Escaping the Burn.....

I've been working way too much lately so when the phone rang on Monday morning I was loathe to answer it. Luckily it was John, one of my favorite people. "Hey you want to go to Fort Bragg this weekend?" was one of the first things out of his mouth. I've been told I'm a mellow type A personality, so pulling together 4 day weekends with very little planning is not one of my best attributes. I can do it, it's just unnecessarily stressful for me. It's all me, I do it to myself, no one else is to blame. I love that part of John, he's always doing stuff like this and I hope to find a balance between us at some point.

So I waffled a little bit, told John I probably wouldn't know if I would come till Thursday at the earliest. We had been in the middle of a bit of a record run of 100 plus degree days, I was getting killed at work and the thought of working longer and harder to take an extra couple of days off was not making me happy. Thursday rolled around and I had to make a decision. WTF, why are you making this so hard, just go!

So I loaded up the truck with very little planning and hit the road early. I had a good 4-5 hours of work to take care of before I could leave town  so it made for a later start than I had wanted. Traffic was sucking ass all the way to Vallejo and was not getting any better as I headed up 101 towards Santa Rosa. At the last moment I bailed off at Petaluma and headed for the coast. Goddammit, if it's going to take me all day to get there I'm going to take the scenic route.

The coast was absolutely stunning, crystal clear and no fog which is very rare for this time of year. I rolled into Camp One in Fort Bragg about 5pm, John had also gotten killed by the traffic and was just getting settled in after arriving an hour or so before me.

Beautiful day on the coast

We went for a short ride with the dogs, Tinker and Sasha, and after a wonderful pasta dinner compliments of John we were off to sleep. Luckily I got the top bunk of the Westfalia, no tent for me this weekend. Sleeping in Johns rig brings back memories of countless trips with my parents in their old VW poptop camper.

Our home for the weekend

Saturday morning we decided to do a ride that was a combo of a few rides I stitched together in a hurry on Thursday night, of course my lack of prep reared it's ugly head when I couldn't find the one I wanted to do. We made do with what I could find and were off into town to park at the Caspar Scales. We did a bit of the classic race course, some Giro's playground stuff and a bit of the Woodlands. All in all it was a great day and I think John really enjoyed himself, even if I didn't know where we were at times.

John at the overlook at the top of Manly Gulch

The aptly named Boiler Trail

 We made our way back to the car and a couple of happy dogs. I decided to ride back to camp so John took the truck back via the milkshake place in town. I stopped at the Subway and promptly waited 25 minutes for my turn to order us lunch/dinner. I rolled back to camp with the sandwiches safely stowed in my camelback.

Sasha at the creek running through our camp, I'm sure the Tinker dog is nearby. 

 Sunday we decided to do a slightly different version of the route we did on Saturday. We did a bit more of the racecourse and did a bit more of the Woodlands trails, all in all another spectacular day. The weather was magnificent and the company even better.

John rolling into a bridge somewhere in the forest.

Another bridge out in the forest

John's an excellent rider, so this is a rare occurance.

Monday seemed to come all too quickly. I woke up in a bit of a funk. I've not been to the coast much since Mary and I split. This morning the full weight of the fact that I never will again see these sights and sounds with her seemed to hit me like a wall of bricks. John was eager to get going since BART was on strike and traffic through San Francisco would likely be historically bad. He was going out to the Big River for a short ride with Tinker and I decided to stay a bit longer in camp and maybe see him out there.

After sitting around a while feeling sorry for myself I decided to head out to Big River. John and Tinker were just getting ready to ride so I suited up for a short 10 mile stroll along the beautiful Big River. They made their way back after a bit and I decided to continue. I didn't make it too far before I fely like I just wanted to be out of there. I caught John just as they were leaving and we said our second set of goodbyes for the day and headed out separate ways into the furnace of anywhere not within a mile of the coast.

Big River beach

The very scenic Big River in Mendocino