Election Section

This may be the most exquisite weekend of the year to explore the rolling hills and small, funky, and beautiful little towns of western Marin and Sonoma counties. The grass is still green, the leaves on the trees are brightly new and clean, lambs are popping, and the fish are jumping in Bodega Bay. 

Saturday and Sunday Bodega Bay hosts its annual Bodega Bay Fishing Festival, where you can sample salmon every which way, and take home crab right out of the water for $3.50 a pound live, or $5 a pound just boiled. 

If the festival crowds are too much, avoid Bodega Bay. There is plenty else to do if you follow this trip through fresh air and occasional animal fragrances. 

Follow Highway 101 north and take the East Washington Street exit in Petaluma. Follow East Washington straight across Petaluma Avenue, and keep following west as it becomes Bodega Avenue about seven miles later. Turn west (left) again at Tomales Road toward Two Rock Coast Guard Training Center and keep going, turning right (north) at Highway 1 into “downtown” Tomales. 

Almost immediately on your left is the Tomales Regional History Center in the old Tomales School, where docents include former students and teachers who still live in these sublime climes (open 1-4 p.m. Friday-Sunday, (707) 878-9443)). Tomales celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2000, which inspired the current terrific historical exhibit chronicling matters of farming, social, cultural, and civic importance, all Tomales High School yearbooks, and the community stature of the local fire department and Marconi Wireless Telegraph Stations. Do not miss the quietly elegant Coast Miwok Indian historical exhibit, respecting the area’s first residents. 

Tomales was once the second largest town in Marin and vied with San Rafael to become the Marin County seat. It was a major trading and farming center served by John Keys’ narrow gauge Northwestern Pacific Railroad connecting Tomales to the Russian River redwoods and Sausalito from 1871 to 1930. Art shows, lectures, quinceaneras, town meetings, weddings and “Grand Balls” still occur at the Town Hall, once the Tomales Temperance Club. Local oldtimers wait for the doors to open at the William Tell bar and restaurant, and the elegant Continental Inn occupies the corner at Dillon Beach Road. 

A real find is Cameron Ryan’s Tomales Bakery. A baking veteran of San Francisco’s Square One, Campton Place, and Splendido Restaurant, Cameron first learned to bake from Mildred Jeffreys, her grandmother in Lookout Mountain, Tennessee. She later polished her skills at the California Culinary Academy. Cameron and friends create pizzetti, pesto, sundried tomato chile twists, and other goodies in a former gas station. As a consequence, the few tables are outside, perfect for watching a parked bike. Tomales Bakery uses only Strauss Family Dairy milk, cream, and butter, and makes the most of local organic fruits, and Sebastopol’s Taylor Maid Farms coffees. 

Next door is Emily B’s Deli, with fabulous chili topped with grated cheese and avocado, loads of sandwiches, and local fish chowder—nothing over seven dollars. Across the street, Diekmann’s General Store is worth a trip through, with an excellent local wine selection, bait and tackle, tide information, and one of everything for your vacation kitchen. Explore Mostly Natives Nursery for plants that may work in Berkeley too. 

Dillon Beach Road heads west between Diekmann’s and the Continental Inn. Dillon Beach is a good beach with decent restrooms, picnic tables, and protective sand dunes, although controversy has surrounded the private access parking charge of $5.00 per car for years. The Dillon Beach Resort is now spiffed up with casually comfortable rooms, cabins, café, and a beach and snack store, right next to the trailer homes overlooking the ocean. Other nearby Marin County natural adventures include Tomales Bay State Park and the sprawling Point Reyes National Seashore to the south. 

Follow Highway 1 north seven miles and turn left toward Valley Ford, population 126 or so. Depending upon the ebbing and flowing fortunes of local antiques dealers, you may want to make a stop, or try the famous Dinucci’s Italian Dinners in its third generation of “excellence without extravagance.” 

Dinucci’s bar is noisy and old and sets the mood for the entire place, where the floors tilt slightly as do some of the customers. But one can enjoy a hugely filling dinner of antipasti, minestrone soup, salad, spaghetti or ravioli, and an entrée for under $16.50. Deep fried chicken, chicken cacciatore grilled petrale sole, cannelloni, and veal Parmigiana are all unsurprising and good. Soup and antipasti or salad, as well as Sonoma County and Italian wines are also available. 

As you continue north, you can either go east to Occidental, or north to the towns of Bodega and Bodega Bay. Bodega combines funk with history, including several shops with reasonably priced collectibles and antiques, and the Bodega Schoolhouse where Alfred Hitchcock filmed The Birds. Leah Taylor, whose parents Tom and Mary Taylor renovated the building decades ago, leads tours of the building where she and her family live and Leah occasionally gathers audiences to experience her performance art (contacts: (707) 876-3257; www.bodegaschool.com). 

Between Bodega and Bodega Bay are Doran Beach and the Birdwalk Coast Access area, the latter of which is part of the California Coastal Conservancy and managed by Sonoma County Regional Parks. Both are well worth exploring before trying some of the glitz of Bodega Bay. 

In Bodega Bay, my favorite food stop is informal Lucas Wharf, which has a restaurant and a café-fish market where you can enjoy sinfully fabulous deep fried oysters, scallops, calamari, or fish and chips (one order is enough for two) either inside among milling tourists or at tables between the buildings and in front of the fish house. Walk back to the fish market pier, and choose your crab or salmon right out of Bodega Bay. Heaven!