One Direction: The Bike Tour Edition

We entered the campsite to find it nearly all occupied, and right after we cleaned up after dinner, five boys from the UK pulled in needed a place to set up. They lugged in a picnic table from another site and by eavesdropping on their chattering I was immediately transported into a Britcom. 

"Did anyone see the other tomahto? We had three and now I can't find it. Patrick, did you do anything with the tomahto?"

"Do you have the lighter Harry? I need matches so I can do it like a cowboys, how they flick it on the bottom of their boot. They do that in all the cowboy films."

"Frank, stop playing with the stove like that. I mean it Frank, turn the flame down. FRANCES STOP IT YOU'LL MAKE IT BLOW UP."

Travis talked to these boys a little the next day, and it turns out that they just graduated from high school and were taking a travel break during the year before attending Uni, which is encouraged in Europe. Travis affectionately called them One Direction, and we probably won't see them again because they're booking it to San Francisco doing like 80 miles a day.

We've met lots of different people on this trip in the hiker biker campsites, and though we haven't taken the time or energy to really cultivate relationships with any of them, it's interesting to see what people are doing and where people are coming from. We've met quite a few Europeans, like a Dutch couple, a Spanish girl, some German boys. I'm assuming their stories are pretty standard: "I'm European and I get ridiculous amounts of paid vacation time every year, so for these two months I'm taking my time visiting the West Coast of America."

I like gawking at other tourists. There are quite a few solo males, actually I'd say the majority of people touring this route are solo males. Most of them keep to themselves, but you have to watch out for the old solo dudes. They're the talkers. We overheard a conversation between two old dudes that lasted for like three hours one morning and went something like this:

"You have to watch some restaurants, they'll include an 18% gratuity on the receipt, and if you're not watching you'll leave an EXTRA tip."

"You can't depend on airlines these days. That's why they call it Delta- Don't Ever Leave The Airport."

We've met a few couples doing the route together, and the very few lone females. I definitely respect the lone females. The most impressive girl has been a Forest Service firefighter who was busting out a 10 day trip from Bend, Oregon to San Francisco to visit her friend. She only had three little bags (no racks or panniers) and slept in a bivvy to save weight. She said if it really rained hard she could string up a tarp tent with a rope and a few knots in a flash, one of the many survival skills she learned as a wilderness firefighter. BADASS.

We've met people riding with all kinds of setups, like couples traveling with massive amounts of gear (six bags each!); a couple on a tandem; one dude riding a track bike with deep V wheels; dudes riding solo with BOB trailers; a couple riding with a dog trailer carrying their trembling four pound dog; a girl walking her bike up a hill lugging a trailer carrying her 40 pound dog. It's interesting to see how other people do it, and it's inspiring me to want to cut some weight AND definitely carry along SOME kind of animal next tour. I'm pretty sure my cat Abby Ryan would be down for some bike touring. 

Fern Canyon

We arrived at Elk Prairie campground relatively early in the afternoon. Since it was only 2pm, we figured we had plenty of time to see a recommended sight: Fern Canyon. 

There are no direct roads connecting the campground to Fern Canyon, which is located ten miles away. There is just a Park Service "road" that peeters out into a single track mountain bike trail, and then joins a gravel road that descends dramatically towards the beach.  

When I say that the road "descended dramatically", I mean I freaked out about how we were going to get back to our campsite before dark. I mean I slammed on my brakes and felt I was diving down the gravel. It took us an hour and a half to reach the beach, and it was 4pm when we arrived. As we travel further south, the days keep getting shorter and shorter, and I imagined us struggling up this gravel hill for hours then navigating the forest mountain bike trail in pitch black, making it back to the campsite around 9pm. I decided right then and there that I would see this canyon BUT I would try my hardest to hitchhike back to camp.

Well, good thing because this canyon was EPIC. For whatever reason, the creek flowing down the bluffs carved out a fifty foot canyon through the sandy cliffs to meet the ocean, and on these canyon walls grows seven species of ferns. The creek had slowed to meandering flow, and there were plenty of huge fallen logs to navigate so you wouldn't get your feet wet. It was truly magical and unlike anything I've ever seen. 

But then we had to go back to camp. It was 5:30, and the sun was starting to make long shadows beneath us. I started up the gravel road and stuck out my thumb. I was dreading the climb, hoping that SOMEONE would have pity and let us through our bikes in their mini SUV. I choked on the gravel dust as the cars passed and passed, no luck. 

But then, after only riding for like 15 minutes, we were back at the start of the mountain bike trail. It was still light. I hadn't collapsed from exhaustion. We were halfway back to the campsite. 

We had worked ourselves us so much about the hill that it was over in no time. I thank the previous day's bi-hiking for crushing it on the climb. We made it back to camp in 45 minutes, with plenty of time to cook dinner AND see that night's ranger program. 

These little legs must be getting stronger and stronger. 

Lost Coast Highway

Learning from our previous mapping lessons, Travis asked a ranger about a "bike trail" that would bypass a gnarly high-traffic hill on 101. This is where we learned a new lesson: people who don't ride bikes don't always give good bike route advice. 

The ranger said that there were some tough switchbacks at first, but eventually it levels out, following the path of the old Pacific Coast Highways. It was only five miles anyway, and he was definitely recommended the route instead of the dangerous 101 section. 

The trail started off nicely graveled, following close to the coast cliffs. Aaaaaaaand then it took a turn straight up a dry, rocky cliff creek bed. Like straight up. Like impossible-to-ride-so-you-better-push-your-damn-bike-and-all-your-gear up. At one point I asked Travis if he thought this was a 45 degree angle, and he said, "No, that would be impossible, because then with each step we'd be going forward and up at the same rate."

I'm pretty sure we were pushing our bikes a 45 degree angle up a cliff. Turns out the easiest way for me to do it was to bend at the waist, press my chest into the handlebars and push with my whole body with each step. I chanted in my head, 'I'm very strong. I'm very strong. I'm very strong.' 

I called it "bi-hiking".

Eventually we reached the ridge, and were able to ride again. I'll tell you what, there's nothing like bi-hiking to make you appreciate the relative ease of riding a bicycle instead of pushing it, even if it is on a steep hiking path. 

And then, suddenly, I noticed the pavement.

The path had leveled off, but it was still cutting straight through an ancient Redwood grove, overgrown with Redwood sorrel in the margins and flanked with sword ferns. Yet there were the white lane lines marking where cars had driven on this pavement before the 1950s, back when the old Pacific Coast Highway ushered sightseers along this scenic route.

The forest had done a magnificent job of reclaiming this human intrusion, and it was utterly surreal to be riding on smooth, level road through this isolated grove without the presence of cars, or anyone else for that matter. 

This was my favorite campsite so far. We just set up the tent in the middle of the road. It was by a little creek and it was flat. We had the Redwoods all to ourselves. 

Into the Land of Ancients

The fall from luxury was quick and brutal: one night we're sleeping in a discounted motel room, the next night we're squatting illegally in a county park. There are some lessons that you learn from bike tour, and one of them is that you can't trust Google with rural areas. Period. Travis found a great highway alternate route on Google Maps that disintegrated into patchy gravel headed straight up a mountain. So instead of making it to our intended campsite, we set up our tent in the back of a park that explicately said No Camping and then worried all night that we'd get in trouble because both our moms are teachers. 

We were on a trajectory back to the coast, but we still had to climb out of the desert rainshadow back over the Cascades to get there. The sun was out in full force. There was a canyon road without much of a shoulder. There were some burning legs. 70 miles and then...

Redwoods. 

The temperature dropped 15 degrees, the light level was filtered out by half, and the highway roars were immediately muffled as we pulled in to Jedediah Smith State and National Park. Impressively big trees filled a grove by the river, blanketing the road with fallen needles, and smack in the middle of that was our hiker biker campsite. 

We took another rest day. How could we not? These are the REDWOODS. They take some time to explore. 

Coast Redwood trees are in the same subfamily as Giant Sequoias. They are taller then Sequoias but not as massive. They are a prehistoric species, and in prehistoric times they grew all over North America and Europe, providing an herbaceous backdrop for dinosaur dramas. Then the asteroid hit and the dino drama was no more, and climate changes limited the Redwood realm to coastal California and southern Oregon. 

They like cool, coastal fog but they don't like salt so they never grow right on the coast. They also like consistent temperatures throughout the day and year- not too hot, not too cold. If the top of the tree is struck by lightening or broken off in a storm, no big deal. The main trunk sends out offshoots towards the canopy which can grow as large as a new trunk. Their roots only grow about two feet deep but spread out over hundreds of feet, intermingling with other Redwood roots in the grove, supporting each other structurally and with nutrient supplementation. Coastal California suited them just fine, and there they grew for thousands of years, literally. Redwoods can live over 1000 years and grow to heights over 360 feet. That's 36 stories high, y'all. 

Can you guess what happened next? Starting in the 1800s they were logged and logged and logged till the point where some folks decided they had to take a stand for their conservation. Who were these folks? Young college radical environmentalists tying themselves to trees? Nope, rich old Republicans. In the early 1900s, wealthy conservative Republicans started buying up old growth forests from timber companies and donated the trees to the state of California. Eventually the land was turned into a jointly managed State and National Park, stretching down the watershed that nourishes the giant trees.

Unfortunately less than 5% of all of California's magnificent old growth Redwoods remain. 

But you know, they fared better than their East Coast cousin. Redwoods are in the same family as the Bald Cypress, our ubiquitous, Spanish moss-covered swamp trees in Florida. Like the Redwoods, cypresses can grow very big and live for a very long time, and they also make excellent lumber. The logging companies cut every single tree they could, and our swamp trees didn't have wealthy donors and a conservation movement on their side. Our remaining giants only exist because they were too gnarled for boards or living deep in a bog too treacherous to reach.

What would Florida look like if we had our own Redwoods? Massive trees over a thousand years old, growing a dozen feet in diameter? Unfortunately we have to visit California to find out.