Day 11: Harris Beach to Crescent City, August 5, 33 miles    

Jenny at Crescent Beach, the second time around

                  We had a leisurely morning, the first of the trip so far, no miles to make up, just a planned jaunt to Crescent City, a short distance away, staying in the cool beach motel to make Squishy the Sea Turtle happy.  I wrote postcards while Robert made breakfast in the new cast iron pan, and then we spent some time reorganizing and cleaning the Bus. We had time in Brookings to visit the Napa store (Robert’s favorite place, as they sell auto gear), to photograph an enormous RV Robert had named “The Beast of Brookings” to send images to Tom, fellow lover of weird campers,

and then we had time for yet more capitalism at Fred Meyer, purchasing even more postcards and cheese and ice.

We tried to get the mail sent, but the Brookings post office does not send international mail after 2 PM, so I was only able to mail postcards and Ariana’s memorial jive. We also took pictures of another groovy Bus.

Passing back and forth between Brookings and Gold Beach, I knew I wanted to stop at Whale’s Head Cove, for I had been there as a last stop before home on the coast so many times as a child. In fact, it is where I found Kelpie, my “pet” piece of bullwhip kelp that my father had ejected from the Bus sometime in the late seventies, yelling “What’s that horrible smell?” and one of the places I remembered being at with Bonnie, my sister Ariana’s mom, on that same or a similar trip.

                  Whale’s head Cove was as familiar to me as the Valley of the Rogue State Park or stopping at Granzella’s for lunch coming up the I-5 from Sacramento to Ashland: it was the last beach before home. However, I looked at the signs as we approached with trepidation:4 Wheel Drive! NO Trailers!  But the Bus made it down the rutted dirt road, and then we were there, having yet another picnic by the beach. The beach itself was everything I remembered, and Robert loved it there. We also met a guy who wanted to talk about the Bus—“You should convert it to biodiesel!” if memory serves, and a nice couple with a tiny Harold dog, only female and much better behaved.

                  Then we were headed south again, crossing back into California, having reached our farthest place north, heading for Crescent City, the beach motel, and a crappy dinner, but we didn’t know that then. We went back to the beach, replaying the first trip but now with the benefit of knowing there was a staircase, and we sang the songs we had practiced there before when getting ready for the memorial, but the ocean boomed, boomed, boomed in the accompanying baseline, and we fell asleep sandy in the bed.

More pictures of BGH Bus rocks at Ireland’s.