9/12: into the great bear state

Total of 71mi, with more climbing than I have seen with my GPS recording since we started. Good prep for the hardest day, which is yet to come. 

9mi from our camp departure, we crossed the border into Cali. I made sure to yell sing the OC theme song for good measure.

Amusingly, there was a logjam of bike tourists wanting to take their picture at the border sign. Gabe even had to take a pic of a mother and daughter crossing into Oregon going the other way. Here's the one I got on my phone:

Crescent City turned out to me a bit more quiet than I was hoping. We finally managed to find an open bike shop. We bought an extra inner tube, a set of brake  pads, and I tried to get my rear detailed tuned up. We also pumped up out tires past what we could do with our travel pumps. Matt was pretty aggressive with his rear tube, which was already a replacement. 

Gabe had looked up some Thai place, so we ate there. Around the area, I noticed that the poverty and lifestyle were a bit more bleak and obvious than in Oregon. 

As soon as we left Crescent City, Matt lost his rear tube. The extra pressure must have shifted something sharp and pierced the tube. So we threw on the tube he'd just bought. I tried tweaking my seat post a bit higher only to strip the threads on the bolt. It was sheer luck that Matt had a spare bolt of the right size. I was not relishing biking back to the shop. 

Raising my seat that extra 2mm made a huge difference in my pedaling stroke. I'm guessing either the post had slipped down some from the weakened bolt, or perhaps the seat had started flattening. Biking with the right fitment can make a huge difference. That's something people underestimate. 

We got over a huge hill out of Crescent City. The trees belied the changing geography:

There were certainly plenty of gimmicks to do with redwood trees. I'd forgotten the Paul Bunyan legend:

Then we entered Klamath. Here, I saw a interesting shop:

A very nice lady ran the shop and gave us samples. The 3-day smoked salmon was incredible, so I got a 1/3 lb. I also picked up some elk jerky. 

It was late, like 3p. Typically, we're within an hour of camp at this time. We had the option of camping near Klamath or pushing another 15mi with a climb into a redwood park. We ran around a bit getting food for dinner and breakfast, going back and forth over a 1 lane bridge. This took at least 40 min. The gas station we ended up shopping at had slots machines that were well attended. The people who came in again had a different trace of destitution to them. I couldn't put my finger on it.

[1 year anniversary note:
when we were turning around, this weird family in an old red Subaru Legacy pulled up to Matt at an intersection. The driver mumbled some pseudo-philosophical lesson to Matt, which he didn't get clearly. Once we finally left Klamath a second time, the Legacy blew by us on the bridge. They seemed to have been collecting junk in the town. The rear hatch suddenly flew open, and we got treated to a view of a bunch of bikes piled in the back. One of the bike wheels flew out and bounced and rolled off to the side, where construction crews were patching up the bridge. The car actually stopped on the bridge, completely holding up traffic. We moved around it because we were in a hurry to get to camp, but the cars behind didn't have that luxury. It was all pretty strange.]

So we stocked up and made the second climb. It was manageable. The reward was a 6-mile descent into the camp. I only had to pedal 23 strokes the whole way (I counted each one). It was such a view, big redwood ally trees (I think that's what they're called -- the big conifers that coexist with redwoods) lining the winding road, light barely filtering through the heavy mist. 

It was almost night by the time we reached the end of that glide. This was our first camp in the state of California. There's the possibility of bears here, so all the trash cans are bear proofed. Similarly, each camp site has a strong box for locking away your supplies. I could just about fit into it. 

There were no bears.

9/12 pics: https://picasaweb.google.com/105909573807230408134/BikeTour912?authkey=Gv1sRgCP6xpOeLk6KGHQ