Mattole Road via Motorcycle: Humboldt County, CA

Dark and stormy along Mattole Road.

Motorcycling in Humboldt County, California often conjures up images of highway US101 through Eureka. There's also SR36 and SR299 for riders who seek out fast twisties and smooth pavement.

But there's other options that criss-cross the mountainous regions to the west of US101, the kind of roads that make you run a slower speed and take you back to an America still stuck in an older, simpler way of life.

Mattole Road takes you through an area of Humboldt County known as "Lost Coast", a mostly natural and development-free area that was named such due to depopulation going back into the 1930s. Starting from the picturesque town of Ferndale, it rises up the mountain range, crosses over zig-zagged cattle range, and drops you down into a short-stretch of coastline that seemingly looks untouched by human hands. The road becomes dark and wet as it runs through thick canopies of evergreens. There are places where rays of sunshine manage to poke through and illuminate the mist. Finally, before reaching the other end, you're lost in the towering jungle of Humboldt Redwoods State Park.

Twice I had done the 75 mile stretch of Mattole Road from its start at Ferndale and its end at Weott. The first time was in 2007 on my 2005 Harley-Davidson Electra Glide Ultra Classic, but I went the opposite direction, starting in Weott.  The second time was in 2011 on my 2006 Honda ST1300, starting in Ferndale.

The entire length takes about 3 hours to complete.  But if you stop for photos and take a moment to soak in the zenfulness, allow for 5 hours tops.  I can't decide which is the better direction to go, both are equally as scenic and both will deliver you to towns with good eats and imbibements.

Mattole Road actually changes names to Bull Creek Road when you get into the tiny hamlet of Bull Creek, about 85% of the way through, inside the Humboldt Redwoods State Park.


The entire course is paved, becomes bumpy in places, but otherwise is fairly smooth. The elevation gains can be steep in places, and there are plenty of hairpin turns in the middle of those gains. If you want to take your dual sport bike, there are other roads that lead you to dirt which eventually take you back to pavement again.

The highest elevation you'll reach is about 2,500 feet.

Ferndale has managed to make a name for itself among fans of Victorian-style homes and country-cottage decorators. It's main street has been the backdrop of several movies and television shows, and was also recreated in Lego bricks at the Legoland amusement park in Carlsbad, CA.

The towns of Petrolia and Honeydew, which you'll pass through, has some small country stores for drink and food, but otherwise no gas and no lodging.

2011, Riding through downtown Ferndale, CA

2011, Mattole Road by the coast

2011, Mattole Road by the coast

2007, Mattole Road by the coast

2007, Mattole Road by the coast.

2011, Mattole Road heading to Petrolia

2011, Mattole Road with sunbeams across wet roads

2007, Humbolt Redwoods State Park

2007, We stopped in Petrolia for a break, and my friend Doc found this kid wandering around barefoot.

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Living in the Suburbs

We've been spoiled it seems to have lived in the urban center of San Diego the past 2 1/2 years (minus the 6 months we were on Road Pickle). A week ago, Sash and I moved into our 3rd digs in the past 4 months, and our 4th home in San Diego overall, though not counting the two motels we spent 3 weeks in.

But this new place is located outside of the city center, further out into the suburban perimeter in the land of master-planned communities, where curvy, meandering Spanish-named parkways replace the grid pattern of Broadways and numbered streets. It's where you find tract homes, HOAs, and three-car garages. It's where dads burn firewood in their driveways and where moms host Princess House parties.

It's also the place where the nearest store and restaurant requires a two mile trek past homes and condominiums, requiring you to take a vehicle to get there. Sash and I were used to living in the city where you can walk to a store and crawl back home from the bar.

In the city, there's an energy of vibrance that fills the air, and somehow it just isn't here in the 'burbs.

But it's not to say that I don't like living here. On the contrary, I've spent many years in neighborhoods like this. It's just a different environment.

Everyone here is all about their personal lives, about decompressing and getting away from the madness of the city. By living several miles from their place of work, they've drawn a distinct boundary between their career and family. But in the city, people blend both business and personal together. There isn't a moment when they only work or only play, they do it all concurrently and they live life at a faster pace.

So when our minds were running full steam on a conference call in the comfy comfines of our downtown abode, it's like culture shock to be plucked into the air and dropped in between a Little League tryout and a lemonade stand. Suddenly, the sight of brace-faced kids in minivans and white button-down Mormons on bicycles, just doesn't make synapse with our neurons. It's as if the neighborhood is telling us to slow down and smell the caramel Frappuccino.

Earlier this afternoon, Sash put together a drawing board of our weekly work schedule, just to remind us that we still have work to do. Yeah, somehow, the slower pace of the suburbs has me forgetting about work in lieu of standing on our balcony to gaze at the lovely swimming pool and spa. In trying to acclimate ourselves to the land of tract homes and complexes, we find the slower, quieter pace to have a calming effect on our mood. We've made good use of the spa 3 times in the past 7 days, each with beer in hand, something we didn't do while living in the city.

And that's not so bad if your work ends on a specific time of day and can you drive several miles away from your office. But Sash and I work out of our home. And in the stuccoed environs of bedroom suburbia, the vibrant energy that used to power our fast-paced lifestyle is not there anymore.

So we're tasked with finding tools to help us get back on track. We're trying to define hours when we work and play.

Technically, we don't have to work in our home, we can always find a coffee shop nearby. But here in the suburbs, chatty teenagers make too much noise to concentrate.

But one can only afford the high-priced rent of the city for so long, unless you're willing to live in apartments of urine-stained sidewalks and iron-barred windows.  But because we're not, it's back to the propinquity of Home Depots, Applebees, and the gentle music of ice cream trucks.

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Behind Every Strength is a Great Weakness

30th Street, North Park, San Diego

Even though Sash and I were thousands of miles from home during our six-month road trip across the United States last year, we had dozens of friends and family following along through our blog and social media. Along the way, we picked up more readers and before we knew it, we found ourselves in the middle of a tight community of friends and fellow riders.

And why? It's not like we're the first to spend six months riding motorcycles.  Others have done longer trips, in harsher environments.

Wendi was someone that Sash and I met a few years ago when were into our diet and exercise regimen.  We were all working out with a couple of retired Marine Corp drill sergeants who decided to open up a fitness boot camp to supplement their incomes working security at the San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant.  Imagine doing push ups with R. Lee Ermey crouching down into your face and screaming "beach body, beach body!"

So fast forward to now.  We we're not as slender and athletic as we used to be, but we have new perspectives on life.

Of course, having just gotten rid of all of our unneccessities, shoved everything else into storage, and traveled across the States with what we could fit on our bikes, it really changed our thinking on how much comfort we find in our material things.

And for Wendi, who had stayed home all her life, she found she had lost her own comfort zone after a string of deaths in her family.

"I'm in my 40s now", she said.  "I'm not married, I don't have kids, and I still haven't traveled anywhere."

Sash, Wendi, and myself, at Sipz Fusion Cafe, North Park

Sash and I felt touched that she contacted us via Facebook and asked to join us for lunch in our neighborhood.  She had been marveling at the places we went to and the people we met, and wanted to do the same.  She took the hour drive south down to meet us.

"This May I'm going to Alaska", she told us.  "And then in August, I'm going to Spain!"

And the thing is that Sash and I each grew up feeling insignificant and unworthy.  Low self-esteem sets in when the people who are supposed to love you and the people you are supposed to love, constantly point out your failures and wonder why you couldn't be like others.  After so much of it, you end up believing it.

Sash has trouble understanding how she could have inspired other women.

But often behind every strength, there is a weakness powering it.

I've known for my entire motorcycle riding life I've wanted to leave everything behind and live on the road.  What motorcycle rider hasn't?  But yet, are we really just embarking on a great endeavor to distance ourselves from some perceived weakness?  Is there something we're trying to prove to ourselves, to others?  Do we over extend ourselves as a way to fetch praise?

Or is it really just so innocent as a desire to explore the great outdoors?

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