Day 24, 9/7/08

We're still not exactly sure how it happened, but today we didn't start riding until 1 pm. We were shooting for Ferndale which should be around 55 miles away, but we sure were getting a late start for that kind of ride. We did reach Ferndale eventually, but sure had to work for it. We ended up riding 65 miles.

We broke for lunch in Arcata at 4:30 pm. We covered another 30 miles after 5 pm. Less than ideal. Conditions today were cold and damp. It was foggy most of the day, worsening towards the end of the day. A missed turn in Eureka cost us 3-4 extra miles and ensured more time cycling in the dark. Around 8:45 pm we had pulled over to check our map. We were 5 miles away from Ferndale, our destination. A woman pulled up alongside us and offered to help. We told her we were set on our directions. She told us that we would soon be crossing a very narrow bridge and offered to drive slowly behind us as we crossed over the bridge. We gladly accepted her offer as the SR211 road were were on was already dangerous for us to be riding at night. She also gave us some info on where in Ferndale we might find something to eat. It was approaching closing time, but she said she would tell the owner at the Ivanhoe to expect us. Once we cleared the bridge, we looked back to see that our good Samaritan had been pulled over, presumably for driving too slow. As they say, no good deed will go unpunished. We imagine that she didn't get a ticket as her explanation would be believable, plus they both drove by us fairly soon after.

Finally arriving in Ferndale, we were cold, wet, fatigued and starving. We found the Ivanhoe at the end of town, only to hear the restaurant owner tell us that he was closed. Wild-eyed, we stared at him for a second in disbelief then raced back to a pizza joint we saw only to arrive at the front door just as a waitress was turning the sign in the front window from "Open" to "Closed". She seemed to understand our predicament and took pity on us and returned and told us that we could order a couple of sandwiches to go. We were soon sitting in front of the now darkened pizza parlor devouring warm, delicious meatball sandwiches and garlic cheese bread in the foggy darkness.

With our stomachs full, we got back on our bikes to go find the Humbolt County Fairgrounds, our campsite tonight, which turned out to be the highlight of a fairly unmemorable day of cycling experiences. It wasn't very far away, but difficult to find in the darkness and heavy fog. To say the night at the fairgrounds was surreal would be an understatement. We found the fairgrounds and eventually a place to pitch our tent. It didn't look exactly like where they wanted you to camp, but it did have picnic tables and grills so that seemed fine with us. The bathroom was possibly the creepiest place we have ever seen. I kept feeling that we were going to be part of the next Saw movie. The bathroom looked like it had been abandoned years ago and the walls were painted a sickening lime green color. We found the showers to be in working order and hot, so we were happy about that.

Soon we were dry and warm in our sleeping bags, falling into a deep, much needed sleep at around 11:15.