Lincoln Avenue.
There is probably a Lincoln Avenue in San Francisco.
After all there is definitely a Lincoln Park; it is at the western edge of the city and it borders an area known as Lands End. It’s a great place to watch the sunset, if there is no fog, and the view through the pine trees towards the Golden Gate Bridge is good too. Below are the rocks and crags of lands End and at low tide you can see the remains of boats shipwrecked here.
The Golden Gate Bridge is in the news this week as the authority that looks after it is facing a deficit of 87 million dollars and is trying to find solutions to the crisis that don’t necessitate raising the 5 dollar toll for cars. This charge is only asked for when you cross into the city and there is no charge for the walkers and cyclists that flock there as tourists, but the solution being looked at is corporate sponsorship. The idea is not to have slogans on the side of the bridge but to use the visitor area for advertising. I was thinking that maybe Matt could help out after auctioning his baseball (see Z).
It is a very beautiful bridge, both for its setting and for its form. In the summer a trip out on foot or bike can be disappointing as the bridge and view is often shrouded in fog, but it is also true that the sun is always shining on the other side.
If you drive across the bridge and head north you can follow Highway 1 along the coast towards Stinson beach, take 101 inland or cross over to the 80. The latter two will lead you out of the city to the Napa Valley, famous wine region but also home of the Petrified Forest.
If you follow the Petrified Forest Road from the 101 to the town of Calistoga and turn left at the flashing red light you will be on….Lincoln Avenue. And at number 1712 Lincoln Avenue, Calistoga you will find the Indian Springs Resort and Spa.
Calistoga is on the edge of an ancient volcanic region and the town is blessed with a selection of natural thermal springs that have been harnessed into spas. At the Indian Springs, named after the Wapoo Indians who first used the area, and elsewhere in the town, you can also enjoy a volcanic mud bath. A session goes something like this.
You are called into a changing cubicle, men on one side females on the other, and there you strip, wrap a towel and contemplate the bowl of fresh orange wedges sitting on a bed of ice. You eat one. Then another. They are chilled and refreshing. Then you pour yourself a glass of iced cucumber water. It’s delicious. Then another wedge of orange and frankly I could have been quite happy doing nothing else. Someone comes and leads you to the bathing area and there is a transition from palatial and expensive lobby to steamy, municipal swimming pool. Except it isn’t a swimming pool but a group of old fashioned baths surrounded by white painted pipes channelling hot spring water through the white wooden room. On one side the baths are full of grey volcanic mud and with difficulty but a little help you submerge yourself into the hot embrace. More mud is scooped on top of you until only your head not submerged, and this you rest on a small plank before accepting cucumbers on the eyes and more mud on the face. And there you just warmly ooze away and would eventually disappear if the assistant did not return after an allotted time to help you get out. And help is what you need. The body no longer responds to commands like “move” and what the mud has sucked in the mud is reluctant to allow out. But out you get and into a shower and then into a bath on the other side full of spring water, drift into oblivion and drink glass after glass of iced cucumber water. Finally you are almost carried into the steam room where you evaporate and then someone, I have no memory who it was, wraps you in a towel and lays you on a bench in the changing room, where oranges and iced water hover in your dreams and you sleep like a child; oblivious to the world racing past outside.
Later you may emerge from this cocoon and the wise would book into the hotel and sleep the sleep of angels. But Calistoga has another surprise for the curious. There are apparently three places in the world where there are Geysers that blow with such precision that they warrant the name Old Faithful. One is in New Zealand, a second in Yosemite national park California and a third here, down the road from the Indian Springs. On the edge of town, in a park reserved for it and a herd of Llamas and Fainting Goats, (so named because any sudden shock causes them to faint, a genetic mishap that caused them to be once used as a sacrificial diversion in flocks subject to attack by wolves; a trait that led to their almost complete extinction), is Calistoga’s Old Faithful, a Geyser that erupts every forty minutes or so.
In between there is nothing, not a sign, except a few wisps of underground steam escaping from the vent.
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