Everett’s isn’t too busy for a Friday, which is surprising, as it’s the premier dive bar in downtown Arcata.  

Catfish is bouncing tonight. I’ve now come in enough to where he doesn’t card me at the door. He tips his hat, “Nice to see ya.” Inside, my boss at the elementary school is playing pool with some skinny aging punk who put King Gizzard on the jukebox. Her long blonde hair falls to the side as she snipes a solid off the wall into the corner pocket. She always wins. My housemate Chris and I go to the bar and each pay $4 for our Rainiers. Robert is behind the bar; he greets us with a recycled dirty joke before he cracks and hands ‘em over.  

On our way over to Everett’s Chris and I walked past The Jam, another bar just around the corner. A few dozen Hells Angels are parked out front, lining G Street. Staring out the porthole window beside our booth, I see a couple of silver-haired bikers still outside, gabbin’ in their leather jackets on the sidewalk. I make out the Hells Angels patches in the red glow of Everetts’ neon signage. It's a patch I’d always look for on a biker when I was younger. Seeing one felt the same as spotting a celebrity or a convict. They’ve descended on our sleepy northern California town en masse, like mythological characters emerging from a forgotten America. 

Arcata is a small town. A two-stoplight town, really. It’s a town that has tactfully slipped through the manicured nails of gentrification — all the buildings are weathered, beaten by California’s wettest winters, but in the cool, charming way everybody but developers tend to idealize. The bikers fit right into our dilapidated facades. After a few of those four buck Rainiers, I’m feeling confident enough to bee-line to the horde of bikers circled outside The Jam and strike up a conversation. Tactfully bumming a cigarette, I ask what all the excitement is about. They oblige with a smoke and an explanation.

David, a seriously burly, ginger-bearded 40-something is excited to answer. He tells me it’s the Humboldt-Redding Hells Angels meet up that takes place the third Friday of every month. 

Humboldt and Redding are connected by a mountainous 130 mile stretch of Highway 299 which runs through the desolate Trinity Alps, California’s northernmost Gold Rush country. Today, many trimmigrants use the highway to join the Green Rush — the growing and trimming of weed plants scattered throughout the Coastal Redwoods. Events like this monthly gathering at The Jam are opportunities for different motorcycle clubs to make connections and pay their respects to the Angels. 

 “We don’t command respect,” says Noodles, a younger biker from a different MC called The Family, who has one arm in a sling. “But if someone comes up and disrespects us, we’ll knock ‘em out.”

I ask about all the nefarious dealings associated with their reputation. I know it happens. My close friend's brother went to jail for running drugs for the Angels in Sacramento. “We don’t sell drugs or weapons,” says David, eagerly chiming in again. “I mean, I’m my kid’s soccer coach back in Redding for fuck’s sake! Most of that shit was left behind in the previous century. Things have changed.” He is definitely the most intimidating soccer coach I’ve ever seen.  

 “In The Family, we do all sorts of charity work,” Noodles adds. “We do an annual toy run, riding our bikes to raise money for kids.” He tells me he’s been riding for The Family for two years, and the two qualifications are that you gotta be a dude and you gotta own a Harley — same as the Angels. He’s still a prospect, which means he does grunt work to prove himself while the seasoned members have their fun.   

David invites me to a party they’re throwing in June, something called Redding Rock at their Hells Angels clubhouse. A silver-haired Angel pipes up, at the mention of the gathering. He’s somewhere in his seventies, with a bushy handlebar mustache, a long ponytail, and Napoleon Dynamite glasses. “I’ve seen some crazy shit there,” he says from under the mustache. “Last year I watched some girl’s pussy lips get stapled together and tased.” I let out an unconscious “holy shit” before dragging on my cigarette. “Yeah, but they’re into that kind of thing though,” assures David. “And they get paid.”

It’s Saturday morning, June 24th. It didn’t take much to convince my partner Ryan to accompany me to a party held by the world’s most infamous motorcycle club. (“I would go whether or not you invited me,” he said.) We pack into his ‘84 Westfalia at the crack of dawn and climb out of the fog, winding up the mountainous Highway 299 which parallels the Trinity River. The drive is about two and a half hours through marijuana gold rush territory. By the time we get to the little mining town of Weaverville, nature calls. We pass a gaggle of bikers gathered in the Western-styled downtown strip, clad in black leather with red shirts and patches. Bars got toilets, so rather than squat on the side of the road we head inside. I come out of the bathroom to find Ryan at the bar with an 11:00am Jack and Coke, so I order myself a morning Rainier. 

We cheers to a round of drinks with our new friends Miles and Dan. They’re in their steep 40s but are as goofy and lighthearted as stoned teenagers stuck in the candy aisle of a 7-11. Their vests are adorned with pins that say things like “I Like Beer.” They’re part of an MC called E Clampus Vitus — “It’s Dog Latin. Doesn’t mean jack-shit,” says Dan. “Our club is dedicated to the preservation of California gold mining history.” Earlier we saw them crowded around the local gazette because their MC had dedicated themselves to the up-keep of California’s third oldest printing press through their club funds and mechanical savvy. They haven’t heard of the Angels party (“A party? The Hells Angels I knew weren’t even capable of putting up a sign!”) and were instead going on a wholesome “clamping” trip that afternoon to initiate new members. 

We finish our morning beverages and carry on, into the dry heat of the day. I grow restless as we get closer to our destination. I don’t quite know what to expect at this party, but I do know there’s no amount of money that’ll convince me to tase my labia. I run through a dozen different scenarios of how the night could go, ranging from getting mad-dogged at the door, to witnessing a knife-fight, to doing coke in a trailer with some strippers and a bunch of gnarly looking dudes, to simply sitting around drinking beer as I would at any other campout.    

The Redding-Humboldt Hells Angels clubhouse is on the 299 in the foothills of Whiskeytown, where there is no whiskey and whatever town there was now sits at the bottom of a dammed-up lake, like a redneck Atlantis. The clubhouse sits atop a dignified hill with views across the northernmost end of the Central Valley. Mount Shasta looms to the north; across the I-5, Lassen’s volcanic geography sprawls eastward. The surrounding area has been decimated by wildfire. From all around the foothills, from most any vantage, you can see the big red letters alongside the warehouse: HELLS ANGELS. 

We roll up to the gates in Ryan’s old rusty van and are stopped by the guards. Parking by the gate is for bikes only. Apparently, there’s a dirt lot a few miles down the road for shuttle pickups. At the lot we strike up a conversation with an older couple from Placerville. I make some joke about the lot being for the nerds who drove cars, to which the man assures us that his bike is “in the shop” while his lady lets out a nervous giggle.  

The shuttle is a minivan driven by another big bearded, soft spoken prospect. Back in the day, grunt work was dealing and fighting and what not. Now it’s driving a rented Honda Odyssey. He and the event photographer in the passenger seat chat about photography ethics and the downfalls of being an Angel while the local radio plays soft rock. “If you’re in the wrong photo you don’t get to travel outside of the U.S. anymore,” he warns the photographer. Because of the Patriot Act they say, foreign Angels are promptly arrested at the airport upon arrival stateside. We drive past an electronic sign: “Look twice for motorcyclists.”

 The prospect slows down around the sheriff, the one that’s been posted up all day between the lot and the clubhouse. We’re met at the gate by a guard with shifty eyes, chewing manically. “Get that hat off the dashboard!” he yells at the prospect. “They can pull you over for that!” We drive up the steep driveway to the entrance and give the ticket booth our $20 each. The prospect at the table gingerly puts our wristbands on. “Thank you so much for coming,” he winks. 

 The operation, at least from the outset, feels just like any other public event, except most everyone in the crowd looks like somebody you wouldn’t want to fuck with. The DJ is swinging between metal and rap and the premises are peppered with dozens of cliques of California MCs. Several vendors are set up outside selling leather goods, glass pipes, knives, gems and stones, moonshine, weed. Inside the warehouse I find a bar, a stage, and a tattoo booth. Above the bar, a stripper cage. There’s also a big blow-up water slide, apparently meant for girls to go down in their bikinis, but a group of Angels decide to take it down right as we contemplate a go. Five bearded, tattooed men in patchwork leather vests unite to deflate and fold a bouncy house slip ‘n slide, which isn’t necessarily on brand. 

We get the first of our many beers for the night and stroll around, trying to blend in but quickly realize that’s going to be impossible. The array of patched vests make the crowd feel like a twisted Boy Scout reunion. Each MC stands for a different mission, all united under the shared passion of riding hogs with their boys; or in the case of the Valley Vixens, their girls. We take our first round of beers and sit at a table with some members of The State of Jefferson, whose bright yellow colors cause their members, consisting mainly of gruff seniors with big gray beards, to stand out amongst a sea of red and black insignia. The State of Jefferson is a movement in the rural regions of northern California and Oregon to secede from the United States and become its own federally-recognized nation.  

Some of the other MCs sport patches that say “Red and White Supporter,” implying Hells Angels adjacency. If you’re an MC, the Hells Angels is the kind of club you want as an ally. They’re a huge club with a lot of money and a reputation that gives them social leverage. They are typically the mediators and the kings of their chapter’s territory. If you’re an MC in the Angels’ territory, you best not act a fool. Every biker at the party has at least a 5-inch knife strapped to their belt. 

A Hells Angels party is not an easy place to make friends. We figured as much before we even arrived, but reality only affirmed our expectation. Yet so far, between The Jam and this gathering, I’ve been met with mostly good manners.  

Dinner is included with the ticket, served at six o’clock. Chicken, Hawaiian rolls, green peas, and corn. “Would you like both?” the vested server asks us about the peas and corn. “Sign me up.” He slaps a serving of peas and corn on our plates and shoots us a sly smile. “Careful with what you sign up with around here.”

 We shuffle off to a table and scarf down a much-needed meal. Anytime I look up from my plate, I am catching glares. A headache began to form in my temple, one that was bound to be made worse by a steady intake of beer, cigarettes, and high-decibel metal. Just as I start to feel a bit directionless, the mic screeches and draws our attention to the stage.

The one Angel with a white leather vest addresses the crowd; on the front right of his vest proudly lives a “President” patch. He has the sharp, handsome features of a Disney villain, and bright, poisonous blue eyes. “Thank you all for coming to our second annual Redding Rock,” he booms. “Who’s ready to get crazy tonight!” Some hollering, but people are clearly not done with dinner. He passes the mic over to his balding vice-president who attempts to raise the spirits of the surprisingly dull crowd. “Once that sun dips past that hill over there, you are going to see things that are going to blow your mind!” He promises scantily dressed women who “love tips” and “to sit on guys’ laps.” Right on cue, a throng of women emerge in g-strings to shake their asses. He lectures the crowd on consent (“You can touch whatever you want, as long as you get permission”) and reassures us of the night's “unforgettable” potential. 

The girls get on stage to do their little dances and one of their boobs falls out from their top. The big, balding vice-president announcer childishly shouts “I can see your nipple!” He pairs their go-go dancing with a sort of amateur comedic commentary in a way that amplifies the absurdity of the whole situation while extinguishing much of the sex-appeal. Some geezer in The State of Jefferson is the first to walk on stage and stick a tip in some jiggling boobs. I exit to piss.

At the porta potties I meet a grandma straight out of suburban Redding. She’s wearing denim-blue cotton capris, pink sandals, glasses on a beaded lanyard. She’s the wife of a friend of a motorcycle enthusiast. If Ryan wasn’t here, I’d have made her my buddy. Realistically, though, if I was alone I’d be getting a lot more attention. 

I head back to the stage, where the girls are still doing their thing while an AC/DC cover band plays inside. As Ryan and I decide to check out the band I run into David, the soccer coach. Despite his eagerness to talk at The Jam, he’s now absent, and wanders off.   

Next to the bar, bent behind the merch booth is a young prospect named Jeremy, a tall, gangly red-head with glasses, no visible tattoos, and a red baseball tee under his vest. I also met him at the Jam. He catches my eye and stands up straight. “Hey beautiful, you actually came!” he exclaims. Turns out he also lives in Arcata, and is studying geospatial sciences at Cal Poly Humboldt. Maybe Ryan and I aren’t the biggest nerds here after all. 

“How’d you get wrapped up with these guys then?” I ask, astonished that someone so seemingly innocent is dedicating their free time to selling t-shirts for a federally recognized criminal organization. He tells me he’s from L.A. and has been riding for a long time. He works at the Harley Davidson dealership in town, where all these guys tend to hang around. “I guess they liked me enough to invite me in,” he muses. “It’s just nice to be a part of a club where everybody likes to eat healthy, work out, and ride their bikes together.”

Folks join a motorcycle club for the freedom of the road, while simultaneously sacrificing their autonomy to weekly meetings and codes of conduct. The club is a lifetime commitment that always comes first. The fraternal mind is powerful in that way. There’s an undeniable, testosterone-fueled desire to feel a part of a brotherhood, especially when membership is something you really have to earn. In these clubs, men often find a sense of belonging and family they didn’t have otherwise.

The Redding-Humboldt chapter is fairly tame when it comes to violence and trafficking, save for a few Mongol altercations resulting in a few fatalities over the past twenty years. But this is just what the news picks up. Mostly, the Angels are trying to leave their past behind them. An older biker walks by. On his vest, a patch: “Not all motorcycle clubs are gangs!” 

A crowd reforms around the stage for the main act of the night — Legion of Sin, a Bay Area-based MC of kink enthusiasts. We swiftly navigate our way through the crowd to get a better view of the mostly naked ladies strutting onto the stage: one of them a brunette in nothing but a leather harness, the other a blonde of Amazonian stature wielding a giant 8 lb. paddle in a fishnet bodysuit. The brunette merely gets paddled, which feels uneventful compared to the pussy-lip stapling the old guy told me about.

A kilted man with an old gray beard suddenly emerges on stage, dual-wielding the “World’s Strongest Vibrator” and a seven-inch combat knife. He presides over the Legion of Sin, as evidenced by the patches on his vest. The brunette in front of him is wearing nothing but the leather harness and her own restlessness. He solicits some jeers; she squirms on a rickety bar stool. 

He approaches slowly, taking his time, drawing it out, putting some flair in his kilt with his gait, before lunging across the stage and grabbing the brunette by her hair in a single motion. His hand goes from her hair to her throat as the tip of his knife begins exploring her body, starting with little circles around her nipples, feigning a jab to her ribs, before teasing her inner thighs and landing at her clit, where he presses the knife deeper with the World’s Strongest Vibrator and pulls the trigger. She moans into his microphone. Kilt-man glances expectantly toward the crowd. 

I look around to find a couple people with their phones out, recording the show for their grandkids or something, but mostly I see blank faces. Being surrounded by hundreds of boozed-up bikers, their nearly unanimous boredom, in witnessing a vibrator jab a knife into a woman’s vagina, is more surprising than the act — this intended crescendo is falling flat. The Hells Angels president senses our apathy. 

“You guys look like a bunch of liberals out there, all quiet and shit! Give these guys some noise!” The previous announcer power walks up to the girl with the mic and asks her favorite color. She moans again. We groan. Intermission.

Ryan and I are milling about during the break, talking about how ridiculous it is that we’re here, when one of the strippers approaches us to tell us we’re the hottest couple at the party. We bashfully kick our feet in the dirt when she asks us what we’re doing after the party. “I got a small bed at a motel in Redding,” she shrugs. We express appreciation for the offer but affirm we’re heading back to Arcata. Apparently, she lives in the neighboring town of Eureka and works at the local strip-club. “You guys should come join me in my Airsoft tournaments!” It seemed like a sincere offer, so she and I exchanged Instagrams. “I have great memes,” she says, showing us her Instagram story. She blows us a kiss and saunters away. 

The performers return to the stage with a cattle prod. The brunette in the harness starts sucking on the blonde’s strap-on while kilt-man prods her inner thighs. I can’t help but think how the Angels feel like a distant after-thought to the performance. Eventually the blonde removes a blue-tinted condom from the dildo attachment. It glistens in the stage lights as she hands it over to the bald announcer. He wiggles it toward the crowd and says, “Anyone want some gum?”  

The announcer challenges the crowd, and a biker offers up his bald head to the taser. A few brave the zap as kilt-man activates a Ryobi Sawzall with a dildo attachment in the blonde’s you-know-what. “What’s your guys’ safewords?” the announcer asks the crowd. “Pineapple!” someone responds. “That’s weird, because mine is just ‘Stop.’” 

Soon, the announcer starts offering incentives. “Okay you guys, loudest group in the crowd gets this here jar of moonshine! Let’s send these guys some love!” The crowd cheers louder for the moonshine than the girls. With all the leather and BDSM, it’s beginning to feel more like the Folsom Street Fair than an ode to La Honda. We have to back up out of the splash zone; the blonde impressively squirts five times in a row. “I love my job!” yells the kilt-man, wielding the drenched mechanical dildo like a Viking in battle. “If my wife were here, she’d say ‘Fuck yeah!’”  

After the climax the performers disappear, leaving the crowd aimless again. The members of the Redding-Humboldt chapter take the stage and give a hearty thanks to wrap up the night. There’s only a dozen of them, varying in age and intimidation factor. After some technical difficulties, the president Facetimes a member who is stuck back in Oakland to congratulate him on his 40 year anniversary with the club. He points the selfie view of his iPhone to the crowd for us to cheer him on. The old man on the phone screen looks confused.

By this point my headache becomes a full-on migraine, but we still have to wait for the shuttle to take us back to our van. Waiting for the same shuttle are two guys that look even younger than us. They had gotten their first tattoos tonight, both on their wrists. One an outline of a buck head, the other a leaping bunny. They’re on a fire engine crew in Humboldt’s mountains. One of them is Jeremy’s housemate, the prospect working the merch booth. “Jeremy is always so busy all the time, between school and the club,” he says. “But you know, I think the Humboldt-Redding chapter is really trying to clean up their image. It’s all about the bikes with them. Maybe I’ll join one of these days.” He offers me a swig of strawberry-chocolate flavored moonshine.

Back at the lot I climb into the van’s bed and let Ryan deliver me to our foggy home back on the coast, a mountain range away from the heat and the strippers and the metal. 

 A few weeks after Redding Rock, I found myself at The Jam again on bike night. I never thought I’d be recognized in a crowd like this but here I am hearing my name called out from a group of bikers. I spot Noodles, whose arm is finally out of the sling. “I’m not a prospect anymore!” he beams. “I don’t have to do the grunt work and now I can just enjoy myself.” I ask him what that process looks like. “The president called a meeting with me at our clubhouse. When I arrived, he made sure I had everything I’m usually supposed to have on me, you know, med kit and everything. He asked if I was ready, which I sure as hell was. We did some whiskey shots, and that was that.”

I look at where his “Prospect” patch had been. Replacing it was the diamond-shaped “1%-er” patch. I’m happy for the guy.