The opportunity to visit the Sacramento, California, area presented itself, and I decided that the best way to get there was on the back of the Yamaha. While I was at it, I decided that the California stretches of the journey would best be made via the state’s lesser traveled highways and byways — the ones with lots of twists and turns.

While planning the trip, I discovered that Oregon has overlooked the Redwood Highway in its development of state parks that provide for overnight visits. A little bit of work online surfaced Sparkplug’s Motorcycle Camp just outside O'Brien, Oregon, which was providential as it occupies virtually the precise location I had in mind as a destination for the first day’s ride. The phrase All street bikes welcome on their Harley‐festooned web site struck me as possibly ironic and made me wonder whether I would be shunned like a Humvee owner at a Sierra Club convention, but that was yet to be determined.

The weather last Thursday was overcast and cool until I was an hour into Oregon, where the clouds parted and the sun shone. I called Sparkplug from about 90 miles away to make sure he had a spot available for the night for my tent. Sure, he said, come on over and I’ll show you a couple. Where you at? After explaining it would be a while before I pulled into the driveway, he invited me to stop by and spend the night.

As I pulled into Sparkplug’s drive, my apprehension about riding a rice‐burner into the midst of a Harley crowd disappeared. There was a Bohemian but cared‐for quality to the outbuildings and yard art that was lived‐in and inviting, and a weathered Ural half‐way under a tarp made plain a motorcycle nut was nearby. His wife waved me up the drive to where several folks were gathered at a covered picnic table, and Sparkplug wandered out to shake hands. He had me laughing 30 seconds later and led me up the trail to a great place to drop the kickstand.

It turned out that Sparkplug has hosted a Shovelhead gathering every Father’s Day weekend for several years, and he was expecting a full house. I was getting one of the few remaining available sites, and indeed throughout the evening the place filled up with Harleys.

After I got my tent staked down, I rode to O’Brien for a burger and fries at McGrew’s, and rolled back into my campsite with 489 miles done for the day. The spot where I set up my tent was within feet of the river; I spent the night lullabied by its sussurations, and just before drifting off to sleep thanked the stars overhead for the luck.

Next morning, one of my campground neighbors wandered up and introduced himself as Wild Man. His appearance matched the nickname: a large fellow in a leather vest with a long, full, flaming red beard. He turned out to be pleasant, soft‐spoken, and just as taken with the surroundings as I was. We talked for several minutes about the usual stuff — where you from? where you going? — and then shook hands and wished each other safe travels. As I was idling my way out toward the highway and on to California, another of the Harley crowd whom I had not met hailed me from the communal picnic bench and made sure I had a Shovelfest West 2012 cigarette lighter.

You meet the nicest people in the most unexpected places.

And then the carnival began. Just outside O’Brien is Waldo Road, which is an inauspicious name for the onramp to some seriously beautiful countryside. The highway twists and turns itself up and out of Oregon and into California through tree‐lined corridors that are almost impossibly fun to ride. I could not believe how remote it all seemed until I passed the agricultural inspection station as I was leaving California three days later via a different highway, and it dawned on me that I had entered the state via so marginal a route that I had not been challenged on the subject of whether I was transporting forbidden fruit.

I was happy to see the espresso sign at the curb outside Marble Mountain Gifts in Happy Camp, California, and equally satisfying was that the Open sign was on at 8∶30 in the morning. After a stop to make sure their latté‐making skills were up to par, from there the day was one long joy ride.

John Sutter and his companions settled at the confluence of the Sacramento and American Rivers in 1839, viz.: Sutter was born in Germany, educated in Switzerland, spoke Spanish, English, and French, had — among other places — visited Oregon, Hawaii, and Alaska, but nine years before John Marshall found gold at Sutter’s mill 40 miles upriver, Sutter and a bunch of folks wandered inland from Yerba Buena (now San Francisco) to the middle of this dry‐summer subtropical valley and said to one another, This is perfect.

On Saturday afternoon, Sacramento hit 105°, making the day the hottest since August 2010.¹ It made me wish Sutter had settled on the shores of Lake Tahoe.

After a delicious breakfast Sunday at Bistro 33 in Davis, it was time to head home. My original plan was to leave California via Lassen Volcanic National Park and the Cascade Mountains, but the hot weather persuaded me to head to the coast and leave via the cool air along Highway 1. After spending the night in the foggy weather, I arrived home Monday with 1,970 new miles on the odometer.