We're on day 4 of our road trip through northern California. We drove north from San Francisco on rt 1 (the coastal route) and we've been camping each night, at Bodega Dunes, Russian Gulch, and Humboldt Redwoods State Park last night. We're driving east on rt 36 now toward Lassen Volcanic National Park. We'll hike there for a few hours, probably camp there, and tomorrow do the tour at the Sierra Nevada Brewery. The roads are all mountain switchbacks and we're wishing we were on a motorcycle. Every day starts out cloudy, then the sky appears mid-day and the scenery turns beautiful. We're pretty high up now and it's 84 degrees (F).
Yesterday we happened upon three motorcycles flying Argentine flags. They stopped at a pullout and we stopped too to say hi in Spanish. They were 3 couples from Buenos Aires and have Harleys there, but oddly (because there are only a few dozen Harleys in Argentina) did not know the guy we rented Harleys from last year.
My Whisperlite International liquid-fuel camping stove, which broke in Patagonia but then got replacement parts, finally gave out on our first night of camping. The pump was leaking gas, then as I took it apart, it cracked. So we cooked dinner and made morning coffee over campfires for three days and then bought a new PocketRocket gas stove yesterday in Fort Bragg. It has very few moving parts, doesn't need priming, doesn't have to cool before re-lighting, and fits into a tiny case. Basically, I should have gotten one a long time ago.
We're moving into our new place on Friday and our stuff is getting delivered on Saturday. Then I start work on Monday! We're looking forward to many weekend trips back to these mountains in the future.
- Ben
Photos: Crossing the Golden Gate Bridge; our full size sedan (we requested economy); camping at Russian Gulch
Yesterday we happened upon three motorcycles flying Argentine flags. They stopped at a pullout and we stopped too to say hi in Spanish. They were 3 couples from Buenos Aires and have Harleys there, but oddly (because there are only a few dozen Harleys in Argentina) did not know the guy we rented Harleys from last year.
My Whisperlite International liquid-fuel camping stove, which broke in Patagonia but then got replacement parts, finally gave out on our first night of camping. The pump was leaking gas, then as I took it apart, it cracked. So we cooked dinner and made morning coffee over campfires for three days and then bought a new PocketRocket gas stove yesterday in Fort Bragg. It has very few moving parts, doesn't need priming, doesn't have to cool before re-lighting, and fits into a tiny case. Basically, I should have gotten one a long time ago.
We're moving into our new place on Friday and our stuff is getting delivered on Saturday. Then I start work on Monday! We're looking forward to many weekend trips back to these mountains in the future.
- Ben
Photos: Crossing the Golden Gate Bridge; our full size sedan (we requested economy); camping at Russian Gulch
Welcome to San Francisco! I came across your page as I was looking for info on Torres del Paine. I live in SF and am visiting Argentina and Chile in December... so we're sort of switching places :) Hope you like living in SF!
ReplyDeleteThanks for reading! I hope you found some useful information about Torres del Paine. I'm sure visiting Argentina and Chile will be awesome.
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