Day 2 – To Mendocino
N39º 18.007' W123º 47.518'
I woke up at 6am, got dressed, had breakfast, checked out, and got a cab to the motorcycle store that has been Alessandro’s temporary quarters for the last couple of weeks. According to the service manager, there was no real ‘smoking gun’ that they found. Might have been the cam chain tension, might have been the timing belt tension, but by that point the engine was already apart so they don’t really know. They’d taken it for three test drives, though, and all was running properly. After going into the back for a minute, the service rep came back and said that it was running out back, and already to go.
“Ummm… don’t we have a little paperwork to do?’, I ask earnestly. I know of the reputation of Ducati repair costs, after all. He looked at me and asked, “You signed a service order when you brought it in, right?” I indicated in the affirmative. “All right then,” he says, “you’re good to go.” Really? “Yup.” (Breton — you’ll want to cover your eyes for this next part…) “No charge,” says he. “Ducati agreed to pick up the labour, so everything is covered.”
I packed up the bike and hit the highway, being careful because of the fog. The guy in the service department said that the fog can create ice-like conditions. He’d spun out his Porsche in the parking lot on the way in that morning. He did acknowledge, however, that this was the result of a very deliberate attempt on his part.
Heading up Highway 1, I took the exit towards Castroville (artichoke centre of the world, they would like you to know) and beyond it San Francisco. Shortly after getting on the highway, the GPS wanted me to turn left. Not that this instruction made any sense, and being at this point used to conflicting directions from the GPS, I carried on. It kept on updating to make left turns, and finally escalated it’s demands to requests for a U-turn. I eventually figured that it was wanting me to go pick up some waypoint before carrying on. (I once went 4 hours to Fort McMurray this way, with the GPS insisting I turn around. When I got there, it wanted me to turn back down the main highway, bag the waypoint, and turn around — for a total journey of 10 hours — when I was less than a mile from my hotel).
At about the time I decided to try resetting the navigation, however, I also came to the realization that the road I was on didn’t look familiar anymore. Consulting the new route, I discovered that I’d confused Highway 1 to San Francisco with Highway 101 to San Francisco (honest mistake) and was now on the interstate that made Dianne swear off ever driving again in California. Briefly considering my options, it seemed the best thing was to backtrack 12 miles and rejoin Highway 1.
One of those points of breathtaking beauty.
The highway from Monterey to San Francisco is a bit of a mixed bag. There are points of breathtaking beauty, and at the same time there are interminable stretches of highway that simply need to be endured. Sort of like enduring the plotline of a Lara Croft movie for those brief moments when you get to ogle Angelina Jolie’s butt.
It feels good to be in the open air again…
San Francisco was a relative joy, however. When Dianne and I drove through at the beginning of July, we struggled through interminable stop-and-go traffic. The traffic was still there, but I got to blissfully bypass it. In California, lane-splitting is legal; or at least, it isn’t illegal. That means that every time I came upon a red light, I was able to filter through to t he front of the line and have first dibs on the empty lanes ahead of me when the light changes. It’s good to be a motorcyclist.
The Golden Gate Bridge, with fog.
Over a fog-shrouded Golden Gate Bridge, I take the exit to Mt. Tamalpais. On one side of the mountain, urban hell; on the other side, a rural expanse that belies its proximity to a major centre. To get there, however, you have to traverse the mountain. Take every twist and turn on the highway from Qualicum Beach to Tofino. Keep the elevation changes. Compress into 5 miles of road. This is the road over Mt. Tamalpais Regardless of what you are driving, it is technical in the extreme, a point rendered obvious by the dude in the blue Corvette that thought he was the cat’s pyjamas but fluffed the left hand hairpin he came across. And if you are reading, sir, yes that haircut makes you look dorky.
Dianne would really rather I didn’t take pictures like this…
Just over the other side of Mt. Tamalpais lies a whole other world, however, as evidenced by the imminent presence of the Pelican Inn, a genuine British pub in the middle of coastal California. Sadly not drinking, I nonetheless had a lovely lunch before hitting the highway and starting to revel in the coast highway. This is a highway that engineers have failed to impact. Apparently, most of the roads in these parts were originally paths worn down by animals. Who knew cows were the first motorcyclists?
Fog emerges on one side of the road…
While the road was beautiful, the weather was repeatedly changing. It never rained per se, but the fog was at times extremely intense, especially when the road hugged the coastal cliffs above the Pacific. These, of course, were also the most challenging of turns and hairpins, frequently admonishing speeds of 15 mph, 10mph and — in one noticeable instance — 5mph. Cautions to be heeded. This road is the motorcycling equivalent of a double black diamond ski run; you had better know what you are doing. The consequence of cluelessness would be the equivalent of dressing a novice skier in the latest fashions, slapping new boards on, and sending them down the steepest runs of St. Moritz… or out of bounds in BC. If you are going to do this, I strongly advise leaving a note and letting someone know where you’ll be.
…while the other side still shows sun.
The ride for the first few hours, though, was nothing more than glorious. The road was largely deserted, the bends kept coming one after the other, and the countryside was gorgeous. Sadly, though, somewhere between Point Reyes and Bodega Bay I lost my sense of humour. Of things to fall off of a motorcycle at speed, this could be considered inconsequential. It doesn’t really make a noise and leaves little evidence of its fall, but is nonetheless potentially dangerous to other drivers should they run across it.
This is what motorcycling is all about!
It is now my considered belief that a healthy sense of humour is essential to successful motorcycling (and possibly life). With it, you can do just about anything. Without it, and progress —where it is made — is at best miserable, with the potential to go downhill from there. As I got further into the countryside, the road hugs the cliffs above the ocean, with exceptionally tight hairpin turns. The consequences of not making a turn are severe, although the ocean will quickly conceal all evidence of your transgression. Throw in pea-soup fog, aggressive drivers, uneven road surfaces and an on-going struggle to keep the bike in a reasonable rev range, and it quickly stopped being fun and started feeling way too much like work.
This is where it all started to go horribly, horribly wrong…
Stopping to fill up my gas in Gualala fortunately offered a different perspective. I was an hour away from my destination, on the first day of a five-day road trip, and success wasn’t measured in how fast I got there, dammit. Success is a product of how much I enjoy getting there. The degree of enjoyment experienced, however, is entirely up to me. I can choose to have a great time, and I can choose to be miserable; the universe will accommodate either experience with equanimity. I’m opting for pleasure, thank you very much.
The last hour felt alot like riding in the fall. It was cooler, with an enduring fog and mist that wrapped the coat in a wet and clammy embrace (not the most romantic experience, by all accounts, but it’s not all about romance, now, is it?). By way of compensation, however, the occupants of many houses had a woodfire going to warm up and dry out. The net effect was riding through a world redolent in the smells of a warm hearth, damp cedar and the ozone smell of the ocean. Heady stuff, and one of the truly wonderful things about riding a bike.
New mindset or not, by the time I finally got to Mendocino I was tired, achey and ready to stop. Dianne had made me a dinner reservation for 7:30, and I pulled into the parking lot at exactly 7:05. Oil the chain, check in, unpack, change and in to dinner. Which was an experience. The Stanford Inn in Mendocino is a four-star ‘eco resort’. Beautiful scenery, comfortable rooms, and a vegetarian restaurant. To be clear, a vegetarian restaurant of the vegan persuasion. No milk, no cheese, no fish, no animal products of any kind. And yet, dinner was absolutely fabulous. Sushi, followed by a pear and spinach salad, and ravioli made with kalamata olive paste and tofu ‘ricotta’.
This place serves meat, and lots of it.
And wine! Here’s my cool discovery: Wine is vegan. Gin is vegan. Even cognac is vegan! If worse comes to worse, and I do find that I am the first one with my back against the wall when the revolution comes, I think I’ll be able to hack it. Or at least, I’ll be happy enough that the consequences won’t seem quite so severe. Of course, I’m going to ignore the irony that lunch was slabs of prime rib sandwiched between a couple of hunks of bread, with a pot of au jus on the side. The vegans wouldn’t be best pleased with me if I let that slip.
This place, not so much.