navelgazing.omphaloskeptic.net Journal

Getting There - Aneel's Travelogue

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Riding Patrick's Point, California, Monday, 08 August 2011 10:00pm

Setting Off
I expected the first day of the trip to be hectic, but perhaps I pushed a little too hard. I didn't end up leaving the city until nearly 2pm, since everything took longer than it should have. I made a last stop at my storage unit, grabbed a burrito, stopped at REI to get a knife and some camping food, and at Mollie Stone's to get some normal food. Then I had to try to pack all of that...

There's a problem with my load out: I don't have enough empty space to stow my riding gear, so I have to carry a lot of stuff with me whenever I leave the bike. I'm not sure what I can really get rid of to make the necessary extra space, though.

I was lucky: I arranged my credit and debit cards so that the ones in my wallet are not the ones I usually keep there. That meant that when I went to the ATM to get some cash for the trip, I discovered that my backup ATM card has a different PIN than I thought. Since I was still in SF, I could just go to a branch of my credit union and fix that. Added some more delay to my departure, though.

The riding was generally straightforward and pleasant. 101 is pretty, once you get out of the urban sprawl. Golden grass. Vineyards. Redwoods. I had to stop and take my liners out just after Ukiah because I was sweating too much. And I had to put them back in as I approached the coast.

I pushed past Eureka to Patrick's Point. It turns out I needn't really have bothered. The State Park were I was hoping to camp was full, so I'm at a fairly generic private park. On the plus side, I have an outlet to plug in my laptop. On the minus side, I can hear the traffic on 101. I'm pretty tired and sore.

314mi in 9:51