Week 14: San Francisco to Humboldt

Our final weekend in San Francisco happened to coincide with Carnaval, a two day long festival with a parade that goes right by our house.  Taking a break from packing on a beautiful Sunday, I went down to see the excitement.  The parade was fantastic with a rich diversity of cultures and amazing artistic talent shown in the floats and the costumes.  There were so many families out, either involved in the parade or enthusiastically watching it go by.  I found myself crying at the beauty of it all, knowing that this was is probably the last time we will live in the heart of San Francisco's Mission district.

After spending most of the day packing, a friend came over and we took Lukas out for a walk.  The streets had turned ugly.  People were joining in knots on corners, drunk and yelling at cops.  We saw several people being arrested.  A fight broke out across the street and people started running toward, and away from, the action.  The park was busy and fun with people BBQing post-parade, but even the festivities there felt like they could quickly get out of hand.  My regrets about leaving the City washed away, and I felt ready to leave as soon as possible and not look back for a while.

The last thing keeping us in town was a wedding on Memorial Day evening.  Heather and Cyrus had a beautiful wedding, complete with masks and a Mardi Gras theme.  The music was swing, 80s and goth, a perfect blend of the couple's shared interests.  Heather looked radiant in her garnet colored gown and Cyrus was a very happy groom.  The party was in full swing when we left in order to finish preparing for our move the next day.

Everyone that has ever moved knows the drama of it all, so I don't need to recount the details.  Suffice it to say that we finally got all our belongings packed up and put into storage, after going to first one storage site then leading the moving van to a different one.  Huge thanks to the movers at One Big Man for putting up with the rain and our inability to determine how-much-stuff-we-have and what-size-storage-unit-that-stuff-will-fit-into.

After a full day of moving in the rain, we were finally back into the RV!  We had been warned against the Candlestick Park RV park in Bayview, but after our last terrible experience at the Pacifica RV park we decided to try it out.  The place was great.  Quiet and clean, plenty of empty spots, nice store and laundry area.  The rain cleared and it was so wonderful to play ball with Lukas outside our new home.

The next step in our adventure was to rent a tow dolly from a nearby UHaul shop.  In order to tow the Mini with all four wheels on the ground we need a baseplate.  That baseplate needs to be made.  We have placed an order but it takes a few weeks to receive the item.  That leaves us either driving separately, shipping the car to the baseplate destination (an option which did not pan out after research), or using a tow dolly to bring the Mini Cooper with us until the baseplate is made.  We had the dolly reserved, but nothing is easy, so once we arrived at UHaul they of course didn't have the appropriate parts.  Luckily UHaul employees don't really care what you do as long as you're not bothering them, so while Brian visited several car shops to find the right ball hitch for the dolly, I put out the slide, fired up the oven and made some pizza bagels.  There are definite advantages to traveling in an RV.

We had been so preoccupied with moving that we put no thought into our travels plans.  By afternoon we were ready to go and headed over the Bay Bridge, pretty nervous with the extra twelve feet of car and dolly tethered to the back of our already huge RV.  It took us an hour and a half to get to Winters, but it felt much longer.  Thankfully the tow car stayed attached to the RV, we didn't go off the road or hit anyone with the trailer, and were getting used to carrying the extra weight while driving.  Winters is a cute little town and we strolled main street, ate some fudge, and found Putah Creek (which I was semi-obsessed with for no reason other than it has an awesome name).  It was getting late so we headed to a nearby state park for the evening.

Lake Solano Park is home to a large population of peacocks, who were introduced a few decades ago in hopes that they would kill the rattlesnakes.  It was pretty amusing to see the peacocks calling in all their spring finery, and of course reminded me of life at the zoo.  This park also had a small chicken coop filled with silkies, a rare breed of fancy chicken from Asia.  You could buy scratch to feed the chickens, and Lukas had a great time doing just that.  The lake is stocked with trout, which were jumping in the early evening.  It felt like we had found heaven.

After further research, we decided to bail on the Highway 5 route and instead cut over to 101.  I was pleased as punch to realize that in order to do that we would pass right by Lake Berryessa.  This is another area I had a bit of a fascination for, without much reason.  The roads were small but empty and the views of the lake sublime.  We will have to return some other time for further exploration of the region.  We made it to 101 and the driving got easier.  Just past Ukiah we found a little RV park on a lake and pulled on in.

Blue Lake is divided into the Upper and Lower lake, and we stayed at the edge of the Upper one.  Pine Acres Resort is a tiny little place overrun by roving bands of ducks.  It wasn't until the next morning that I learned the store sells bags of scratch to feed the ducks, which is why the ducks are so "friendly", persistent, and aggressive to their own kind.  There was one white duck who was the head gangsta.  When we finally broke down and bought some food I tried to keep him away and give extra to the loner mallard female instead.  Lukas acted the part of the zoo keeper's son and held his hand out flat, letting the ducks peck away at the food and making his mama proud.

The other interesting snippet about Pine Acres is that it was hosting a "Re-Bounders" meeting.  It did seem suspicious when we pulled in and most of the RVs were Bounders.  Later one of the ladies explained that they meet here once a year, and the Retired Bounders group meets monthly in areas across the state.  Why should I be so surprised?  There are groups for every kind of interest, why not the model of your RV?  But surprised I was, and also pleased that this group of retirees was quiet and had an early bedtime.

Brian was having a bit of an obsession with finding a handheld CB radio, so we went back to Ukiah to purchase one.  While there, I insisted we have lunch at the Ukiah Brewing Company.  Slow food style with an emphasis on veggie.  The beer was good, but the food seemed a bit bland.  Then up the 101 to Humboldt!  We hit up another brewing company for dinner, this time the Eel River Brewing Company.  The Organic Porter is excellent, currently ranked as my favorite beer.  The food was okay.  If I learned anything from today, it is that brewing companies are good at making beer and the food is secondary.  In any case it was a lively evening and Lukas was strangely good at the table.

The next day we decided to utilize our tow car and go back to all the roadside attractions along 101 that we had passed in the RV the previous day.  We hit up the One Log House, Curious Hill, Leggett's Drive Through Tree, and Avenue of the Giants.  Super fun!

Our morning excitement was followed by a visit to nearby Ferndale, where we had burger and chocolate recs from a friend.  The No Brand Burger Stand is a hole in the wall serving Eel River grass fed beef, which we could see grazing in the field behind the burger shack.  As a recovering vegetarian I'm still pretty picky about my meat, but this was some tasty beef.  And at least I knew where it came from!  We ended the day by the Eel River, Lukas throwing rocks and Brian listening to truckers on the CB.  Life is good on the road.  I can't wait to see what happens tomorrow!

RV PARK REVIEWS

Casa de 24th Street, San Francisco: C

  Managed to pull the RV into the tow-away spots we had reserved for the moving van.  Loaded up and got outta town ASAP.

Candlestick Park RV: B

  Quiet, clean, laundry and store.  Much better than the other option near SF.

Lake Solano State Park, Winters: B+

  Peacocks, lake with swimming area, chicken coop, large pull through sites, quiet except for the peacocks and chickens.

Pine Acres Resort, Blue Lake: C+

  Small, throwback to the 70s, duck gangs, on a lake.

Riverwalk RV Park, Fortuna: C+

  Big RV park, not actually on the river as advertised but within walking distance of river, clean hot tub and pool, playground, freeway noise, someone doing donuts in their car at 2 am, semi-industrial area, walking distance to Eel River Brewing Company.