Back to the coast

From Yosemite we drove again to the Pacific coast for the last 4 days.

In the USA, the first Monday in September is Labor Day, which drives the masses out of the cities and into the national parks and coasts.

I think we were the only ones leaving Yosemite in the evening.

Unfortunately, this also had an impact on the location of the campsites. We thought it wouldn't be a problem to get a spot along our route later in the evening - we thought wrong. On the one hand, it was already quite late when we started looking, and on the other hand, everything with four wheels was actually on the roads and campsites.

We thought about just standing on the side of the road before making one last attempt. Unfortunately the place was already closed, but Anita spoke to a drunk man who was getting a Bible out of his truck in the parking lot in front of the campsite. He was a guest at the campsite and graciously opened the entrance for us with his card and said that there was a space next to him anyway before disappearing back into the pub.

Overjoyed, we stood on the spot, quickly settled in to sleep and a few moments later we were in the land of dreams. It was about 11 p.m.

Suddenly the motorhome rumbled. At first I thought I was just dreaming when it pumped again. Little by little I realized that someone was banging on the window outside. Drowsy, I opened the passenger door in my underwear when a man and a woman looked at me grumpily. “You are on our spot,” said the man with a stone-faced expression. Damn!, someone actually arrived at 1 a.m. and we're standing at their campsite. I quickly woke up Anita and Julius, who were sleeping in the roof tent, so they could come down. I let Konstantin sleep in the stern. With the roof tent open, we drove around the campsite as if in a trance to see if there was anything else available. There was a free space, but before we were woken up again, we thought we'd better stop at the "overflow" parking lot. That was a good idea, we were able to sleep well until 8 the next day and ended up paying $35 for dry camping.

The lesson from history. Don't trust a drunk who pulls a Bible out of his truck late at night 😉.

After another 3 hours of driving we ended up at Bodago Bay, about 70 miles north of San Francisco, where thanks to Anita's persuasion we got a place for 2 days at an LBQT-friendly campsite. Rainbow flags were flying everywhere and in the evening the loud YMCA sounded from the clubhouse. A totally relaxed atmosphere and very nice people here.

Julius received an ornithology book as a gift from a camper when he noticed that he was taking photos of quail-like birds at the campsite.

By the way, part of Alfred Hitchcock's film "The Birds" was also filmed in Bodega (city).

Tomorrow we continue along the coast south of San Francisco into Sillicon Valley.