Back in Victoria!

Well, 2050 km completed and now we're home again. This adventure was surprisingly easy for the untrained cyclists to complete (I made up for lack of biking experience with excessive stubbornness). We rode the train back to Victoria, ensuring that this was a low-carbon honeymoon. I've been hit my a mysterious ailment this past week which has left me with almost no energy. Luckily, I've been able to lounge on lawns, trains, ferries, and finally on a couch back at Chloe's parents.

Now it's time to change gears and equipment and get ready to move to Africa. We leave in 5 days and don't yet have a place to stay when we arrive...but that's one of our tasks for this week and it should work out.

In the mean time, I get to look forward to another Hepatitis shot and a Yellow Fever vaccination on Saturday plus the first week of 14 months worth of malaria medication! Bring on the lucid dreaming and strange mood swings!

Do Raccoons Eat Tofu? and other night animals

The short answer is yes. They definitely do. Whether they actually like it is another question but those pesky little creatures plague the hiker biker camps of the Pacific Northwest & make a racket. Luckily we early on opted to hang our food (Oregon didn't have any food lockers unlike most of Washington & California) & trust me, those raccoons are macho. They ate through someone's super heavy duty drybag in the night & have even eaten hotsauce.

A few nights ago there was quite a night where 3 raccoons got inside a foodlocker (a poorly maintained one), munched someone's food & then got stuck inside & started banging around in there. Our tent was one of the closest so I got the duty of opening the thing & letting the terrified creatures out. Such fun! And a night ago, a new beast decided to poke holes in my platapus & our water bag...luckily our last camping night so not a huge lost.

Our last camping night we spent on Marin headlands (named after my bike..hahaha...its a Marin), for free overlooking San Fran & the bridge. Listening to Barn Owls & coyotes (?) scream (I think it was bobcat still..) Beautiful. Now we're in the city proper doing the sites. Yay we made it. Logging over 2000kms & pretty much doing in Chris' rear wheel (a spoke ripped it up eventually). I changed only my second flat of the trip, right above the golden gate bridge. Picturesque if not frustrating with all those tourists at all.

Trip summary & conclusions coming soon, but hope you all enjoyed our "first" honeymoon. Stay tuned for the African one!

Over the hills & back to the coast

Odometer: 1705km Location: Fort Bragg, Cal.

After a long traverse through the cold & damp Redwoods, we hit the interior of Northern California for a few days which was hot hot hot! Chris has been burned several times & we find ourselves chilling in the shade wearing shorts & t-shirts. Its quite nice although the route has been hilly and at times a little too hot. Had a run-in with a skunk trying to eat Chris' pannier, but otherwise the bikes continue to survive as does our gear.

We summitted the 2000ft Leggett Hill yesterday--piece of cake in the end, with almost no traffic. Then down 2000ft past the ghost town of Rockport, then up another 800ft. Then out to the coast again for fantastic views and many many ups & downs around little bays & inlets. We entered Fort Bragg this morning for a tasty breakfast and some time at the library--towns with libraries & stores we haven't seen in a few days.

Today, more of the same--vista points & inlets. San Fransisco is within arms reach & we expect to be there early next week!
Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving.

"What a difference a day makes..."

"...24 little hours, brought the sun & the flowers, ooh where there used to be rain!" Dinah Washington


I've been singing this song the last few days as we've travelled along, as it really happened this way..we had an incredible storm overnight in Humbug Beach State Park, which ended around dawn & we haven't seen a raindrop since! We had one more glorious day in in Oregon, one of the most scenic areas in Oregon, cliffs & seastacks and hills into the sea...we covered 82km and had our first real tailwind! It was glorious! Worried it wouldn't last we zoomed on, entering California mid-morning of the next day (after picking up some more spokes) and flew along fields outside Crescent City bathed in sunshine, glorious sunshine (yes, Chris burnt again...).


We packed a load of food and headed to the Redwoods for some hiking, etc. which Chris will tell you all about. We had to summit 2 large hills..one over 1000ft (took 1.5hrs to climb, but we were surrounded by large Redwoods). The ride coming down was amazing and we are encouraged by our fitness as we have a 2000ft one to do in a couple of days. There are rumours about cyclist graves at the sides of this one from those who died trying!

Well, we're in good spirits as the weather continues to be glorious, with no end in sight, and we've seen a few Palm Trees here in Arcata so we hope the weather stays this way!

Odometer: 1400km Location: Arcata, California!

California has Elk?

Apparently, it does. The Redwood forests of Northern California are home to more than 2000 Roosevelt Elk. The only other place that has these elk is some remote Canadian place called "Vancouver Island". I remember seeing elk signs near Campbell River but I had to come more than 1400km to see them.

We spent two nights at Elk Prairie State Park in California. This meant that we got to have a day without riding. Of course, Chloe does not believe in true "rest days", so the day was spent hiking about 20km down to a Fern Canyon and eating our lunch next to giant elk that were doing the same things. The elk seemed uninterested in my cream cheese and we were equally uninterested in their grass shoots, so the meal was pleasant for all. The hike was great, actually, with towering Redwood trees all around us and numerous types of ferns and berries for Chloe to quiz me about (I think I'll need a re-test)

The nights in the forest were cold though and the water that I'd left out for quick hot chocolate making in the morning was starting to ice over (As a side note, I'm a little concerned about the amount of hot chocolate powder that I've been consuming in the past few weeks, I really hope it's not carcinogenic!)

Windy, Wet & Wild

Odometer: 1180km. Location: Langois, Ore.

I'm not sure what the weather has been like back on the island, but we've had 5 days of rain & wind here in Southern Oregon. That hasn't stopped us though & the day with the worst weather was actually our longest--as there just was no reason to stop (it was also a less scenic day although we did pass miles & miles of sandunes!).

There was also one spectacular day out of Newport that although the wind howled we saw some absolutely spectactular scenary...we hugged the coastline, passing over scenic bridges, observing lighthouses (like Hecata Head), Sealions and all kinds of "Devil" landmarks--Devil's horn, Devils punchbowl, for example. Beautiful in any weather, although we couldn't stay long. At one point I clocked my odometer at 10km/hr while going downhill. Yikes--it was a strong headwind. Actually, the wind, contrary to what we were told, has been mostly of the head variety. Apparently, the winter storms are a bit earlier this year. But aside from a few grumblings (from me), and copious stops at coffeeshops & Fred Meyers for tea & bean & cheese burritos, we pushed one.

Then there was the day of 2 broken spokes...yes, 2 more. One on the back and one on the front. It had been more than 500km since the last one, so we were due apparently. Luckily, the weather was much better that day, only the occasional storm. The guy in Astoria told us that the spokes were just old (2years!) and weren't used to bearing weight so we could expect more. Now we're out of spokes and praying we make it to the next town that has one (tomorrow).

But we hear it will clear up soon...hopefully. Today is much better, and really we're still having a great time.