Route 50 Road Trip: Day 13, California Finale

End of the line. Spent last night in a Best Western in the Soma district of San Fran. I thought about taking an evening wander through the city, but decided that I was pooped from fighting the rush hour traffic coming from Berkely. So, I stayed in and hit the sack early.



This morning I got up, packed, grabbed breakfast in the hotel (first hotel in which I've ever had to pay for the continental breakfast), and made it across the Golden Gate Bridge and up to Muir Woods National Monument by 8:30 am.



Even that early, though, there were a couple of big troops of people: One of Germans who split up and wandered about in smaller groups; the other a bunch of senior citizens, all outfitted with packs and trekking poles, who chattered so loudly that I heard them 5 minutes before I saw them behind me on the trail.



Like other things I've seen on this trip, I can't begin to describe the giant redwoods and I don't think my photos fully captured the effect of them. They were probably hundreds of years older and three times as tall as any tree I've seen on the east coast. The trail I took was a loop that started out from the main area around the visitor's center, then worked it's way fairly steeply along the side of a ridge. Below and around the trail, redwoods and ferns predominate. After climbing 900 feet or so, it was interesting to be almost on a level with the tops of trees growing up from the floor of the forest.

Crossing over the top of the ridge, the trail passes out of the redwood forest into a meadowy, wooded section that would have overlooked the coast if it hadn't been so foggy that morning. I did get a glimpse of Mt. Tamalpais, though, to the north.







Back at the visitor's center after my hike, it was very funny to listen to the tourists chatter and take photos of each other with their arms stretched out in front of one of the nearby giants, and to think of how ancient these woods are. All of our petty concerns really are inconsequential in comparison. To borrow a section from Abbey's Desert Solitaire, (changing the desert references to forest, of course):

"How difficult to imagine this place without a human presence, how necessary. I am almost prepared to believe that this sweet virginal primitive land will be grateful for my departure and the absence of the tourists... Grateful for our departure? One more expression of human vanity. The finest quality of this stone, these plants and animals... is the indifference manifest to our presence, our absence, our coming, our staying or our going."



It's a great thing that someone was awed enough by this place to preserve it, so that a bunch of other people can now run around here being silly and acting as if it were nothing but an amusement park of big trees and tame chipmunks.

I'm always torn in places like this. I'm incredibly grateful that it has been preserved. And then, of course, I have to admit that the tourists are a necessary evil. If they didn't come here and gawk, this land would be lost to the damned developers, the redwoods would be churned up, and these fern-covered hillsides would be turned from an amusement park into high income 'estate homes' or worse. As disruptive as they are, the tourists actually help to protect the place. If only they could be more respectfully awed and less chatty...

But enough with my ranting. Time to get off the soapbox and steer the Pony back down to San Fran... I may have time to hit the Haight before heading to the airport.

My hat's off to whoever put in the roads leading up to and back down from Mt. Tamalpais and Muir Woods. The longest, tightest, curviest stretches of road I've ever been on. Too awesome. I ended up doing some cruising around the Marin Headlands and Golden Gate National Recreation Area to get some photos. More great curvy roads along with the terrific views. Stopped and wandered around Hawks Hill, where the military had built an overlook and bunkers to protect the bridge. The bunkers, etc are now defunct and in ruins, but the hill's apparently well-known as a spot for migratory bird-viewing. Got to see the moon-rise in the middle of the afternoon when I came around a curve in the trail and caught a young couple who had apparently mis-judged the solitude of the area. The view was definitely gorgeous (not the moon, though, it was a tad pudgy), but I have to admit I was most excited over getting close-up photos of a pair of ravens that were also wandering around that afternoon. (Post-trip note: The raven photos are not very good quality, so they're not posted here. Ravens are, unfortunately, very fidgety models.)







Back across the bridge in San Fran, I took a quick spin around Golden Gate Park to the Haight-Ashbury section of town and found my favorite sort of lunch spot: Rockin' Java, a very funky, punky coffee shop on Haight Street. Spinach lasagna, salad, jasmine lemonade, and a cool atmosphere in which to relax before the stress of air travel.

At the airport, waiting for my flight after sadly parting company with the Pony and having been picked out for 'extra special handling' at the security check-in, I'm reading my notes and going through my photos, anything to try and re-live this trip that ended way too soon. In retrospect, there are places where I wish I had slowed down, spent more time and been fully present in the experience. And there are places I skipped over that I now wish I hadn't. But that's the thing about a road trip-- You just don't know what's ahead. Taking the time for something now could also mean missing out on something even better somewhere else. There's no predicting, and dwelling on hindsight only takes away from the experience. You can't regret or bemoan any parts you didn't enjoy or any thing you missed. You have to get something out of whatever you do experience, whether it's good, bad, or mundane. Besides, with any luck, those places passed over could very well form the springboard for a future trip (At least that's what I'd like to think). In the meantime, these notes and photos are my way to hold on to this particular 3,537 mile experience for as long as possible.

"...So in America when the sun goes down and I sit on the old broken-down river pier watching the long, long skies over New Jersey and sense all that raw land that rolls in one unbelievable huge bulge over to the West Coast, and all that road going......"

-- Jack Kerouac, On The Road (Too bad for Kerouac that he wasn't able to get his hands on a Ford Mustang... Click here for many more images of Muir Woods and the Marin Headlands.)

Route 50 Road Trip: Day 12, Nevada to California

Of the two Best Western's in Carson City, NV, one is a multi-story with casino attached and the other is a traditional two-story 'motor court'. I went with the lower-key motor court last night and hit the Chinese place next door for dinner. Today's breakfast is at Heidi's Family-Style Restaurant, which has an alpine theme that seems out of place with the western glitz of Carson City. Makes sense, though, considering all the different nationalities that helped to settle the "Wild West". This was clearly pointed out yesterday in the Comstock Cemetery. A large percentage of the headstones included a line naming the country of which the deceased had been a native. I saw quite a few naming England or France, so a Germanic alpine place in Carson City is really just as authentic as any other.

Today, of course, is bittersweet. As much as I'm looking forward to seeing California, crossing that state line is just a reminder that the trip is over tomorrow night. There've been times when I was tired from driving all day, and there've been places where I wish I could've spent more time, but overall I've been very comfortable with the nomadic lifestyle these past two weeks. And I'm gonna miss the hell out of the Pony.

Roughly 200 miles later, I'm sitting in Spenger's Fresh Fish Grotto (a subsidiary of McCormick & Schmick's, I later learned), on 4th Street in Berkeley, CA. Back in NV this morning, I had stopped at the forest service office in Carson City to ask about places to hike around Tahoe and been told that all of the trails were most likely covered in snow. I headed toward Tahoe in the hopes of finding a trail at a lower elevation that might be clear. Route 50 around the lake reminded me of Deep Creek Lake in Garrett County, MD-- A beautiful place overtaken by lakefront homes, commerce and tourism. I did find one little strip of shops that included a hemp store (which wasn't open that morning, unfortunately), a bagel/coffee shop, and a natural foods cafe, where I picked up a smoothie. Everything else, though, was geared towards either seasonal tourists or the yuppies who can afford to live there. The town of Stateline (on the state line, of course) was like a mini-Vegas, with a half mile or so of 20-story casino hotels. I had been hoping to find at least one of the state parks located in Emerald Bay, but when 50 turned to head away from the lake I still hadn't seen any signs for parks. So, the habit of following those 50 West signs thoroughly ingrained, I just headed on.



The road climbed up a series of tight curves, the sort with which I've become so familiar over the past week or so. I did pass a few recreation areas, but every one of them was still closed for the season. I also couldn't take as many photos as I wanted to. Whoever planned 50's route through the mountains of Tahoe wasn't smart enough to include 'view areas' like the ones in Utah. There were small areas to pull off here and there, but the amount and speed of traffic made it unwise to step on the brakes when a turnoff came into view just around a curve.

By the time the road descended from the mountains, I was thoroughly disgruntled by the quick pace of the traffic and the commercialism of Tahoe, so I stepped on the gas and pushed on to Sacramento. Unfortunately, my mood continued to disintegrate as my time in 'civilization' increased. As 50 approaches Sacramento it turns into Route 80. I have to admit that I became a bit emotional when suddenly all of the highway signs read 80W and I realized that 50 had ended with no recognition of any kind from the CA D.O.T. After 12 days of adventure all along the same road, this was just too unceremonious for me. I spent the next 90 miles towards San Fran trying to block out the eight lanes surrounding me and to re-live the calm and intimacy of two-lane 50.

A stop in Sacramento's old-town district could have been interesting if I weren't already cranky when I got there. I'm sure there was fascinating history to be learned in the preserved waterfront area, if one could dig through the tourist shops and eateries to find it. A sculpture of a galloping rider denoted Sacramento as the end of the Pony Express route and further drove home the fact that my own trip was just about over and I would soon be parting from my own Pony.

Rather than barreling straight into San Fran, I've stopped in Berkely for lunch and to hopefully find some information about the Bay area. I'd still like to squeeze in a hike before tomorrow night's flight home, but first need to decide where the heck to stay tonight. Some funny (or not so) observations came to me while having oysters in Spenger's:

- By and large, 50 is definitely a rural route in spirit. In many of the small towns along the way, 50 becomes Main Street as it passes through. As it approaches larger cities such as Cincinnati and St. Louis, though, it joins up with larger highways to take a by-passing route around the edge of the city, until it can split off and become two lanes again on the other side.

- I saw a homeless person for the first time in 12 days, today along the riverfront in Sacramento. Granted, I by-passed Cincinatti and spent little time in St. Louis so I'm sure I missed the homeless populations there, but the sight was still unexpected after so many days in more rural atmospheres.

- In the family-style restaurants in which I've eaten most of my meals, I was generally seated in the middle of the restaurant, often at tables meant for several people. Here, at swanky Spenger's in Berkely, my lone, hiking-booted self was seated at a tiny little table in a corner by the fire exit. I may be reading too much into that, but considering that it's 2:30 in the afternoon and the lunch rush is clearly over, maybe I'm not.

Call me a curmudgeon, but I'm suddenly wishing I were back in eastern Nevada, with only ravens and golden eagles for company.