On the Road Again - California Coast & Mount Shasta

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On collecting our van for the next 4 weeks from the rental depot in Dirty-Harry-suburbia San Francisco, we set a bearing of North over the Golden Gate bridge to Marin County, Northern California. We've estimated between 4000 to 5000 miles of tarmac for this escapade and looking at the road map, it takes the shape of a wide lasso being thrown around the Californian Coast, the Wild Wild West and the deserts of Utah, Arizona and Nevada.

It's a monster road-trip with 4 weeks to get back to San Francisco's Union Square so I was keen to get some miles under the belt straight away. This was difficult though because just 2 miles over the Golden Gate bridge, we looked down steep cliffs to the pretty sea-side hide away of Sausalito and caught an amazing view back to San Francisco. We had to drive down the hillside for a closer look and found a decent Italian dishing up some good pizza. I think we deserved it to calm the nerves after successfully navigating the van from South San-Fran to North San-Fran without any major glitches.

Once back on the road, we decided to drive to the Pacific coast via an inland detour to Napa and Sonoma, famous for lush green vineyards, rolling country hillsides and numerous wine tours. The tasting was tempting but when your driving a van, we reckoned it would be a bit unfair if only one of us could sample the regions grape while the other drove and to be honest, I have never really been much of a wine "taster"; admittedly, more of a wine "drinker".
So happily we continued East over the hills towards Mendocino County, where we caught up with Route 1 on the 4th of July and continued up the rugged North Californian Coast to Fort Bragg.

The drive up the coast was a fantastic first sampler of the next four weeks in the van. The rugged coastline lived up to its scenic reputation and appeared wilder than the coastline I travelled 3 years ago from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Nevertheless, there was a real sense of serenity in this neck of the woods and it wasn't uncommon to see that we were the only car cruising the road for miles ahead or behind.

By the time we reached Fort Bragg, the 4th of July fireworks were about to be lit and with light fading fast we prepared for our maiden night asleep in the van. It reminded me of having the van in New Zealand where picking the right spot to park up for the night can be a tricky business. You want somewhere private but not a million miles up some dirt track and also dont want the prospect of some local or cop tapping the window and asking you to "move on" somewhere else. Luckily we found a discrete lay-by hidden from the traffic of Route 1 and in the dead of night with the engine off, drifted asleep by listening to the muffled crashing of the Pacific waves meeting the cliffs of the coast far down below.

On getting up and pulling back the curtain in the van the next morning, we saw what we couldn't see the night before: the big blue sea rolling in just below us and great views South and North along the Coastline and of course, way out to the vast ocean itself.

That day, we snaked North along Route 1 following the wriggly coastline before cutting sharp inland at Arcata and climbing steep up into the densely forested mountains towards Willow Creek. It was a welcome feeling to be checking-in to an old country motel and at that very point, I felt really happy to be back on the road again in the back of beyond and away from the hustle and bustle of towns and cities. It seems like it's these places where you find the most interesting characters, like the woman behind the desk of the age-old Big Foot Motel in Willow Creek.

The next day, we headed further back inland towards the Oregon border where we we're chased in our minivan and flagged to pull over by some locals (gasp!)... had an encounter with the California State Patrol (gosh!) and got some nurture for the soul and good-feelings by helping a homeless old man out (aaaw...!) in the good old town of Weed, California...

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