Our first trip - Bodega Bay, CA

My wife, Emily, and I just returned from our first RV trip.  We traveled just ninety minutes up the coast to Bodega Bay, CA for two nights.  After twenty years of tent camping, we were stunned by the ease of our first RV adventure.  Wow!

There are lots of nice campgrounds in the area.  You can get detailed information about them from the California State Parks website: http://www.parks.ca.gov/.  We spent our first night at Wright's Beach.  The campground is right on the beach, which is some miles or so long.  Quite beautiful.  Leashed dogs are welcome on the beach, and we bent the rules a bit by walking far out of sight of the campground to let ours run free awhile.

Next day, we traveled just five miles down the road to Bodega Dunes.  Campsites there do not have a view of the beach, but it's a nice place nonetheless.  We found a spacious and secluded spot.  Dogs are prohibited on the beach there in order to protect snowy plover habitat, but the rangers have maps for a number of beaches just minutes away where dogs are welcome.

On the way home, we drove Highway 1 south to Point Reyes.  It's a beautiful ride of about one hour.  The road is narrow and winding, and the pace is enjoyably slow.  Dogs are prohibited throughout much of Point Reyes, but welcome at Kehoe State Beach.  We spent a lovely afternoon there.  Unfortunately, Tomales Bay State Park closed its doors to overnight camping some years ago, but there's a private RV park just down the road in Olema.

We know this area quite well, so feel free to drop me a line if you're planning a trip and have questions.  I've learned a lot from this forum, though I've been a member for just a week or so, and would like to give something back by way of travel tips if anyone wants them.

We're still very much in the learning phase ... how this works, how that works, what to pack where, etc.  Driving the vehicle, too, will require further learning.  A sailboat on wheels!  But it felt safe, I took things slow, and it was a really enjoyable experience.  Thanks again to all on this forum who provide so much useful information for newcomers like us.

Paul
Albany, CA

Congrats on your maiden voyage and relaxed attitude.  That's the way to take them  Slow and Easy.  Makes for a much more enjoyable trip.  Bet it won't be long before you venture out again.

Glad to hear everything went well on the maiden voyage. Sounds like you had a great time.

It sounds like you had a wonderful trip.  I'll have to look up that area so I can add it to my "must see" folder.  I'm a ways away from being able to travel but am collecting info on interesting sounding areas.  I like the dog beaches and area ... thanks for the info

Congrats on an uneventful first outing. Please do share any other info on campgrounds and sights in your area. Lots of us visit California frequently. And don't forget, California has some nice discounts for disabled people and California seniors, disabled vets, and former POWs.

Enjoy
Wendy

Welcome to the forum and congratulations on a successful first outing with your RV. 

Small world:  Tom lived in Albany from birth until our marriage in 1960.  His folks lived on San Carlos Avenue about a block from Thousand Oaks.  He went to Marin School and graduated from Albany High (a lonnnng time ago  )  We now live in Oregon when we're not on the road.

We hope you enjoy this forum as much as we have for the past ten years or so.  A nicer bunch of people can't be found anywhere  on the web!

Margi

Small world indeed, Margi!  Especially insofar as Albany is just one square mile.  We live on Curtis, one block from Marin School.  I'm semi-retired, and Emily plans to retire in three years.  We're thinking on leaving Albany then and heading up your way, but further north, and settling somewhere in the Puget Sound area.  We particularly like a number of small communities around Bellingham, WA.

Wendy, it didn't even occur to me to inquire about discounts for seniors!  The campground at Wright's Beach is just twenty or so spaces.  Half are right on the sand, maybe fifty yards from the surf.  The others are further from the water.  The sites closest to the water are a whopping $35/night.  Those further away are $25/night.  At Bodega Dunes, where we spent our second night, all sites (around ninety of them) are $25/night.  While $60 for two nights was a fair amount of money, it sure beats hotel rates on the California coast!

To the best of my knowledge, there are no water or electrical hookups in either park.  If a person wanted to be certain about that, though, I'm guessing the information is on the California State Park website.  Bodega Dunes has free hot showers and a waste disposal station.  Wright's Beach has neither, but campers there are welcome to use the facilities at Bodega Dunes free of charge (they're just five miles apart).

Prospective visitors to the area might want to remember there is no overnight camping (other than a few walk in sites) at Point Reyes now that Tomales Bay State Park is closed to overnight use.  A darn shame.  There's an RV park in Olema, just a short drive away to the south, and another at Dillon Beach, which is much further (maybe an hour, north toward Bodega Bay).  There's a boat launch at Dillon Beach and the fishing is good.  I have crabbed from the pier there and caught the limit on several occasions.

If I recall properly (pretty sure this is correct), dogs are welcome at both the Olema and Dillon Beach RV parks.  The owner of the latter allows livestock to come and go on the property, so dog owners must be on the lookout.

Roads throughout the area are winding and narrow, and the rural countryside is pretty as any I've seen anywhere in the world.  The nearest major thoroughfare is 101.  Chilly fog is common on the coast, of course, though we were blessed with clear warm weather in the day and spectacular stars come nightfall.

Best,

Paul

Roads throughout the area are winding and narrow, and the rural countryside is pretty as any I've seen anywhere in the world.  The nearest major thoroughfare is 101.  Chilly fog is common on the coast, of course, though we were blessed with clear warm weather in the day and spectacular stars come nightfall.

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All you have the further advantage, and possilble thrill, of being camped, at all those locations, IN the San Andreas Fault Zone, which is about one mile wide at that point.  If you Google Earth the location Olema, CA.  The west side of the zone is marked by a prominent straight line border in vegetation.  The east side by cut off hills and drainages.  The west, Pt Reyes, side is granite, from 350 miles to the south.  The east side is the junky Franciscan Formation of crud scraped up from the bed of the Pacific Ocean. 

Quite right, Carl.

If you're traveling around Point Reyes, you'll see roadsigns for an AM radio station that has an interesting oral history of the area, including earthquakes.  I believe the broadcast is done by the National Park Service.  If memory serves, all of Point Reyes, starting around Olema, was in position "A" at the start of the 1906 quake on the San Andreas Fault, and in position "B" quite some distance from "A" when the quake ended.

We had a short but violent shake on the Hayward Fault here in Albany some weeks ago.  As you may know, it's a major quake on the Hayward Fault that has this area most concerned.  I will hope to be in the RV somewhere far away when/if it happens in my lifetime.

Paul

As I remember the horizontal displacemen on the San Andreas in 1906  was around 22 feet with Pt Reyes moving northwards.  That measure was made in the Bolinas end of the valley again as I remember

All this talk of faults and earthquakes makes me glad I don't live in California anymore. But, then, I'd rather live with earthquakes than hurricanes or tornadoes.

Wendy

wendycoke said:

All this talk of faults and earthquakes makes me glad I don't live in California anymore. But, then, I'd rather live with earthquakes than hurricanes or tornadoes.

Wendy

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That's ok Wendy.  Colorado has something that is even more deadly and happens every year.  It is called winter.  Quakes are over in minutes, winters take months.  Earthquakes you wear whatever you have got.  Winter you have to buy a whole new set of clothes. 

It's ok Carl, we have a dry cold here in SW Colorado. And, oh, what a joy it is to have seasons that you can tell one from the other and trees that change color.

I lived in California for over 20 years. I prefer Colorado.

Wendy

Wendy you forgot to mention the lack of the long parking lots they call CA freeways. ;D ;D  Like you I lived in CA for a while but it didn't take me 20 years to figure out it wasn't for me. ;D

wendycoke said:

All this talk of faults and earthquakes makes me glad I don't live in California anymore. But, then, I'd rather live with earthquakes than hurricanes or tornadoes.
Wendy

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At least we can tell when a hurricane is coming...

KodiakRV said:

At least we can tell when a hurricane is coming...

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That's why I prefer earthquakes....I like surprises. Besides, an earthquake is usually over before you realize that that's what's happening. Hurricanes have way too much anticipation and waiting.

Wendy

wendycoke said:

That's why I prefer earthquakes....I like surprises. Besides, an earthquake is usually over before you realize that that's what's happening. Hurricanes have way too much anticipation and waiting.
Wendy

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Imagine the hype if the Weather Channel could figure out when & where an earthquake was going to occur...

"This is Jim Cantore reporting live from Ground Zero where we're five hours away from a magnitude 6.8 disaster..." 

Hey, they say anticipation is half the fun!

We've lived in California for 27 years and have no plans to leave. We've lived through a couple of (significant) earthquakes, including the Loma Prieta quake.

As for freeways, Ron must have lived in one of the large CA cities such as LA, San Francisco or San Jose. They're no different than a number of other cities I can think of around the U.S. and they probably have a lot less freeway traffic than somewhere like Chicago.

We live out in the boonies and the only traffic we see are boats coming in and out of the local marina. Actually, on our side of the street (in our bay), the only traffic is the few boats heading out to fast water or the occasional boat returning to the local marina and the occupants wanting to cool themselves off in the water in our quiet bay before heading home. Oh, we do have the occasional fisherman come by to fish around our docks and the levy.

Oops, if we travel the local highway (a levy road), we might see some farm equipment. Now that really slows down traffic 

Our daughter lives in the Sierra foothills, in the middle of a forest. She has deer visit her front yard daily. When we visit, the nearest freeway has very little traffic, unless we transit through Sacramento (an hour from our daughter and an hour from us) en route during rush hour. Again, nothing compared with other major U.S. cities.

Back to the original message ....

If you travel the CA coast, it's very scenic. We've been only once to Bodega Bay, by car, and stayed in a hotel. We'd really like to re-visit the area with our RV.

Further south, there's a campground at Half Moon Bay. Again, we've not stayed there, but visited on our boat trip down the CA coast. We haven't yet had a chance to get back there by RV.

CA traffic jam - our friend and wannabe RVer Kathy departs our dock, no other boats in sight.

Oops, I forgot about our neighbor across the street who takes off from and lands his plane on the water. This photo was taken on a nearby Delta slough. Get out of the way everyone!