Kiki Bikes Across America

Thursday, August 13th – Cape Blanco, OR – Harris Beach State Park, OR

I woke up super late – I think the latest on the entire trip. I got up at 10:40am and packed up and rolled out of the campground by noon. I went to check out the Cape Blanco lighthouse and the views were nice and the fog had enough time to burn off so I could actually see the lighthouse and coast. It was probably the first day where I was starting to see some really nice scenery along the coast. I biked on out 6 miles to the main road, Hwy 101 and headed towards Port Orford and another cyclist (without gear) passed by me. We said hi and then I saw him again along with his family down at a rest area just in town near a view of the coast and beach. I chat with him and the others (two families). There are two families who are doing a little vacation together along the coast while the husbands ride down the Oregon coast from border to border. Dave, Gayle, and Kelsey and the other family of Bob, Pam, Bethany, and Josh tag along with Dave and Bob as they ride the coast and offer SAG support and hang out in the evenings and do the fun stuff after the rides. So it was fun chatting with them and then Gayle gave me a lift 20 miles that day, since I’d had such a late start and wound up chatting so long that it was 3:30 and I had only ridden 20 miles thus far.

My first good view of the Oregon coast without fog!

From the point where I was dropped off (about 7 miles north of Gold Beach), I had another 26 miles or so until I’d reach Harris Beach State Park just outside of Brookings, OR (the last town in OR before crossing into California). I stopped briefly in Gold Beach at a peach stand and got a peach, about 1/2 pound of cherries, and a homemade brownie – all amazing! I’ve definitely become a fan of the fruit stands I’m now seeing alongside the roads! The coastline was so beautiful that I kept taking my time stopping at overlooks and snapping photos and then I ran into one couple from California (25 miles outside of San Francisco) and they were all curious about my trip and we swapped photo taking and then they gave me all their AAA maps for California which was awesome – I didn’t have to hung any down when I crossed the border!

Dave, Me, and Bob - two other cyclists (as well as their families) that I met on the Oregon coast.

I pulled into the campground about 7:45pm and registered and then set up in the hiker/biker area and there were tons of other cyclists and hikers there. I met a few, Leonard from Holland, Spencer from Long Beach, CA, and Rodney (not sure where he was from). And there was a couple on their honeymoon riding their bikes down the coast but were out of time and were going to rent a car the next day from Crescent City, CA and drive the rest of the way to San Francisco, I believe.

The coastline

As I was paying for my camping fee, guess who showed up? The three motorcyclists (well 4 really) that I saw in Bandon, OR the day before. Deb, Ken, and Tony were there along with the fourth whom I hadn’t met yet (Jase). So after showering and getting organized, I took my cooking stuff over to their campsite and cooked there and chatted with Ken and Tony for a bit and made penne pasta with pesto! It was pretty yummy and Tony had two leftover cupcakes so guess who got to eat those? ME!

So it was a good day of nice scenery, met lots of nice people and it was fun hanging out with the motorcyclists from Victoria, British Columbia and talking with them. After they went to bed, I headed back to my campsite and wound up chatting with another cyclist, Scott – he’s from San Francisco area and heading north on the PCH and stopping and doing fishing along the way. He was pretty chatty and very knowledgeable on all sorts of topics and laws and different things – apparently cannabis is legal for medicinal use in San Francisco. He was telling me all about that and the different issues he’s had with his husband regarding the use of marijuana and such and his husband Dan apparently has been involved with some of the wrong people. Finally, I crashed about 12:30 at night after chatting and then just as I was going to bed, another couple people showed up in the hiker/biker camp area. I think they were ‘cheating’ and not really hikers or bikers because they had a huge tent and there’s no way they could have been carrying it, plus I think their truck was the one parked outside the hiker/biker area in the morning. The campground was completely full except for the hiker/biker area, so I think they were trying to sneak in and stay there.

Anyway, off to bed around 12:30am to wake up around 7am in the morning.

GPS Stats: (including hitched 20 miles approximately)
66.0 miles
62.9 max speed
15.7 avg speed
04:11 moving time

Computer Stats:
46.05 miles
51.0 max speed
12.2 avg speed
03:46:17 moving time