Article seri An Amerin Summer, which explor way people around untry spend their summers, on some of about two dozen mpg rorts sttered around Rsian River Valley north of San Francis, Calif, that ter to gay men and lbians; photos; map (M)
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GAY RSIAN RIVER
Gay Friendly. and Gay Exclive Rorts. Gay owned.
Gay owned and operated. Gay owned and. Highlands Rort offers a relaxg and peaceful gay and lbian (straight-iendly).
to stay gay at The River; rorts wh bars by the pool (rtrants, too) are. overlook the River and are gay owned. ''Fife's and the two dozen or so other rorts sttered around the valley, a verdant stretch of redwood-rich land about 15 om the Pacific Ocean, have long offered a bulic refuge for gay men and lbians, a place where a mix of eedoms -- social, personal, sexual -- transform the annual summer holiday to somethg more than jt a week's break om the grd of the 's particularly te of Mr.
JOURNEYS; AT RSIAN RIVER, GAY CAMPERS FD THEY ARE NOT ALONE
Bracctti's Northern California -- that clud summer mpg trips wh their parents and siblgs, an annual fay rual they found they missed as they grew olr and beme clear that their futur would not clu wiv and the two men joed the Los Angel branch of Great Outdoors, a gay and lbian recreatnal anizatn, and for the last five years they have led a group pilgrimage to Rsian River and to s mercial hub, Guerneville, a somewhat rough-around-the-edg California town of 3, 000 that is home to an eclectic mix of gay bars and Irish pubs, gay bookshops and ice cream parlors, tattoo artists and vegan chefs, and stor sellg a variety of merchandise, cludg X-rated greetg rds and cha saws. Then, 1978, a wealthy Philalphian named Peter Penr bought the old Murphy's Ranch Rort, which the Murphy fay had opened 1905 along the river at the edge of downtown Guerneville, and reopened as Fife's, the area's first gay rorts unrwent siar transformatns, addg dis bars and clothg-optnal hot tubs, and soon the Rsian River Valley was Northern California's answer to Cherry Grove on Fire Island and Provcetown on Cape Cod.
''Gay and lbian people have always sought out ways to gather plac where they uld let their hair down and be themselv, '' said Eric Marc, the thor of ''Makg Gay History: The Half-Century Fight for Lbian and Gay Equal Rights'' (Harper Colls, 2002).