With the ladies keen on keeping a mid-afternoon family appointment in the Bay Area,
we are rather poignantly up before dawn,
missing out on some of the local splendors of the Coast from Port Orford to Gold Beach,
though not all,
as the gloom also lightens to reveal
rocky seastacky splendors
all the way to Brookings.
Over the California border, the weather still grim by the Klamath --
atmospheric conditions counterintuitively
(in the dry season,
this seaside is typically fog-shrouded,
and now we've experienced it clear in both directions),
suddenly, and welcomely take a turn for the better, all the way into Arcata and the mendicants of
Eureka, with car and personages fuel stops.
Turning inland, the climes turnagain in the climb, but dramatically in light-and-shadow back through
Scotia,
the
Avenue
area,
Richardson Grove,
the fair / wondrous
oaks of
Laytonville,
for another respite at flood-soaked Willits.
Sun and clouds and
sun and clouds
through Ukiah,
hopping
along
to --
yes --
Hopland
past
peaks
and
slopes and
Digger Pines (no longer the current designation),
back beyond Frog Woman (definitely) / Squaw / Lover's,
leaping down the
Russian River
watershed,
still inclemency at Olompali and
Sears
Point,
all the way to dropping off Tisha and Claire,
and even worse in the final push
over the Sulfur Springs and among the
Lagoons. It is very good to be home.
