ROAD DOOS
WORDS AND PHOTOS by Nik FREITAS
HERE WERE NO SECOND
thoughts the morning of July the
first as Joe Barnes, John Griffin, Ben
Krahn and I strapped ourselves into
the small brown Nissan. A strange feeling
loomed about the car. It was a feeling
that you get before every road trip, a
sense of the unknown, and we were feed-
ing off it. The word "go" was the
only word we cared about. Little
did we know that the journey we
were about to embark upon, to
skate thirty cement parks in thirty
days, would take us through three
states and a different country
You see, there was no real plan, only to
skate as many cement parks as we could
from the City to Seattle. We didn't have a for-
sure place to stay until we reached Seattle,
and there was no time frame, only to be back
in time to pay rent. There wasn't even a set
path, only a direction: north. Money, you ask?
Ha. We rolled on out over the Golden Gate
and I heard Ben laugh as he reached into his
pocket, pulling out five shiny coins. "I only
have nine cents!"
Our first destination was a town up above
Humboldt called Arcata. We had heard that
their new park was super good but hadn't seen
what it looked like. So after a quick stop in
Santa Rosa (to warm up our wheels a little bit)
and attaining fifty-cent bags of granola for the
road, we were on our way.
Johnny crouched behind the controls and
whipped our y ship up the 101. It was nice to
our tiny
get away from the ruckus of the city. After a
couple of hours and a few thousand trees flew
past my window. I was psyched to see the
Arcata sign. A A left here, a right there, and there
she was in full session.
The park was sick, with a snake run and a big
bowl with coping.
We skated until sundown and
then assumed "where to sleep?" mode. Arcata is
a small town, so finding a place to sleep was
going to be sketchy. After much searching we
found some tall weeds behind the park that
would hide us from view.
Arcata must have the most mongo pushers per
capita than any other town, but who cares when
you're stoked on skating? Dudes were showing
up at sunrise. The sound of boards woke us up
and after a quick bird bath in the drinking foun-
tain, we were forced to join in on the session. The
only bad part about the park was the pad rule. A
cop would roll by every hour or so to check
up on
everyone. We risked it for a while, but Johnny Law
made a sneak attack, catching Ben and awarding
him a reckless skating ticket. We were getting
some bad vibes from the police at this point-they
Ferry rides
offer lots of
time to think.
Longtime Canadian ripper Alex
Chalmers stale transfers at
New Westminster, Canada.
America, land of the free..
Thirty-six hours, 107 trias, one Ben Krahn,
one frontside blunt at the hat in Seattle
77