Day 337 – 4th of July 2010: The Wild River

I went to the 4^th of July BBQ last night, but had a few too many beers while chatting to Lauren and Douglas. By the time I hear the camp band, which I later learned consisted of Douglas on guitar, his Native Indian BBQ sous chef on bass and the sous chef’s ten year old son on drums, I am in my tent and ready to sleep. The incessant primitive quality of the boy’s playing, the beat never changing no matter what the song, gives the music a psychedelic quality. Given the setting, I can’t help but think of the film Deliverance, but this time with magic mushrooms. Apparently a bear staged an impromptu stage invasion during the gig too.

I wake up to the sound of woodpeckers on the tree next to my tent, like a woodland alarm clock.

On the jet boat, the pilot takes us first to the mouth of the Klamath, which is lagoon like as it is cut off from the sea by the lower tides. He tells us that Great White Sharks are sometime found here, though at this time of year, they have been chased away by the warrior kings of the ocean, the Orca.

The boat is large for a jet boat, fitting about twenty people, so this isn’t going to be quite so hair raising as those in New Zealand, which are swung and jumped around within inches of rocks. However, the Klamath is like a vast wilderness sanctuary, the real wild, not a parkland set aside for tourism. There are even wild cows and bulls here. However, the highlight must have been seeing Golden Eagles and Bald Eagles. These were both nearly extinct when I was a child, so I never expected to see any in my life, but one swoops down right past the boat, mistaking a floating log for a possible catch.

The other boats on the river are small fishing boats, taking eager anglers to some of the wildest fishing spots in the country. We have to be considerate when passing the fishing boats as they reel in the magnificent river salmon. However, this doesn’t stop the pilot from spinning us around a few times and giving us a good drenching. The best trick though is the ‘turbo brake’. This is when he suddenly puts the jet flow in reverse throwing up the rear of the boat, threatening to fling the passengers out of their seats.

After the boat ride I visit ‘The Trees of Mystery’, one of the commercialised attractions in Redwood. The car park of the large gift shop features a giant talking carving of Paul Bunyan, the mythological lumber jack created by an ad agency about a hundred years ago. The trail through the woods features a number of timber oddities. Redwoods have the ability to grow out of eachother, like the Candlabra tree, which spawned a series of new trees after it fell. The trunk of the fallen tree lies overhead across the path, with younger trees taking root within it and shooting straight up. Other Redwoods twist into odd shapes, but the centre piece of the trail is the ‘Cathedral Tree’, nine trees in one like towers ascending from one base forming a cove. I descend from the top of the trail via the bubble car lift to get a good overhead view of the forest, but the air in northern California can be cool and moist from the sea, even in July, and the windows of the bubble car are fogged up.

I spend the evening chatting to camp commander Douglas and with Lauren too, the latter of whom tells me that his experience in the army has turned him into a communist. I think that is just what people here like to call themselves when they have a strong rebellious streak.

Eagle's Nest

 

Golden Eagle...or possibly a Kestrel

Wild Bull

 

camera fogged up after the boat ride

 

Day 336 – 03 July 2010: Big Lagoon

This morning I rent a kayak to go across the Big Lagoon, 9.5 miles in circumference and 3.5 miles in length along the shore. The woman who runs the kayak hire warns me that the wind is due to pick up in the afternoon to 35 mph inshore and probably higher here, and advises me not to do the whole circumference. She emphasises later that the kayaks are designed to be paddled into the wind, if I should get caught out.

I hadn’t necessarily planned to go all the way to the other end, but as I paddle along the western shore and go around each bend, I feel the urge to at least reach the next one. After an hour and a half paddling into the wind, after some cigarette stops, I reach the north end of the lagoon. The ocean only climbs into the lagoon at the very highest of tides. I climb up onto the beach and there is no man or beast in site. The water here is too cold to swim in, but even if it weren’t, the rip tides that cause waves to crash onto the beach could batter a body. It’s a brown foamy tide here, so is the prettiest sea view either.

On the way back with the wind pushing me east, I try to keep along the west bank as far as I can, surfing the current now rippling with small waves, before trying to attack across the lagoon back to the south end of the lagoon. For the first half hour, I make good progress, paddling only on my left side to keep the wind from turning me around. I’m having fun now and for a while I think I will get back to the south end in just an hour.

However, the wind picks up violently and my attempts to paddle across the wind back towards the west bank are a waste of energy. I wind up in the sand marsh shallows of a creek flowing into the lagoon from the east. I get out to walk, dragging the kayak behind me. I take off my crocs as they are dragging water and sand with me, but then I cut my foot on a rock hidden by the shiny surface of the floor.

Fed up, I decide to get back into the kayak for one last heaving attack into the wind. I can’t take a break from paddling as I will just get blown backwards into the shallows. This saunter across the lagoon turns into a lot more exercise than I had planned for. Eventually, the wind dies down and as I enter the cove of the boat launch area, I am finally sheltered. I mention my little adventure to the kayak rental woman, who repeats that I should always paddle into the wind, which would be fine if I only wanted to go in one direction.

I have come to a point in my trip where my money is running out and I don’t know exactly where to go next. My rental car has to be back in a few days, which means that I will probably not have enough time to visit Oregon, which Stewart in LA had highly recommended I visit. My original plan when I landed in LA was to end up on the east coast about a month later. Five weeks later I am still on the west coast of California.

To rent a car and leave it on the opposite side of the US works out to be too expensive for me. I consider catching trains, but Amtrak seems to have a ‘can’t get there from here’ network. I even think about getting a Greyhound bus across to Miami, but I have heard too many horror stories about who might be my fellow passengers. Apparently I’ll be lucky to get off the bus still wearing all my clothes, nevermind my guitar or luggage. Hmm, perhaps I am ready to go back to normal life.

Tomorrow I will be taking a jet boat ride down the Klamath River. The Klamath originates in Oregon and its mouth lies at the centre of west coast of Redwood National Park.

I head north to find a campsite nearer the river and the first one I see signs for is called ‘Kamp Klamath’. It is only a few dollars more than the woodland campsite by Dry Lagoon Beach I stayed at last night and has hot showers and a café restaurant overlooking a field by the bank of the river. I spend the rest of the day sat in the patio seating of the café pretending to look at emails while I listen to other people chatter. Most of the people on the patio work at the campsite and are preparing a fourth of July BBQ feast for tonight.

The man chopping carrots for the salad turns out to be a competent German and Russian speaker, chatting amiably with a Swiss man. He eventually volunteers the information, in English, that he served with the US Army as a tank gunner and also as an intelligence analyst, which seems an odd combination. Like Charlie, my Green Tortoise bus driver, he is somewhat embittered by his experience in the Army, feeling that the American people have been fooled by the US media about the country’s role in the world and its supposed enemies.

Lauren, as I eventually learn he is called, also speaks Korean, having served there at one time in his military career. Asked by the Swiss man if he had been an officer, he responds ostentatiously in Korean, before translating, that he doesn’t care for officers.

Meanwhile, Commander Douglas, the camp’s boss, happily guts a huge sea bass, pointing it toward me in mock attack.

notice in men's showers

Day 335 – 02 July 2010: I’ve been to Hollywood, I’ve been to Redwood

The family opposite are not any quieter in the morning, nor any less friendly, offering me their leftover tortilla chips for breakfast while they pack up. They are still trying to place my accent and the little girls come over to say superfluous hellos to get me to say something.

I overhear the younger lady, presumably the mother and also the main vocal force of the family, say that she once took in a cat which, on the first day she had it, crapped on her bible. I think about telling her how I once crapped on a yak, but given her frequent references to the bible, I decide she may not share my sense of humour.

The boys had still not risen and are refusing to. ‘Get Up!’ shouts the mom, volume no obstacle, but the boys won’t budge even after a crescendo of orders to arise. Eventually though, the sound waves defeat their attempts to rest in and the eldest, who I have learned is a fourteen year old called Marcus, emerges from his tent visibly cranky. I missed the prevocational context, but he starts shouting at one his younger sisters ‘shithead, shithead, shithead’ and then, after his mother tells him to stop swearing, ‘kaka, kaka, kaka’. ‘You’ve lost your allowance for a month’, shouts his mom, which elicits whispering under Marcus’s breath. ‘Stop whining you fourteen year old baby!’ bellows Mom. ‘Yeah, stop whining, you fourteen year old baby!’ repeats his sister. ‘Stop that’, exclaims Mom.

The older woman, presumably the Aunty, seems to have much more control over the kids, and is calmer, but only marginally. ‘Did you accuse me of smoking dope?’ she asks Marcus.

‘I said you were smoking a roach’.

‘Don’t accuse me of smokin’ no roaches!’

‘I said roach, not roaches’, protests Marcus.

Aunty, who walks awkwardly due to a slight back defect or injury, asks Marcus if he wants to box. ‘I’ll come at you like a steamboat!’ she says in reinforcement.

‘I’ll come at you like a spider monkey!’ replies Marcus. It’s not clear if Aunty knows what these are, and there follows a discussion about what other fantastic creatures he might come at her like. It is still not 9 a.m.

Eventually I leave them to it to go down to the lake to take a dip. However, it is not perfect swimming, as the edge of the lake is a flooded end of the car park. There are plenty of hiking trails that surround the lake which come recommended by my Frommer’s Guidebook but, as I am keen to get to Redwood to find a camping spot, I only go for a short walk along the lakeside watching the water-skiers pierce the waters across the lake.

The drive to Redwood National Park should take three or four hours, but I find that the area designated as the park, which is an amalgamation of State Parks, doesn’t cover all of the attractions the area has to offer. I stop first at the ‘Loghouse’, a cosy tunnel bungalow carved out of a felled Redwood, next to a roadside giftshop. Nearby is the ‘Grandfather Tree’, a very wide Redwood in the grounds of a giftshop stopover. Next, I stop to see the living ‘Chimney Tree’, a hollow Redwood with a doorway which is seemingly alive, though I am not sure if this is just the greenery growing out of it. The gift shop here is closed though.

After discovering that all of the National Park campsites are full for the weekend, I am directed to a first come, first serve site hidden in the woods by Dry Lagoon Beach. Though it does have drop toilets, the site is deep in the woods and I have to walk a dense forest trail to get to my pitch. At $20, it isn’t much cheaper than a private campsite would be.

I got some pot noodles and tins of fruit and tuna, but with no cooking utensils and no can opener, I have to make do with a granola bar dinner.

at Lake Mendocino

 

the roads of Redwood

 

Day 334 – 01 July 2010: On the Road

Finally, I leave San Francisco, on route to Redwood National Park having picked up another rental car from the airport. I go to Mendocino Lake, a beautiful spot off the more frequented tourist trail. It seems to be mostly Californians visiting here, with families swimming in the lake and boats trailing water skiers speeding around it.

I camp at Chekaka, a basic campground near the lake. The place will be packed at the weekend with campers celebrating the 4^th of July, but there is space for me to stay tonight. In the plot opposite me there is a family of two middle aged women, possibly sisters though one looks notably older than the other, accompanied by a pod of kids who come and go from their pitch. They are a loud but friendly group, who are visibly curious about my accent, though they don’t say anything. They offer me some of their spare firewood, with the eldest boy helping me to carry it.

The boy who helped me with the firewood leaves to go to bed saying to the older looking lady ‘sorry I was mean to you earlier, I love you’. ‘I know you do’ she replies. I remember this only because of what occurs the next morning.

I go to have dinner in nearby Ukiah at what is called here a ‘brew pub’, i.e. one with its own micro-brewery. I drink some wine and have a passable burger while listening to an easy listening jazz band in the background playing for tips. I am not sure what emotions this sort of music is supposed to evoke, but it makes me feel like a lonely loser sitting at the bar for the company of alcohol. Looking into the mirror at the back of the bar, I can’t help feeling that life on the road over the past year has aged me noticeably.

lighting fire in California summer is easy

Day 333 – 30 June 2010: Going Electric

Feeling that I haven’t really explored San Francisco, I decide to rent a bike. As a hostel dweller, the reception tells me I can get a discounted rate of $18 if I go to a specific shop. However, when I pass a shop renting out electric bikes, my muscles that have tensed up at the thought of trying to push myself up San Franciscan hills walk me through the door. It will be $30 much better spent than on some buffet dinner in Las Vegas I tell myself.

From the west end of Fishermen’s Wharf, I go along the north shoreline past ‘Aquatic Park’, a small beach area almost enclosed by a hooked pier. This area is Presidio Park which originated as a military base founded by the Spanish in 1776 and it is from where the Golden Gate Bridge launches. I drove over the bridge a couple of weeks previously, but cycling over it is rather more hazardous....for pedestrians. Cyclists have to use the fenced off pavements on the sides of the bridge and legions of latex clad cyclists speed along it regardless of the fact that the path is shared with those on foot. Several overtake me as I move cautiously along looking out for people stepping out from the swarm of walkers.

I cycle down to Sausalito, the fishing port turned upmarket tourist stop across the bridge. I have doubts about my bikes ability to get me back up the hill on my return, but I gleefully overtake struggling cyclists, many of whom resort to walking. The extra $12 for the electric motor is definitely worth it.

After cycling back across the bridge, I travel south through Golden Gate Recreational Reserve. I stop by the grand ‘Legion of Honour’ war memorial and museum, which has a Rodin Thinker sculpture taking pride of place in the courtyard. Museums are expensive in California, the state’s notoriously perilous financial state limiting scope for subsidy, and this one charges $25 so I don’t go in.

On the hill up the Legion, my bike’s battery runs out, despite my efforts to only use the electric on uphill slopes. Come to think of it, most of my time was spent on uphill slopes, as the downhill ones don’t take so long. There is very little flatland in SF. From being the best and speediest bike on the road, I now find myself cycling an ill designed lump weight of metal with the dynamics of a tractor.

I get down the hill going along Ocean Beach and then into Golden Gate Park. I get lost in the park again, until finding an exit to establish my position. The hills I have to cycle up to get back to Fisherman’s Wharf are of the type SF is famous for, and even pushing the bike is a strain.

After giving the bike back, I go back to the hostel, and get a massage for $10 from a fellow resident. The masseuse is another Brit from Great Yarmouth. She tells me she loves SF because she can ‘feel the energy of the sea’. Um, that would be the wind coming from the bay and your mouth I can’t help thinking to myself.

A short walk down Broadway is the ‘Beat Museum’, with what I think is a replica, but may be the actual car that once took Jack Kerouac on a long journey. ‘On the Road’ is still near compulsory reading in SF, especially amongst the hostel dwellers. Actually I have a copy myself, which I bought in China of all places. I can’t think that ‘On the Road’ promotes a lifestyle that would be approved by the government of the People’s Republic. I’ve given up reading it though, as its prose has aged badly. It now reads like someone trying too hard to be ‘real hip, man’.

After helping out to cook a free dinner in the hostel, I chat to a photographer from Hawaii who tells me he does wildlife photography work for National Geographic. However, he also does ‘gallery work’. He has the air of someone confident that people will find him interesting, and seems too eager to share his stories with me. But then, what am I doing? He shows me a diverting video on his camera of some homeless people playing drums on upturned garbage bins and an old beat up guitar, a film he tells me he took last night in the small hours.

Later I chat to Tim, a German furniture maker taking a few months off to travel. We are both waiting for a hostel organised bar crawl offering the first couple of drinks free, though of course we will still have to tip the barman. However, after a couple of bars we realise that we are being led to a series of dance clubs with conversation defeating music and I suspect the bar staff are too used to getting 15% of nothing for the free drinks as the bar service is nearly absent. Tim and I retreat back to the hostel ‘ballroom’ for drinks and a few games of pool.

Alcatraz

 

fishing on the pier

relics from Presidio's time as an army base

 

Bucket Drummer at Fisherman's Wharf

floating restaurant

The Beat Museum