Sunday, September 24, 2017

Days 21 & 22 - A day off in Ft. Bragg, and then on to Fairfield, CA

Day 21 was a planned day off in Ft. Bragg - I had already had more than enough days off in Missoula, but skipping this would throw off lots of hotel and AirBnB reservations, so we kept it on the schedule. A bit of sleeping in, then coffee and out to explore around Fort Bragg. We decided to head down to Glass Beach as it was something we all wanted to see. This beach is mostly comprised of beach glass (or sea glass).



Its a bit hard to see in this photo, but the beach surface is more glass than sand/rock/pebbles. When you pick up a handful, you can see its mostly glass.



Read more about glass beach HERE. Sadly, the beach glass is disappearing as people cant seem to leave things be and are taking it home. At some point, it will just be another beach.

The trail along the shore was nice, and according to the signs, it would wind back around to the other side of town where we needed to go - what it didn't say that 2 miles down the trail was blocked off for construction, and you had to turn around and walk all the way back the way you came! Gah! At least there was nice scenery.


We found a great little pizza joint for lunch, then went back to the hotel for a bit. I had some maintenance on the bike I had to do, and after the 7 mile walk, we were all a bit tired. Later that evening, we went back to Glass Beach to watch the sunset,


Day 22 - Fort Bragg, CA to Fairfield, CA

We were out and on the road by 7 - we didn't have a huge amount of miles to cover today, but there was sightseeing and it would all be 2-lane roads, so we knew it would take longer than the GPS said it would. 

Leaving Fort Bragg, we stopped for fuel - excuse the language, but what the fuck does California have against credit cards? I can't remember the last time I had such a hard time using a credit card for purchases! And your gas pumps! Gah! It has never taken me so long to get 4 gallons of gas in a motorcycle!

The first stop of the day was at Point Cabrillo Lighthouse. It was a 1/2 mile walk from the parking area down to the light, but it was paved and not too bad. It was still pretty early, so nothing at the light was open, but we still got some good photos. We also startled a bunch of deer having their breakfast!


A few miles down the road was our second lighthouse of the day - Point Arena Light. John had looked up the website the night before, and we all agreed that Point Arenas was pretty full of itself. Decide for yourself at the website HERE.

It wasn't open when we got there, so we had to take photos from the parking lot. We all agreed that Point Cabrillo was prettier.



The next stop was at Sea Ranch Chapel. I had found this on Roadside America, and planned a stop, but I did not think we would enjoy it as much as we did. It was a really beautiful little chapel. Certainly worth a visit if you are in the area.



A little further down the road was the Expanding Universe Peace Obelisk. This was also more impressive than I had expected. All of the decoration on the obelisk is mosaic tile - pretty impressive!


All in all... the scenery along CA-1 is fantastic, but that is about it. The road is in really bad shape, and there was some sort of bicycle race going on for the entire route, making for slow going. Note to California drivers - DO NOT PASS A GROUP OF BICYCLES IN A BLIND TURN! I don't like seeing the grille of a car in MY lane when rounding said corner in the opposite direction!


We stopped in Point Reyes for a really nice lunch - John and I had grilled tri-tip sammiches and Erin had a smoked trout. Both were really good - better than expected. During lunch we talked about the ride so far and agreed that it would be best to abandon CA-1 and just go directly to the AirBnB in Fairfield the most direct route. 

After checking in, John and I headed to the grocery store to get provisions for dinner. After a few drinks on the deck overlooking the valley, we cooked up a fantastic spaghetti dinner with a nice bottle of wine.


All in all, a pretty great day!

Today's miles - 208

Total miles - 3904

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