Bodega Dunes State Park

Saturday October 12th, 

Since Bruce and Lynn were leaving their house by 7 it was an early morning for us.  Luckily we didn't have a tent to take down or sleeping mats to roll, all while our hands and feet are freezing from the brisk clear morning. but once on the road the cold hands happend anyway.  It was really nice to have an early start as we made quite the progress by late morning.  Talking about my art the night before gave me some good ideas for what I want to start working on but it made for many stops for pictures.  

We were just starting to climb the one big hill of the day when Rigel broke his chain.  We had the right tool to fix it so we figured it out and were back on our way. Then a little while later snap! there goes Rigels chain again.  We fixed it again and it turned out it was the same link.  We moved on but a little more warily this time.  We made it to Jenner and noticed the chain was about to break again. Rigel put it right again and started climbing a hill, and then guess what? It broke again. Rigel got a little angry and decided to walk the rest of the way to the campground (about 10 miles).  Luckily for him it was mostly downhill so he could coast.  

Once we got to the campsite Rigel tired to fix his chain with Bryan's spare links but the chain was still stiff in the place it was rejoined. One of the other bikers at the site gave Rigel a spare quicklink to use and some useful information on how to fix broken chains.  Turns out you don't put the old pin back into the link and should only use quicklinks.  A quick link is a link that just slides right into place without the use of tools.  Very handy.  Didn't see much of the campsite or dunes since we were a bit busy with the chain.

really sharp looking plant in the morning sun