To: WL
From: "Kathy E. Gill" <kathy@motogrrl.com>
Subject: Day Two : Remedial Math 101 - Part Three
Cc: 
Bcc: PE 
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Leggett is home of one of the "drive through the tree" places  - this 
one is a state park. I'm tired and decide to play tourist. There's a bit 
of a line to drive through, and I realized late that the entire road is 
hard pack dirt (sprinkled with water to keep the dust down). 

Lie down on a picnic table for 15 minutes or so - no power nap, there 
are too many kids running around, but the rest does me good. Stretch 
muscles; grab diet soda for caffeine; munch a balance bar.

Now it's Route 1. Very narrow, very twisty, irregular road surface. This 
is the headwaters of the road, so to speak, and its seriously scenic. I 
meet a rider who gives me an aggressive 'slow down' signal; I do. Two 
turns later, it looks like someone dumped a wheel barrel of pea gravel 
on the road. I would have been ok without his warning, but the heads-up
 was nice.

I'm taking downhill turns relatively faster than I did at CTS (but still 
not as fast as 'up'). I am *so* grateful that track day was before this 
ride. It boosted my confidence and my knowledge of the bike at least an 
order of magnitude. Every-now-and-then, I say, "well this is turn 3 or 
this is turn 4." And Gooz, I'm getting quite good at dropping a gear 
entering the turn. ;-)

After 20 miles or so of tight turns, the road reaches the ocean. Despite 
the fact that this is a holiday weekend, the roads and beaches are 
relatively uncrowded. Maybe because it's so far north?

It's about 65 miles down to 128, where I plan to cut back over to 101. I 
stop in Ft. Bragg for gas, pee-break and more caffeine. Another five 
minutes stretched out on the asphalt.

Catch up with my first certified BDC of the day - a guy driving a 318i. 
(harumph, he gave bmw drivers a really bad name.) He's too busy talking 
to the sweetie in the car to pay attention to the road - and seems to 
think he has to look at her the entire time he's driving. I figure I'm 
annoyed because I'm getting tired (tired = less patience with stupidity). 

There's too much traffic to pass him, even on double yellows. Besides,
he gases it in the straights. (Hi, Scott! <g>) I learn to drop back 
quite a bit on curves so I can keep a steady throttle. Still, I almost 
go postal when he drops anchor on a posted 15 mph hairpin -- I swear he 
wasn't going 2 mph. I had to come to a _stop_ and promptly lay down on 
the horn (wishing I had after market sound).

This was the final straw - the next half-way chance I got, I passed him 
on a double-yellow. I figured that was less risky than staying behind 
him.



Kathy
still postponed