RETURN TO THE CALISTOGA ROASTERY

...a chance conversation with a really good mom...

The woman must have been at least 80.  As I rolled up on the Yamaha, she was sitting on a bench backed up to the Calistoga Roastery clutching a heat-sheathed cup of something.  I suspect coffee.

I backed Enrico’s rear tire to the red-painted curb.  (I’ll explain this later.)

“I don’t think you can park there,” the woman said.  Her voice sounded as if it emanated from vocal cords made of razor wire.

“I know,” I said.  “I’ll just be a couple of minutes and I don’t want to take whole parking space from somebody in a car just for the bike.”

“Oh,” she said.  “That’s a nice idea.  You go inside and I’ll keep an eye out for the cops.”

Parking along Calistoga’s quaint downtown main drag is a combination of parallel spots and diagonal slots.  The transition is mid-block and at each transition zone, about twelve feet of curb is painted red.  The northern-most Napa Valley town is a mecca for motorcyclists of all stripes with all of the roads leading in and out of the berg – CA 29, CA 128, Silverado Trail – motoring delights for folks on two-wheelers.  Giving over about six of each of those twelve feet for motorcycle parking would likely ease stress on parking slots for cars.  I'm gonna write the City of Calistoga about this stroke of genius on my part...

I popped into the roastery, picked up two pounds of whole-bean and was out in two minutes.

“That was quick,” the woman said.  “Where are you going?”

“Home.  Cloverdale.  I come over here every few weeks to buy coffee partly because of the coffee and partly because the ride is so pretty.”

“We looked at Cloverdale when we moved.  Too hot.  Ended up here about 30 years ago.”

“That’s nice,” I said, unhooking my helmet from its lock.

“How far is it from Cloverdale to Boonville?” she asked.

“Twenty-eight miles,” I said.  “I ride that road quite frequently.”

“You think the coffee’s better here?”

I laughed.

“My daughter just moved to Boonville.  Husband got laid off and they couldn’t afford their place in the City.  Bought a place with a cabin and acreage...”

“Boonville’s nice.  Sorta remote.”

“My son lives in Sacramento. Well, El Dorado Hills.  You know where that is?”

I was beginning to feel a bit stuck.  “Yes.  I used to live out that way.” 

“What did you do there?”

“Education.  What’s your son do?”

“Some sort of science.  Something about rocket engines and the sort.” She paused – but not quite long enough.  “Cloverdale’s nice.  A bit too hot for me, but nice.  What kind of people live there?”

“Oh, a nice mix.”

“We had Thanksgiving last year up in... in... Placerville.”

“Hangtown!”

“Oh?  You know it?”

LA Times Photo

“Historic downtown.  Just like this.”  I waved my arm up the street.  “Used to ride up that way all the time.”

“Daughter said something at dinner and son replied with something about President Trump – he loves President Trump – and then he got up and stormed away.”

“That’s too bad.”

“Yeah,” she said.  “People... We share so much in common.  My kids even share blood!  It shouldn’t be like this.  I felt so bad.  Keep asking myself, 'Where did I go wrong?'”

Social distancing protocols prevented me from approaching the old gal and offering a hug, but I sure wanted to.  I waited for a moment and then asked, “Did you do the best you could do, Mom?”

She took a first sip of her coffee.  Her eyes crept over the rim of the cup.  “I think so.”

“Well, then.  You did the best you could.”   My smile was concealed by my helmet, but I think we made eye contact.

Straddling Enrico, I fired the Yamaha up.  Lifting her paper cup and tipping it toward me, she nearly hollered: “You be careful on that thing.”

(c) 2020

Church of the Open Road Press

TOURING THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE SONOMA AND NAPA COUNTY FIRE(s) OF 2017

Sorry, no pictures this time…

Yesterday I made my monthly coffee run from my home in the Russian River Valley over to the Calistoga Roastery in Calistoga.  The blends they create are robust and tasty and you get a full pound when you buy a bag. I always pick up two.

This would be my first coffee run since the fires ravaged large potions of Sonoma and Napa Counties.  I hopped on Enrico, the Yamaha, and headed south and east on CA 128, knowing I’d return by a different route, thereby making a loop out of the little adventure.

November is that special time of year when the harvest is in and the leaves on the vines turn a rainbow of reds and orange and yellows.  The colors depend on both the varietal planted and the location of the block.  In the Dry Creek Valley it is not uncommon to see a field checkerboarded in chartreuse and rust divided by vines already naked or vines yet to turn.  Up a hillside will arch a band of bright Zin or Pinot between stands of pine or cypress or oak.  Over in the Alexander, fields run from the banks of the Russian River all the way to the rolling summits of the Mayacamas.  On a clear, sunny day, the evolving landscape is glorious. A random tune enters my head and accompanies me through this joyful kaleidoscope of scenery.

Dropping into the Napa side of things, the area is more densely forested until you descend into the broad valley of one stream course with its rich, verdant soils, then over a rise and into the next and the next.

Weekdays are fine for such an excursion because the weekend wine tasters and lookie-loos are home or at work or doing something other than clogging the beautiful roads that sweep through the area.

On 128, a tick or two from Tubbs Lane, about six miles north of Calistoga, that thick forest has suffered harm, however.  Grievous harm.  Last month, on a night with near hurricane force winds, something touched something else and the shower of sparks that resulted kindled what, on any other evening would simply be a spot fire. 

Rounding a bend into a darkened section in a relatively narrow canyon, the trees that weren’t bare wore chalk-brittle leaves, fried in place.  The grasses were gone and, though weeks had passed, the air hung with the residual acrid odor of nature’s fury.  A pair of deer stood in the roadway, seemingly still dazed, only clattering out of my way at the last moment.  Up the highway a piece, I squeezed into a one-lane traffic–control section.  Arborists sawed and chopped and grinded the standing deadwood that would be hazardous to passers-by if left unattended.  But just as quickly as I entered that scene, I exited.  Four miles on, Calistoga, a town which had been under mandatory evacuation orders stood bustling and calm and unscathed as if what had happened, never happened.

I parked Enrico in front of the Roastery and dropped in picking my two bags of whole bean: “Eva’s Bitch in a Bag” (I’ve met Eva) and some “Frank Sumatra.”

Just north of town, the alternate route I chose would find me heading west on Petrified Forest Road, winding over a ridge, then tracing a creek, then turning right onto Porter Creek Road which, itself winds through a narrow canyon before it becomes Mark West Springs Road and descends into the northern outskirts of Santa Rosa some ten miles distant. 

The Santa Rosa Press Democrat reports that the fire traversed those ten miles that windy, windy night in about two hours and forty-five minutes.

Shortly after I dropped over that first ridge the forests I’d so anticipated and appreciated were gone.  Naked trees, those that had not collapsed, stood like the giant bony hands of some wicked October witch, ready to reach down and grab what ever might be passing on the highway underneath.  Pastures were scorched bare.  Wire fences sagged between the random distant posts that didn’t get consumed.

With the surrounding vegetation gone, home sites that I hadn’t realized were home sites were now evident, not because some expansive domicile was left, but because the masonry chimney was all that could withstand the fury.  Around a bend, I entered a swale where nothing was touched, just as quickly to pass through and see what looked to be someone’s ’28 Model A, reduced to rust inside the concrete stem wall of what used to be a garage.  Out of the little canyon, where valley opened up, entire hillsides were denuded.  Nothing left but ash.  And that sad, acrid odor.

Safari West, tourist attraction and home to exotic animals, seemed spared.  Mark West Springs Resort and Conference Center: same.  But coursing down into north Santa Rosa it was clear that these were exceptions.  Just short of the Redwood Highway (old 101) mainstays of a safe, cozy and modern American life – subdivisions – were rendered to crazy paved cul de sacs littered with the rusted hulks of minivans and SUVs, dotted with freestanding chimneys and the occasional melted piece of something metal. 

In the initial scene of an Indiana Jones movie, Dr. Henry Walton (Harrison Ford) finds himself in a tunnel when a huge round boulder breaks free and comes charging at him at breakneck speed.  He runs for his life.  I picture that this is how the fire must have seemed – must have advanced – that night.

I had packed my camera.  In the past, when visiting a fire aftermath zone, up on the Stanislaus or the Tahoe, I’d stop for snapshots of the unbelievable.  This time, I could not.  This time, it felt too much like invading the privacy of those who lost something precious, their home, their photos, their memories, and for some, their grandparent, spouse or neighbor.  It seemed unbecoming to photograph the objects of someone else’s grief simply to induce a reader to drop his or her jaw at the spectacle.

Motoring home, the random song that might accompany me in the saddle grew mute.  It is tough to feel music when so many lost so much.

© 2017

Church of the Open Road Press

COFFEE RUN

More on shopping locally, thirty-five miles from home

I live in a place where there are no bad roads.  Even the freeway that cuts through town is palatable: north to the redwoods, south toward the bay.  Secondary roads?  A week ago, I ventured to a tiny grove of redwoods – just a dot on the map.  Yesterday, it rained and I rode west to the coast.  Today?  I was running short of the whole bean coffee I grind each morning for my single cup of Joe.

My first experience with a really nice motorcycle involved an ’83 BMW R65.  Perhaps a bit too small for my lanky frame, I enjoyed the occasional commute from one end to the other of Sonora in Tuolumne County for a haircut.  I chose a barbershop that required a good thirty minutes on skinny and entertaining roads for my once-monthly riding delight. Twists. Canyons. Pines. Granite. And then the shears.

Long ago, it became my practice to shop locally as far from home as possible.  My intent yesterday was to buy coffee, but I ended up taking a route that led me in exactly the opposite direction to a nice little chowder house with a view of a churning sea just off the pier in Point Arena.  Not surprisingly, today, I was still short coffee.  Funny how wanderlust can derail even the simplest of agendas.

Sonoma County, California, it is said, has more soil types than all of France.  Perhaps this is why Sonoma’s main agricultural endeavor seems to be wine grapes.

Travelling along the secondary roads, over ridges and into vales, vineyards appear as rolling waves across the undulating landscape.  Real picturesque.  Generally, we find Pinot Noir and Sauv Blanc to the west, Zins and Cabs in the drier regions east.  But pocketed microclimates married to soil regions borne through the combination of tectonic forces and eons of erosion bear blocks of myriad fruit, each with specific characteristics based upon genetics and locale.  If one likes wine, Sonoma County is heaven.

Likewise, if one likes a range of riding experience, Sonoma County does not disappoint.  Today’s excursion traced the edge of the Alexander Valley, crossed the Mayacamas hills and descended into the northern reaches of a Napa Valley that may not quite deserve the vaunting wine reviews it receives; at least that’s what those of us in Sonoma County believe…

To be sure, there is – or was – more going on in the realm of agriculture in this region than simply viticulture: cattle are grazed, fruit and nut orchards dot the landscape and tiny farms, organic and otherwise, checkerboard the area.  But overall, the acres and acres of grapes, which have displaced perhaps too many of the old time farms, provide a beautiful backdrop for the twisting, rise-and-fall pavement that invites a casual throttle and a relaxed pace.

The ride through northern Sonoma County into neighboring Napa County is a rewarding two-wheeled escapade.  The city of Calistoga is a berg of a few thousand situated at the north end of the Napa Valley.  Though there is an a comprehensive John Deere tractor dealer on the east end of the main drag – bring a grandson or daughter and buy ‘em a green ball cap – the community’s agricultural roots are deeply hidden by a burgeoning tourist trade: mud baths, a quaint downtown, tasting rooms monikered with names famous for stuff other than wine.

Allow and hour or so to stroll the street.  A great bookstore awaits.  A classic California café, as well.  And the Calistoga Roastery: it offers the whole bean coffee that, they claim, “wakes up Napa County.” 

I use this independent business as my excuse to do seventy miles of enchanting pavement.  The roastery sells whole bean and blends whose essence, the day after, reminds me of the pleasantry of the journey – smooth, warm and satisfying.  Plus, at the Calistoga Roastery, a pound of coffee still weighs 16 ounces.

What could be better?

I’ll ask myself this question tomorrow morning over a warm and fragrant cup and conclude: “Not much.”

For the ride and the commerce, I’ll be back in about three weeks, unless I should happen across another roaster while exploring a different thirty-five miles of twists, turns and stunning scenery – somewhere else local.

o0o

Notes:  Info on Calistoga may be accessed at: http://visitcalistoga.com/

Specifically, the Calistoga Roastery’s website is: http://calistogaroastery.com/

o0o

Routes:  Yesterday: north on US 101, west on state route 128; south on state route 1 to Point Arena.  Right on whatever the street is that leads a mile out to the pier.  Chowder house is there.  Try the Manhattan.  Return?  South on state route 1 to Jenner, east tracing the Russian to Monte Rio, Guerneville and Santa Rosa; to 101.

Today:  South on US 101, east on state route 128 at Geyserville to Calistoga.  Left onto the main drag.  Return?  Retrace.

© 2016

Church of the Open Road Press

MICHELIN PILOT ROAD 4 TRAIL MOTORCYCLE TIRES

A product review

Whereas, there was about six miles of life left in my old, dependable rear Metzeler Tourance dual sport tire; and

Whereas, while I enjoy riding solo but have grown weary of having to figure out how to right the heavy BMW GS after having misjudged some gravelly curve in the wilderness; and

Whereas, I’d determined that there are plenty of paved secondary roads to keep me adventurously entertained;

I therefore resolved to purchase a pavement-focused set of new tires for my adventure-touring bike.

What the heck, I figured.  A pavement-centric tire will probably afford longer tread life and – while I don’t have the nerve to race around at the big Beemer’s limits – better handling.  I do have a penchant for purchasing tires and gear that will out-perform my personal riding limits given the ever present chance that something unexpected may require me to respond as if I actually had the nerve.  Take the time an eighteen-wheeler’s recap blew up a few seconds ahead of me on one of CA 128’s rather tricky curves.  Please.

Having done a bit of research and owing to the great confidence I developed in the Pilot 2s I’d placed on my Guzzi, I opted to have the big bike shod with newly released Michelin Pilot Road 4 Trails.  “Not for use on forest roads,” a promotional video warns.  I’d grown (or chickened) to where I was okay with that, although the wiggly - as opposed to traditional adventure-style blocky - tread took some getting used to visually.

My new-to-me local BMW store – Santa Rosa BMW/Triumph in Windsor ordered up a pair while I took a final tour up into Oregon on the Metzelers.  This proved to be one final tour too many as the steel belt began peeking through the rear Tourance just as I rode into our garage in Cloverdale.  Gingerly I limped the bike down to Windsor where I hid out so the mechanic couldn’t hunt me down and scold me for riding on rubber in such condition.

We are told to be careful for the first fifty to one hundred miles on a new tire.  On the day of purchase, I took the freeway from Windsor to Ukiah and a series of windy frontage roads through vineyards and over hills home.  Nice, I thought.

The next trip was in a heavy mist turning into rain ride over Mendocino back roads where I employed a gentle hand on the throttle.

Then came spring.  On a fifty-degree morning, I piloted south on 101 from Cloverdale to Geyserville.  There I picked up CA 128 for a glorious ride through the Sonoma County Wine Country, crossing ridges and creeks, into and out of the regions various appellations. (Sonoma County takes a back seat to no one when it comes to both wine and roads.) 

After breakfasting at the historic Café Sarafornia in Calistoga, I headed out of town east catching the Silverado Trail which traces the eastern edge of the Napa Valley.  This ribbon of pavement offers sweeping views of the scenic valley through row upon row of just-ready-to-bud vines, backed by lusciously forested hills.  Tiny drives spur west across the valley and east up into them hills. (Napa County takes a back seat to no one when it comes to both wine and roads.)

I chose to cross the Coast Range on 128 from about Rutherford, past Napa’s Hennessy Reservoir – full enough this day to make one forget that there’s a drought going on – thence past Berryessa and into Winters. 

Recently completely repaved, this route invites a rather open throttle but one must be ever cautious about slides of scree that migrate onto the highway after a heavy rain, a heavy wind or a perfect-weather day.  There may be gravel on the road any time you ride it.

The trip proved to be a lovely test of the Michelin Pilot 4s.  Their grip inspires confidence, and although I really liked the Metzelers I’d sworn to before – which, granted, are engineered for a slightly different purpose – for pavement riding, these Pilots are a cut above.  “Handles as if you were on rails” is the phrase that comes to mind. 

Two minor brain farts yielded no casualty.  One was letting a low sun get in my eyes resulting in entering a bend a bit quicker than I’d have liked.  An extra lean kept me on my side of the double and after I quit beating myself up, I chuckled a bit.  Incident two involved a turkey vulture dining on road kill until a fraction of a second before I was to pass.  Intent on his lunch, this birdbrain (literally, folks: birdbrain) chose to carry off his carrion too late at my approach: a huge wing missing the top of my windshield and then my helmet by mere millimeters.  There would have been contact had the Michelins not effectively scrubbed off the tiny bit of speed I asked them to. 

I like these tires.  Months ago, I decided to forego the forest service dirt roads I had enjoyed when I didn’t worry about the effort necessary to pick the damn motorcycle up off its side.  My next trip to some remote fire lookout can be in the pickup or, better yet, on foot. 

The road-worthy confidence inspired by these Michelin Pilot Road 4 Trails makes the choice to go with a more pavement oriented tire seem like no compromise at all.  They have converted my adventure-touring machine into a better long distance touring machine. 

o0o

Notes:

What Michelin has to say about their tire: http://motorcycle.michelinman.com/tires/michelin-pilot-road-4-trail

What Metzeler says about the Tourance (a really great tire as well): http://www.metzeler.com/site/com/products/tyres-catalogue/Tourance.html

Regarding Calistoga’s grand, historic and a bit funky Café Sarafornia: http://cafesarafornia.com/

© 2015

Church of the Open Road Press

The Napa - Sonoma Marsh Ride

off CA State Route 37

The principal difference between the average driver on I-80 and Michael Andretti is that Mr. Andretti knows how to drive fast.  Drafting, sudden lane changes, going 20+ miles per hour over, debris, frequent abrupt slowdowns not "under yellow" and hordes of amateur Michael Andrettis and Kyle Pettys are par for the course on the section of freeway between Sacramento and San Francisco.  Thus, I avoid I-80 whenever possible.

It is the case, however, that in order to get from home to one set of grandkids, that stretch of the interstate is pretty much “it.”  One of the pleasures, though, is the cut off State Route 37 takes between Vallejo and Novato across the top of San Pablo Bay and the Napa Sonoma Marshes. 

The road offers pleasant views across a wide and muddy flat to a distant ridge of the Coast Range.  Up close, great blue herons and snowy egrets stand reflecting in the still, briny, topaz-blue waters.  Normally racing to see how much the little ones have grown, we don’t stop.  This day, I took the bike and braved the freeway with the sole purpose checking out this area.

My selected day and time of day, could, most certainly, have been better.  A thin, gray overcast foretold of a storm approaching maybe a day and a half off.  The tide was low, thus the reflective blue sky-blue water that seems so enticing so many times from the car window was muted.  And those graceful shorebirds decided this day to play hard to get.

I paused at a nicely maintained vista point on I-80 west past Cordelia Junction and checked out the view toward the marshes.

State Route 37 splits from I-80 just a half mile further on, then arches over the Napa River before settling onto a raised straight stretch across the wetlands.

At select points, wildlife viewing access is indicated.  Speeds along the highway range above the posted 55, and the turn-offs to these viewing kiosks can be rather exciting.  Watch for gravel!

The state, in concert with a conservancy has built viewing platforms and access for kayaks and canoes.  Ample parking is provided.  Nicely graded trails head through the wetlands on levees constructed, perhaps, by long-ago rice farmers.  All one needs to view waterfowl is a spotting glass or some good binoculars and – some waterfowl.

Out this way, Skaggs Island Road heads north, but after only about a mile, one comes to a locked gate – military reservation? – and a bunch of busted glass.

A sucker, myself for sheds and small buildings, I spot a corrugated assemblage decaying by a levee.  I stop for a close-up and wonder about its original purpose.  Perhaps a pump station.

A bit further on, a tiny shack sits abandoned next to a powerless power pole.  I considered the effort involved in slogging through the bog to construct anything at all and understand why, along with the seasonal clouds of flying insects, there are no large structures out this way.

I made five or six stops along this seven or eight mile stretch.  Absent the birds, always entertaining were the wildflowers and the changing views of the distant hills.  And those little buildings. 

At the Sonoma County Raceway, also known as Sears Point, State Route 121 heads north and east toward Napa.  This much preferred alternative brought me round to 128, Lake Berryessa, Winters and home.  I’ll do this ride again checking the weather for a more crystalline day and the tide charts for a better possibility of some birding.

o0o

Winters, CA (file photo)

Today’s Route:  I-80 west to SR 37.  37 west to SR 121.  121 north through Napa toward Lake Berryessa and SR 128.  128 east to I-505 or on to Davis via Russell Road and I-80.

© 2013

Church of the Open Road Press

WHILE RIDING ON THESE COOLER DAYS

Baby, it’s cold outside.

- Johnny Mercer

WHEN THE DAILY HIGH temps only rise to the 50 to 55 degree range, only the intrepid can be found enjoying the highways and back roads on two wheels.

Out state route 128 past Winters, there are few if any motorcyclists this day. The fifty-degree air slices through my layers. Every square centimeter of my being feels the chill – except for the middle finger on my right (throttle) hand which cannot feel anything at all and won’t until I stop for a cup of coffee at the café located junction of 128 and 121. Here I would thaw out the digit by simply placing it in the steaming coffee, until such time as I received feedback that feeling had returned.

A fellow in riding gear was finishing a burger and ordering a slab of apple pie. His V-Strom was parked outside, now with my GSA beside it.

The usual questions ensued. “Where you going?” “Where you out of?” “How long you been on the road?” “Any route recommendations?”

The gentleman told me that this was his third V-Strom. First one had been a 650. He wanted more power so after 40,000 miles, he traded for a 1000 model, which he summarily crashed after hitting a water hazard just up the road from this café. Opted for his current 650 since Suzuki wasn’t importing the bigger model. “It isn’t my only bike, however,” he confessed. This explained the Harley garb we wore while touring on the Japanese bike. “My Street Glide’s parked in the garage right now.”

I shared that I, too, had a second bike – a beautiful little black Guzzi.

He swallowed a bite of apple pie and washed it down with some coffee. “Kinda makes you sad, doesn’t it?”

I shook my head, unclear of his drift.

“The second bike.” He motioned with his fork. “Sitting at home and missing all this.”

I thought about the Breva isolated in my cold and darkened garage and nodded.

He said, “They know, you know.”

“Yep. I suppose they do.”


TEMPERATURES IN THAT LOW 50 range effect photos in a bad way. The pictures become non-existent. Inside the heavily insulated winter gloves, my hands are warm and my digits relatively mobile, with the exception of that one finger. I know that removing the gloves to fetch the camera will end with me slipping once-warm hands into once-warm-but-no-longer-warm gloves. Thus, rather than stop to record the flaming Big Leaf Maples or Black Oak leaves, or the row upon row of wine varietals – each changing hue consistent with their lineage and micro-location in the vineyard – I whisk by thinking perhaps I can resort to using words on a keyboard once I’ve found shelter for the evening.

Pictures would have been a good idea. My hands ultimately developed that chilled stiffness anyway, so I may as well have stopped now and then. By not doing so, I aligned no electrons to depict the rolling hills mostly covered in chemise, but blocked, in select places with cultivated vines. I didn’t pixilate the muted colors under a pewter blanket of cloud, nor the flaming cabernet, pinot and zin leaves against a deep azure sky where the sun had melted those clouds. I didn’t catch the remnant moisture from yesterday’s storm rising as mist aside a forested hill. I missed the golden English walnut leaves and the spare, spindly pear branches reaching skyward, already devoid of foliage; and the Victorian set back from the road in a cluster of pecans and mulberries; and the red barn with a corner of rusted corrugated roof peeling away. Also not photographed for posterity: the Great Blue standing at the edge of a gray pond; the placid water under a Napa River bridge; the small convention of geese gathered on some farmer’s front lawn; or the Spanish moss over the graceful curves of the still damp Silverado Trail. In general, of the elements that define the ride, none were captured.

I guess if I’d stopped for one photo op, I’da stopped for a bunch more. Darkness would have settled in and, along with that darkness, an even deeper cold. Maybe I’m just not intrepid enough to both ride and take snapshots.

OVER THE MEADOW and through the wine country, I would see and spend a couple of nights with granddaughter and her new seven-week-old brother. Perhaps I had reason to hurry. Perhaps not.

In any event: no pictures. At least, not of the ride this time.

© 2011
Church of the Open Road Press

DAWN’S EARLY LIGHT II – NETHERWORLD IMPRESSIONS OF COUNTY ROAD 31 AND STATE ROUTE 128

Sometime, between about 55 and 60,

the herd begins to thin itself.

And it’s the herd I’m in.

I THINK OF THIS as I motor across the valley floor on what is a now-familiar route. Back to the east, a few shafts of morning sunlight slip over the mountains and under a low ceiling of clouds. In moments, the promise of daybreak will be gone, absorbed in the velvet layer of moisture that blankets the region and renders the landscape gray. The morning is not warm, but it is not cold. I am in the midst of a netherworld – a neither-this-nor-that environ – similar to the one separating last night’s wakefulness from sleep. It’s a good thing I know this road.

I wonder, as I advance into the next turn, if Aunt DaVonne is somehow in a netherworld of sorts: unwanting of the oxygen tube forcing the breath of life into her, but equally unwanting of the alternative. Today, I’m told, for the third or fourth time in the too-recent past, the device supplying O2 will be removed. “Can’t keep the tube in there too long or the lungs will forget how to function.”

I EXHALE THROUGH MY NOSE and the inside of my Shoei helmet's visor fogs. The road disappears. Riding blind at 55 to 60, I push upward on a tab to crack open the face screen. The condensation melts away. Again I see the muted colors of the mid-autumn landscape. The valley’s beauty subdued. Its aromas of fermenting grass stubble and derelict melons have soaked into tiny, leaden water droplets that fall to the ground. A fence line parallels the road. Its wooden posts, once erect, tilt at odd directions, bases rotted away, suspended by the strands of wire the posts, initially, had been engineered to, themselves, suspend. Two hundred yards west, the fence disappears. But it never goes away. For as long as I choose to be aware, the fence continues, always disappearing into the gloom. Always two hundred yards ahead.  And I smell moisture.


MY MIND WANDERS to the netherworld – the ill defined place between the here and now and the somewhere else. I wonder who populates this undefined place: who they are, how long they might stay, where they might be headed; but mostly: are they still with us?


THE ROAD RISES from the valley floor and into that low blanket of cloud cover. Its cloak thickens. Then, after a distance, as the pavement twists and sweeps upward, the mantle disappears. The fence is gone, too. Ascending, I pass the familiar concrete dam on Putah Creek and its reservoir, then through stands of valley and blue oaks and thickets of scrub. The road dips into pastures of golden grasses recently laid flat by the rain. The land here is sectioned off. More fences. Country folks scratch livelihoods, raising dry vineyards or irrigated pasture or, maybe, a Christmas tree farm. A paintless, weathered barn balanced on an ancient rock foundation and its attendant cattle shoot faces the highway. Back from the road a distance, a derelict Atlas moving van with faded lettering and an artful curve to its prow provides covered storage for silage or equipment. Primitive, scrabbly dirt roads exit to the left and right of the pavement, curling around knolls and into hidden and, perhaps, enchanting homesteads. Each one is gated to protect what’s in there from what’s out here.

Topping a ridge, I find slivers of blue sky, but only slivers. Thin cirrus ice crystal arrays, harbingers of tomorrow’s storm, already lace the highest atmosphere. Though the temperature has slightly risen, when I snap closed the Shoei’s face shield, my breath fogs the damned thing up.

I stop to wipe it clean, pull out my word processing device and begin to type these words. Kind passersby see the BMW propped at the side of the road with one pannier open. They pause to ask if I’m okay.

I am, I say, thanking them.


THIRTY MILES AWAY, a loved one has, by now, been freed of her ventilation. She is no longer in the netherworld between self-supported breathing and not. I hope to see her in the next hour or so, but wonder if somehow, we might have passed along the way this morning.

Then, damn it all, I think about the thinning herd of which I am a part and realize: Auntie DeVonne is, too.

© 2010
Church of the Open Road Press

JUST-PAST-DAWN’S EARLY LIGHT: YOLO COUNTY ROAD 31

A MID-MORNING NECESSITY in Napa finds me racing westward across the floor of the Sacramento Valley. Seventy-five miles behind me, the sun has crept over the summit of the Sierra. The season’s first drenching rain occurred yesterday and extended into the evening. This morning’s rays work to slightly warm the air and dissipate the season’s earliest Tule fog.

Life had dealt Auntie DeVonne a bad hand. An internal infection needed to be staved before an operation could repair the faulty heart valve. The abscess, however, wouldn’t respond to antibiotics and the infection’s growth now inhibited respiration. During the storm last night, DeVonne “coded.” Something much more invasive was necessary. But what of the weakened heart? According to the surgeon, Auntie’s circumstance was “like being on the third floor of a house where the first floor was totally involved in flames. You can wait around or you can jump out the window. I’ve got the net.”

There would not be time for breakfast on the road this morning. Or pictures.


COUNTY ROAD 31 beelines west from Davis. Once out of town the farmland looks laser flat. In the slightest depressions, cool air pools. Clinging, earth-bound sheets of gossamer fog mark these low spots: rimmed silver on top by the rising sun, but filled with icy daggers as the rural road slices through. Even with the heaviest of riding gloves the chill, like an x-ray, finds each of the 54 bones in my hands and tries to freeze them – and their connecting tissue – solid.

Under the broadening expanses of clear sky, yesterday’s rainfall begins a fermentation process on fresh wheat stubble in the neighboring tracts. The air assumes a sugary fragrance, as the landscape outside the fog pools turns golden. A field of rotting watermelon smells particularly pungent and rich. As does the windrow of eucalyptus planted several yards south of the pavement just beyond an irrigation canal. The BMW’s on-board thermometer reads 48 then 50 then 52 degrees. My black leather jacket absorbs some early morning warmth and an involuntary shiver transfers it to my body.

Straight ahead, the lower reaches of the Vaca Hills of the Coast Range bask in this just-past-dawn early light. But the season’s first storm had been significant. Up the mountain, fresh moisture soaks the top few inches of soil and the lower few feet of atmosphere. Vaporous wisps fill the east-facing hollows of seasonal creeks that may have come back to life. At the crest, a bounteous pure white blanket of moisture lay peeking over, so much like disheveled bedclothes pushed back against a footboard after a raucous and intense night of passionate and long-awaited frolic.

Sure enough, once over the little nameless pass and into the Monticello Valley where now rests Lake Berryesa, the sun’s work has not begun. The road enters the bank of fog, perhaps never to exit this day. The cold x-rays work against my hands to stiffen them and render them numb all the way to Napa. But the recent warmth and sweetness of the Sacramento Valley at dawn lingers and comforts me.


AND CONTINUES to do so as I sit outside the ICU, awaiting word.

© 2010
Church of the Open Road Press

BACK TO THE PAST: STATE ROUTE 128 – WINTERS TO NAPA VALLEY

THE OTHER DAY, I found myself on the road to Napa to visit a hospitalized friend. Interstate 80 makes an efficient route just as Burger King is efficient with lunch. I chose California 128, which begins in Winters (off I-505) and winds up at the coast. The last fifty miles of 128 from Cloverdale to Route 1 is the stuff of legends, but the section from Winters to the Napa Valley provides graceful in-saddle relaxation and a few sections of challenge. Here are a very few notes on what I found:

DOWNTOWN WINTERS. If you, like I, grew up in a small town where everyone knew who you were, take heart that such places still exist. Main Street, Winters CA, is two blocks south of route 128. The downtown bank isn’t a multi-national. The realtor has his own name on the door. The Buckhorn Steakhouse provides world-class fare with area wines from small growers. My noontime found me eating a burger at the Putah Creek Café and eavesdropping on the conversations of locals about the sheriff’s race, today’s unseasonable temperature and somebody’s new baby boy. My lunch prompted me to tell the waitress that most burgers are nothing special, but this one is to die for. Nicely browned, garnished with fresh local produce and sitting atop a bun that never saw the inside of a corporate bakery – if one is destined to have coronary artery disease, this is among the most enjoyable ways to get it. Dive in. Don’t look back.

LAKE BERRYESSA. Not the most picturesque of reservoirs, the turnout at Monticello Dam, west of Winters, affords a pleasant view down the course of Putah Creek. A small resort rests at the bottom and the still waters of Putah Creek provide great fishing and invite a swim on a hot afternoon. At the dam site, the endless efforts of tectonic forces uplift and bend once-seabed into what is now the Coast Range of California. Easily seen are the layers upon layers of sediment that predate just about everything but the big bang. Off to the west, shoreline is a matrix of clustered oaks on a golden-grassland palette. Berryessa is an Anglicization of "Berrelleza" – surname of Basque settlers who first settled this and many other tranquil Coast Range valleys. Somewhere off in the distance, livestock still graze near where the Zodiac of the 1960s did one of his awful deeds. Moonset from this vantage point, one imagines, both warms and chills.

SPANISH MOSS. West, the road rises and settles into various valleys and swales. Where the temperature and humidity are optimal, long arrays of Spanish moss hang from the arms and chins of the valley oaks like beards of a Tolkien character. Its presence gives the woodlands an ethereal quality that goes unnoticed by passers-by seeking the ethereal quality of the redwoods yet another two hours west. Still the soft blue-drab beards and muted light invite fantasies of trolls and animals that talk and young maidens carrying baskets to grandmas. A picnic along the side of the road in early spring or late autumn seems in order.

THE NICHELINI WINERY. Established in 1890, my first visit to Nichelini was the result of stumbling upon it when driving north out of Fairfield with friends. I believe we purchased some wine in a jug, but three decades (and too much wine from jugs) may render the memory a bit fuzzy. One of the oldest wineries in all of California, Nichelini produces absolutely premier wines from local vineyards. Their Chiles Valley Zinfandel accompanies nicely a tri-tip dinner from the Buckhorn in Winters or that picnic under the Spanish moss. Plan on finding space on the rack at home and buying a case. Open for tours only on the weekend, and with limited parking along the windy route, too many people race by and miss this California heritage business.

STATE ROUTE 128 and sister route 121 (directly into Napa) do all the verbs we riders seem to like: sweep, twist, lilt, rise, fall, challenge and invite. My friend’s illness provided an unhappy counterpoint to this delightful route, yet the route provided a delightful counterpoint that would not have been achieved on the Interstate.

A quick scan of two of my habitual monthly reads: Rider Magazine and the BMW Owner’s News, finds that most articles about travel are from those who have journeyed great distances for their story: Alaska’s Haul Road, the Blue Ridge Parkway, California Highway 1 – even globe trotting through Africa or around the world. Yet, in most of our backyards are roads people travel for days just to visit. Leave us not overlook these gem-like local routes in our quest to find something special. Special is right here.

RESOURCES:

www.buckhornsteakhouse.com/ Info on the Buckhorn Steakhouse and Putah Creek Café

www.nicheliniwinery.com/ Established in 1890, the Nichelini Family is the oldest continuously operating family owned winery in the Napa Valley.

http://visitwinters.com/  This site is devoted to providing information about Winters, California to residents and visitors alike.

STICKER SHOCK - STATE ROUTE 12, NAPA COUNTY

A WINDOW STICKER. A pleasant one with a pleasant message. Two children, in white vinyl, praying under a white vinyl cross. Peace. Tranquility. Patience. Love: the unquestioned type.  All that Christ-like stuff.

The window sticker was affixed to the aft window of a late model Camry. Tinted. So the image looked white on black.

Pretty damned cut and dried, in my opinion. If existed both good and evil, this represented good.


CALIFORNIA STATE ROUTE 12 is a two lane affair heading west from Interstate 80 toward US 101 below Santa Rosa, through rolling hills and vineyards.  The road adequately bears the traffic that it is asked to. Everyone moves along at the legal limit and only curses blue when a semi, laden with cases of Carneros region wine struggles to make one of the hills.

I keep a safe distance and am generally well aware of how many seconds separate me from the fellow in front and how many seconds separate me from the motorist behind.

Where this lady came from to me is still a puzzle. A mystery. How she got there is not.

The first bit of road that had an inkling of straightness proved to be her opportunity to pass. I braked and pulled dangerously close to a gravelly shoulder as she rocketed by on the curving up-hill grade.  Mrs. Andretti? I presume.

Once the adrenaline cleared and my bearings were restored and I’d thanked BMW for putting anti-lock brakes on this motorcycle, I oriented myself toward this new situation, slowing, as necessary, to again achieve the two-second safety gap.

Ahead of me now, the Toyota’s rear window, was the cherubic window sticker. So pleasant. So docile. Saying so much without any words what so ever. Peace. Love. Brotherhood. All of those things her Lord and Savior might have preached. Yea, verily: did preach.


IN A MOMENT, the road shifted from two lanes to four. Shortly, there stood a stoplight and an option for motorists to head north to Napa or West to Sonoma. The Camry yielded at the light, detained by a vehicle or two in the lane ahead of her.

As she waited, I motored along side and gave the driver a meaningful (or a questioning) glance. Catching her eye, I motioned to her as she glanced at me while I lifted the shield of my helmet.

She lowered her window, although I could see the trepidation in her face, me being on a motorcyle and all.

“Nice window sticker,” I said, blipping my throttle.

“Huh?”

I cocked at thumb over my shoulder to the tinted rear window of her Camry. “Nice window sticker!”

She nodded. Smiled. “Oh. Thanks.”

“Say,” I began before the red light turned, “How would Jesus drive?”

“Huh?”

“I said, ‘How would Jesus drive?’”

Her face whiplashed from the smile of approval into something less. Something different. Her eyes narrowed and her lips tightened. Her trepidation regarding me was clearly founded. “How the hell should I know?”

The light toggled to green and she was gone.

Onward I continued, quite happy that she was far in front of me.

© 2006
Church of the Open Road Press