May 16, 2023 – Bodega Dunes State Park to Samuel P Taylor State Park
We had planned to eat breakfast in Bodega today at one of their many cafes, but turns out that most of them are closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays. We definitely wanted to fuel up for our day, so we ended up going to The Tides Wharf and Restaurant inside of what looked to be a pretty upscale hotel. Plus side of this is that we got to eat at a table overlooking the bay and had a solid breakfast. This was good because we started off the day with 2 very steep hills over the first 17 miles or so on our way to Tomales. Tomales is a tiny town but looks very nice. We stopped to buy some snacks at the nicest general store I’ve ever been to and then went to fill up on water and take a quick break at a local park. The park was really well maintained and all of the facilities were immaculate; definitely want to go back there with the family.
After Tomales, our goal was to make it another 17 miles or so into Point Reyes for lunch. We made pretty decent time as the hills got significantly shorter (although still plenty steep) and eventually we hit a 5 mile patch of pretty flat road (or as close as you can get around these parts) and were able to make up some time. We made it into Point Reyes and had a fantastic burger at Station House Cafe and then got a text from Larry and Owen (fellow cyclists) saying that they planned on making spaghetti for dinner at camp and had bought enough for us. After a quick stop at the grocery store for some snacks and breakfast for tomorrow, we headed out to do the last 7 miles of the day to Samuel P Taylor State Park. After a couple of miles of good road, we turned off highway 1 onto Francis Drake Blvd and started the climb of a very steep and very long mountain (I was very thankful for our big calorie lunch). Before crossing a bridge into Lagunitas, there is a turnoff onto a paved bike path away from all of the traffic that was an awesome change of pace. It was mostly flat and took us straight into the park and our campsite for the night.
At camp, Larry and Owen were already here as well as a couple from Switzerland that is finishing a year long cycling/hiking/traveling trip in San Francisco. They’ll bike into the city tomorrow, spend a week there, and then head back home. Before doing their little 4 day cycling trip around here, they shipped their bicycles to Ecuador and cycled all the way down to the tip of South America; very nice people as well. Larry and Owen made us the spaghetti they promised with ground beef, mushrooms, and bell peppers they had brought up from the market in Point Reyes. It was a nice treat to have a normal hot meal at camp; the spaghetti was very good.
While we started eating we all were able to get to know each other a bit better. Larry was interested in Isaac’s engineering degree as he just got a product patented and wanted to talk about production. They asked me a bunch of questions about my job and background so I talked plenty (probably too much). The Swedish couple was interested too because they’ve been listening to cybersecurity related podcasts during some of their trip. Anyways, turns out that Owen is a scientist who works with a company doing research on the neurology and inner workings of the retina; sounded like a great field of study. He specializes in modifying the DNA of mice for the lab to test with.
Overall it was a good day and meeting people like these is definitely part of the fun. Also they tend to have done way better research than me about this trip and I’ve been getting great information about the upcoming areas we’ll be in. Aside from Big Sur being closed, some of the campsites south of there are closed due to damages from all the rain this year and other state parks in SoCal have taken out the hiker/biker sites because they were getting overrun with homeless people. So we got some ideas for alternate campsites and will look for motels where we aren’t able to find any.
-Chris
