Today was a pretty relaxed day. I explored a lighthouse, caught up with some friends/family who are living in normal life, bike 20 miles, saw a beautiful sunset, and met a new friend Max in the campground.

First and foremost though, a huge shout out to the Oregon park system. The hiker biker sites include USB charging!! And everyone has been super nice.

I opted to sleep in today, so my day started late (8am.) First stop was a lighthouse. It was built in 1918, and outdated by 1935. Oops. Oh well, still nice to take pictures of!

Bandon was a nice town, and I spent some time in Bandon calling and talking with people. I stopped by the Bandon Brewery on the way out of town. Not recommended. It wasn’t great. Then started my short 26 mile day to Cape Blanco!

I thought this was funny! Saw this on the road to Cape Blanco. You’ve all heard of this town, right?

Cape Blanco is absolutely beautiful! It’s was settled originally by the Hughes, an Irish family, when it was totally isolated from everything. Eventually it became a huge farm. I went to visit the graveyard there as well.

This is the view from the coast.

Notice those rocks out there? Yeah, they’re probably at least half a mile out, but you can see the waves crashing up along the rocks. That was pretty cool to watch.

I got settled into the hiker biker camp, and ended up talking with the camp host for awhile about being a camp host. Sounds like a pretty nice gig :). Hopefully you can do so without driving an rv, because that seems stressful. (Although he said that he thought riding a bike on the 101 is stressful. Touché.)

After a quick shower I walked back to the hiker biker camp and ended up chatting with Max, another biker in the camp, for most of the night.

Max is from France, and his English is self taught, so I was pretty impressed we were able to continue a conversation for as long as we did, but we talked for a good 4 hours. Apparently, by law in France every 6 year you must be able to take 1 year unpaid leave. So that’s what Max is doing now. He was just in Peru, then flew into SFO, bought a bike and rack, strapped his backpack and tent (which he also bought) to it, and started going! How cool is that? Just goes to show anyone can do a bike touring trip.

Short day, and short write up today. Tomorrow I think I’ll stay here. I’ll have to ride 10 miles into town to get food, but I’ll try and buy some brauts and beer. Austen, from earlier, is trying to push a 95 mile day tomorrow and will end up here if he does. I’ll have some food and beers waiting for him if he makes it.

As always, a beautiful sunset on the coast!

Goodnight!

It’s T-1 (day) until the trip starts! And as I sit writing this in a warm hotel room, it’s raining outside, the window is shivering in the windy, and wouldn’t be described as nice. I’m definitely thinking twice about my decision to camp...

The drive up to Astoria was beautiful. I-5 was much prettier then I remembered it. At least once we got north of the Central Valley and into the Shasta wilderness area. The sun was out, the weather was beautiful, and we made excellent time. We arrived at our destination for that night pretty tired, but got dinner at “Stacy’s Covered Bridge”, (which was awesome! And recommended by the people at the hotel) then went to bed.

Apparently I’m a sucker for advertising!

The next day we finished the drive to Astoria, in the rain. And that would continue all day. (It’s still raining now) We visited lots of state parks along the coast.

Ecola State Park - It’s wicked windy, and still raining. However, the beach was beautiful!

After Ecola State Park, we visited Fort Stevens State Park, which was full of bunkers that dated back to the Civil War! We would’ve had an awesome game of hide and seek if we had more people.

Dad in front of an old shipwreck at Fort Stevens.

The Jetty that guards the entrance to the Columbia River

A gun installed at Fort Stevens for WWII

Fun fact, Fort Stevens was attacked during WWII by a Japanese submarine. Later, after the war, the captain was asked about the attack. He said had he known the guns located at the fort, he would not have attacked. However, during the attack the Fort did not have permission to return fire.

After exploring Fort Stevens State Park, Dad and I went to church. It was a very nice mass. The church was beautiful, with the side facing the Columbia river being almost all glass. At the end of mass, the priest asked if there were any visitors in attendance and both my dad and I introduced ourselves. Then, to my embarrassment, my dad told the congregation that I was biking back to SF and asked the congregation to pray for me. On the way out of church it was still raining, and Dad made a comment about the rain. The man behind us commented “what ugly weather, just glad we’re not biking to San Francisco. Smart Aleck.

After church we went to dinner at The Buoy Beer Company. Food, pretty good, decent beer, good service, but the best was the view. The restaurant was in an old cannery right on the Columbia River. We got to watch some ships go by and see some others parked waiting for a pilot.

We’re back in the hotel, watching TV and resting. Dad leaves tomorrow at 5 or 6 am, and I’ll get going around 8 or 9. I look forward to it! But hoping for better weather!!

New vest given to me by some loving (concerned) parents.

The days are speeding closer and closer to my bike trip! As a final pre-trip, to make sure all my gear is in working order and I’m in good enough shape to do this, I biked out to “Coast Camp” in Point Reyes. I had a gigantic burrito along the way, got my butt kicked by the final climb, and ended up cooking in the rain, but as I write this in the warmth of my tent, listening to the call of birds and the roar of the ocean, I think I’m ready for the trip, and happy with the day.

The day started the previous night, getting all my gear packed. I was easily able to fit all my gear into two panniers and one dry bag, so I took the front rack off my bike. (#ultralight #itsalifestyle) Thanks to Mike (DSR) Cristian, I opted for a rear rack instead of a front rack, after reading lots of reviews of people online about what they prefer.

The morning of the trip to Point Reyes I did what everyone does before a bike trip, get a haircut. (A lesson learned from last trip.) I think my hair is the shortest it’s ever been (the hairdresser used a two on the side, but he’s pretty opinionated about my hair, so I trust him just to make it look good.) Post haircut I loaded up the bike, and headed off!

(Me post haircut, and as always no idea what to do with my hands.)

You’ll notice from the picture above that the panniers are definitely not full. I have a two man tent in there, sleeping bag + pad, biking clothes, warm layers, evening attire (aka clean clothes to sleep in, or go into town in) stove + cook gear, food, head lamp, water, and some miscellaneous gear. I’m not sure why I needed all 4 panniers when we went to Europe, but maybe I just have better gear now?

I took the Golden Gate Bridge out of the city, and got my picture taken in front of my bike by a nice French guy. He asked “Where did you come from?” and I had to sheepishly point at the city and say “there.” He followed up with “Where are you going too?” and I couldn’t bring myself to say that I’d be back tomorrow, so I just said “Portland.” That’s mostly true, right? We chatted a bit more, and then I rode off again.

I quickly entered Mill Valley, and then started slowly climbing towards the panoramic highway. It would be my first of three major climbs of the day. The road had a pretty small shoulder, but only one car didn’t give me plenty of room. He got a yelling at. Everyone else was plenty nice. Even got a shocka (did I spell that right?) from one car and a “hang in there” from another. (I don’t think I was looking that gassed, but apparently I was.) I took the panoramic highway up a little farther, and then flew down to Highway 1. (The 1, if your s Californian) The downhill was a blast! Cornering a loaded touring bike is a bit of a chore, but definitely do able. Being that no cars ever caught up to me on the way down, I must of been doing pretty well.

After getting on the 1, I quickly entered Stinson Beach, and stopped for lunch. A picture of the restaurant is below.

The restaurant serves the biggest (and probably most expensive) burritos I have ever seen. The burrito was about 14 inches long, and had an oval diameter of 4 inches by 2 inches. It was huge. I finished it all though, guess I was pretty hungry, but my body was not too happy with me for the rest of the day.

From Stinson Beach I followed highway 1 too Point Reyes. I stopped at the visitor center to request a last minute campsite, and was given a site at “coast campground” which, as you might guess, is on the coast. Thinking I was almost there, I filled my water, used the restrooms (thanks to that burrito), bought a beer (oops!), and took off in high spirits. Unfortunately, I did not realize I had one more hill to do.

Being Point Reyes, you have to go up and over a ridge to get to the ocean. I did not remember that, but will in the future. I likely was just tired, but it was about a 4 mike climb that seemed to take forever. I thought a few times about just going back to the visitor center and asking for a closer campground. But, alas, making me very happy, the road started to level, and then go down, and I was able to fly downhill.

I pulled off at the Point Reyes Hostel (probably should’ve just stayed there, they had room, but oh well), filled up my water once again, and rode the last 3 miles on a gravel road into camp. Luckily, the rain held off just long enough for me to setup my tent, so all my sleeping area is dry. However, I ended up cooking in a down pour. It seems like a storm system just moved in off coast. After dinner the rain lightened, and I got some nice sunset pictures before headed to bed!

Tomorrow will be back to SF, drinks with some friends, and then getting thoughts of sleep to start my trip on Friday! I’m looking forward to it!

(Addendum) The ride back was much better! I’m having a hard time figuring out how to deal with the temperature, sweating bullets on the uphills and freezing on the downs, but I had a fantastic ride back to SF. On the way back I stopped at a place called “Sol Food.” They served Puerto Rican food, and it was absolutely amazing! I’ll definitely be going back! Here’s a few bonus pictures from the past two days:

Waves breaking from the campsite

View from the panoramic highway

San Francisco looking good!

Hey, you see that cow?...

Fort Bragg! I’ll be coming through there later