. But that was ok because Nimrod was paying for the meal,
not Quiedo.
I liked both of them but found myself
having to drag my 'well mannered self ' kicking and screaming out of
my mind's back closet. They were both terribly polite. Fun, but
restrained and mature. And also politically correct and worried about
offending....anyone. Nimrod was curiously vulnerable for someone as
big and loud as he was.
Somehow I must have managed to suppress
my less gentile self and made some sort of favourable impression on
my well bred companions. Nimrod said I needed to become the Prime
Minister; I forgave him because I'm sure he meant it to be a
compliment.
They were heading to Los Angeles.
They passed me the next day in a car.
Nimrod's face had swollen up so much he peered at me through slitted
eyes. Some sort of reaction to a pollen in the air had called their
trip short. The doctor said if the allergic reaction happened again
he could asphyxiate. I commiserated with him and wished him well.
Later that evening I met Joe. I was sitting
on the side of the road looking at a map. Joe pulled up next to me on
his bike and asked about camping.
Gualala wasn't terribly forthcoming
with it's camp-grounds. So we looked at the map. Exchanged
information and cycled on chatting for a while.
“Bambi!” I exclaimed.
“Where?!” Joe asked.
“Dead.” I sighed pointed and the
speckled fawn lying prone by the road.
“Oh.” Said Joe.
Joe was much like a fawn. All thin and
gangly, wild energy, pretty to look at, and silly.
He is 18.
We found the camp-ground and entered
the hiker/biker site together. Late afternoon sun dripped through the
green canopy and onto the leafy carpet beneath us.
“Wow!” Said Joe. “We're either in
Narnia or Vietnam.”
“Don't Move!” I hissed.
“W..why?” Joe asked.
“You're standing on a mine.”
We had a great time setting up camp and
telling foolish jokes. After being so serious with Nimrod and Quiedo
it was fun to be silly again.
Then Emily and Matt turned up. Emily
and Matt had been at the same camp-ground I'd been at last night.
They are political science major's from
Washington on holiday for the summer.
“How do you know if split pea soup is
ready?” Matt wondered prodding his soup with a spoon. Joe looked
critically at the broth and shrugged.
“When the peas become whole again?”
He hazarded.
There was not a lot of room to set up
tents in that place so we were camped about a foot apart. I am
grateful for that.
Because that was the night of the
Raccoons!
They attacked just as we were all
getting ready to sleep. Suddenly the undergrowth was alive with white
and black furry bandits.
Raccoons look cute. But they are pure
evil. I've been hearing about the damage a raccoon can do since
Whistler. For one thing they are completely fearless. They are known
to enter houses through cat flaps, walk up stairs and into kitchens
and help themselves to anything and everything. They frequently take
large dogs to pieces. German Shepherds or pit bulls even have lost
limbs or lives to them.
Raccoons are fierce. Generally they
don't attack humans, but neither are they terribly frightened of us.
So we had put all our food in the
wooden box in the camp-ground designed for that purpose. But there
was not enough room for four people's food. Anything left out was
fair game. Panniers or anything in canvas was at risk. Raccoons
simply gnaw through the fabric. We threw things at them, they blinked
at us. We hung things from trees. They attacked the wooden locker
with a demon like ferocity. And managed to grab some stuff through a
hole in the bottom. Lying in my tent I could hear them screaming at
one another, running around my tent jumping on the table and
searching through any unfortunate panniers.
It was the first time I'd ever seen
raccoons. When I got up to go to the bathroom I eyed the darkness
nervously.
“If you're not back in half an hour.”
Matt said. “We'll come rescue you.”
“Just tell my mother I love her.” I
declared and wandered off into the dark, feeling small beady eyes
tickling on my back.
That night I dreamed of Raccoons
dragging me from my tent and boiling me over a fire.
The next day I started the day with
Emily and Matt. Joe disappeared at 6am. We got on the road at 11.
After half an hour I decided that
travelling in a road train isn't for me. We were going too fast.
I let Emily and Matt vanish ahead of
me. Then I relaxed and got on with my day. Cycling with other people
is too hard. I just don't have any desire to go fast. Or rather,
going fast isn't really worth the energy.
The road went up two hills that day,
right on the edge of the ocean. I went up about 700feet. And it was
pretty, with an amazing views of the ocean and the cliff lined coast.
There was no verge. No trees and nothing but thin air between me and
that 700foot drop to the ocean. There was also trucks. Going up was
ok. Going down was terrifying. I clung to my handle bars and sang a
rousing tune to maintain my courage. It didn't work. I kept seeing
myself flying off into space and taking my first and final dip in the
Pacific Ocean.
On the evening I caught up with Matt an
Emily. We passed a further pleasant night cooking dinner and
discussing the day's ride. There were no raccoons.
I kept pace with Emily and Matt for
another night. We met up just north of San Francisco in Samuel L
Jackson State Park.
It wasn't actually Samuel L Jackson. It
was Samuel Taylor. That was Matt being silly.
I rode into San Francisco late
yesterday afternoon. Tired. Dear god I was tired. I'd ridden 160
miles in three days. Which isn't huge for other people, but I am not
other people.
The bike map I had guided me through
the quiet, quaint, sun drenched suburbs of North San Francisco.
Through tree lined streets and pretty little homes made of every
material under the sun. I felt like I was home again.
Hot sun above me, gum trees, bright
blue skies overhead and the roar of cicadas in my ears.
I thought San Francisco would be
horribly hilly. It wasn't. Not yet anyway.
I rolled along those 30 miles with
incredible slowness. Even for me. There was so much to stare at.
Little shops and towns of the outer suburbs. The little houses. The
flowers. The people.
Bicycles everywhere. Teenage girls, all
long blond hair and bare legs flitting by in loud happy gaggles. Down
to a woman, teenage girls in San Francisco ride those beach cruiser
bikes. The single geared, fat tyred, wide handle-bared bikes that
look pretty and are easy to ride. Everyone else was on road bikes and
going too fast to say hello or even smile.
Ah to be in a city again. People avoid
eye contact in a city. Just encase doing so marks them for death.
I meandered through Sausilito. Stared
at the shops. Tried not to be killed by tourists on rental bikes.
Tourists on rental bikes are scary. So few of them know about cycling
in straight lines. I found a group of them underneath the Golden Gate
Bridge and they were pushing their bikes up the hill. Looked at them disdainfully. I noticed especially the two very thin
and pretty girls who were pushing their bikes up a hill.
I went up the hill easily, still lugging
my obese eight year old. Thin and pretty eh, I thought smugly. Thin and pretty and
incapable of cycling up a bit of an incline. There has to be some perks to cycling a thousand miles.
There was Golden Gate Bridge. Yay. I
took a photo and somehow lost my cycle computer. I went back down a
really long hill to look for it but it was gone. Then I went back up
the hill. To the top of the Golden Gate Bridge. But the West footpath
was closed.
“Go to the East side.” Said the
sign. It pointed to some stairs that dropped straight down into Hell. They
weren't nice wide, gentle stairs. They were rough steep stairs.
“How the hell am I supposed to get
you and all my gear down that?!” I asked The Delinquent Caribou.
The Delinquent Caribou wasn't pleased about the prospect either. But
there was no choice. I wedged the tyres into the edge of the stairs
and held on to the brakes. The seat drove into my kidneys. My bike
wanted to lung downwards and drag me with it. I got stuck between the
hand rail and my bike and had to inch down the stairs whimpering in
pain. No one helped me.
I went under the bridge found an
identical set of stairs going up on the other side. Swearing and
heaving I dragged my bike and all my gear, weighing more than an
obese eight year old at this point because I was tired and hungry and
no one was helping me and I'd lost my cycle computer and I didn't
know where I was staying and why wasn't the stupid west footpath open
anyway!
At the top of the stairs I lay on the
concrete and got my breathing under control.
People ignored me.
People can go jump off a bridge for all
I care.
I cycled across the bridge and almost
got blown off. It was windy and freezing.
Dodged all the tourists and other
cyclists. Regarded the city's outline fretfully. It looked big.
Bigger than I'd thought.
How the hell was I supposed to find a
hostel in amongst all those wretched buildings?
I rolled off the other side with the
beginnings of worry inside me.
Where was I going to stay?
I had no map. It was getting late. Not
hugely late. Just not early.
Guess where is not a good place to ask
strangers for directions? Near Golden Gate Bridge. Because lets face
it, it's full of Tourists. And Tourists don't know anything. I should
know I am one and I knew nothing.
Eventually I asked the gift shop dude.
He sent me down the hill and towards a big warehouse off in the
distance. I rolled down the hill found a bike shop.
I was on a bike. It was a bike shop.
Equals: they might be sympathetic.
They were. Not only did they google a
hostel for me, they also let me use their phone to make a
reservation. Then they showed me how to get there on google maps.
Bless the nice San Francisco bike shop people.
I rode on and found the Fort Mason HI.
And that is the story of how I got the
San Francisco on my bicycle.
I am not sure if I am going to Los
Angeles.
There are other places to see. But I'm
am at this time Undecided.
