The Odyssey Today

Beautiful Piece of Burl

Tree-Hugging Liberals

Heading north. The last days of the Odyssey. We've been all over this great big ole land, and now we're homeward bound, humming Woody Guthrie songs all the way. We've seen the big skies of Montana, the white sands of Florida, the evil chipmunks of Wyoming. We've done battle with Harleys in South Dakota, green-head flies in North Carolina, and avoided West Virginia entirely. We've eaten a lot of barbecue, met a lot of new friends, and come to know a lot more about Kinko's than anyone really ought to. 36 states later, we're drawing ever closer to Seattle and the new beginnings that await us there. Still, we can't help but look at our map and see a lot of holes. Will those remaining 14 states be calling our names next summer? Will Otto need to go amphibious to hit Hawaii?

Weighty questions, indeed. For now, we'd have to satisfy ourselves with getting out of Napa. We'd pulled into our private campground the night before with nary a moment to spare. The campground manager shook her head as she looked at her watch. "Just in time," she said. "We've got two sites left." Well, actually, they only had one site left since the site she originally assigned us was already occupied by some other poor sods. Poor sods, I say, because their tent was set up practically in their neighbors' fire pit. They really had 'em wedged in here, taking advantage of every inch of the terrain. We shuddered to think at what that last site would be like...

All our shuddering was for naught. The site they gave us was right on the creek, secluded, and quiet. We didn't really understand the apologetic tone with which they remanded us to this site. I mean, sure it was a long walk to the bathroom, but at least we weren't set up next to the people with the posse of wiener dogs yapping at gnats. We proceeded to spend a quite pleasant night amidst a shady grove of trees, sleeping in for a deservedly long time. We came to appreciate our quiet campsite even more as we walked to the bathrooms the next morning. The first RV we passed featured two seventy-year old fellows lighting up their first Budweisers of the morning over a discussion of the relative merits of the sewage hoses that drained their RVs' tanks. "Yeah, my buddy Earl sez I need to move up to a six-incher, maybe even in a penda-flex, but I think he's full of it."
"'Full of it.' Heh-heh. That's a good one, Jimmy. You kill me."

That was small potatoes compared to what we hit a few sites down. A skinny fellow, about six-foot-three, comes bounding out of his RV, clad in a black sleeveless t-shirt, black jeans, and sunglasses. He's looking good, tattoos blazing down both of his arms, and head pounding up and down. He, too, is sporting a Budweiser. There's a half-empty fifth of Jim Beam on the picnic table. Apparently, folks at this campground get started early. The person I'm pretty sure he calls his "old lady," is sitting in a lawnchair sucking on a beer of her own, and bobbing her head, too. Why is everyone bobbing their head? There's no music, save the bawling of their three kids who are rumbling around in the dirt, raising up a heck of a ruckus. Then, I hear it. "Brnnnnnnowwwwwwwwwrrrrrrr.....dunh. dunh. dunh. dunh." The clarion call of Van Halen I, the Magnum Opus, leading straight off with the classic, "Running With the Devil." Man, no wonder they were bobbing their heads before the beats even hit them. Even though I usually don't like hard-rock while I'm camping, I had to agree that certain allowances have to be made. And Van Halen I is definitely one of them.

After banging my head for awhile to "Atomic Punk" (second side, dude, it rules!), we bugged out of the campground early, heading to Calistoga for a bagel and some coffee. This took much longer than expected, owing to a sudden cream-cheese outage that required a visit to the market, but we eventually made it. Strangely enough, we did not visit a single winery in Napa. Sure, we pointed and said things like, "Hey, look at that -- Mondavi," or, "Gee, there's Beringer. My mom likes their White Zinfandel," but we never really stopped to take in the whole experience. So, we haven't any amusing anecdotes about us getting completely trashed on Muscat and insulting a carload of debutantes from Sausalito. Certainly, no lurid recountings of wild parties on the wine train while swilling buckets of Cabernet from an old man's trousers. Nothing like that.

Just as well, I say, for we had miles to drive before we slept. We took a side road over the coast range, heading through the tiny little hamlet of Boonville. Have you heard about this town? It's one of the few places in America where they speak a genuine dialect -- Boontling -- complete with its own words. For example, in Boonville a telephone is called a, "Bucky Walter." The reasons for this are twofold. First, when they first got a telephone, it cost a nickel, which they called a "bucky" in Boonville. Second, the first one in town belonged to Walter. There you go -- Bucky Walter. I'll be offering similar fascinating nuggets throughout this episode, hereinafter titled, "Muddled, Messed-Up, and Hard to Understand -- The Lost Coast Episode." Cool. By the way, Boonville is also home to my favorite brewery, the Anderson Valley Brewery, as well as my favorite beer, "Boont Amber." Check 'em out, if you can.

Finally, we hit the coast. Pacific blue and salt spray, how we love it. It's even Today's Scenic Shot. Ocean, ocean, burning bright. Nope, that's not it.
Northward we went, bound for the Lost Coast, the area of California's coastline where Highway 1 abruptly juts eastward just west of Leggett, leaving the coast to its own devices. If you're sneaky, though, and you've got a map, you can still get out there. That was the plan. First, though, we had to deal with the Extremely Strange Concept of the Day.
For free? Really?! Demonstration forest? For free? Huh? I've never ever understood this. Are the trees not real? Have the timber companies somehow devised a way to communicate the feeling of a forest without its actual physical reality? I guess I understand that this is meant as some sort of touchy-feely gesture of goodwill from the resource-extraction industry, somewhere along the same lines of Chevron's "People Do" campaign, but somehow I'm still scratching my head. For free? I can really walk in the woods for free? Like I was a real citizen, and everything?! Thanks, Louisiana Pacific! You're not just a major denuder of precious forestlands -- you're my friend.

We were scared of the Demonstration Forest, so we didn't go in. Some day, I'll muster my courage and deliver a full report, but not today. Today, I wanted to pick some berries. So, we found our single-track road that would deliver us from Highway 101 on out to the Lost Coast and stopped at a beautiful campground amidst old-growth redwoods for the night. There was even an orchard full of apples, and lots of blackberries to pick, as you can see below.

You're never too old for nuts and berries. You're never too old for berries and nuts.

We stayed up late, nibbling on blackberries and playing cards, enjoying the feeling of being out in the open again. Join us tomorrow as we head northward for the Smith River! See you then.

Total Miles for 8/24 = 232

Next Stop -- Smith River, California


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