cartour 4

3-17-16

Bend, OR to 20 miles southwest of Corning, CA

Couple of things: the asian-american barbeque in Weed, biking the sacramento river trail and later Buckhorn recreation area

Main drag through downtown weed a man and woman in smoke on the sidewalk amongst 5 or more large blackened brutalist iron  contraptions. He bellicose, blustering utilitarian “No difference for no bread brisket sandwich to go same as list, number 17” - 12 dollar each. She was more conversational and confided her dislike of wind but was merely philosophical about the price of oak firewood which seemed to be running around 300 a pickup load which can vary in my experience. Sharon broke him down though after he proudly gave us a sample of the just finished burning of the meat. She said it was way too fatty. He said that is brisket and a complex back and forth ensued with Sharon refusing the whole enchilada but I was on my own so to save face all round and because i loved the fatty brisket I stayed in the game and came away with a box full of fatty brisket and rice and some tiny little boat of sauce that was real good sauce. And I ate that thing most of the way to redding and sharon had a little and she was right about the fat because in mine there were trimmed pieces of just fat included with the slices that almost always had a nice waddle of fat attached or hanging by a thread of gristle.

Not really representative of the Sacramento River Trail that we pedaled but we liked this part as well.

      West of Corning we drove and drove on black butte road through rolling hillocks of medium green grass up against the coast mountains coming to a oak covered hill above a small reservoir. We had a couple of warm beers and a sandwich listening to the coyotes a generator and a guy running his van to charge the two women he took care of’s cell phones. He came over to explain to me what was happening to him and resulting things he was having to do, some of which he was having misgivings about. I said I thought that the park rules said everyone had to go to sleep at 10 pm and he asked me what time was it and I said without seeing too clearly, it was dark, that it was 20 til and moments later I said to 9 and he said in the interim that he was going to turn off the van in 10 minutes and went back over to it and turned it off so that left only the generator.