Northern California is beautiful; it has bit of everything mountains, beach, rocky cliffs, lush forest the whole bit. Id suggested that we rent a beach house up on Russian River so we could all spend some time together, see some of the incredible wild life that lives along the coast and just get away from the city for a day or two.

Our first stop was the Bear Valley Ranger station where Id hoped wed get up-to-date whale spotting info but someone was conducting a study on the elk population so access to the lighthouse was cut off. Having taken a pass on the elephant seal spotting at Ana Nuevo I thought wed drive up a few miles to Chimney Rock to see if we could find any bulls on the beach duking it out over a female. As we were walking out to the cliff above the seals Mr. Ps mom kept saying that maybe this type of thing was for people with more experience, which I though was weird because it was an easy walk, then I realized that she thought we were going DOWN the cliff to look at the seals. Like I was seriously going to make them repel down the rocks to the beach below. She was visibly relieved when I pointed out that we were only going as far as the bench by the fence. Perhaps the tide pools really were a bit more than theyd bargained for.

Trail, yes.

Repel sea cliff, no.

We watched the ocean for a while then made our way to the beach house. It was dark by the time we arrived and absolutely beautiful, the sky was full of stars and the house came complete with a driftwood and river rock fireplace next to the bank of windows overlooking the ocean.

Wed settled into a night of eating, drinking and domino playing and things were going well. As it got later and the house got quieter and quieter Ill admit it was a bit spooky. The bedrooms were all downstairs and our game table was directly above them, occasionally I thought that Id heard something downstairs but didnt say anything that would set anyone on edge because theyre a pretty excitable group. Sometime between one and two in the morning we decided to go to bed, Mr. P went down first and I came after to see him standing in the bathroom at the end of the hall. Right as I walked over to see what he was doing staring at the wall I heard the thump and we both jumped backed. Then there was the scratching. Just as Mr. Ps parent came down Id heard enough to figure out that a raccoon must have wedged itself into the space between the cliff that the house was attached to and the access door leading out of the bathroom and was either searching for garbage or had gotten itself stuck. Mr. Ps parents were not amused, really Id say more like panicked when they heard this behemoth of woodland creature throw itself against the door again. Mr. P mom started screaming at his dad to do something and Mr. Ps dad clearly wanted nothing to do with it. I tried to calm everyone down and told them it was probably just a raccoon but they really werent having any of it. Mr. Ps mom was convinced it was a bear and suggested that we, in all seriousness, smoke it out. I didnt think that the situation was really going to benefit from the introduction of fire and tried to assure everyone that wed live through the night and if it got really loud wed try to find a night manager to shoo it away and that a bear cant really fit into a two foot wedge and if it did it couldnt be a really big bear anyway. They finally went to bed but didnt sleep much Im sure. The next morning I went upstairs to find all the light had been turned on inside and out. Country people they are not.

<< previous | next >>