![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thehefnerMy final round of pictures from the West Coast encompasses my last two days on the road before arriving in Seattle. I've put off doing this post because it felt almost anticlimactic, as the trip itself was. To make matters worse, the real story to be told here is the one I can't yet tell, not now and maybe not ever.
After waking up at 7am in the suddenly-not-so-scary state park campgrounds, I resumed my trip North, intent upon stopping over in Mendocino, where MURDER, SHE WROTE was filmed. Like so many places along the desolate and beautiful Route 1, the town seemed to be entirely populated with rich people on one hand and hippies on the other. I took no pictures, as nothing seemed photo-worthy in the strangely-dead town. Both recommended restaurants were closed, and I wondered, was I perhaps *too* early in getting up and going?
So I cut my losses and went onward. Here, have a random dinosaur and gorilla.
I decided to finally take advantage of the many microbreweries all over the West Coast, and had planned to hit up the North Coast brewery in Fort Bragg, maybe get a bite to eat someplace. Man, I was hungry. But when I got there, guess what? Closed! Both of them! Another town, seemingly shut down!
And that's when it hit me. "Duh... it's Thanksgiving!"
Even when I swung by that internet cafe in Mendocino to check my LJ and discovered Rick Astley singing on the FOSTER'S HOME FOR IMAGINARY FRIENDS float, even then it didn't sink in that it was fucking Thanksgiving. In fairness, how could it? It felt like any other day for me, under the circumstances.
I knew I would be on the road during Thanksgiving, and had prepared myself for being alone and without family. But I hadn't considered that everything *else* would be closed. Where were the restaurants, catering to the lonely and the lazy? Nowhere to be seen, as Route 1 is its own little world, completely free of chain restaurants and suburban sprawl for miles and miles and miles.
So I drove on, through a valley of trees right out of Hobbiton...
... and through said miles and miles and miles...
... when, still hungry, I decided to stop at my first redwood forest. Being from Maryland, where rattlers, copperheads, ticks, and brown recluse spiders are the norm, I'm a little unsettled by nature. Particularly being alone in such awe-inspiring nature, following barely-defined paths and listing to the eerie sounds of absolute nothingness in the winter forest.
I drove on, hoping to see the Drive-Thru Tree in Leggett, but even it was closed, the road restricted by a flimsy chain. I contemplated just exploring it on foot, but I had no place to stash Magnolia. Feeling defeated, like my entire day is spelled out before me, I went on.
I came upon a Mystery Spot-wannabe known as Confusion Hill, but never went in.
It was one of those many times that I wished that I had internet access, to check around and see if this was one of those roadside gems (kitschy or otherwise) or a waste of money. No one was there, save for the owner, and I regret being too nervous, too shy to suck it up and let him show me around. His was one of the few spots open to me on that lonely Thanksgiving, and rip-off or not, I turned it down. What was I thinking?
But at least there was the Avenue of the Giants.
And once again, my camera wasn't big enough. But to give you an idea, I took this shot at eye level:
From that same spot, I turned the camera upward...
And I kept going...
... until the glare of the gray sky blotted out all but the sillouhettes of those sky-scraping tops.
Let's rearrange them to see those same pictures this way;
The whole while, the words of John Steinbeck ran through my mind: “The vainest, most slap-happy and irreverent of men, in the presence of redwoods, goes under a spell of wonder and respect.”
After the Avenue of the Giants finished up, I pulled into a small town whose name escapes me, where I finally found a restaurant open and serving Thanksgiving lunch/dinner. When I walked inside, the white-trash waitress complimented and coveted my bowler derby. I told her it's easy enough to get one off of eBay, to which the trucker-cap-wearing busboy snorted, "Yeah, but to do that, you'd need internet. Good luck finding that in this town."
The food was overpriced and underwhelming, but there was no denying that the experience didn't remind me a bit of my childhood weekends in Thurmont, MD, a white-trash mountain town near Camp David where my stepfather Gordon's arboretum still operates. The meal was pure Thurmont: white mashed potatoes, dry turkey, gravy whose nature can only be described as "brown," and squashy pumpkin pie. I ask you, who really prefers their pumpkin pie to be squashy rather than spicy? Maybe it's just the way I was raised, but Mom would throw all kinds of wonderful shit in there, cloves and all that, wonderful.
And yet, for reasons I still don't quite understand, I found the meal to be entirely satisfying. Maybe I was just grateful to be getting anything at all. Maybe I was glad to finally take part, even in some small way, in Thanksgiving.
Just around the Oregon border, I illegally pulled over to a bridge to shoot this sunset. Made me wish I had a wide-angle lens, but I made do in two parts.
I camped out at another state park, still feeling dubious from dinner at the only place open in the nearby town. Really, if you order a platter of nachos from Denny's, don't be surprised by what you get.
The next morning, I rejoined the coast and had forgotten how much I missed its presence with things like this:
Such grandeur and wonder truly put Route 1 entirely at odds with the cultivated Americana of 66, but lest I start feeling nostalgic for the Mother Road, 1 threw me a little taste of what I missed:
Prehistoric Gardens, Port Orford, OR, a collection of brightly colored, more-or-less life-size Dinosaur sculptures. Had it been open when I was there, I might have actually gone. Oh who am I kidding, I almost certainly wouldn't have. Look at that.
Finally, there was the State Park known as... well, in RTUSA, it's called the "Devil's Punchbowl," but when I arrived, it went by the less colorful but more apt, "Devil's Churn." And it was awesome.
I've included ten pictures of the Punchbowl/Churn, in the hopes of giving you folks some idea as to the awesomeness I beheld. Waves rolled in, and the waters crashing and sprayed and in a violent display unlike anything I'd ever seen. Curdled-looking foam rolled in clusters atop the waters, rocking with rise and falls. And when a wave would hit them, the curdles would spread out in what looked like fresh, smooth cream. I had to get closer for a better look.
I could have stood there for an hour. So really, it's just as well that--as of literally two seconds after that final picture--I was soaked from head to toe, nailed by an absolutely magnificent wave. People screamed, thinking that I was getting swept out to sea, or to be a new ingredient to the Punchbowl. Me, I was too busy giggling like a madman, my embarrassment outweighed only by my concern for my camera. I wiped it down with fresh water, and a month later it still seems to be okay. But as the sailors say, "rust never sleeps."
That done, I let the humiliation take me over, eyes of everyone upon me like a walking cautionary tale. I used to think it's better to make an ass of myself in front of strangers, because you'll never see them again, so they won't hold it over your head the way only your very best friends do. But as my jeans began to chafe, I thought about how much I wished for one of you guys to have been there with me. To laugh at/with me, and that I might join in. Because to those tourists, I'm a nobody. Just that idiot who got too close and was subsequently nailed.
I took no more pictures along the West Coast route, not even of the Tilamook cheese factory, which I only visited because L.A.'s magnificent Apple Pan restaurant prided itself on using Tilamook cheese. But the entire affair was suitably cheesy all right, and no pictures seemed necessary. On the plus side, they made the best goddamn strawberry milkshake ever. If Daniel Day-Lewis has any lasting legacy, it's getting me to imbibe in milkshakes every now and again.
From there, I hostelled it in Portland, and the next morning, drove to Seattle. And here I am, with two more days to go before I hit the road again. It's been a hell of a month, crazy with highs and lows and everything in between, and I still don't yet know how things are going to turn out. I'm hoping for a happy ending on all fronts, but right now, some things are just... hanging. And I hate it.
Yet I should really learn to appreciate this feeling, because it means the story's still going on. But then, this entire trip has been all about the struggle between my desires for safety/security and my intentions to grow, explore, and become a better adult. I don't know where life is taking me these days, and while I'd like to think I'm more than halfway through, I just don't know. It could keep going long after I've returned.
After all, I don't write the stories. I just transcribe them.
Next stop: back to Portland, and then off to Vegas, baby. It's gonna be coo-coo, pallies. Real coo-coo.
After waking up at 7am in the suddenly-not-so-scary state park campgrounds, I resumed my trip North, intent upon stopping over in Mendocino, where MURDER, SHE WROTE was filmed. Like so many places along the desolate and beautiful Route 1, the town seemed to be entirely populated with rich people on one hand and hippies on the other. I took no pictures, as nothing seemed photo-worthy in the strangely-dead town. Both recommended restaurants were closed, and I wondered, was I perhaps *too* early in getting up and going?
So I cut my losses and went onward. Here, have a random dinosaur and gorilla.
I decided to finally take advantage of the many microbreweries all over the West Coast, and had planned to hit up the North Coast brewery in Fort Bragg, maybe get a bite to eat someplace. Man, I was hungry. But when I got there, guess what? Closed! Both of them! Another town, seemingly shut down!
And that's when it hit me. "Duh... it's Thanksgiving!"
Even when I swung by that internet cafe in Mendocino to check my LJ and discovered Rick Astley singing on the FOSTER'S HOME FOR IMAGINARY FRIENDS float, even then it didn't sink in that it was fucking Thanksgiving. In fairness, how could it? It felt like any other day for me, under the circumstances.
I knew I would be on the road during Thanksgiving, and had prepared myself for being alone and without family. But I hadn't considered that everything *else* would be closed. Where were the restaurants, catering to the lonely and the lazy? Nowhere to be seen, as Route 1 is its own little world, completely free of chain restaurants and suburban sprawl for miles and miles and miles.
So I drove on, through a valley of trees right out of Hobbiton...
... and through said miles and miles and miles...
... when, still hungry, I decided to stop at my first redwood forest. Being from Maryland, where rattlers, copperheads, ticks, and brown recluse spiders are the norm, I'm a little unsettled by nature. Particularly being alone in such awe-inspiring nature, following barely-defined paths and listing to the eerie sounds of absolute nothingness in the winter forest.
I drove on, hoping to see the Drive-Thru Tree in Leggett, but even it was closed, the road restricted by a flimsy chain. I contemplated just exploring it on foot, but I had no place to stash Magnolia. Feeling defeated, like my entire day is spelled out before me, I went on.
I came upon a Mystery Spot-wannabe known as Confusion Hill, but never went in.
It was one of those many times that I wished that I had internet access, to check around and see if this was one of those roadside gems (kitschy or otherwise) or a waste of money. No one was there, save for the owner, and I regret being too nervous, too shy to suck it up and let him show me around. His was one of the few spots open to me on that lonely Thanksgiving, and rip-off or not, I turned it down. What was I thinking?
But at least there was the Avenue of the Giants.
And once again, my camera wasn't big enough. But to give you an idea, I took this shot at eye level:
From that same spot, I turned the camera upward...
And I kept going...
... until the glare of the gray sky blotted out all but the sillouhettes of those sky-scraping tops.
Let's rearrange them to see those same pictures this way;
The whole while, the words of John Steinbeck ran through my mind: “The vainest, most slap-happy and irreverent of men, in the presence of redwoods, goes under a spell of wonder and respect.”
After the Avenue of the Giants finished up, I pulled into a small town whose name escapes me, where I finally found a restaurant open and serving Thanksgiving lunch/dinner. When I walked inside, the white-trash waitress complimented and coveted my bowler derby. I told her it's easy enough to get one off of eBay, to which the trucker-cap-wearing busboy snorted, "Yeah, but to do that, you'd need internet. Good luck finding that in this town."
The food was overpriced and underwhelming, but there was no denying that the experience didn't remind me a bit of my childhood weekends in Thurmont, MD, a white-trash mountain town near Camp David where my stepfather Gordon's arboretum still operates. The meal was pure Thurmont: white mashed potatoes, dry turkey, gravy whose nature can only be described as "brown," and squashy pumpkin pie. I ask you, who really prefers their pumpkin pie to be squashy rather than spicy? Maybe it's just the way I was raised, but Mom would throw all kinds of wonderful shit in there, cloves and all that, wonderful.
And yet, for reasons I still don't quite understand, I found the meal to be entirely satisfying. Maybe I was just grateful to be getting anything at all. Maybe I was glad to finally take part, even in some small way, in Thanksgiving.
Just around the Oregon border, I illegally pulled over to a bridge to shoot this sunset. Made me wish I had a wide-angle lens, but I made do in two parts.
I camped out at another state park, still feeling dubious from dinner at the only place open in the nearby town. Really, if you order a platter of nachos from Denny's, don't be surprised by what you get.
The next morning, I rejoined the coast and had forgotten how much I missed its presence with things like this:
Such grandeur and wonder truly put Route 1 entirely at odds with the cultivated Americana of 66, but lest I start feeling nostalgic for the Mother Road, 1 threw me a little taste of what I missed:
Prehistoric Gardens, Port Orford, OR, a collection of brightly colored, more-or-less life-size Dinosaur sculptures. Had it been open when I was there, I might have actually gone. Oh who am I kidding, I almost certainly wouldn't have. Look at that.
Finally, there was the State Park known as... well, in RTUSA, it's called the "Devil's Punchbowl," but when I arrived, it went by the less colorful but more apt, "Devil's Churn." And it was awesome.
I've included ten pictures of the Punchbowl/Churn, in the hopes of giving you folks some idea as to the awesomeness I beheld. Waves rolled in, and the waters crashing and sprayed and in a violent display unlike anything I'd ever seen. Curdled-looking foam rolled in clusters atop the waters, rocking with rise and falls. And when a wave would hit them, the curdles would spread out in what looked like fresh, smooth cream. I had to get closer for a better look.
I could have stood there for an hour. So really, it's just as well that--as of literally two seconds after that final picture--I was soaked from head to toe, nailed by an absolutely magnificent wave. People screamed, thinking that I was getting swept out to sea, or to be a new ingredient to the Punchbowl. Me, I was too busy giggling like a madman, my embarrassment outweighed only by my concern for my camera. I wiped it down with fresh water, and a month later it still seems to be okay. But as the sailors say, "rust never sleeps."
That done, I let the humiliation take me over, eyes of everyone upon me like a walking cautionary tale. I used to think it's better to make an ass of myself in front of strangers, because you'll never see them again, so they won't hold it over your head the way only your very best friends do. But as my jeans began to chafe, I thought about how much I wished for one of you guys to have been there with me. To laugh at/with me, and that I might join in. Because to those tourists, I'm a nobody. Just that idiot who got too close and was subsequently nailed.
I took no more pictures along the West Coast route, not even of the Tilamook cheese factory, which I only visited because L.A.'s magnificent Apple Pan restaurant prided itself on using Tilamook cheese. But the entire affair was suitably cheesy all right, and no pictures seemed necessary. On the plus side, they made the best goddamn strawberry milkshake ever. If Daniel Day-Lewis has any lasting legacy, it's getting me to imbibe in milkshakes every now and again.
From there, I hostelled it in Portland, and the next morning, drove to Seattle. And here I am, with two more days to go before I hit the road again. It's been a hell of a month, crazy with highs and lows and everything in between, and I still don't yet know how things are going to turn out. I'm hoping for a happy ending on all fronts, but right now, some things are just... hanging. And I hate it.
Yet I should really learn to appreciate this feeling, because it means the story's still going on. But then, this entire trip has been all about the struggle between my desires for safety/security and my intentions to grow, explore, and become a better adult. I don't know where life is taking me these days, and while I'd like to think I'm more than halfway through, I just don't know. It could keep going long after I've returned.
After all, I don't write the stories. I just transcribe them.
Next stop: back to Portland, and then off to Vegas, baby. It's gonna be coo-coo, pallies. Real coo-coo.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-01-03 08:50 am (UTC)I've never seen the West Coast any further north than San Luis Obispo, but I suddenly feel like I'm missing the best thing in the world. Your photos have made me happy. I especially love the photos of the incoming tides from different locations -- they're beautiful. :3
no subject
Date: 2009-01-03 08:54 am (UTC)I'm glad you dig 'em, and thanks for the kind words! Hope you enjoy the ones from the road back home, whenever I actually get around to writing them several weeks from now!
no subject
Date: 2009-01-03 10:09 am (UTC)I plan to sit down and read through the whole trip again. One day I will do this trip for myself.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-03 07:43 pm (UTC)People screamed with good reason. People have been knocked over and pulled out to sea plenty of times along that stretch of coast, only to drown and then be found in the Pacific three days later. Don't fuck with the Pacific Ocean.
Isn't the Oregon coast just gorgeous?
As for the redwoods, having grown up around them, I'm always in awe. There are living redwoods that are over two thousand years old in California, and what other tree grows to almost three hundred feet in height given enough time? The redwood family is old, too. I have to look up the fact sheets again, but they've been around for, IIRC, millions of years.
No pictures of SF? :-)
no subject
Date: 2009-01-03 09:08 pm (UTC)In case you missed it, here's what happened in San Francisco and why there are no photos.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-03 09:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-04 02:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-04 05:07 am (UTC)