Today was just a day to cover distance. We spent most of our time on back roads and didn't have much a view of the ocean. The ocean along Hwy 101, when we were near it, was ok...it wasn't a deep blue as what we have been seeing during our tour on Hwy 1.
We got up at a reasonable hour and went to the convenience store attached to the Inn we were stayed in and picked up some sausage, egg, and cheese biscuits and juice for breakfast. We then headed out of Ferndale towards Eureka, CA. It was one of the last towns that we knew we could get camp fuel for quite awhile. The sun was shining and we didn't have strong headwinds.
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| Ferndale, CA |
When we arrived in Eureka, CA we immediately went to the local bicycle shop, Henderson Bicycles, to find out where get food. That is one thing that I've learned after years of traveling with James. If you want to find the best food, the best place to go is the local bicycle shops. They owners always know of the good local food joints. We were directed to the Oaxaca Grill on 508 Henderson street. The owner was super friendly and it was obvious he was trying to build his business and he really wanted to make his customers happy. We ate a giant burrito, fresh salsa, a tasty mole sauce with a Mexican Coke. Mexican Coke is made with sugar rather than high fructose corn syrup and it tastes less sweet -- the amount of simple sugars in the Mexican Coke close to "American" Coke though. After eating our burritos we ran into a bakery where James picked up some fresh bread that they sliced for us and we took with us.
We then headed across town to a sporting goods store / bicycle shop called Adventures Edge to get camp fuel and to look around. The guys at the shop were really nice and when they found out we had climbed "The Wall" they were quite impressed. While I was there I picked up a souvenir. My arm warmers I took with me were too warm for the the temperatures while I was riding but it was too cold and breezy to go without. So I bought a long sleeved synthetic blend shirt and it served me very well during the rest of the trip. Note to self: next time I tour the coast in May and June, take a couple of long sleeve synthetic shirts. The bicycle shop folks gave us a directions to a new bike path that would keep us off of Hwy 101. Granted going this way meant we covered a little more distance since it was the less direct route but we prefer to avoid the busy Hwy 101 and to stay off it as much as possible. In fact, we didn't go into Arcata, CA at all.
What we did was cross the bridge that went over Arcata Bay by taking "R street" out of town. Once we crossed the bridge we turned right on New Navy Base road and traveled on some back roads until we connected with the bike path called "Fischer road" that took us into McKinleyville, CA. The bike path runs alongside Hwy 101 until Clam Beach State Campground -- it isn't much of a campground and we didn't stay there but we did stop to have a snack. The roads were quite flat compared to what we did the day before, very low traffic, and it was quite pleasant. I was glad we made the decision to stay off of Hwy 101.
We rolled into Patrick's Point State Park and the camping for hiker/bikers was located on the cliffs above the ocean. We couldn't see the ocean but we could definitely hear the ocean as we camped that night. We were able to take a short hiking trail and watch the sunset on the ocean. I must say camping near an ocean beats staying in a hotel any day.
We rode 57 miles for the day and have a total of 445 miles on our legs for this trip.
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