Share the roadkill: further adventures on the Oregon South Coast

Very recently, I once again traveled up the Pacific Coast to my muse’s favored creative hangout (Port Orford and Gold Beach in Oregon). Part of my intention was to visit an old friend whom I have known since we were both medical technologists, starting off post-Vietnam service back in Berkeley of 1969.

My friend, whom we shall call ‘Charlie’, is now 78 and suffering from the early effects of dementia. That is to say, while he is still quite mobile and active, his memory is starting to reveal significant gaps that are typical of dementia and Alzheimer patients in the preliminary phases of those syndromes.

Charlie is, however and despite this moderate loss of pre-frontal lobe memory processing capability, a former US Marine from a Marine family and his whole life has had a sort of continuous ‘git ‘er done’ determination to it. In other words, he thrives well enough despite this substantial handicap, albeit aided handsomely in his endeavors by the ministering support of his wife, who is also what I would call also ‘determined’ and self-directed person (who fortunately does not suffer from Charlie’s memory loss problem).

Charlie can recall things in his earlier life quite well, often with crystal clarity, but I noted recently that even this is changing noticeably. At any rate, I took a week to travel up to his neck of the scenically spectacular Oregon South Coast to pay a visit, check up on him, and relax a bit myself (hopefully). Charlie and his wife have a large, rather nice home on Edson Creek Road, located about three miles from Gold Beach and tucked back behind a ridge that separates them from that coastal town. Their home is situated on the side of that ridge, fortuously sited well above whatever level any reasonably anticipated tsunamic tidal surge would reach (short of the cataclysmic Cascadia Subduction Zone event that all the seismologists have been in a dither about for the past several decades). Naturally enough, when Cascadia finally blows out, all bets are off no matter where you are along the Pacific Northwest Coast, since when it finally does cut loose, we're ALL toast!

In back of his home and a bit farther up the densely wooded ridge lies a small in-law cottage, measuring about 20 feet by 10 feet. Of fairly recent construction and well insulated, it has several nice windows in front that verge on a veranda that projects about 6 feet from the front of the cabin. Inside, it is nicely furnished with a tiny kitchen nook that is adjacent to a desk area crafted from a gorgeous slab of blonde oak; nearby is a sofa-bed. There is no toilet or shower but those logistical necessities have been accommodated in a rather droll manner…by the placement of a small (RV-sized) chemical porta-pottie at the extreme right end of the deck, surrounded by an ingenious (and coincidentally camouflaged) domed ‘privacy enclosure’. It certainly suffices to meet the need in emergencies (say at night, when the urge hits suddenly and unexpectedly), at any rate, and showers can be taken in the basement of the main house that contains another in-law-livable apartment. Since my friend and his wife reside there alone on the upper level (her children by a previous marriage now in their 40s, and his living apart in other areas), I can use that basement apartment’s full bathroom to take care of my requisite cleansing ablutions, since it’s just a short walk downhill from the cottage.

All in all, it’s just about a perfect arrangement for a writer. They have full satellite internet access, so I can handily tap into their LAN wifi for my own needs and it is oh-so-peaceful up there, nestled among the pines.

Given my frequent need to escape the increasingly toxic atmosphere of politically correct Californica (sic), Charlie’s place is a fantastic refuge for someone who has pretentions of being a writer (even someone who had ADD as a child, like me). And so, I regularly spend a few weeks each year ‘in residence’ as Charlie’s guest.

My friend Charlie has always been in pretty good health throughout his life, a blessing doubtless augmented to some extent by his careful diet and abstinence from any bad habits (such as excessive drink, despite being an Irishman by genetic lineage). In recent years, however, he has tended to get a bit wonky in terms of how he eats, developing some extreme ideas about nutrition (and in particular about supplements and erstwhile ‘health foods’). His regular noonday meal, for example, consists of what I call bird seed and penis butter (my jokey way of saying sesame crackers and almond butter). Since I need a bit more substance at noon (at least a sandwich) than he does, it frequently becomes a bit of an ordeal getting him to detour off our day’s adventurous itinerary to seek out a sandwich shop or café where such fare is more readily available.

Last year, despite his lifelong health habits, he was suddenly diagnosed with cancer of the colon. Fortunately, Gold Beach has recently (about a year ago) gained a full service, multiple floor hospital with all the normal in-patient and clinical capabilities, so when Charlie experienced some recurring gastrointestinal difficulties, a quick trip to Gold Beach General Hospital’s ER quickly revealed the malignancy.

Given Charlie’s VA benefits as a former Gyrene (that’s ‘US Marine’ to you), he was able to seek treatment at VA facilities in Roseberg and Portland, where surgical resection followed by chemo and radiation therapy seem to have stopped the CA cold. Given Gold Beach’s somewhat remote detachment from the interior of Oregon, thanks to its coastal mountains, his treatment involved regular trips north to Portland, which can in the winter be somewhat arduous. Nevertheless, that is now all over and done with, excepting semi-annual check-ups to ensure the CA is indeed arrested and in remission.

Charlie’s concerns therefore have fortunately now been reduced to his memory problems, and therein lies another tale.

If none of you have dealt with a person with either dementia and/or Alzheimers (the incidence of both of which is spiking unnaturally across the country these days), the chief concern for those dealing with a person in the early stages is coping with short-term memory loss. We’re not talking the typical ‘senior moment’ that everyone in this age group is prone to and that provides a great deal of senior merriment (typical joke: ‘Every morning you get to greet a new person in your bathroom mirror’, etc.). Rather, it boils down to a repetition of conversational exchanges throughout the day as the afflicted individual asks the same questions over and over, to which you are forced to answer with exactly the same responses. In a certain sense, it would seedm like effortless conversation, since there’s no need to think deeply about what is being said, given that you said exactly the same thing mere minutes ago. But you'd be surprised how exhaustively taxing it can be when engaged in at length.

In Charlie’s case, he has been a keen appreciator of picturesque little towns, villages and rural homesites for most of his life, accustomed to making a number of detours along his driving routes to examine what those ‘picturesque little towns and homes’ have to offer. The only problem is that given his fading short-term memory, he now regards all those very familiar sights as entirely new experiences and when he drives in his redoubtable small Toyota pickup truck (as I reluctantly accede him the right to do), he is constantly asking me if I’ve ever been up this way before…because ‘there’s this curious little road that leads back to some interesting places back there’. Repeat this mantra 100 times or more per day and you get a glimmer of the idea.

Of course, I have seen these small roads and curious places many times before on previous trips, but all this is lost on Charlie and so we play this game continuously throughout the drive. It’s a major reason why I insist on driving myself more often than not, since playing this game all day long soon grows quite tiring and exhaustive, even. At least if I am driving, I can avoid a great number of those little sideroads and detours that otherwise characterise Charlie’s usual tour routes.

Charlie has a number of quirks, of course, (don’t we all?) and it reminds me of some of the liabilities that my early Sierra Nevada mountaineering trips posed, wherein you had a small two-man mountain tent that you had to share rather intimately on peak-bagging treks and winter ascents. In those confined spaces, the personal habits and quirks of your climbing partner can quickly become incredibly irritating. It’s a smaller and shorter-term version of what the old sourdoughs used to call ‘cabin fever’, in which miners shared a small cabin through the long winter and by the time spring finally arrived were ready to brain each other with the nearest heavy blunt object.

Among Charlie’s more irritating quirks is his habit of bringing along a CD folio with about 15 music disks that he slaps on the car’s CD player and listens to while he’s driving. And of course, he has his favorites that include the soundtrack from the Disney movie ‘Babe’ (remember that movie? About a sweet little pig who leads his fellow animals in a rebellion against their farmer. Shades of Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm’ with a smarmy Disney twist).

Others include classical music selections that I would normally greatly enjoy (such as Ferde Groffe’s ‘Grand Canyon Suite’ with its syncopated mule pack-train and Antonín Leopold Dvořák’s ‘New World Symphony’), but when listened to ALL DAY LONG, over and over repetitively, prompts me to not just damage the CD but emasculate the player as well. Of course, the absolute worst torture would be listening to the ‘Babe’ soundtrack in this serial manner, but even I have my absolute limits of patience. Actually, I’m surprised at my restraint in not having covertly destroyed that particular CD years ago!

I can assure you without qualification that there are fewer more subtle and nerve-wracking mental tortures than being coerced into listening to Vivaldi’s ‘Four Seasons’ (for example and masterpiece that it is) for several hours on end without a break, as you whip around hair-pin curves, perched several thousand feet above the ocean on a sheer rock face, driven by my 78-year-old friend Charlie. Unfortunately, another of Charlie’s quirky proclivities is to get easily distracted at such infinitely hair-raising moments, requiring me to be ever-vigilant and ready to grab the wheel to correct our trajectory towards infinity as we head for the extreme right-shoulder safety barrier that anticipates such unintended off-course excursions (many hearty thanks, Oregon DOT!).

Typically, my visits to Charlie’s place combine a bit of prime writing time with yeoman’s duty as a ‘Charlie-sitter’, which doubtless helps his long-suffering wife by giving her a brief respite from her marital duties watching out for him. So, every other day we pile into one or the other of our vehicles and take off up or down the coast to check out the terrain for anything new or unusual that may have cropped up in the time that has passed since my last trip up from the Calville State Mental Hospital (AKA: The State of Californica).

As mentioned earlier, I usually insist on taking my vehicle, since that greatly spares me the recurrent irritation of trying to keep Charlie on-track (and off the side roads, which I’ve seen many times before). One recent day, we decided to drive south to Brookings, which contains about 6500 permanent residents (and many more in the summer months…Gold Beach has roughly half that number but in the summer far more, being located at the mouth of the Rouge River and a great Mecca for fishermen). There’s a little coffee house on the south bank of the Chetco River mouth in Brookings, down near the US Coast Guard Station and the wharfs there, named ‘The Bell and Whistle’ (16340 Lower Harbor Road, Suite 101 ….thebellandwhistlecoffeehouse) that we often frequent.

In most cases on such excursions, we first visit the voluminous Gold Beach Bookstore and Coffeehouse, sited smack in the middle of Gold Beach on Highway 101. Claiming to have (either on display or in storage) more than 75,000 books of new and used vintage, this is a major ‘must visit’ for any bibliophile worthy of that appellation. Unfortunate for me is the fact that I am one of those people who literally get disoriented in bookstores. Typically, the moment I enter such a place I am overcome with a sort of mesmerized state of defuddlement, probably at least partially due to my belief that books are a form of rare and pleasurable treasure (I am not worthy!, as Wayne's World would put it). Bookstores are therefore a kind of Aladdin’s Cave by my reckoning and I can and will get totally lost in the stacks until mercifully retrieved by a kindly and well-intentioned party of friends performing a pseudo search-and-rescue mission on my behalf.

This great (I’ll recant my personal philosophical discipline long enough to briefly contemplate using that forbidden word ‘awesome’) repository of books is without any doubt whatsoever one of the best (if not the absolute best) bookstores in Oregon, outside of Portland and definitely the best on the entire South Oregon Coast. You can find just about anything there, from the latest best-sellers to old and rare treasures dating back to the mid-1800s. It’s a fabulous find for a first-time bookworm, to be sure, and on each and every visit I usually haul back with me about $400 in purchases (more than guaranteed to drive my long-suffering wifie even further over the edge, sad to say).

One of the best parts of the Gold Beach Books experience is the fact that they have a coffee house attached (on the first floor) that offers a yummy assortment of coffee/tea drinks and a surprisingly varied menu of excellent in-house-made baked goods (croissants, muffins, turnovers, etc.). This gustatory adjunct serves as a daily meeting place for a small group of (retired) local men who have homes in Gold Beach, so there’s always an interesting conversation to find going on there. Just to cite an example of the mix, one of the fellows is a retired CalTech rocket scientist; another was born in the Czech Republic and survived the Second World War (fighting on the OTHER side). Several others include a local (still employed) lawyer, the local undertaker, the Curry County Sheriff and an MD or two. All in all, it’s quite a rich mix of worthy souls and usually great fun to drop in on.

That said, we paid our personal respects to this group and grabbed a muffin and coffee before continuing south to Brookings. Being late October, the summer crowd that characterises the whole Oregon South Coast scene had long since dissipated, leaving mostly the long-time locals whose families have inhabited this stretch of Oregonian turf for generations. Gold Beach in particular reverts to its more ‘regular’ demeanor and everyone buttons up for the usually pleasant but sometimes quite blustery weather and fog that this part of Oregon is noted for.

On the way down to Brookings (which lies about 28 miles south of Gold Beach) we stopped briefly for something at the local Gold Beach sporting goods store. While I was admiring their collection of antique rifles (acquired as part of a gun-collector’s estate sale, about a year ago), I found myself arrested in mid-gaze by a beautiful young Asian woman standing next to me, waiting to buy a small camping-type GAZ propane container.

Since I am notorious among my friends for my bias for and attraction to gorgeous gals of Asian extraction, I turned to take her profile fully in and was probably (but not quite) staring at her stupidly with an open mouth while wondering what brought her in there. As I took her full length in (and she was slightly taller than usual for an Asian person) and obvious comely femaleness, it gradually dawned on me that she was wearing what was likely a bicyclist’s gear, being dressed in patterned Lycra tights and dark windbreaker shell.

Never missing the chance to provide the world with further proof that I am a slightly better-than-average dirty old man, I asked her where she was from (since it was obvious that she was neither a local nor a vacation-homer). In a beautifully accented, but perfect English voice she told me she was from China (the mainland), although staying in San Francisco, and that she had bicycled up from that city, doing the Pacific Coast bicycle route.

She really was quite beautiful, her long dark Chinese hair pulled back into a utilitarian (and typically Chinese) ponytail, with perfect facial bone structure. Under the windbreaker was ample evidence of the well-conditioned, lean and physically fit body most serious cyclists have and I could have followed her anywhere at that moment (I rarely have these moments, fortunately), such was the effect of her spectacular aggregate of female resources. I found myself silently wondering, as I stood there, somewhat awe-struck, why I had never met anyone as spectacular as her when I was still young enough to vie for her attention (sigh!) romantically.

I couldn’t resist using my pathetic residual Mandarin (Beijing Hua) on her and even shared the fact that my wife is from China (acquiescence to the inevitable, I guess, since I’m no longer a ‘contender’). We had a short but pleasant conversation while she paid for her item and I’m sure I found myself wishing time would stand still a bit longer than it was at that particular moment. But, being an honorable person as well as a realist, I made to depart a bit later with my friend Charlie in tow and we exited the store through the front door.

There on the storefront walkway was her bicycle, unchained or secured and clearly…obviously…a VERY expensive, state-of-the-art bicycle. I estimated it must have cost at least 5 or 6 thousand dollars and it was loaded with gear that was discernibly also expensive…and perfectly suited to someone who was a class-act from top to bottom (no joke intended).

Given that she was a visitor from China, but so well educated (perfect English) and equipped (both physically…ahem…and in terms of her gear), it was fairly obvious that she came from a very wealthy Chinese family. Likely the female scion of the class of wealthy Chinese in the People’s Republic who have profited enormously from trade with the US and other nations, as China rises to world-power status.

That realization was quickly followed by the realization that she was entirely alone, unaccompanied and solo on her trip. No formidably buff white male boyfriend looking after her, as is often the case when a spectacular Chinese beauty sails into sight these days. Wow. That told me that she was probably VERY unaware of the somewhat less-pleasant possibilities single and unaccompanied females can encounter on trips like this! Although she had obviously done her navigational homework, I wondered if she had much of an understanding about that dark ‘underbelly’ of predatory rogue American maleness (read: ignorant, uneducated, not extremely bright) that may be encountered in remote stretches of our otherwise beautiful coastal areas. Probably not! Scary! Suddenly, I found the randy male part of my persona dropping away as the paternal, protective nature of someone twice (perhaps thrice!) her age took over and I worried for her sake about this innocence in her deficit understanding of America.

Well, there was plenty else to worry about, given that she was bicycling on the Oregon Coast Route. First of all, she was dressed in dark, non-reflective clothing. While it may have been state-of-the-art apparel, it was most definitely not conducive to being easily spotted by a motorist coming around a tight turn in the road at high speed. Her helmet was also darkish, as was her gear. All in all, it was absolutely frightening to reflect on typical Oregon coastal weather, with its often-dense fog banks, practically non-existent roadway margins and insane traffic (every other vehicle being either a logging-truck or an obscenely huge motorhome) that this lovely young woman was navigating so trustingly.

It reminded me of my own many decades of bicycle experience in all sorts of situations, ranging from Saudi Arabian deserts to dead-of-winter icy roads in North Dakota, to these same Pacific Coast highways. Bicycling is and never has been safe for anyone on two-wheels and most specifically on dangerously challenging roads like Highway 101 in Northern California and the Oregon Coast.

At the very least, cyclists MUST wear bright colored clothing & helmets when on these hazardous roads if they wish to remain living. I’ve seen far too many assholes on 4-wheels just about physically take-out bicyclists in such scenarios and believe me, a lot of them drive these parts of Highway 101!

Then too, there is that obscene DOT philosophy that takes the form of frequent orange signs along these roads stating ‘Share the Road! As if putting a fu*king sign up saying ‘Share the Road’ is going to somehow protect a fragile human flesh-and-blood package of organs, skin & bone weighing 125 or so pounds from the full impact of a 28,000-pound truck, cutting too close on a foggy, twisty roadway! Are you fu*king kidding me?!

Where do we get these Gyro Gearloose civic planners who are too cheap to do what REALLY needs to be done to protect cyclists: physically separate cars & bicycles. For that’s what they are: civil servants who pander to the whims of state highway budget bean-counters (out of fiscal necessity, naturally).

From my viewpoint, it’s either a testament to the collective naivete of young bicyclists (that they allow themselves to be treated this way) or a blatant disregard for human life (on the part of DOT planners and politicians)! And meanwhile in our politically correct society, we have an extremely vocal, outspoken and highly emotional left-of-center outcry over the plight of thousands of (potential) illegal Hispanic immigrants streaming to overwhelm the borders of our nation (item seen on the current evening news, as the latest hoard of those from south of our borders flood in, claiming a humanitarian crisis and seeking asylum) while we remain perfectly complaisant and willing to let cars & trucks slaughter bicyclists like ordinary roadkill whenever they wish!

The more I thought-out this perversion of civic transportation priorities, the more I found myself worrying about this lovely young lady (she must have been in her mid-20s) as the day wore on.

I am not ashamed to say that later that same night I found myself waking up, STILL worried about her safety, all alone on those danger-strewn roadways in her dark and inconspicuous clothing; even after I returned from my week or so up in Oregon I caught myself wondering whether she had returned safely from her ride. Admittedly, this stretch of the Pacific Coast is inarguably beautiful, but there have been more than an occasional fatal accident along its length. The fact that, relatively speaking and proportionately considered, there have been fewer deaths than statisticians would say are noteworthy doesn’t lessen a whit the fact that those are needlessly hazardous roadways for bicyclists. It was further shocking to go on-line and find that seldom if ever are these hazards mentioned in the glowing public relations blurbs put out on the merits of the Pacific Coast bicycle route.

In my considered opinion, either the respective DOTs take necessary steps to provide safe (separate) bike lanes on these highways or they should make it mandatory for ALL cyclists to use and wear high-visibility clothing and gear. Any other policy is synonymous with coldly premeditated (and cost-sanctioned) bureaucratic murder.

We finally (Charlie and I) did get to Brookings that day (lest you wonder) and after the usual requisite, multiple rounds of coffee & pastries in that town, made it back to Gold Beach safely (since I was driving, LoL). I should say that there are more than a few hole-in-the-wall coffee houses here and there in the Brookings area (most usually not lasting very long and folding after a year or two), but only a very few that are really worth the trouble to stop at.

Brookings, despite its collegiate status, can be a bit seedy (think: a whole city full of WalMartians) in off-season and they definitely don’t have big-city coffee savvy (I’m not talking about corporate monster outfits like…YUK!...Starf*cks here, which should be off-limits to any reflectively intelligent and aware person).

The next day we headed north to Port Orford (my favorite quaint costal community), Bandon (an artsy but somewhat banally commercialized enclave) and Coos Bay (which is an interesting place, but tres post-logging era vintage). On the way back, we stopped at a fantastic place that I’ve waited several years to visit, a quirky little place right on the highway in Port Orford named ‘The Crazy Norwegian’s Fish & Chips’.

With its white clapboard exterior gaudily decorated somewhat like you’d expect to find in a Norwegian expatriate’s nightmare, its appearance belies what you will find inside! In fact I was astounded! As someone who has many decades of experience with fish & chips (starting with the original ‘H. Salt Esquire’ chain back in 1969 Berkeley, where they served London style fries and North Sea Plaice...a yummy flatfish...wrapped in newspapers), I can truthfully say that ‘The Crazy Norwegian’ iteration is utterly in a class by itself!

Fantastic stuff! The chips are perfectly done (not too greasy and decently sized) and the fish is prepared from the finest Pacific Cod fish imaginable (their motto is ‘In Cod We trust’)…fresh each day from the sea. I was in heaven as I ate mine, secretly wishing everyone served it like this. Then too, there was a house specialty soup that consisted of pumpkin spice curry. Delicious and memorable (never had anything like it as good).

In short, if you’re in this neck of the Oregon coastal woods, don’t fail to have dinner at ‘The Crazy Norwegian’s’ place in Port Orford! It’s been local landmark for decades. Let’s hope it continues for another few!

As for my anticipated writing stint up there, I found that my nearly new DELL laptop developed a weird angular display anomaly that made all the images on it look like something from Superman’s Bizarro World. What a disappointment! Ironically, upon my return to Suckatomato, I’ll be dammed if I could get the bloody thing to replicate the fault. It now seems to be content to behave perfectly normally!

And so, as I end this here, I find my last thought reaching out to envelop that lovely young Chinese bicyclist that we encountered up on the Oregon Coast, wondering how she is doing and wishing her all the very best for a safe and productive ride (despite the precarious nature of her American travel innocence!) back to San Francistern (sic).

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Postscript: My favorite example of the unsafe conditions I wrote about earlier is Richardson Grove State Park (a stand of Coastal Redwoods near Garberville CA on H-way 101 and actually one of the earliest California State Parks), although the overtly dangerous conditions found there (where the highway snakes deceptively through this ancient grove, with little or no edge-margin for bicycles) are somewhat typical of the entire stretch of the Pacific Coast highway, through northern CA and southern OR. You can see some sobering pictures whereof I speak, here .

It’s bad enough that cars whip through there at unsafe speeds, but it’s the big commercial logging trucks that literally make it a perfect roadkill gallery. The experience is so mentally constipating that it makes me nervous just driving my automobile through this section of 101.

You truly have to have big brass balls (or titanium ovaries) to attempt this on a bicycle, given both the traffic and the poor (dim) lighting found there.