The Flume Trail And My First Hillbillies

Under the suggestion of the bartender at the Gold Hill Saloon, I drove back towards Lake Tahoe and went to Spooner Lake to rent a bike and ride the Flume Trail. The first part of the trail is a 4 mile ride that climbs 1000ft in pretty soft gravel. Between being out of shape and riding in high altitude, I found myself extremely out of breath and walking the last 1/4-1/2 of the trail. Once at the top, I got a beautiful view of Marlette Lake, an almost untouched lake that was a crystal clear blue.

After getting to the edge of Marlette lake, the actual Flume Trail begins. The flume trail was the most technical trail I have ever ridden (which isn't really saying all that much) and easily the most scenic. The trail wrapped the round the top of a mountain which rounded Lake Tahoe (as seen above) though the view was hazy due to the fires in Yosemite and elsewhere. When I got back to the car (a van picks you up) and ate, I didn't get on the road till 3 pm which would make it tough to make it to Oregon the same day.

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Passing through Reno I stumbled on a AAA office and stopped in to get a camping guide. In looking through the guide I found Milford, CA to be the best bet for a camping spot. I couldn't find a place to buy food along the sometimes desolate HWY 395 but, in learning from my past decisions, I decided it was better to find a place and let food figure itself out.

Driving along the 395, I see a sign for a state run campground and ventured 2.5 miles to the west. Half of a mile from the campground, I see a sign for a road closure. For some reason I ignore this sign and continue along the freshly groomed gravel road. I get to the campground and the entry gate is open, proving to me that the road closure sign MUST have been wrong.

As I enter, I pause at the bulletin board to see if there are announcements. None. There is a payment receptacle but no bulletin regarding cost and no envelopes for payment which is strange. None the less, I see an old bet up truck through some trees and decide to go see who's there. I round the corner and make out 3 old big trucks with wooden side wall extensions to make the walls of the truck as tall as the roof of the cab.

I spot the bathroom, which looks like a fancy hole in the ground (vaulted), which is not surprising as the AAA guide already warned me of no showers or flushing toilets. An overweight woman with brown hair emerges from the toilet with a small yappy black dog following close. The minute it sees me, it begins to yap uncontrollably. As I pass the woman I see her, who I presume to be, husband and 3-4 young kids and identical black dog which begins to yap uncontrollably the minute it sees me, this one somehow more annoying than the last.

As the father and children come into sight, all heads snap towards me in unison. The father, whose curly hair spilled out of his faded baseball cap, flashed me a look as if to say, "If you knew what was good for you, you'd keep on moving." Though I could see him clearly through the corner of my eye behind the dark lenses of my Ray-Bans, I never turned my head to acknowledge him. I just kept up my speed, making sure not to run over either of their dogs, and returned to the gravel road before the dust could settle from my drive over. The complete dusting of my car, along with the gravel beating the undercarriage, was the punishment as if to tell me to believe the signs next time. As I headed back to the 395 as fast over the speed limit as I could justify, I couldn't help but notice how much the family, in all seriousness, reminded me of the Spuckler's from the Simpson's. Their appearance, posture, and dress were remarkably similar.

I drove north on the 395, battling sunlight, and found an RV campsite a few miles down with showers, something I needed more than ever due to the bike ride, and a convenience store. As I cooked dinner that night, I found myself constantly fighting off the local cats that seemed to be quite comfortable at the campsite but have no home to speak of. They bugged me from the minute I parked my car though they became more relentless as I began to cook in the dark, keeping tabs on them by darting my flashlight around to find them in between stirs of my food. It didn't help the fact that I decided to cook tuna that night.

My First Haunted Hotel Experience

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I was up nice and early and on the road quickly which was disappointing because I didn't get a chance to say good morning and good bye to the new friend I made last night at the campsite. I made my way down to Davis to spend a couple nights with Joelle relaxing and doing a little hiking at Tiburon.

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After Joelle cooked me a big breakfast and sent me off with snacks, lunch, and dinner (I would have visited a lot sooner if I knew I was going to get this sort of treatment), I headed towards Silver City, NV under the suggestion of a close family friend, Steve. As I passed through Lake Tahoe, I stopped for a short bike ride around the lake.

Just north of the 50 on the 391 was a bunch of junk on the west side of the road, or so I thought. After driving many miles, I have come to realize that it is pretty standard practice for people to leave equipment, when it is broken, out on the property to rust and sit there pretty uselessly. Some people, like the ones who own this property, decided to make art from some of their "junk". I turned around and found a place to pull over and snapped some shots of all of the art.

I had headed to Silver City originally because it had been described to me as this cool little touristy town up on a hill. When I arrived at what I believed was Silver City, I didn't see much more than run down buildings and a couple of historical markers that were not kept particularly well. Seeing no reason to turn around and go back, I kept driving to explore a little bit. When I went a little farther to go into a local thrift shop, I could tell by the bumper stickers that I was not around people who shared my beliefs. After a short wander around, i headed back down the hill when I stumbled upon the Golden Hill Hotel and Saloon where I decided to stop in and have a drink before trying to find a place to stay for the night.

As I walked up to the front door, there were two people sitting and enjoying a drink that greeted me and I began to talk with them. After a couple minutes, they asked me to take a seat and I did. One of the people happened to be Bill, one of the owners of the hotel. Bill was a somewhat soft spoken, portly man, who had many stories to share if he is provoked to tell them but he seemed more interested in hearing other people's stories. As the night went on, I met many people, both local and guests of the hotel. Many of the guests were regulars who come back every year for various reasons. Some, like myself, just stumbled upon it or found it on the internet.

With the group of people outside growing and changing constantly, I had an incredible time talking with everyone. Many of the people had done a lot of traveling and one couple had even worked for the UN for many years and urged me to look into it as well (they gave me some resources if I was interested). After a couple drinks, Carol (Bill's wife and other owner) had asked me why I wasn't staying there. When they told me it was only $50, I got a room and stayed the night, drinking and talking with the people I had met and eventually retiring to my room sometime after midnight.

(Dan and his wife worked for the UN)

 Although the hotel has history and is in a relatively nice dessert surrounding (it's cooler there because of the altitude), the main draw of the hotel is that it is haunted. There have been many sightings both from psychics and regular people. There were some young people a while back who stayed in room 18, the mining room. They saw and recorded their encounter with ghosts and sold it to the History and Discovery Channel. Room 18 was booked for 60 straight days after the piece aired. It was interesting to here Carol tell all of the ghost stories and sightings. Fortunately for them, the ghosts are generally friendly there (from what they can tell).

Even more fortunately for me, I got room 3, one of the only rooms that has never had ANY ghost sightings. The funny thing about staying in a haunted hotel is that you begin to almost expect to see a ghost. You begin to attribute everything that happens to ghosts. When something very simple all of a sudden has no explanation, you ask yourself, "is it a ghost?" Soon you realize that it's not, though the amount of time your mind takes to process normal things and tell you they're normal has somehow seemed to slow to a snails pace with the opportunity of the explanation being "ghost." It didn't help that the room had 3 different types of locks on the door (is that SERIOUSLY necessary?), old tapestries on the wall and an 18th century picture of a scary looking, pale skinned child who's lifeless eyes seems to stare through to your soul no matter where you stood in the room.

When I walked in the room, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. After realizing that I was in a haunted hotel and that would probably explain the hairs on my neck, I shoot a glance to the picture of the demon child and realize it's crooked. Is this a ghosts way of somehow communicating with me? Does it know that deep down, there's a small bit of OCD in me and I would notice this, thus proving after all, that room 3 actually IS haunted? No...wait, they probably tilted it when dusting. As I began to settle in and my nerves followed at a slower pace, I began to calm down a bit. I made sure to place everything on the floor as I had been told that the ghosts had been known to throw things on to the floor and somehow I didn't think apple would take "ghost" as a reason for a broken laptop when I took it in for warranty.

Even as I settled down and got comfortable in the room, I still paused every time I walked into the bathroom, a little darker than I would like with a rather large mirror over the sink which sat to the left of the doorway as you entered the small bathroom. I paused as the hairs stood up on my neck, every time, and I quickly looked to the mirror expecting to see someone besides as if I was in elementary school testing to see if saying "Bloody Mary" however many times in the dark would make her appear. After acknowledging that it was only me, I would look myself in the eyes and chuckle inside at my ridiculousness. And though I laughed at myself every time, I still repeated this every time I walked into the bathroom, turned around from peeing, or came out of the shower. I survived to the next morning with no sightings and some decent rest, happy to be untouched, a little disappointed I didn't have a story to tell.

Camping Off The 299

Just as all available light is beginning to slowly disappear, I pull into one of those state owned, put money in the slot with site number on it, there's a host at the entrance type of camp sites. I didn't realize you could pay by check so I paid with a $10 bill and eight quarters (talk about desperate).  I look over at the host site and see a full on family sized army style tent my family used to have but I can barely remember. There is stuff sprawled all around, including a portable shower, lots of water jugs and a jeep at the edge but no sign of anyone around. It looks like the set of a movie, just put there to convince you someone is around but no one actually lives there. I take a quick look around and see 1 or 2 trailers in the distance, again, no sign of life in them either. I pick up literature warning me about bears, walk back to the car and check my cell phone, zero bars, I am officially off the map. Nobody knows where I am and I have no cell reception, in today's terms, I don't exist. Being half way through a 200 mile stretch of hilly, heavily forested highway, I don't know why I would expect to have reception.

I walk back to the car and before doing anything, open one of the big bottles of beers I got from Anderson Valley. I was looking forward to this beer, partially because I had never had it, partially because it had been a long day, and partially because I needed to calm my nerves. I quickly pitch the tent in complete darkness as there is no ambient light under the thick canopy of trees and lack of moon. When I finish pitching the tent, I throw all my things in it and finish my beer. I hear ruffling noises from behind the tent and quickly flash my mag light in the direction of the noise, darting it back and forth while mentally planning out what I would do if the sound were a bear, noting which car doors were open and which would have best access to the drivers seat as my bike was in the back. I still hadn't decided whether I would drive off into the night or just sit still and wait for it to leave, imagining a scene from a show like Family Matters where I wake up in the morning to the sun light and birds chirping with my flashlight clutched to my chest like a warriors axe, nothing disturbed outside or in. By the time I start thinking of whether I would be sober enough to actually drive (a big beer drank quickly on an empty stomach), I realize my day/night dreaming has gotten too far off track and I need to get back to reality. I realized a few minutes later that the noises I heard earlier were actually my thermarest inflating and moving against the sides of the tent. 

 I put the car lights on to illuminate the picnic table, crack open the second bottle of beer and start planning for dinner. As I rummage around for my cooking knife, a.k.a. my leatherman, I realize I don't have any way of starting my camping stove. I am annoyed but don't try to problem solve as I realize cooking means bugs, small animals, and possibly bears as well as dishes and trash to properly take care of. I can't leave anything out because of the bears and then the picture of my dad, shirtless, pretending to be a bear in front of the bear locker at Yosemite YEARS ago keeps popping into my head.

I decide to forget the whole thing, I tear into the package of baked, marinated tofu with my teeth and eat that along with some peanut butter pretzels my neighbor Karen had given me before I left. I sat down in the drivers seat and wrote in my journal and finished my beer. I hoped this extra time would help make me tired/drunk/worry less about the possibilities of bears or wandering axe murderers. I was also hoping the extra time would allow me to get all the beer out of my system and not have to get up in the middle of the night to pee. As I started to write in the journal, I see a light in my side mirror. For a minute I got a little scared but then realized that if a psycho killer with half a hockey mask, hunched back, and rusty axe were trying to kill me, he wouldn't carry a a flashlight (I need to stop watching movie trailers). After this realization, I stepped out the car to greet the host. He greeted me with a short "Howdy" as he wrote down my car's info and when I probed him a little with some questions, he stopped me dead in my tracks with 1 syllable answers. Looks like he got the perfect placement for campsites judging by his people skills.

A minute later, a car passed by the entrance and went to one of the trailers in the distance, that took some weight off my shoulders immediately. It's interesting at how much of an imagination I have of the worst case scenarios, especially considering I generally steer clear of horror movies. When I was younger, I could only watch Are You Afraid Of The Dark when they started showing it during the day.

As I was more comfortable and started to relax, I started to notice all of the stars I could see through the trees and decided to take some photos. Since it was my first night camping, I thought I would take some photos of me with my tent. I triggered the flash 4 time total. After the 2nd flash, I heard a grunt, though I did not think anything of it. After the 3rd flash, I think I heard someone say "STOP" though I didn't figure out what it was until the end when I processed everything. After the 4th picture (fortunately it was a good one), I hear someone yell "KNOCK IT OFF!!!!" After a short pause it was followed by a trailing off "Fucking city moron..."

Now it's been a while since I used my outdoorsman speak, but I am pretty sure that translates to: "Welcome!!!!" and "Have a nice night..."

SF to the 299 (2 days)

After a lazy Sunday of brunch with Halley, some packing, and some planning, I hit the road later in the day, passing through hwy 1 just north of SF as sun was setting and the moon was rising. I stopped by Russian River Brewery for dinner and some beer tasting before getting to my hotel in Anderson Valley.

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I woke up early and headed straight for the Anderson Valley Brewing Company brewery (one of my absolute favorites) to get into their first tour of the day. Fortunately, as it was a monday at 11AM, I got a personal tour from one of the head brewers, I couldn't have asked for a better experience because I got to pester him with questions and he spoke a little more candidly about some of the aspects of their business. At the end of the tour, I went for the obligatory tastings and tried a beer they're testing out called Limited Huge'r Boont, a blend of 60% IPA, 40% Porter, it was delicious, I hope they produce that. It had all the body and smooth finish of their Porter but the bouquet and citrus flavors of their IPA.

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After the brew tour, I headed west to the 1 and then up the coast. That section of hwy 1 has to be one of the most tiring drives I have done up to this point (and by this point, I mean 9/18/09, I'm in Montana on my way to Denver at this point), it was an incredible relief to get to the 101. When I got to Humbolt, I took the Avenue of the Giants detour which had a lot of interesting places to stop and walk among very old trees (redwoods I think). They have a marathon held there every year and if I was into running, that would definitely be one I would train for.

When I finally reached the 299, I started heading east to Redding, CA. The 299 drive has to be one of the most underrated drives in CA. It is a nice wide road in good condition that slowly sweeps through scenic views of old forests dotted with small towns and campgrounds along the way. As the sun started to go down, I decided I would camp for the night rather then continue to Redding and pay for a cheap hotel. I decided I would find a market to get food for dinner and then a campsite. I passed a camp site that looked somewhat alive with people and then found a market to get food. Rather than backtrack a couple miles to the campground I saw, I decided I would continue to Redding and not waste miles. I finally came across a state owned campground that had a few tents pitched but not one person around. I drove into the empty campground in the middle of nowhere, parked, paid, read the bear warnings and walked back to my car as the last minutes of light burned away faster than I could find my flash light, the full story another time.

San Francisco

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Got up and took Tommy to work and he suggested taking the 280 to SF due to less traffic and a more scenic drive, he was correct on both accounts. I drove straight into the Mission District and stopped by the bike shop ken works at and talked with him for a while before heading off to grab lunch, under his recommendation, at a taco truck called El Tonayense. The tacos were absolutely delicious and simple, just meat, salsa, cilantro, and onions. The Al Pastor and Carne Asada were the best tacos I have ever had. I then headed to Ritual Coffee (missing their coffee cuppings, which are held every Friday, by an hour, oh well). I brought my laptop and kept myself busy until Dee was finished doing her errands. I randomly saw Scottie at Ritual (I used to ride bikes with him back in SD).

The next couple days in SF broke down as follows:

Finally went to Tornado. It was not as divey as I was expecting from others' descriptions and the lights were on a little too bright (like in SD) but the beer selection DEFINITELY did not let me down. Atmosphere was a little more relaxed than SD just because it was beat up a bit more.

Street Food Festival. Dee and I walked there from her house (not a short trek) without eating anything for breakfast. At one point, Dee turns to me and says "Ok, I am starving, I am about to start getting pretty grumpy. Just to warn you." A couple blocks later we run into the taco truck and after hearing me rave about it yesterday, we decide to get one to hold us over until the festival. The festival was PACKED and we were starving so we picked the shortest line that sounded good, Salvadorian food. We didn't realize that there was a whole 2nd half to the festival (neither did most of the people there) that had shorter line and food that was just as good. Either way, the tropical fruit agua fresca was good and perfectly complimented the emenada and tomal perfectly.

Philz Coffee. Philz has entire menu for all of their different types of coffee, explaining the flavors and type of roast. Each cup is mad individually with a drip filter. The quality of coffee is as good as ritual but a lot less pretentious, it is much more of a neighborhood spot. I had the "Soooo Good" blend and that it was, soooo good.

Little Otsu. A really cool independently owned stationary and zine store. Really friendly people working and a really great selection of things. Great for little gifts for people.

15 Romolo. After meeting Sellan, Denise, Philip, and Jupei for Sellan's birthday dinner, we met up with some others for drinks at various places, my favorite being 15 Romolo. They served classic style cocktails with all natural ingredients. Really great stuff, my favorite drink was the Rio Grande.

The trip was surprisingly short for how much I love SF (love it more and more each time I visit) but I wanted to get on the road and see other things. Besides, I will be back in April anyway.

From Half Moon Bay To San Jose

 

Being that I was on the schedule of a HS teacher, I was up early and decided to head out to Half Moon Bay. The morning was relatively clear for being in the bay area and I headed out to sit at the cliffs above the beach and relax. As I watched the birds fly along the waves, I started to notice a small pod of dolphins not far off the coast. After wandering around the beach, I decided it was a perfect morning for a bike ride so I went and grabbed my bike out of the car for the 1st time on the trip. With the exception of the horse manure in certain sections, it was a very nice ride.

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After Half Moon Bay, I headed over to meet Lou for lunch and then grabbed some coffee at Red Rock Coffee while I waited for Tommy to finish work. Tommy works for a small tech company and for those who haven't experienced what a tech company atmosphere is like, let me run you through what it's like. When Tommy is done with work, I meet him at his office, the 3rd floor of a pretty basic office building in Mountain View. With the exception of some conference rooms and an office or two, everyone works in one big room, seperated into their own areas, or sharing that area with someone else (two desks pushed together). Hanging from the walls are silly sayings, or ongoing office games they have going on. As an outsider, if you didn't notice the handful of people sitting at their computers, you would swear no work is getting done. People are working together, interacting, and the mood is definitely light.

I walk into the server room where the servers take up about 1/20 of the space of the room, while there sit 2 nice Foosball tables in the center of the room. We play some games of foosball (I get my ass handed to me as the other guys had quite a bit of experience under their belt as they not only play a lot now, but also played a lot at their last tech jobs) while the techs run some diagnostics on the servers. Tommy and I head off to leave but before we do, he goes to pick up some food. They get food fully catered once or twice a week (before the recession, all lunches were outside of work and paid for by the company). On the counter of the kitchen area is a brand new espresso machine with instructions on how to make different espresso drinks (before the recession it was a tab at Red Rock picked up by the company for all employees). All-in-all, after my last job, it felt like a giant play ground for adults. From my understanding, this is pretty normal, and for bigger companies like google, it is to an MUCH larger extreme. If you don't believe me, ask Dee.

After picking up Tommy, we went back to San Jose where we hopped on our bikes (like we used to do back just about as long as I can remember) and rode and checked out the local rose gardens and met some exchange students in town for the summer to work and learn English. They were really friendly and interested in talking with us, though I am pretty sure they were most interested in Tommy due to his impressive hair. After the rose gardens, we ate and drank, then rode some more, then drank some more, then rode some more (being completely safe of course), and then drank some more. We went to a place called Trials Pub where they had 3 different beers on Cask that you could buy by the pitcher, it was phenomenal. It felt good to be back on the bike and it felt good to be doing what I used to do (before the accident). Felt like things were beginning to get back to normal, even with so many changes going on.

Central California Coast

 

I got up early to start the day, but also so I wouldn't have to wait inline for the Hostel's free sourdough pancake breakfast which was actually quite good. They provide the batter, you cook your own. Some of the European guests had never had pancakes before so I had to explain how to cook them (gotta thank mom for that one).

After breakfast, I packed up and drove through Montana De Oro National Park, a nice coastal park with small beaches dotting the coast line and nice hikes to the top of the different peaks. I hiked up to Valencia peak, a 2 mile hike each way, with no water. That wasn't such a great idea but I made it back alright. After the hike, I drove to Morro Bay for lunch and stopped of at Giovanni's Fish Market where the woman next to me had a dog that was the spitting image (though skinnier and MUCH more calm) of my old dog Rocky. The oysters are Giovanni's were really good, very fresh and no need for the cocktail sauce.

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After lunch, it was time for Big Sur, a famous, beautiful, scenic, and tiring drive. About half way through, I stopped to check out the price of gas at the most expensive gas station in the U.S. and to get some caffeine in me for the remainder of the drive. The guy making coffee drinks was easily the quirkiest, most interesting barista I have ever experienced.

 

I continued up the 1 to Monterey and then drove up to San Mateo where I met with Tiffany for sushi and good conversation as always.  

Los Padres National Forest

 

I embarked for my travels on 8/18/09 around 10:30am. First stop? Irvine. I met with my old engineering professor and adviser, DDR, for lunch. It was good to catch up with him and talk about the environment, engineering, education, and the interrelationship of the 3. I was excited to hear that DDR was now the chair for Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at UCI, a very big deal. I also met with Jansen for one last pint at the Pub, Sunny, Steven, and ran into Marissa on my way to get coffee for the road.

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Once I did that, it was off on the open road! Nothing in the world to hold me back.....except for traffic on the 405....and the 101. But when I finally hit the 33, the fun began. I took the 33 because I had read somewhere that along the 33 was a cool small little town. The problem was I forgot to check what the town was called before I left and it was written down in my laptop, not on the paper I had with me up front. I later found that the town was Ojai which I skipped completely. The drive was not a loss though. The 33 was a beautiful drive, a somewhat hidden gem of southern California. The weather was nice and skies were clear which lended itself to beautiful views across the Los Padres National Forest (I was told later there are some natural hot springs along the 33 that you can get to only by foot that are supposed to be very nice).

The last 1/3 of the 33 was freshly paved which made for easy driving. As I began to descend from the mountains on the freshly paved straightaway coming down from the mountains, I started to smile, everything started to sink in, the trip had began. I wish I would of had more time to stop and take photos but I was racing day light (and the check in time at the HI in SLO). There are a lot of farms, abandoned buildings and equipment, and nice views along the 33 that I would have enjoyed stopping to see more of.  

 

I Hopped on the 166 as the sun was setting so it was a pretty dark drive. I had Kanye West on shuffle on the iPod and 15 seconds into Flashing Lights, I came up over a hill to see all the lights of Santa Maria break through the darkness. I found the Hostel and checked in with about an hour to spare. Not a bad place for $23/night.

A Preface

A lot of you are probably a little confused on the title. You are probably thinking something along the lines of, "Adrian, this makes no sense! You are far from ugly, the epitome of beauty and excellence in fact!" I would probably disagree with you(but only out of pure modesty of course). The name actually spurs from a stupid inside joke from 6 or 7 years ago between Rochelle, Sellan, and myself. But ever since, we have called each other uggs, ugglie, ugly, and just about any possible variation of the names, to the point where it feels odd calling Rochelle by her name. Last time I did it by accident she told me it sounded weird and to never do it again.

Anyway, long story short, Rochelle met the people at ugly dolls at a conference a while back and they gave her some ugly dolls and she gave me one (see above). Since it is hard to get any pictures of yourself when you are traveling alone (people get very intimidated by my camera), I decided to bring the doll along to represent me throughout the trip. Besides, I think it kinda looks like me. If you don't see the resemblance, what about now? Exactly.

I am going to try to keep on top of this as best I can but internet is sometimes a little scarce. In the meantime, you can see the pics from the going away party here. I will be posting all of my pictures from the trip on my picasa as well as some on my flickr (you can also see my pictures from Australia there). If you feel like a more up to date, ADD account of my travels (including my routes), you can follow me on twitter.

Here's to the good times, people, food, drinks, and stories of the past, present, and future. I'm off.