Napa's 1st Street becomes Browns Valley Road, bear left onto Buhman. Eventually there will be another junction where you have to turn right to stay on Buhman, then later a right onto Old Sonoma Road.
Probably should have taken Old Sonoma from downtown, it would have saved maybe 2 miles. Don't know why I'd ruled it out earlier.
Walking in a pleasant twilight made me notice the lack of mosquitos. Haven't seen a one since sometime before Burning Man.
Aa soon as I get to 121, there's a sign indicating a bike detour pointing vaguely off to the left. The right shoulder is blocked with those big concrete barricades. Not sure what the sign means but the only logical thing seems to be to walk against the traffic, in the eastbound lane's shoulder. So I do. There's one spot where that side has the concrete barrier too, and I almost despaired before realizing it was only for a few feet. Waited for a break in the traffic, and went around it. Construction ended after about 2 or 3 miles later, and a nice shoulder appeared before doing the usual "amazing shrinking shoulder" trick.
Not far after the Napa Rd. junction, there's a wide shoulder, but eventually, without warning, it turns to gravel. Almost wiped out. Paved area only about a foot after that.
Another bike detour sign pointing off to the left somewhere. Ignored it, Mapquest doesn't show a parallel road and I'll be damned if I'm going all the way to the bay and back just to please these anti-cyclist idiots.
Bear left onto 121 where 12 and 121 split. Then right onto 116; the 116 shoulder appears and disappears capriciously and without warning too. I sometimes think there are saidistic, cyclist-hating killers at all the state DOTs, setting us all up for "accidents". Well, if so, I ran their gauntlet successfully this time. Got to my friend's place about 0300 and left my stuff while I walked back to town and looked around.
last updated 2009-11-11 04:37:23. served from tektonic.jcomeau.com