Chapter 24

  Chapter 24

 

 

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 2008

 

Garberville to Westport 70 miles

 

Garberville was a nice little town albeit was not in my plan - all mountainy with quaint people with big hats and moustaches. Even the women (no! I’m joking!). 

Coffee and 2 buns and off into the, now tedious, immediate climb. It’s a bitch to get a hill first thing, before your legs are ready. Now this is not the little hill up by the garda station in Naas. This is 4º for 2 miles! A leg wrecker so early in the morning. Little did I know this was just the beginning of a day which, when over, would go down in the annals as the worst days climbing on a bike I have ever done, by a long, long, long way. 

The 5 or 6 big climbs before the town of Leggit were severe in themselves. But put with that a very hazardous road. Shoulder of about a foot at most, on a single carriageway road with sheer 400/500ft drops on your immediate right side with no guard rail. Man, that was scary! 

 

 

 

And the logging trucks! The trucks had nowhere to go. So, it was a hairy few hours. The climbing was the easy part!

After that it was into Leggit for a quick coffee before tackling the BIG ONE. 

In preparing this trip, I had looked at the route in terms of the climbing involved. Leggit was the one that stood out. So, by the time I got here, I was very familiar with what was in front of me.

One thousand five hundred feet elevation over about 6 miles miles. Switchbacks the whole way, no shoulder, just relentless climbing. As I neared the top I was cursing the switchbacks because each one, I thought, this is the last one. But no, that was never the last. There was always another. At last I crested the top greeted by an amazing descent. A roller coaster. Ten miles down, a switchback descent, like something in the Tour de France. Very fast. Hugging the corners. Using all the road. Going too fast to give way to anyone. Keep in front of the trucks. I was faster anyway. Made all the climbing worthwhile. 

Then when you least expect it .... another climb .... six hundred feet climbing over three miles. Is this climbing ever going to stop? Over the top and another screamer downhill. 

 

 

 

 

Stop at the bottom in a café for some well-earned food. In the café I run into the guy I met on the ferry from Victoria to Port Angelas. What a surprise! He had left me after the ferry, to go to Seattle to meet a mate and head down the coast. We cycle together for a while, but he and his mate are faster than me, so off they go.  

Arriving into Westport there are no facilities so even though I’m wrecked, I have to keep going, for another 15 miles to the campground. When I finally get there, I am the only one there, so sleeping alone again.... bummer!! There is something very exhilarating and scary of being alone in a forest at night and through the night. But its adventurous and I am excited about the prospect of the night.

I forage around for some wood. Get a little campfire going and cook some food before getting my head down.