Wednesday 1st July 2009 – Lost in the Forest

California Highway 1 is much used by cyclists for exercise. It winds its way across the hills from Leggett to the coast, where it is named the 'Shoreline Highway'. I found it quite enough exercise just driving it. It really was physically quite strenuous, even although there were few places it was possible to get above about 30mph. Sometimes we had to travel at the cyclists' pace, since there was no space to pass, and no sightlines to allow using the other side of the road. Often the trees come right up to the edge of the driving space, with no verge at all. It was quite an exhilarating experience.

What with the covering of giant redwoods, and the extreme twisting and turning, the fair Dulcinea got severely knicker-twisted from time-to-time. When she doesn't know what's going on, she is inclined to shout "recalculating, recalculating" repeatedly; when she doesn't know were she is, she falls silent, passing a written note saying "acquiring satellites", whatever that might mean.

So while I'm wrestling with Rozzie, dear old Dulcie is adding to the general sense of chaos by shouting incomprehensibly, and passing daft notes all the time. The great redwoods watch impassively. I'm not much of a one for scenery, but even I am mightily impressed when the road gives me a breather to look.

US 101, from Eureka to Leggett, goes through the Humboldt forest, with the trees getting denser,

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and denser,

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and denser.

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Eventually, at Leggett, we are reduced to going through the trees.

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The woods are lovely, dark, and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep: a hair-raising run down the cliff edge to Fort Bragg. Fort Bragg is a very strange kind of seaside resort. The beach is fenced off for the entire length of the town. If it's beach your after, you have to go out-of-town to get it. On the other hand, they have a rather nifty railroad. [6056]

And a 'Micro' brewery, with its very own brewery tap. To which I repaired, later that same evening.

In the course of testing out the local product I discover that, no sooner have I got here than California has gone bust. US States have to set their budgets by July 1^st, and, not being actual countries, can't print their own money, so the books have to balance. California is reduced to issuing post-dated cheques (they say 'checks' here), which amounts to printing money.

Retailers like you to know how much tax you're paying when they give you the bill. There is much hilarity in the Brewery Tap, with requests to pay the tax part of the bill with a post-dated check. Bills are paid at the end of the evening. The saintly barmaids try to feign amusement.