Trinidad, California that is, and headed further south along the north coast. Unlike blogger weather reports from much of southern California and Arizona, the weather on the north coast has continued to be very nice. From Trinidad, we cruised southward through Arcata, Eureka, Garberville, with a fuel and food stop in Willits.
My boondocking database does not have many entries for the area immediately north of San Francisco. Fortunately, we discovered one of the nicest campgrounds around a few years back – which is on Lake Sonoma. It is an Army Corps of Engineers site which is one of the nicest, most scenic, and steepest campgrounds I have ever seen. They have a problem with the water system, so fees are a reasonable $10 for dry camping.
I got downright comfortable there, even hooking up my satellite internet system and TV for the first time since thawing out the rig from the frozen north. It was so nice that I spent part of the day hiking in the hills above the campground, then decided to spend another night.
Besides, that way I would not be faced with driving through San Francisco in weekday traffic.
I made a new perch for Hailey in the back seat, so now she does not spend all of her time on my lap when we are on the road!
We crossed the GG bridge, the morning after watching a documentary about the escape from Alcatraz. I have often gone toll-free on the bridge, perhaps because I am usually northbound (?), but got dinged a full $18 for this crossing.
c
Traffic was light, however and we were soon back on the coast southbound through Pacifica, Half Moon Bay, Santa Cruz, and Monterey, with a short break at the Pigeon Point Lighthouse.
There used to be a great boondocking spot near there, but it has had big ugly ‘no camping’ signs for a few years now.
While trying to expand our boondocking database we checked out a couple of side roads leading up from the coast – that really should have had signs saying ‘no trailers’! One we tried out was a one lane with pullouts type, through big overhanging trees. We had to carefully wheel our way through that maze for about two miles before finally finding a place to turn around.
Not learning the lesson very well, we did the same thing on another road shortly after, but the helpful local traffic was friendly and pointed out places to turn around.
Eventually, we found a spot we could agree on, complete with an ocean, and bridge view!
Big Sur next.
Your boon docking data base might make a fine reference book for great boondocking spots of the American West someday. Might be an interesting little project to concentrate some thoughts on:)) Then again, maybe not. Revealing where all those beautiful spots are could eventually defeat the purpose. Ya, just better keep them spots hush hush for those of us who really appreciate them:))
ReplyDeleteOh you are in my favorite places. Quite often when we leave Washington we go down the coast and Hwy 101. We love Trinidad, at Garberville we always stop for ice cream. We pull a trailer so we are about 50' long and in Garberville we just park in the middle of the street like the delivery trucks and then I run in and get the ice cream. I went to grade school and high school in Pacifica, of course back then it was called Linda Mar, Rockaway Beach and Sharp Park
ReplyDelete