Up the coast.

It was difficult to push on from the Tahoe area; there was a sense of so much left to see and do. But push on we did, heading over toward the California coast. We spent a night in Ukiah (just up the road from the more well-known wine country) where we savored good beer and food amidst an eclectic group of townspeople. Wound about the oak-covered hillsides the next day before reaching the ocean, where cold fog greeted us. Definitely not my preferred vacation weather, especially after enduring a bland, gloomy spring that stretched well into summer. The bay below Mendocino at mid-day. I wasn't kidding about the fog.
Doesn't this plaza in the northern coastal California town of Arcata look pleasant? Seems like a gathering place for locals and tourists alike. A spot to enjoy weekly music, festivals, and such. One only needs to spend a night at the historic Hotel Arcata, in a room overlooking the plaza, to experience the reality: young vagrants boozing up ~ and exercising their vocal capacity in the process ~ 'til all hours of the night; a row of reeking bars open 'round the clock; and a token squad car that circles the plaza hour after hour, the officer within showing no interest whatsoever in enforcing noise ordinances. Such a shame. It could have much to offer ~ if it wasn't bathed in fog half the day and the July high crept past 60, that is. Surely this is captured within the pages of a volume dedicated to roadside American kitsch.

The Oregun dunes are stunning ~ even if the ocean in the distance is obscured by fog.
Inland again to the warmer climes of the Willamette Valley, where I ran the trails in Eugene ~ "Track Town, USA".
Home again, home again, jiggety jig. The end of the rainbow.