My favourite Mamas and Papas song, right there. I had a great ride today, a real highlight. After making it yesterday to a place called Eureka, a word which has deep Australian cultural connotations, my American readers, I headed off along the US101 South, and almost immediately I was offered a detour into the Valley of the Giants. I took it, of course. This refers to the remnant forests of giant redwoods. For about 25 miles or so, you can just wend your way through the forest. Occasionally you pop back into civilisation for a bit, then back into the awesome peace and quiet of these majestic trees. In a few places, I got off the bike and walked into the forest and just sat for a while. At times, there was the faint hum of freeway traffic or other noise, but mostly there was just silence. To just sit quietly amongst these beautiful, wonderful trees was a time to savour. To imagine that some of these were over 2000 years old. To imagine that some of them were growing since before Jesus himself had learned how to make a mortice and tenon joint. To imagine that throughout all the recorded history of the last 2000 years, the oldest of these trees had just sat right here in the same place, quietly growing, just being trees. Wow, I was stoked.
Oddly enough, at one point all I could think of was some dialogue from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, when King Arthur encountered the Knights Who Say Nyiit in a forest. It goes something like this:
KNIGHTS: "We are the Knight Who Say Nyiit, and we will say Nyiit to you again if you do not appease us."
ARTHUR: "What is it you want me to do?"
KNIGHTS: "You must cut down the mightiest tree in the forest wiiiiith.........a herring!"
ARTHUR: I"ll do no such thing"
KNIGHTS: "Aw, please"
But I was always being distracted like Bart Simpson when I was a kid in Church anyway. Yet by the time I left the forest, I felt relaxed, and kind of connected to the planet, if that isn't being too weird. And if trees can do that to a cynical bastard like me, then they're well worth keeping. I think I read there are only some 4% of the original redwood forests left, but they are slowly being replanted. Good. Plant faster.
And that's just the bottom half. Some of these get to 400 ft high, that's more than 30 stories high.
I couldn't help myself when I saw this sawmill en route. A sawmill struck me as a strange thing to find in a tree museum, but then again, it wasn't always a museum, was it. The mill looked like it was decommissioned, but clearly they had their differences of opinion with the tree huggers. Sound familiar? And with that, I was out of the forest and guess what? Right on cue, there was no cloud, nothing but blue sky, and I noted the temperature had shot up to about 80 deg F. Welcome to California!
Of course, there has to be a bit of comic relief. I can truthfully say I have actually ridden over the odd log or two, out on a trail, but until today I had never ridden through one. I hope if I ever hit one, it has a nice big hollow spot in it, just like this specimen. Right, lets ride. Back out onto the main road. The 101 is a bit funny in this area, it goes from divided road, back to narrow one lane winding through the trees, back to freeway. I just took it as it came, but I couldn't figure it out. Maybe Caltrans ran out of dough. But from the minute I left the 101 at Leggett, and took the State Route 1, the fun began. There was very little traffic for the first 100 miles. Initially the road wound through thick forest, about 20 miles of tight twisties. That was just terrific. Every so often I got stuck behind another vehicle, which probably saved me from myself, because I did push the envelope a bit. No chicken strips on my tyres now, and a few new scratches on the boots. Then all of a sudden the road broke out onto the coast.
Still hardly any traffic, the road opened up and the speed went up accordingly. I had an absolute ball for the next 80 odd miles, I was just right in the groove. As noted previously, I just love this bike in the mid range, and I gave it a flogging. I could not believe my luck, this just has to be one of the world's greatest bike rides. Not only was it twisty, but it climbed, then descended repeatedly, with fast sections and tight sections all mixed in. And the scenery wasn't too bad either. Reminiscent of the Mediterranean coast of Turkey (but with better road surface) or the Great Ocean Road in Victoria (minus the traffic), or the Cook Highway north of Cairns (in the old days, before every other bastard found out about it). Why does there always have to be a proviso?? The last 100 miles or so was slower, because there was more traffic on it, but I deem that today was one of the most exhilarating rides I have ever had, period. Two hundred and fifty miles of motorcycling nirvana.
I finished up by going through Bodega Bay, which film buffs may recall was the setting for Alfred Hitchcock's legendary movie The Birds. Looks like the town has recovered ok. Whatever happened to the dashing Rod Taylor, and the delightful Tippi Hendren anyway? I then headed across to Santa Rosa, from where I will head to Sonoma, Petaluma and maybe Napa tomorrow. Wine country. At last. The promised land!
Oddly enough, at one point all I could think of was some dialogue from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, when King Arthur encountered the Knights Who Say Nyiit in a forest. It goes something like this:
KNIGHTS: "We are the Knight Who Say Nyiit, and we will say Nyiit to you again if you do not appease us."
ARTHUR: "What is it you want me to do?"
KNIGHTS: "You must cut down the mightiest tree in the forest wiiiiith.........a herring!"
ARTHUR: I"ll do no such thing"
KNIGHTS: "Aw, please"
But I was always being distracted like Bart Simpson when I was a kid in Church anyway. Yet by the time I left the forest, I felt relaxed, and kind of connected to the planet, if that isn't being too weird. And if trees can do that to a cynical bastard like me, then they're well worth keeping. I think I read there are only some 4% of the original redwood forests left, but they are slowly being replanted. Good. Plant faster.
I couldn't help myself when I saw this sawmill en route. A sawmill struck me as a strange thing to find in a tree museum, but then again, it wasn't always a museum, was it. The mill looked like it was decommissioned, but clearly they had their differences of opinion with the tree huggers. Sound familiar? And with that, I was out of the forest and guess what? Right on cue, there was no cloud, nothing but blue sky, and I noted the temperature had shot up to about 80 deg F. Welcome to California!
Of course, there has to be a bit of comic relief. I can truthfully say I have actually ridden over the odd log or two, out on a trail, but until today I had never ridden through one. I hope if I ever hit one, it has a nice big hollow spot in it, just like this specimen. Right, lets ride. Back out onto the main road. The 101 is a bit funny in this area, it goes from divided road, back to narrow one lane winding through the trees, back to freeway. I just took it as it came, but I couldn't figure it out. Maybe Caltrans ran out of dough. But from the minute I left the 101 at Leggett, and took the State Route 1, the fun began. There was very little traffic for the first 100 miles. Initially the road wound through thick forest, about 20 miles of tight twisties. That was just terrific. Every so often I got stuck behind another vehicle, which probably saved me from myself, because I did push the envelope a bit. No chicken strips on my tyres now, and a few new scratches on the boots. Then all of a sudden the road broke out onto the coast.
Still hardly any traffic, the road opened up and the speed went up accordingly. I had an absolute ball for the next 80 odd miles, I was just right in the groove. As noted previously, I just love this bike in the mid range, and I gave it a flogging. I could not believe my luck, this just has to be one of the world's greatest bike rides. Not only was it twisty, but it climbed, then descended repeatedly, with fast sections and tight sections all mixed in. And the scenery wasn't too bad either. Reminiscent of the Mediterranean coast of Turkey (but with better road surface) or the Great Ocean Road in Victoria (minus the traffic), or the Cook Highway north of Cairns (in the old days, before every other bastard found out about it). Why does there always have to be a proviso?? The last 100 miles or so was slower, because there was more traffic on it, but I deem that today was one of the most exhilarating rides I have ever had, period. Two hundred and fifty miles of motorcycling nirvana.
I finished up by going through Bodega Bay, which film buffs may recall was the setting for Alfred Hitchcock's legendary movie The Birds. Looks like the town has recovered ok. Whatever happened to the dashing Rod Taylor, and the delightful Tippi Hendren anyway? I then headed across to Santa Rosa, from where I will head to Sonoma, Petaluma and maybe Napa tomorrow. Wine country. At last. The promised land!
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