August 8: Gold Beach, OR to Klamath, CA
75 miles, 13.3 mph
Did I mention that I'm sick of the GD fog? Oregon's tag line should probably be, "the fog state." We woke--after our tribulations of the previous day--early and kind-of slow-moving. The ever-present fog was still ever present, and we took it really easy for our first 25 miles. There were a number of so-called scenic overlooks that were actually not scenic at all because you couldn't see anything through the fog. In particular, we crossed over the highest bridge in Oregon (350 ft) shortly after leaving Gold Beach, and couldn't see anything but fog from the top. Some of our descents were nerve-wracking because the visibility was so limited.
The first 25 miles or so had a variety of climbs, rolling hills and straight segments. We grabbed coffee from Starbucks at the Fred Meyer in Brookings--the last Oregon city before the California border. We'd enjoyed coffee at several Fred Meyer's thru the course of the trip and it was kind of nice relaxing in what had become a familiar, comfortable setting. It was still cold and foggy as we started out for our lunch destination--Crescent City.
We spoke to a couple of locals at the Starbucks and they advised us--as did Google maps--to leave US101 for Ocean View Drive, shortly after crossing into California. We took their advice and climbed and descended a set of unwelcome, unexpected and surprisely steep rolling hills on country roads--all within the view of 101 which was flat and smooth. From that point on, we stuck to 101 which eventually guided us to Crescent City.
I had stopped at Crescent City earlier in the summer, spending a forgettable night at the EconoLodge as I drove from San Francisco to Seattle. At the time, the best dining establishment I found was Denny's. We were fortunate enough to find a Subway where we dined and fretted about the rest of the day's ride. Mark had informed us (numerous times) that before reaching Klamath, we would face a hellacious 3-peak climb of roughly 1200 ft before we descended at a 7% grade to the road below.
It was a hell-of-a climb, basically straight up for 4 miles or so, and then a steep nail-biting descent. But, on the other side, the sun came out, it warmed up and we had a relatively flat cruise into Klamath. It felt like a California experience. On the way we stopped at "Trees of Mystery" where we got our pictures taken next to Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox, and where Amy took the tour (on a gondola) into the redwood forest.
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