Mountain View to Lake Mendocino

We have a number of options when it comes to driving home from the Mendocino coast, and all of them are at least somewhat winding and scenic. We’ve traveled State Route 20 from Fort Bragg east to I-5 in Colusa County; Highway 128 along the Navarro River to Cloverdale on U.S. 101; and of course the more indirect route, down the Shoreline Highway (SR 1) through Bodega Bay, Petaluma, and Vacaville to Interstate 80. But recently, our preferred way home has been via Mountain View Road, a (mostly) two-lane strip that winds 25 miles from Highway 1 just north of Point Arena to pop out onto SR 128 near Boonville. From there, it’s another 17 twisting miles on SR 253 to U.S. 101 near Ukiah. Along the way we travel through beautiful stands of coast redwoods in the Mendocino Range, eventually arriving in the Anderson Valley.

The road between Anderson Valley and Point Arena now known as Mountain View Road or CR 510 was first surveyed in 1869-1870, but it remained a steep and difficult route even as late as 1914. With relatively sparse population, as well as hairpin turns, blind curves, and a single-lane bridge across Rancheria Creek, it remains a risky travel choice during wintry weather even nowadays.

The Anderson Valley takes its name from the first white family in the region, who built a log cabin in 1852, and the small town of Boonville got its start in 1864 as Kendall City after Alonzo Kendall opened a hotel in the area. He later sold out to W. W. Boone and relocated to the coast at Manchester.

The road between Boonville and Ukiah (now SR 253) was completed in 1868 as a toll road but certainly remained an isolated route; it was along this road in 1897 that robbers held up a stagecoach and got away with the payroll for one of the coastal lumber mills. Our journey was much less hazardous. We only needed to watch out for a bit of black ice and some road work.

Arriving at U.S. 101, we turned north, passed through Ukiah, and turned east onto State Route 20, passing Lake Mendocino as we headed toward the familiar sight of Clear Lake in Lake County.