The Sinkyone Wilderness

Wow – what a day. It had it all – good roads, very, very bad ones, 5 degrees and howling winds and 32 that would melt you. Awesome scenery, vineyards, interesting food, perfect bitumen and, best of all, some really good people.

The road from Shelter Cove certainly lived up to the locals predictions. Thank goodness I didn’t try it last night. It would have been dark before I was even halfway through it and the result would have been calamitous. The road was very rutted and, while it wasn’t overly steep (with a few exceptions), it was constant up and down once I’d got to the top of the ridge line above the Pacific Ocean. It was largely pretty smooth red clay, but the holes were gigantic, there was rock in places and it got a bit powdery towards the end. The first 30 km took me over 2 hours, with the last 15 a bit under an hour. I didn’t see a soul all the way through and there weren’t a lot of tyre tracks. At its worst, I knew that I was only going to be about 20 km from either the start or the finish. That’s quite walkable and was what decided me on having a crack from the outset. The signs at the beginning didn’t actually help I might add.  A pretty remote bit of country and, on reflection, tackling this one alone wasn’t one of my best decisions. I was sweating buckets by the end, but got away with it ….. just.

As I rode along, I was rewarded with the odd, brief glimpse over the misty forest to the ocean. I’d love to have got a really good view of this, but didn’t. As you will have noted, the mists, particularly, had intrigued me over the last 24 hours. How could something so innocuous have created so much grandure? I was traveling through both rainforest and Redwood’s – they are obviously much more widespread that I had imagined. Not surprising when you give it some proper thought. The temperature when I’d left Shelter Cove was low, probably 7 or 8 degrees and I’d rugged up a bit knowing that, once I got back above it, I’d find blue sky and better than 25 degrees. This proved to be the case. Back down the bottom at the other end though, it got very cold, much colder than earlier. I think it was a lot more exposed to the ocean and the wind. The sun broke through occasionally and there were a few moments with light spilling onto the road that were quite ethereal – I was waiting for a booming voice from above!

The road was nice and quiet and, by this stage, had settled down into something much more manageable. I thought I’d take advantage of the situation, get my pushups done for the day and record another video of the challenge. This is proving to be quite fun!

I wanted to ride N Highway 1. Everyone I’d seen had said that the views were spectacular and the roads even more so. It was so, so bloody cold though, only a few degrees above zero. I was still soaked, hours after getting out of the wilderness, so I decided to pull up for lunch (an omelette at Eggheads – an interesting little place with a Wizard of Oz theme) and put on all 3 of my merino layers. It sure made a difference. Toasty and warm I blasted down the highway, passing heaps of road and adventure bikes heading north, all taking advantage of Highway 1 and the ride she offered.

The mist and greyness of the day actually added to the experience (once I stopped shivering). It was very dramatic and suited the environs and bleak emptiness of the ocean and the coastline. How lucky am I?

It ended all too soon and I headed back east. Literally 15 kms from the coast, with only 500m of elevation, it was back to 30 plus degrees. It’s funny isn’t it – you wonder if you’ll ever be warm again and, before you know it, you’re about to expire from the heat. The road was a beautiful twisty, windy piece of blacktop and I scooted along, although I did have to go into conservation mode towards the end as none of the towns had gas stations. I loaded up in Boonville, before heading further east on more twisty’s and through grape country towards the Napa Valley.

As I crested the pass leading over to Clear Lake, I pulled up to take in the view right next to an RV with a bunch of people sitting on the roof enjoying the evening. ‘Ah ha’, I said, as I read and pointed to one of their T-shirts – ‘Outback Australia!’. ‘Are you an Aussie’ they yelled. ‘You bet’. This was greeted with a big cheer. I was offered wine and invited to join them on the roof. After a round of introductions and a bit of a chat, I said ‘so you guy’s are Israeli?’. They were very pleased with my perception. We chatted for half an hour and I really enjoyed their company and the warm Yellowtail white (Australian) that they offered. They were staying put for the night and invited me for dinner and to camp with them. Normally I wouldn’t have thought about it twice, but it was getting dark and I wanted to be with Scott in San Fran at a reasonable hour the next day. I needed to get at least another hours’s riding under my belt so, after a few photos I took off.

What a great bunch of kids. I gathered that they were all vaguely traveling independently of each other – one was heading home in a few days, another to India shortly. Some were heading north and a few weren’t quite sure what their next steps were. One of the girls (her name was pronounced ER, although I have no idea how to spell it) had been to Australia, working on a cotton farm at Cecil Plains – she certainly knew where Toowoomba was. They were enjoying the countryside, living out of the RV they had bought (to resell later), having fun and making the most of their youth and their lives. I did the same in Israel (and the surrounds – Turkey, Syria, Jordan and the Sinai) when I was their age, 30 odd years ago. My budget then was was less than $10 per day for everything – accommodation, travel, food and booze. A bit different to now. I call them kids with a degree of wistfulness, although I certainly can’t complain about my lot in life. Interestingly, I think some of them were a bit envious of me!

Down the range I went, into the darkening evening and a full moon. I kept riding, enjoying the night, quite warm and feeling at peace with the world. It’s never hard to find somewhere to set up the tent and a meal is rarely a problem.

By about 8.30, I thought I should call it a day. I had quite sore quads already from the mornings efforts, so I pulled up at the township of Clearlake. The only thing open for a feed was a Mexican grill. It was still hopping and quite a few of the patrons (gringos) were right over the top – the waitress just kept rolling her eyes at me and apologising for their carrying on. Not a problem – quite the opposite actually. The meal of a taco and a Mexican salad was just what I needed. The salad had fruit in it as well as corn chips and a very powerful dressing. An interesting but delicious combination. There was wonderful music that made me want to dance (I didn’t you’ll be pleased to know although, like my joke telling, I’m very good) and the noise and humour was infectious. Cleaning up around me, the owners shouted me my last drink and then, lip’s burning nicely, I headed of to a good nights sleep.