We made it!

Day 11 – June 20, 2009
We have arrived in California today! Within minutes of leaving Carson City I began to see trees on the mountains; not big trees but at least they were green; mostly pines or evergreens. By the time we had circled around South Lake Tahoe the trees were Ponderosa Pines, huge tall trees. Lake Tahoe is beautiful but definitely a tourist spot. We continued to climb summits of over 7000 feet and rock and roll down the other side. The curves were so gentle until we reached Placerville California where we left route 50 and headed north west on California 49; wow what a road! We must have traveled at least 50 miles with hairpin curves and S turns one right after another. Now I have never ridden Deals Gap but I’m sure this road has that one bet. No guardrails, step banks, tight turns, on coming buses and trucks it was a real test of skills – a motorcyclist’s playground. I’m estimating we passed 100 locals riding bikes on this road today. After lunch we called and reserved rooms at the Sherwood Forest Motel in Garberville. We have found it is less stressful if we call ahead and reserve rooms for the night around noon instead of just taking our chances each night. California appears to be the land of milk and honey after several days of dry and windy deserts. I can only imagine how the settlers must have felt crossing this great country of ours. Was that all there was? Why would anyone want that barren wasteland? In California we found trees and lots of them; green fields of tomato plants, hay, vineyards, orchards and herds of cattle. The mountains in the distance look ‘fuzzy’ and when we got close and began to climb I noticed they are covered with a low growing brown grasses which make them very pretty. Soon we follow route 20 into the northern coastal area where we begin to see the mountains covered with large pine trees and then taking route 101 we begin to see the Redwoods. The ones along route 101 are huge but they are just baby trees. I cannot wait to see the giants tomorrow. It is cold! It was cold when we left Carson City then warmed around noon and then by 3 it was getting cooler and by 4 it was just plain cold. I would never have dreamed it would be this cold in June traveling across the country. Everyone we talk to says this is not the normal weather.