Miles: 1045 (per Google)
I called my friends Mike and Hilda on the weekend to see if it would work for them to have me return the bike Mike had loaned me several years ago and which I no longer ride and spend a night or two with them this week. Mike had told me their schedule several weeks ago but I had not recorded it. I knew they were going somewhere this month but I thought it was later. It turns out they were leaving Monday night, 4/21, to spend about 2 weeks in Vietnam. We tentatively agreed I would bring the bike up in May.
Sunday evening I started entertaining the idea of taking the bike up Monday as they were not leaving until 11:00 PM. I would spend a night in the cheapest accommodation I could find, go for a walk with my son Dan and drive home on Tuesday. About 9:00 Monday morning this seemed like a good plan so I started casting about for an inexpensive place to spend the night. I finally settled on the Hidden Villa Hostel in Los Altos Hills, $45.00, very reasonable for The Bay Area. I made a reservation even though I knew I would have to be there to check in by 8:00 PM. I thought I had plenty of time. I called Mike to tell him I was coming and got everything together and got on the road about 10:50.
After getting away and setting up the GPS and looking at the trip time it calculated I realized I would have to hustle all day to get to the hostel by 8:00. This seemed like a bad idea. By the time I decided it was a bad idea and to try to cancel the reservation I was out of phone range. To make a long story short I did not reach the hostel phone until almost 3:00 an was informed that I could cancel my reservation but would not receive a refund. I pressed on.
About 6:30 I was approaching Gilroy and could see I would make it by 8:00 with no problem. I was talking to Dan on the phone (hand free) as I was coming down Leavesley Road to get on Highway 101 for the final push to the hostel. A semi-truck with a large tractor on the trailer was going very slow in front of me and I pulled out to pass him. Just as I got up to his tractor I saw turn signals and realized he was turning left. I did my best to go to the left around him but my options were somewhat limited by the nature of the ditch before the driveway/dirt road he was pulling into and he got me with his front bumper per the photos above. Fortunately I had room to stop without doing any further damage. The guy told me he had his turn signal on but I do not believe him. At any rate it is his word against mine and I was on the phone which is hard to defend. I was tired and rattled an did not want to mess with it so we exchanged info and I left. My poor car is not pretty but it all still works so I guess I can pretend I live in Boston and NYC where 90% of the cars have worse damage than this. The truck got some paint on the front bumper.
I got to the hostel on time and checked in then took the bike to Mike's, got some food at the local Safeway, went back to the room and ate and went to bed between 10:00 and 11:00. Somewhere in this series of events I arranged with Dan to meet him at his home in the morning for a walk.
I did not sleep well and woke up at 4:00. My mind kept replaying the car mess and I could not sleep so I finally got up at about 5:00, packed up and started home. I was able to beat 95% of the rush hour traffic out of town and stopped at McDonald's about a mile from the scene of the fiasco at Leavesley and 101 for 2 large coffees to go and drove on. I stopped at McDonald's in Los Banos and got a bite to eat and some Cokes for the drive. I had decided to go home on Highway 99 rather than I-5 and to go through Porterville and through or over the Sierra to Kernville then home from there.
I had been several times on the road that goes from Highway 395 north of Ridgecrest through Kennedy Meadows and on to the Kern River about 20 miles north of Kernville but I had never taken the connector to Porterville. This turned out to be a very interesting ride. The highway (190) climbs steeply up the Tule River north then east then south-east to the top of The Great Western Divide at about 7200 feet. I was familiar with the GWD farther north in Kings Canyon and Sequoia NPs but this not realize it extends this far south but it does make sense as it is the western wall of the Kern Trench, a large N-S Gash in the middle of the Southern Sierra. The trench extends from Lake South America just over the south wall of Kings Canyon to Lake Isabella, a few miles south of Kernville, roughly 40 miles.
The highway follows the Great Western Divide for 10-12 miles then turns east and drops steeply down the Kern where the road to Kennedy Meadows and Highway 395 also meets the river (Sherman Pass the high point on the road to 395 is about 9,000 feet).
From Kernville I had the usual ride home over Walker Pas on Highway 178, Highway 14 to InyoKern and 395 then 395 to Kramer Junction, 58 to Barstow and 247 and 62 home from there.
Going up the Tule River
Looking Across The Kern Trench on the Way Down to the River
Impressive Falls on a Side Creek not far Above The Kern
Old and New Bridges Across the Kern
The Kern is Very Low and Placid This Year
A River Access Ramp for Rafters and Kayakers
A Very Low Lake Isabella
Walker Pass Campground - I Spent a Couple of Nights Sleeping Next to this Ramada on my Cot Last Spring While Waiting For Dan to Hike In
Expensive Gas at Kramer Junction/Boron
The Bicycle That Started it All (In the Foreground)
I called my friends Mike and Hilda on the weekend to see if it would work for them to have me return the bike Mike had loaned me several years ago and which I no longer ride and spend a night or two with them this week. Mike had told me their schedule several weeks ago but I had not recorded it. I knew they were going somewhere this month but I thought it was later. It turns out they were leaving Monday night, 4/21, to spend about 2 weeks in Vietnam. We tentatively agreed I would bring the bike up in May.
Sunday evening I started entertaining the idea of taking the bike up Monday as they were not leaving until 11:00 PM. I would spend a night in the cheapest accommodation I could find, go for a walk with my son Dan and drive home on Tuesday. About 9:00 Monday morning this seemed like a good plan so I started casting about for an inexpensive place to spend the night. I finally settled on the Hidden Villa Hostel in Los Altos Hills, $45.00, very reasonable for The Bay Area. I made a reservation even though I knew I would have to be there to check in by 8:00 PM. I thought I had plenty of time. I called Mike to tell him I was coming and got everything together and got on the road about 10:50.
After getting away and setting up the GPS and looking at the trip time it calculated I realized I would have to hustle all day to get to the hostel by 8:00. This seemed like a bad idea. By the time I decided it was a bad idea and to try to cancel the reservation I was out of phone range. To make a long story short I did not reach the hostel phone until almost 3:00 an was informed that I could cancel my reservation but would not receive a refund. I pressed on.
About 6:30 I was approaching Gilroy and could see I would make it by 8:00 with no problem. I was talking to Dan on the phone (hand free) as I was coming down Leavesley Road to get on Highway 101 for the final push to the hostel. A semi-truck with a large tractor on the trailer was going very slow in front of me and I pulled out to pass him. Just as I got up to his tractor I saw turn signals and realized he was turning left. I did my best to go to the left around him but my options were somewhat limited by the nature of the ditch before the driveway/dirt road he was pulling into and he got me with his front bumper per the photos above. Fortunately I had room to stop without doing any further damage. The guy told me he had his turn signal on but I do not believe him. At any rate it is his word against mine and I was on the phone which is hard to defend. I was tired and rattled an did not want to mess with it so we exchanged info and I left. My poor car is not pretty but it all still works so I guess I can pretend I live in Boston and NYC where 90% of the cars have worse damage than this. The truck got some paint on the front bumper.
I got to the hostel on time and checked in then took the bike to Mike's, got some food at the local Safeway, went back to the room and ate and went to bed between 10:00 and 11:00. Somewhere in this series of events I arranged with Dan to meet him at his home in the morning for a walk.
I did not sleep well and woke up at 4:00. My mind kept replaying the car mess and I could not sleep so I finally got up at about 5:00, packed up and started home. I was able to beat 95% of the rush hour traffic out of town and stopped at McDonald's about a mile from the scene of the fiasco at Leavesley and 101 for 2 large coffees to go and drove on. I stopped at McDonald's in Los Banos and got a bite to eat and some Cokes for the drive. I had decided to go home on Highway 99 rather than I-5 and to go through Porterville and through or over the Sierra to Kernville then home from there.
I had been several times on the road that goes from Highway 395 north of Ridgecrest through Kennedy Meadows and on to the Kern River about 20 miles north of Kernville but I had never taken the connector to Porterville. This turned out to be a very interesting ride. The highway (190) climbs steeply up the Tule River north then east then south-east to the top of The Great Western Divide at about 7200 feet. I was familiar with the GWD farther north in Kings Canyon and Sequoia NPs but this not realize it extends this far south but it does make sense as it is the western wall of the Kern Trench, a large N-S Gash in the middle of the Southern Sierra. The trench extends from Lake South America just over the south wall of Kings Canyon to Lake Isabella, a few miles south of Kernville, roughly 40 miles.
The highway follows the Great Western Divide for 10-12 miles then turns east and drops steeply down the Kern where the road to Kennedy Meadows and Highway 395 also meets the river (Sherman Pass the high point on the road to 395 is about 9,000 feet).
From Kernville I had the usual ride home over Walker Pas on Highway 178, Highway 14 to InyoKern and 395 then 395 to Kramer Junction, 58 to Barstow and 247 and 62 home from there.
Going up the Tule River
Looking Across The Kern Trench on the Way Down to the River
Impressive Falls on a Side Creek not far Above The Kern
Old and New Bridges Across the Kern
The Kern is Very Low and Placid This Year
A River Access Ramp for Rafters and Kayakers
A Very Low Lake Isabella
Walker Pass Campground - I Spent a Couple of Nights Sleeping Next to this Ramada on my Cot Last Spring While Waiting For Dan to Hike In
Expensive Gas at Kramer Junction/Boron
The Bicycle That Started it All (In the Foreground)
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