This was the initial idea. Fly to San Francisco and drive up to Portland up the 101 coast road and fly back from there. So I was in Portland and I had a return ticket from San Francisco, so… the obvious thing to do was drive. And going this way, there was the added bonus of being on the sea side. Lovely. The views. There are whales to see, seals, sea lions, there’s a place called Otter Rock…
“How long do you think it takes to drive down to San Francisco?” I asked at the hotel.
“Well, it depends how fast you drive and how many times you stop, but if you go direct… maybe about 10 hours”.
“How long do you think it take to drive down to San Francisco?” I asked the bloke at the market where I was going to buy some really nice jewellery made from local Oregon stone until “Oh, that piece is from Australia” and “Oh, that piece is from Mexico” and “… from South Africa”…
“Well, it depends how fast you drive and how many times you stop, but if you go direct… maybe about 10 hours”.
He told me about Coos Bay and Shore Acres and Depoe Bay and Boiler Bay and the best places to see whales and seals and unicorns. Sounded idyllic. If it takes about 10 hours with my foot down, I’d take two days, stop overnight somewhere but two days… that’s enough to be a bit relaxed, to be able to stop here and stop there, to hang out for a bit with the whales, seals and sea lions, to have a drink at Otter Rock.
Portland’s inland, on the map about an inch from the coast. An inch and a half, max. How long’s that going to take? I think it was only when the clock passed 4pm and I still hadn’t hit the 101, I began to get the feeling that 10 hours was maybe pushing it.
Down past Salem, past Otis, Lincoln onto Depoe Bay. Now it looked beautiful. Big rugged rocks, wide expansive beach, big dunes, and that water, that’s the Pacific Ocean. I’ve seen the Pacific enough times but there’s still a sense of awe, of hugeness. It’s easy to say that if you stand on Brighton beach and look out at the sea, all you can see is sea. And if you stand on the beach at Depoe Bay and look out at the sea, again, all you can see is sea. But this is different. This is seriously different. It’s somehow bigger, vaster.
Past Newport, Seal Rock, Waldport and to Yachats. Yachats looked really sweet, a lovely bay. A good place for a drink stop. The sun was shining – it was by now about 5pm – and it was too soon to have a stopover, but I hung around, bought some jewellery for everyone from an amazing rock shop and headed off.
The woman at the rock shop had suggested I head down to Florence, so I headed down to Florence. No point asking advice and not taking it.
Florence was nice enough, a bit twee, clearly a place used to people stopping and shopping. But it had a reasonably cheap motel and there were a few places to eat and drink. But… Dorothy, you’re not in Kansas now. The place to eat was full (well, my bit was full) of rednecks who were off on a shooting holiday hoping to kill some bears, and at the bar there was a (mixed) group of happy drunks who – and fair enough – wanted to talk suits, rings and nail varnish. (Actually, all that stuff was OK, but when I flashed my red socks… Oy). But they were OK, funny and OK. But the bear blokes… I just hope the bear got to them first.
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The thing about driving down the 101 is… it’s really beautiful. It hugs the coastline and every other bay is Seal Rock. Or Whale Beach or Otter Bay or somesuch. There are huge sand dunes and huger trees , frolicking creatures and sights of natural beauty. Essential to this romance is the ability to see it, so when I woke up in Florence and found a day that would have been rejected by the burghers of Manchester for being just too grey, rainy and miserable… It didn’t bode well.
I looked at the weather app. That didn’t bode well either. Actually it boded worse. Heavy rain till mid-California.
What does it even mean, rain out here? It didn’t make sense. This is… OK, it’s not California yet, but it might as well be. It’s the pacific, the coast, the 101… It’s not supposed to be bloody Manchester. It’s supposed to be so dry here you can’t even think about having a sneaky fag for fear of starting a forest fire. But, you know, give it a bit more thought and… The trees are the size of a mountain. How would the redwoods get to be such giants if there wasn’t a fair amount of rain? I hadn’t really thought of that before going to Budget Rent-A-Car.
Florence. It was halfway – if that – down the Oregon coast. And we hadn’t even thought about the California coast yet. It was too far to turn back, too far to go to even think about how far there is to go. Oh well. The car’s comfortable, Spotify works well and petrol’s still very cheap. Always look on the bright side of life.
I stopped in somewhere Nowheresville Cafe and, as the grey rain pounded the streets, two things hit. The first is that the 101 might be oh-so-beautiful and every other bay might be Seal Rock or Otter Bay or somesuch and there might well be whales round every corner posing for selfies, but unless you park up and stop you’re not going to see them because you’re driving and you’re not going to park up and stop because you’ve just realised that even if you don’t ever sleep again and even if you resolve not to stop ever again and just wee into a water bottle, this drive is still going to take till November to finish.
The other thing is… it’s now raining heavier than before and visibility is minimal, so even if you do park up and stop all that’ll happen is that you’ll get wet and that’s miserable. So you just keep on driving and then you just keep on driving some more.
The drive is… the truth is that the drive is boring as fuck. I’ve got a sneaky that even if the weather had been beautiful, it would still have been boring as fuck. The sea might be just there and the landscape might be picturesque, but the reality is that you’re watching the road, not the scenery because if you watch the scenery and not the road… you’ll probably crash and die. So you just keep on driving and then you just keep on driving some more.
The other other thing is that there’s Portland and that’s kinda big and there’s San Francisco and that’s definitely big and in between there are trees which are really really big and there’s the road which is really really long and apart from that there’s very little else. Once you get past Coos Bay (just past Florence, still deep in Oregon) there’s not much at all. Not much human stuff and no signal.
At first, “no signal” was irrelevant. I decided that the way to counter the miserable weather and the prospect of 435 hours of white line fever was to adopt a Zen-like attitude. “I am on a mission and this is going to be a meditation. I’m going to be like a cross between some Buddhist monk and Kowalski in Vanishing Point. Just me and the road. I will become the road. The road will become me. There is only the here. There is only the now”.
Well, bollocks to that.
For a while – for a good few hours and good few hundred miles – that’s fine. You get into a deep meditative zone driving like this. White line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line white line just onandonandonandon. God knows how long-distance drivers do it. No wonder they invented Yorkies.
I’m not sure how healthy it all is. Just you and your thoughts… no digital intrusion… no external interference… I guess it depends on who you are, maybe it’s like jogging but… There’s every possibility that even before the lights turned amber thoughts turn in on themselves.
The biggest thing about there being no signal was… where the fuck was I? I haven’t got a map. Who’s got a map? I’m going to reach into the glove compartment and get out the A-Z? Most of the time I had no idea where I was. There were no reference points, no moments of “Oh OK, there’s Birmingham. That’s about halfway to Manchester”. And it was a bit disorientating.
At one point deep – I thought – into California, I stopped at somewhere called Garberville to get some petrol. It was the sort of place that would have once been called a one-horse town but a few years ago the horse got bored and moved on. There was a bloke in the gas station, an Asian bloke from London. Normally I’d have been up for a chat but this time… I had a serious case of CBA. It was about 5pm and I’d been driving since maybe 8am. By now I’d had it with the 101 and just wanted to get to San Francisco, see some people, get away from this bloody road.
“How long do you think it’ll take to San Francisco from here?”
“Well depends how fast you drive”
I was so in the mood for comedy answers and I think maybe he spotted that.
“This time of day, the traffic will be OK, so maybe about five hours. Probably about five and a half”
“Fi… what??”
“If I were you, I’d stay here. There’s a Best Western and some places to eat. Stay here and make an early start”
“Blimey mate, I don’t want another five-hour drive tomorrow. What’s past this place?”
“There’s nothing much past here till you get to Willits. There’s a McDonald’s there”
I didn’t have a clue. I didn’t know where Willits was. Didn’t know what I was going to do when I got to Willits. Stay in a McDonald’s? Have a Big Mac and sleep in the car in the car park? No idea. But that’s what happens when your brains a bit scrambled. All I could think was “I don’t want to do this for five hours tomorrow. I want to get this done”. So… filled up with petrol and got back in the car. By now it was nearly 6pm and I didn’t have a clue.
So that’s the other thing that happens on a long drive by yourself. You go a bit a bit mad.
I drove for maybe an hour and a half and saw the sign to Willits. It’s a curious thing how by now “I drove for maybe an hour and a half” felt like driving down the road. But Willits. Fantastic. I can’t tell you the relief because by now it was getting dark. It was getting dark and I was getting frazzled.
The Asian bloke had undersold Willits. It had more than a McDonald’s. There was a Best Western. Pulled into the car park, put on my best smile and
“Hi there”
“I’m sorry, we’re full”
“You’re what?”
“We’re full. I’m sorry”
“Is there anywhere else in town?”
“There’s another hotel here? A motel?”
“There’s Motel 6 down the road”
“Thanks. I’ll try there”
“I’m sorry, we’re full”
Willits was full. Clearly world about the McDonald’s had got out.
The next town was called Ukiah and was another 35 miles down the road. By now it was darker and I was frazzleder. It had stopped raining, but I was seriously frazzled. I had a drink and a smoke and got back in the car.
Ukiah was bigger than Willits, but how much bigger? No idea. No idea because it was darker than a dark place with not many lights. And there was still no signal.
There was a Best Western.
“I’m sorry, we’re full”
“You’re full? Here? How?”
“I’m sorry”
“Is there anywhere else in town?”
“Sorry”
“Is there’s another hotel here?”
“There’s the Motel 6 down the road”
“Thanks. I’ll try there”
“I’m sorry, we’re full”
“You’re full? Here? How?”
There’s every possibility I came across as a bit rude and I’m sorry about that, but every hotel in every town is full? Should I be putting a plaster on my ear again? Is there a bit of nail varnish envy?
It turned out that the recent forest fires might have been a tragedy for the environment but they were a boon to the local hotel trade, and every hotel and motel along this stretch had been full for as long as they could recall with people – builders, construction guys – who were here trying to rebuild the area after the fires.
I remember muttering something inelegant about the amount of rain there’d been today that would be the end of fire risk…
But “What the bloody hell am I going to do now?” was the main thought rushing through what was left of my head. I started driving round Ukiah, looking for… I have no idea what I was looking for. Somehow I found myself in the dark, suburban streets of Ukiah, the streets where people lived. No lights, no shops, no signal and no bloody chance of a hotel. No idea what to do except keep driving.
Back on the main drag, I saw a sign, all neon lit, for “The Economy Inn”. And that, that’s what happens when you’re one of the Chosen People. I pulled in and there were no cars there. Nothing. Every hotel and every mote was full to the brim but the car park at The Economy Inn was empty. This must be some place.
Before I said before my brain was a bit frazzled. Now it was later and frazzled was in the rear-view mirror. Now I was somewhere north of frazzled.
There were no cars, but loads of pallets and piles of breeze blocks in the car park… but fuck it. It was a bit of a dump, but at this stage of the game I wasn’t looking at aesthetics, I just wanted a pillow.
I saw a sign that said “Office”, went over and knocked loudly. It was only when I’d knocked – repeatedly – that I saw the full wordage on the sign. “Site Office”. Still, the night watchman was quite understanding.
Just as I was preparing to drive out of Ukiah and head back on the freeway – it’s what Reacher would have done – there was a flickering neon sign “Sunr se Inn” and underneath “ acancie “
Single storey. Cars parked at the front. Old school. I’d promised Lou I’d stay at somewhere like this. $70. Perfect. By now it was gone 9.30pm and I’d been driving over 12 hours and the “Sunr se Inn” looked like the best hotel in the world.
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PostScript: This chapter was going to be about the giant redwoods which I did stop for and I did get wet for. The giant redwoods are properly extraordinary. Huge, upright creatures that stretch into the sky, they have the power to humble in the same way that a vast mountain does. Effortless, silent, dignified power. Stranding next to these vast beings in the rain, getting stupidly wet, looking up and seeing just more tree… I don’t know. To be honest, it made me feel even more stupid. What was I doing, running around crossing things and places off a list? Austin. Two days. Right done Austin. Portland. Two days. Right. Done Portland. I know it sounds a bit mad. I know it’s not like the tree could have said to the other tree “Fancy going to Austin? I’ve heard there are some really cool bars there”… But the silent dignity of these huge beasts just made it all feel a bit daft.
