The ride was beautiful from that gas station near Hornbrook until maybe forty miles outside of Redding. Fantastic switchbacks with an incredible Northern California sunset as a backdrop to the rolling hills.
Time for a disclaimer...
I loathe Yreka with so much of my being. No offense to anyone that lived/lives there, but, on my first tour when I was seventeen with Pheado, our van broke down there two days before christmas on our way to LA. Four of us had to hitch hike and sneak on busses to get to Compton in time to track while a shop fixed out cracked block in that shit brown Chevy we lived in for god knows how long. One of the worst and greatest experiences of my life.
Back to this trip, just outside of Yreka Kia's electrical decided to take a shit. Kyle and I pulled over to see if we could help, even though we don't really know that much about pan shovels. Thankfully, Kyle had a spare ignition switch and that seemed to do the trick at first.
As we were doing our best freeway fix, Dalen rolled up in Thom's rig with his knuck on a uHaul trailer. It was beautiful sight!
Kia was able to get his chop running and nursed it to the next exit with Kyle and Dalen while I ripped ahead to find Todd, Nick, and Thom to show them where Kia was so we could all put our heads together to get the pack back on the road.
Thom, Todd, and Kia finally got it figured out. I couldn't tell you what was wrong. My brain was fried from lack of sleep.
The sun was completely gone by the time we all hopped back on the road with the intent on making it as close to Oakland as we could, despite our late start and minor set backs. I absolutely love me some freeway night rides. It's almost surreal. I don't know what it is, but, there's something exhilarating when you can only see what the headlights, taillights, and street lights allow you to see.
We'd had dry pavement during this somewhat short stretch in California. It's as if we'd been racing the storm. Although, as we continued south down I-5, the drops started coming down. Nothing to worry about at first so we powered through. Although, as the water started collecting on the road, Thom pulled the pack over to make sure everyone had their rain gear on. I had my pants on, but, was just rocking the leather up top. I threw on my rain jacket. Kia hadn't had any rain gear on yet so he was soaked.
We had a pow wow and decided to keep a safe distance from each other, slow down, and have Dalen follow us with his hazards on so the semis that were blasting by us, would have an actual vehicle to see before six bikes with chopper lights and pedal bike blinkies flashing like a UFO.
Mind you, only one bike out of the six has a front fender. Two don't have front brakes. Only two have disc brakes while the rest have drum. Kyle and I are the only ones with modern head lights and I'm the only one with a true full face helmet. None of us have speedos or turns. Basically, we weren't prepared for what was ahead of us.
I swear the gods decided to take a piss right on us for the next twenty miles. I guess we were barely going twenty five miles an hour. I was trailing Thom on his right side so he could see better. Semis were blasting by us at full speed, spraying us with water off the road. Pretty sure we all caught the hep or something. Who knows where these Cali highways have been?
We finally pulled over at the next stop after what seemed like hours. Thankfully it was a rest stop. We killed the bikes under any cover we could find and took off our gloves and helmets. It was obvious that we were all beyond tense. I've ridden in some rain, but never six deep on the freeway in that gnarly of a downpour. Looks like we didn't beat the storm.
After some mildly tense conversation, we decided to pull out our sleeping bags and crash in an empty vending machine building. It was the only dry ground we could find. At this point we didn't give a fuck if the cops showed up. We were soaked to bones of our white knuckles and there was no way we were getting back on the five. I'd like to see them try and kick us out.
To be honest, I was actually a little thrilled. I set out on this trip with adventure at the forefront of my mind and saw this building as providence. I didn't plan on sleeping in hotels. My home is strapped to my bike. In all actuality I've probably got more than I actually need for the next three months with me. All we were missing was some whiskey.
We passed out within fifteen minutes waiting for the sun to rise.
The sleeping spot sounds like an excellent adventurous spot to snooze. :)
ReplyDelete