The eagle has landed! I repeat, the eagle has landed!

Well I'm just going to go ahead and post without a picture because I can't wait any longer. Di's got the good computer because she's in North Carolina, where the cigarette tax is only 49 cents per pack and gasoline is 2 something. 2 SOMETHING! I haven't seen gas at two something since what (?), Clinton was president? Cheap gas and cigarettes. The beauty of the south. Oh, and the cuisine of course.

SO she left me the jalopy computer that can't handle pictures. Yeah I know. Look, this one you have to tap the top three times, rotate it in a counterclockwise fashion until it starts to glow, and point the screen to the east before it will even think of starting up. I want a Mac I want a Mac I want a Mac. Sorry. Lost it there.

Anyway, to catch you up to speed, we left Big Sur and that wonderful cabin where I could've spent the rest of my days, disappearing forever in that Redwood forest, on that deck, with the warm winds, the swaying trees, the gurgling brook down there in the valley below, the crickets at night. I could have sat right there for eternity. Now accepting donations for the Jason Sits on Big Sur Deck Forever-a-thon. I could put a cam there and turn it into a reality TV show. Or a web thing. You could check it whenever you wanted and there I'd be. Sittin'. Drinkin' my tea. Readin' a book. Look the bathroom was outdoors. Of course I'd be readin' a book.

From there up to wine country, Sonoma to be exact, where we spent the remainder of our roadtrip riding our bikes through wine country, stopping here and there at the various wineries, tasting, swerving back on home in time for dinner. Did some mountain biking up there as well. Found out later there was some bouldering in the area. Anything else you need for a vacation spot? It's a pretty cool thing to have a little slice of the Mediterranean right here in America. Weather and all. If you haven't been it's highly recommended. Oh, don't bring your Visa because they only accept American Express.

Lastly, we cooled our heels, shut the van down, emptied her out, and opened the door to our little cottage here in Sausalito, our final resting spot for the next six months. Pretty wild living in a place that tourists take the ferry over to see. We have a view of the bay from our living room. The fog horns on the ships are loud enough to almost wake you up. From our front door you can ride right into the birthplace of mountain biking (was that Joe Breezer that just walked by?). The Marin Headlands are pretty much our backyard playground now. Just think of miles and miles of rolling coastal hills, the Pacific Ocean on one side, the bay on the other, Mt. Tam the predominant feature, everything from eucalyptus groves to sandy beaches, and I mean miles and miles of it. All of it protected. All of it with trails and fire roads that you could spend days riding from one end to the other. Literally. There are bike/hike/horse campgrounds dotting the area for those who wish to traverse it. Take out a map and check out the part of Cali just north of San Fran where the Golden Gate bridge reaches over the bay. Now you see it. All the way up to Pt. Reyes National Seashore. That's our local open space. Not bad for a farm boy like myself.

Before Di left town we cruised over to Stinson Beach, home of the Great White shark bite capital of North America or something, and did some bouldering. Yup. Right on the beach. Boulders, waves crashing, sunshine. Di was bouldering in a bikini top (no pics of that!). I think it was like 70 degrees that day. Best time we've had bouldering in a long time. And did I mention that's also right here in the Marin Headlands, our backyard playground? So little time...

So I decided to go and get myself a Surly Crosscheck. What's that? Oh, a cyclocross bike. Why? Well, back when the earth was created, what, 6000 years ago? Right. After the Roman gods and the Greek gods finally got their way with the whole grape thing, on the eighth day of creation, in an 11th hour decision, the little-talked about Cyclocross gods finally got their way. They were granted one place on earth to put their playground. And so they chose the Marin Headlands, or the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, as their place for their cyclocross bliss parties. Yeah, I know. You're thinking wait, Marin is the birthplace of mountain biking. Yes, but it was made for cyclocross, just like I just told you. And here's the thing. I love it. I love the bike (pure steel baby). I love the idea of it. I can't wait to go out again (tomorrow?). You know why? Cyclocross requires you to actually ride your bike. With control. And to pick your lines meticulously, not just carefully (or carelessly nowadays with all the "big hit" bikes out there). There's a certain level of class and sophistication when you're riding a road bike with skinny nobby tires on the same trails you would with your mountain bike (okay, maybe not ALL the same trails you would mountain bike, but then again, I think I'm at a point in my life [age?] when I'm starting to ask, if it's THAT technical, should I be riding it all?). Makes my mountain biking side feel like a knuckledragger.

When I'm on my cyclocross bike I feel like I should be listening to Vivaldi, maybe sipping a little wine, wearing a Campy hat. It requires a certain level of attention to detail you don't have to have on a mountain bike. Most mountain bikes these days allow anyone to go out and nearly traumatize themselves and everyone else on the trail. They seem to allow for way too much speed in the hands of way too clueless riders. Just my experience. I can't just bomb down hills on my cross bike like I can on my mountain bike. No mam. I have to pay careful attention to what I'm doing. Control my speed. Respect my tenuous relationship between tire, dirt, and my uprightness. Call me a snob, or better yet, an old curmudgeon (oh, I like that, do it again). Here's to riding a road bike on the dirt! May all those who know honor the sacred vows of the covenant, and forever grin holding the sweet secret revealed in the land of Cyclocrossatopia. Long live the brother-sisterhood!

And the road riding here. You should see this place on a Saturday afternoon. Cyclists rule the roads here. All the twisting, turning back roads of Marin draw em' by the thousands it seems. That's the other thing about the cross bike (again, pure steel baby!), throw some slicks on it and I'm off. The little road riding I've done here has woke up the old roadie in me. I haven't had that much fun riding on a road since I can remember. Probably since the country roads of Howard County, MD.

SO that'll about do it. I think I'm gonna go hop on the bike, climb up onto the ridge on "Morning Light" trail, connect to Alta, down to Rodeo beach (pronounced rode-AYo, not like the horse and bull torture game cowboys play), back up onto the sea cliff above (that's the Golden Gate behind me, looking north nothing but rolling, green, coastal hills and the Pacific Ocean), and see what other discoveries await (oh look, there are some horse riders down there in the valley on Bobcat trail). On the way out and back to the cottage maybe I'll stop at a little cafe, sip an espresso, and watch the gulls fly overhead, ponder the aesthetic possibilities of a Brooks leather saddle on my new ride, or maybe some Phil Wood hubs. Or maybe just the salt sea air instead. Yeah, let's just smell the wind and watch the water, shall we?

I'll get some pictures up when the real computer makes it back.

UPDATE:

Well I guess I could change the name of this post to say that yeah, the eagle has landed, and now he's all covered in oil. Or I could've ended it with smelling not so much the salt sea air, but the fowl, piercing smell of rank oil. In case you haven't heard there was an oil spill here in the bay area. I did go for that ride and descended down 800 feet from the ridge to Rodeo beach and when I got there the place was crowded. News trucks, fire trucks, police, park rangers, curious citizens, and surfers with downcast eyes shaking their heads in disgust, were there looking out over the Pacific. Men in yellow plastic suits and rubber gloves walked the beach shoveling black sand into plastic bags, picking up dead birds, doing their job. If you've never witnessed an oil spill it is a tragic thing to see. It's one thing to see it on TV, read about it in the newspapers. But to see it in person...

I climbed back up onto the ridge and headed north a little bit and looked out over the ocean. As far as I could see an oil slick covered the water below. This is where the Marine Mammal Center is. This whole coastline is a marine sanctuary. How many marine mammals will die? How many birds?

A container ship (carrying what? Lead paint toys from China? Soccer balls? Flatscreen TVs?) struck the bay bridge and poured thousands of gallons of oil into the water. Apparently the Coast Guard screwed the pooch on this one and under reported the amount of oil spilled. You'd think with all that new money thrown at them since 9/11 they'd be able to do their job. Guess they were busy waiting for Osama to paddle his pretty blue kayak from Pakistan to come and take us all hostage, turn us into commies.

Forty miles of coastline have been affected by this spill. Eight beaches have been closed. 58,000 gallons. Here's a dead, oil covered bird: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2007/11/09/MN3TT959H.DTL&o=4

Slow response by the Coast Guard? Try glacial. Try what-the-hell-did-we-give-you-all-that-money-for slow. Guess this is the price we pay if we want to drive our cars. Get cheap beer. Play video games. Wear jeans. Furnish the new kitchen. Wait one minute, I'll be right back...sorry, that was the UPS guy delivering my replacement lenses for my sunglasses. Well look at that, Made In China. Well whooptie frickin' dee. Do I get a choice in this matter? You can't find American made replacement lenses. Not since some died-in-the-wool, blue-blooded, god-fearing, patriotic, tax-evading American CEO decided to move his operations to slave labor land, decrease his costs, beat the sh*t out of his competition. Semper Fi. Oorah.

That's the beauty of the "free" market system folks. We get to buy our stuff from way over there for real cheap. REAL cheap. And some corporation gets to pass the buck. Hand me another slice of apple pie. Tell me about the purple mountain's majesty. Just make sure I get my cheap crap.

But the real costs, the real costs lay floating right out there my friends. They've got to get passed somewhere. What will they add up to? How do they affect our collective bottom line? I guess we'll find out.