Up the West Coast

Cal-i-for-nia here we come. After about three weeks in the desert, we arrived in California. I-80 is a tough interstate. The mountains we climbed were tall enough to have snow (it was snowing as we drove across.) The road was rough from trucks using chains to drive the pass. We were coming across just a day before a big storm was to hit the area. The entire trip on I-80 was very windy, but the higher elevations were really “exciting”. The weather was enough to make us change our original route plans. We had planned to get off of the interstate, but changed our minds.

We drove to a quiet campground near Upper Lake California. We arrived early in the day (about 1 pm) and just took an afternoon to read and recharge our batteries.

We moved to Trinidad the next day. (California, not the Caribbean) Trinidad is the entry point for the Redwoods National Park. We stopped at the Park information center. We took a nice drive through the park. All along our drive we saw the roughness of the Pacific Ocean with it’s large beaches and rocky coastlines. It is a beautiful sight.

Magnificent Redwoods


Sally is dwarfed by the redwood stump

We moved on into Oregon with our first stop in Coos Bay. We stayed there three days to take advantage of the National Wildlife Refuges. We had been contacted by two of the coast refuges about working this summer. We actually got to meet one of our contacts while we out looking at the wildlife. We also took advantage of our stop to eat at a couple of seafood restaurants.

Driving the coast has its challenges. We drove Highway 101 from Trinidad, south of Eureka, CA, into Oregon. It is a drive with major changes in elevations - we drove through snow at about 1000 feet in elevation and rain and wind near 10 feet in elevation. The coastal road is very winding and narrow in many places. Some places it looks like the redwoods are right on the shoulder. It took nearly 6 hours to travel the 250 miles.

Snow on the road

Coos Bay is where the Redwood Country of California and Oregon gives way to the Oregon Dunes. The dunes are MUCH larger than what you may expect. They look more like hills!

We drove from Coos Bay to Netarts, Oregon. The drive was once again exciting with the wind, rain and narrow roads. We have seen a lot of wet weather since getting into the coastal states. Lots of beautiful scenery, lots of good chowder, and lots of soup weather in April!

Netarts is very close to Tillamook, which is the home of Tillamook cheese. On the way north the next morning, we stopped to take a quick tour of the cheese factory and sample a bit of the cheese.

Making cheese in Tillamook

But after our arrival at Long Beach, Washington, the weather has taken a good turn. The boundary between Washington & Oregon is the Columbia River -and it is huge! The bridge from Astoria, OR, and Washington is not as long as the Ponchartrain bridge, but it is MUCH taller. Once we crossed, we stopped at Dismal Nitch to try to get some Washington information, but we were disappointed at the rest area, no kiosks. Dismal Nitch is where Lewis & Clark spent a week during an early November snow storm on their way to the beach. Their next stop was Disappointment Cape, but we drove right past. Finally we arrived in Long Beach - where Lewis & Clark found their goal. The Pacific Ocean, which they decided is not really as peaceful as the name suggests. But we enjoyed walking to the beach and dipping our feet in the water. Then we toured Marsh's Free Museum (you have to see the 2-headed calf and Jake, the Alligator Man).



Tom in the Pacific


The Museum

We did get a break in the weather, and a break from the road. It has been a nice stay.

Tomorrow we head to the May worksite at Penrose Point State Park on the Puget Sound west of Tacoma.

Spectacular Natural Wonders

The miles are rolling away fast and the touring is great. Since our last visit we have traveled to The Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, and Arches National Park. The views have been breathtaking (everyone breathe deeply). Many oooh-ahhh moments have happened.

After leaving Tucson, we parked the motor-home in Williams Arizona. It is about 60 miles away from the canyon. We hit the road to the canyon early to try and get good pictures. We did very well, walking the rim trail for about 2.5 miles, looking out over the havoc that nature does wroth. We learned a lot of history about the explorers of the canyon and the mining that brought people to the area. Most miners were disappointed with the finds, but some realized this could be an attractive tourist site. So they improved their claims and built hotels and shops. It is quite a history.

View from the rim...............Bright Angel Lodge

More views.........................Plus proof we were really there!

The second day in Williams is another misnomer; we spent the day going to Winslow (as in the Eagles song “Take It Easy”). Then we took a look at some cliff dwellings at Walnut Canyon on the way back to Williams.

Standing on the Corner...........Cliff Dwellers in Arizona

Dinner that evening was at the Route 66 Cafe. We enjoyed the malt - a real treat. Williams was the last town on Route 66 that was bypassed by I40. They have the traffic light in the local visitor center. Someday we'll do the whole route.

Note James Dean in the background!

We started heading for Moab Utah, with a stop planned for Monument Valley. There are rock formations that have been revered by the Navajo for centuries. There have been a few western films shot there (at least the exterior shots) including the first Stagecoach.

Monument Valley - can you imagine John Wayne riding through this scenery

Moab Utah is the home of Arches National Park. It is famous for the sandstone rock formations, weathered by rain and wind to create holes in the rock. Once again we started an early day to get decent pictures.

There really is too much to see in just a couple of days. We hope to make it back sometime and spend more time exploring.

The Arches

After leaving the red rock country, we traveled up through Salt Lake City and across towards Nevada. It was so windy crossing the Bonneville Salt Flats that we went through a dust/salt storm. We made an unscheduled stop at Wendover, NV, because it was too windy to drive comfortably.

Bonneville - Salt Storm?

Our tour through Nevada included a couple of nights in a little town close to Reno. We drove up to Reno and over the Sierra Nevada to see Lake Tahoe. It was gorgeous. We didn't realie that the lake was so clear!

Lake Tahoe

The next day we crossed into California and started north - but that story will have to wait for our next post.

Happy Trails!

Touring the Southwest

It has been more than 7 days and 1000 miles since our last post. We have explored the some of the sights of Corpus Christi Texas, Carlsbad Caverns New Mexico, White Sands Missile Range New Mexico and Tucson Arizona. We have had some wonderful tours, some self guided, others graciously lead by hosts.

RV Park on the bay--USS Lexington

We last posted in Corpus Christi. We had a wonderful visit with Sally’s nephew Brian, his wife Donice and their spunky daughter Evie. While in town, we visited the USS Lexington, a decommissioned World War II aircraft carrier. It is a floating museum dedicated to the effort in the Pacific and the aircraft used on carriers before and since WW II. We had a truly enjoyable time (and ate very well, again.) We thank our hosts, Brian and Donice.

We next toured the Carlsbad Caverns National Park. There is a cave with many interesting formations. We visited Mammoth Cave 2 years ago and it is the longest cave, but Carlsbad has many interesting rooms with views, (of course) of different rock formations.

Carlsbad Caverns - the sign - the entrance - the Big Room

One thing to note before you get the impression it is all fun and adventure, we still have to maintain our motor-home and ourselves. We traveled over 750 miles in two days between Corpus Christi and Carlsbad. That takes a lot out of travelers.

Golf in White Sands

Our next stop was a day trip to White Sands Missile Range and White Sands National Monument near Las Cruces New Mexico. WSMR is where the first atomic bomb exploded and where the US started it’s space program with the V-2 rockets brought back from Germany at the end of World War II. There is a museum(fascinating, but small). It includes one of the original V-2s and many other missiles tested there. Then there is white sand. It’s a very white desert of gypsum sand dunes in the middle of a “normal” desert. It was an interesting side trip, and afterwards we did some food shopping in Las Cruces, then moved on to a campground where we holed up for two nights just to recharge before moving to Tucson.

We needed a day of rest before meeting up with our friends Glenn and Karin and our favorite 60pound lapdog, Cooper. They are the buddies we traveled to and from Alaska with last year. They’ve led us on a whirlwind tour of beautiful desert scenery and exceptional weather (for those of us from Alabama). It’s nice and warm during the day, cool at night and very, very, very dry!

Hiking in the desert ---Hummingbirds Close up---Desert in Bloom

We’ve been hiking in Sabino State Park and driving through the Saguaro National Park. Tucson had a very rainy winter which led to the best spring blooming season in 10 years. The desert is full of beautiful blooms – wildflowers and cactus! We have lots of pictures. We also visited the Sonora Desert Museum which is more like a cross between a zoo and a botanical garden. We got very friendly with hummingbirds and a couple of Harris’s Hawks and saw lost more beautiful desert blooms. Finally we toured Kartchner Caverns – a pristine cave that is still growing. You have to go through two airlocks entering and leaving and walk through a mister to keep the lint down. They are very careful to affect the cave environment as little as possible. Unfortunately that means no pictures. And finally we went to Tombstone so Tom could have his picture made in front of the OK Corral.

Lunch in the Crystal Palace in Tombstone near the OK Corral --- Sonora Desert Museum

We’ve also had lots of really good food – rouladen, steaks at a western themed steak house, Chinese, pancakes, pork chops on the grill, curry, Mexican and more. We also enjoyed the pool and hot tub at the park they live in. It was a great stay and we hated to leave.

Now we are on our way to Northern Arizona to visit the Grand Canyon. Then it’s on to Utah.