A Sunbeam

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If we see a swimming hole, we swim. A taco stand, we eat. And if we pass a Saab with 97 surfboards on its roof, we go back to get a picture. These are the luxuries of traveling by car.
After logging over 300 hours on buses, incarcerated in rolling prisons, the freedom of the car is positively glorious. So far the Sunbeam has carried us the vertical length of California. She’s gotten as low as 28mpg in the mountains, but during the most recent stretch she carried us 32 miles for every gallon she sipped. She takes her time accelerating, but hums like a top at 80mph. Her elegant lines are constantly catching eyes, the eyes of State Troopers notwithstanding. The cop told me he stopped me for doing 15 over in the city limits, but I’ve had a pretty girl on my arm before, I know what he wanted.
The Northern Californian coastline is wild and beautiful. Sheer cliffs and jagged outcroppings rise from pounding breakers into lush pine forest. A narrow strip of asphalt a few miles inland is aptly named Avenue of the Giants. Colossal trees, Sequoia Sempervirens, dwarf even the preconceived trees I’ve been harboring in my imagination.
The Avenue meanders alongside the gravel-bottomed Eel river through a series of Redwood groves. For a West Tennessee boy, who is used to being up to his needs in Hatchey Bottom mud, swimming in the Eel river with the Giants for lifeguards, was pretty Narni-esque. The water was clear like crystal and surprisingly warm. My imagination took me to a house built into a hollow Redwood like a giant staircase. A river gently caressed the gravel bar . In that place I could swim to work. That’s my kind of commute! Exercise and bath to boot!
Things continue to go well, and unless the misfortune besets, we should be up to Alaska in a couple of weeks. Looming ominously, like the clouds I see billowing in from the Pacific, is our trips biggest hurdle…the crossing of that same ocean. We are pouring over forums, maps, and websites and calling all manner of people who might have a valuable bit of info. Next week we will be in Seattle, and I think that’s a place where we can learn a lot about shipping in the north seas.
It’s tricky to get papers for Russia. Their thinking doesn’t very well accommodate our spontaneity. Besides the fact that we don’t know if there are ships from Alaska to Russia, we will need invitation letters, and a specific detailed itinerary if we hope to meet welcoming arms. We would much prefer to meet this type of arms than the alternative, side arms.
I’m still hopeful that, with a bit of wit and persistence, we can find a way to cross directly from Alaska to Russia. I’ll be disappointed if we have to compromise. I recently compromised and cut off my mullet for my medical school interview. Although I recognize the value of compromise, I’d rather compromise on haircuts and restaurant choices than the Alaska/Russia jaunt.