May 23, day 20 Rio Dell to Redway

May 23, day 20 Rio Dell to Redway

Starting odo 7067

We take an easy day due to my knee and also  Shyam's knees feeling a bit off.

Right off the bat, we forget to return the key to the motel, and only
remember it when we are about 2.5 miles away.  I ride back to the
motel while Shyam waits on the side of the road.  The ride back is not
hard, but I also don't try to press it.  I am still worried about the
knee.

About 5 miles down the road, we turn off on the Avenue of the Giants.
This is a road that more or less parallels 101 but goes thru the
Humbolt Redwoods State Park where many of the old growth redwoods have
been preserved.

All progress halts as we take pictures and slowly ride down the nearly
empty road looking at the trees. Some of these trees are taller than
the tallest hills in Austin, and they also started growing around
2,000 years ago!  Its just not possible to comprehend the age of these
trees.  Some of the trees are hollow, due to fire at some point in
their lives.  If the outer part of the tree is not greatly harmed,
they continue growing.  It gives me a special feeling to be standing
inside something that has been alive for so long.

We stop in Myers Flat hoping for lunch, but there is only a small
store open, the restaurants have all closed down. Later we find out
that the vineyard that is offering tastings also had food, but this
was only advertised on the main road, so we didn't see that!  We're
hungry by now, so we get onto 101 to try and make better progress to
the next town, only to discover the next two towns are not on 101!  So
we try to get back by taking the next exit, but the road doesn't cross
over to highway 254.  As we are looking at our maps, a lady drives up
and asks us if we are lost.  We explain our desire to get to highway
254 and she tells us to take the Miranda exit, and also that there are
restaurants in both Miranda and Phillipsville we can eat at.  Problem
solved, and in relatively short time we are eating at a mexican
restaurant in Phillipsville.

We move on to arrive at the Dean Creek Resort. Its an adequate   but
not fully kept up RV park which charges about $28 per night even
including the Senior discount.   We have stopped here in order to hit
Redway the next morning and pick up a bluetooth keyboard I have
ordered.

I spend the evening and morning uploading photos to the blog via the
slow network at the motel using Shyam's netbook