BY ED MURRIETA
ARCATA — When I embedded in Humboldt County before last fall’s vote on Prop. 19, visions of cannabis vacations danced in my head: a potpourri of pot tastings, meet-the-grower field tours and cannabis-infused spa treatments — like a wine country weekend, but with marijuana.
I’d check into a hotel, where, next to plush terrycloth robes, I’d find a vaporizer and a mini-bar stocked with Humboldt’s finest canna-crops — heirloom outdoor buds, indoor diesel nugs, joints as fat as hippie chicks’ dreads, and great balls of hash.
A masseuse would knock on my door, and my 5-hour drive up the gorgeous but grueling Redwood Highway would end happily with cannabis salves soothing my stiff muscles.
Dinner would be a ganjanated feast: beef from happy, grass-fed cows; salads of local, organic marijuana leaf; microbrews finished with hemp, not hops; and sativa sundae dessert.
After a soak and a toke in a hot tub, I’d retire to my hotel, where, on my pillow, chocolate kief truffles would ensure sweet sleep.
Then, on Nov. 3, I woke up to the morning-after election news that the majority of California voters — and most Humboldt growers — nixed legalizing marijuana for non-medical pleasure.
Canna-vacation dream over?
Dream still on.
While California won’t be Amsterdam on the Pacific any time soon, if you’ve got a Prop. 215 medical marijuana recommendation, you can enjoy a legal Cannabis Country Vacation.
Here’s my Humboldt trip.
Pot Appetit’s Ed Murrieta talks about pot tourism (near the 10-minute mark) in this report by Los Angeles public television station KCET.
