Fred cuts inland through Chico on the way north, tries both the local brewery and Sierra Nevada.
From the Humboldt Brews journal entry, 040812:
Yesterday in Chico we went for a dip in the creek in the park, and tried the sampler platters from both the Chico Brewery and the Sierra Nevada Brewery. The latter had a selection of about 14 beers, most of which tasted as they should, but not exceptionally great; the former — both the bartender and the waitress said their favorite was the half-and-half of raspberry ale and chocolate porter, which tasted to me like drinking a beer candy bar. But the IPA at the local place was a lot tastier, even though both tasted like an IPA; I guess my favorite was the Sasquatch (or was it Bigfoot?) which I don’t even recall the variety but I got a t-shirt.
Aside from the breweries, this morning I said goodbye to Felicia and headed out through Red Bluff, stopping for a haircut in olive country, also picked up some olives and pickled okra, and across the hot mountains. Highway 36 across the coast range was small and windy, often down to an unstriped single lane down the mountain; my brakes got a bit hot and I stopped to let them rest.
Going through first redwood groves today; was passed by my first logging truck two days ago; first dip in a cold mountain stream today (I’m not counting Chico which was nice but not exactly mountain stream-ish).