Day 52 Van Damme Park to Manchester Beach KOA: The steepest grade on the California coast - oh boy! - 2 For the Road

August 24, 2017

Day 52 Van Damme Park to Manchester Beach KOA: The steepest grade on the California coast - oh boy!

our hiker/biker site at Van Damme - no one there but us!

the beach in the early morning. As we were heading up, these divers were heading out to dive for abalone

We woke up to sun! Happily we got up and had breakfast and were on the road by 8:00. Up a small hill to start the day got us warmed up. We knew this would be a challenging day, so the warm up hill was a good thing – funny how my point of view about hills has changed since the beginning of this tour!

We had some long slow climbs, most notably the 1 mile hill after crossing the Albion River. Actually, it wasn’t that bad, just long.

a view from the top - not so bad, this one

We continued to enjoy the sunshine and views of the ocean as we made our way towards the town of Elk, where we stopped at a great place called Queenie’s for second breakfast.

We needed a few food items, so stopped at the little store in Elk, where Jim struck up a conversation with an older gentleman. Why? Well, he was wearing a Michigan sweatshirt, of course! Turns out he and his wife and friends had driven up from San Francisco for the day. How funny it is to hear people talk about a day drive from somewhere that will take us a few days yet to get to. They were lovely to talk to and told us places we should make sure to check out in San Fran when we get there. Speaking of which, we have been talking about our route options. We knew we didn’t have enough time to ride the entire route we had originally planned and are now thinking of ending our ride in San Francisco and going somewhere else from there. Although we are quite sure we would be fine in Mexico, we are feeling the effects of having been on the road for 2 months and are wondering if we have the energy emotionally to really enjoy the journey there. We don’t want to ruin what has been such a good trip by pushing ourselves past what we can do. We will continue to think and plan over the next little bit.

After Elk, we knew that we would be facing a pretty good hill. According to the book we are using as our guide, this is a short hill with switchbacks and has “the steepest grade on the California coast” – oh boy! Sounds like a whole lotta fun! Well, along came the hill and it sure did live up to the billing! Switchbacks and lots of traffic going both ways, and of course, no shoulder to speak of – everything I love! Oh well, we engaged our steep hill strategy of choosing a spot just up ahead and heading for it, stopping for a break and then repeating until finally reaching the top. The last switchback, however, proved too much for me. Jim headed to the other side of the road, which allowed him to snap this pic of me pushing my bike around the bend – it was pretty freaking steep!!!

according to our book, this is the steepest grade along the coast. The motorcyclist who stopped to talk to us at the top said he felt like he was going to fall off his bike on this turn - yep, it was STEEP!!!

We made it to the top and pulled off for a good long break where we were met by a couple of guys on their motorcycles. One was originally from Montreal and now lives in Florida and the other from Fredricksburg, Texas – a place I had visited last year with my daughter, Annie! What a small world this is! We enjoyed chatting as we caught our breath before they headed out and we as well, just a little slower!

The rest of our ride went slowly. Not because of the hills, but because of the scenery! Time after time, we had to stop and pull over to take pictures of the things we were seeing. We were so thankful to have had this great, beautiful, sunny day to ride in. Wow!

one of the nice parts about riding is you can stop quickly, like here when we spied some deer in a field. We were able to pull off and take some pics, but in a car we probably wouldn't have even noticed them - nice.

and more. This was the view from a 2.1 million dollar home for sale, but we got it for free!

dead end - duh! If you kept going, that's what you would be!

fields and fields of these red/orange flowers. Jim asked a lady stopped at a farm what they were but she was also just trespassing, looking at them, so we are still in the dark - pretty though!

The long day ended at Manchester Beach KOA. There was camping available, but we opted to stay in one of their Kamping Kabins. We’d seen them at the other KOA we’d stayed at, and by this time, having 4 walls around us sounded pretty good as the fog was rolling back in again.

As we headed out to get settled, we ran into Paul, who we’d talked to back at Stadish Hickey. We were really surprised and happy to see him – surprised as we thought all those guys had passed us long ago. It turns out they had decided to take a rest day after doing 2 longer days than us, so we caught up! We had a nice chat before he headed off to where the rest of the gang was camped out. We tried to find them later, but went to the wrong place – oh well!

KOA’s are pretty sweet places as they have laundry and cooking facilities, as well as wifi. We took full advantage of all by washing all of our very sweaty clothes, checking in with the world and cooking dinner on a real stove – bliss!

It was Karoke night at the KOA, but by the time we had played a few hands of gin and were ready for bed, the music had ended and all was quiet. A great way to end a long day. Tomorrow we plan to split up the ride again, making 2 shorter days instead of a longer one. These hills are pretty tough and are getting pretty tiring!

Jim enjoying the porch swing on our wooden tent (also known as a cabin).

Today's ride: 45 km (28 miles)
Total: 1,857 km (1,153 miles)

Rate this entry's writing	Heart	0
Comment on this entry	Comment	0