The coast road, US101, is a beautiful road that winds its way gently around the coastline. At times we were so high that it took my breath away to look down and of course there were no barriers along the road and some really serious drop-offs which put my stomach muscles into clench mode instantaneously. Near Depoe Bay we saw whales blowing, but the pull-off was full up so I watched them as Frank watched the road....... It was a quiet day for me - I could not find that peace nor that smile that usually comes with the wheels of the RV turning. The views were amazing and many photos of the most awesome rocks in the sea were taken - I just knew Steven would love it! I was not a happy lady at all and finally that night when we were in the campground, I just crawled into bed and howled it all out on Franks shoulder again - I should have done it at the airport then it would have all been out already. I always cry at airports but tried to be a 'big girl' this time - HAH - fat lot of good that did me!
Anyway - we stayed the night in a KOA Campground and when the lady at the register saw the RV, she paid for the night! That was really so sweet. We took that amount and put it into the collection bottle we have and it will go to the LLS too. Thanks Kathy!
The campground was right on the dunes and was gravel with a good few fourwheelers buzzing around. Frank does not like dust, so it was really early the next morning before too many of the fourwheeler campers got up, that we left there. It was a good place for me to catch up on some emails and reading that I had been missing out on as they had free high speed internet.
Tuesday was much better all around. Steven and Laura were home safely and had even managed to find their luggage which had not followed them on the same airplanes. The mist was very thick, at times totally hiding the ocean from view. We drove through Coos Bay which is now big enough to warrant 2 Mc Donalds! One on each each end of town.... We passed by a Minnehaha street - camera missed that one. Some street names are really weird - maybe I will start watching them at home too when we get there.
We stopped for a break in a glorious pull-off with an absolutely stunning view of the ocean and as an added bonus saw more whales too! They were not really close in but it was a really special feeling to stand and watch them breaching and blowing, gently moving along with no time constraints at all. There were a good few other people up there watching too, some with camera lenses I drooled about! The ground we were standing on, this was waaaaay high up from the ocean, was cracked in multiple places - kinda like it had been pulled apart or rattled apart in an earthquake. I must admit to being chicken and standing way back from the edge.
All along the coast were the most amazingly humongous rocks littering the ocean. Some have trees and plants and pretty flowers growing on them, others are barren like volcanic rock. They were all ringed with the white water crashing along their bases and dotted with hundreds of sea birds that also swirled around them. It was with views like this that we entered California on the US101. The road took us around a corner, slightly away from the sea and brought us back in much higher than before. While we were driving, the mist ate the world! I looked out of the window and saw nothing, absolutely nothing except a few ghostly skeletons of trees reaching up through a total white-out.......... for a moment it was very disconcerting. It was as if there was simply nothing there anymore, as if a big flood had come in and everything was gone - very weird. On the road we could see the mist still rolling in thicker and thicker and wondered just how long we could keep driving like this. It really was very eerie with trees and rocks only barely visible at times and then nothing again. After about 10 minutes of this white world, it all cleared in a second and we were eye level to enormous redwood trees! Sometime during the whiteout, the trees had grown up - it was simply stunningly beautiful! After having the lights on for the mist we now had to put the lights on going through this amazing forest of giants. We had driven into the Redwood National Park and were really soaking up the sunshine and warmth that streamed through the wide open windows.....
There was one really enormous stump of a redwood tree with other trees grown up all around it - it was almost as if, once the Big One had been chopped down, the other grew around the stump in protection. So many really big stumps littered the forests everywhere - quite sad. We looked for a campground inside the National Park, but must have missed it so we kept on going, following the Klamath River for a while. We stopped at a beach to stretch our legs and see if we could find some shells or white sand to take back with us. The sand was gray and coarse and beautifully warm! The beach seemed to be lower than the water and I was quite uncomfortable there. The waves were really big and strong and crashed like thunder onto the sand - all seemingly higher than us. We collected some pieces of driftwood - once again there were absolutely no shells at all - and headed back to the RV. I did stop and take some pictures of those waves - they were really menacing and I would have hated to have been caught in that water!
The mist was still swirling inbetween the trees and covered much of the ocean view - the photos of those waves look very eery indeed with the mist putting a veil over it all. We had checked the weather for the coast further south and found that it was going to be or get colder than what was comfortable for beach walking, so right before Eureka, California, we headed inland on the 299 E. The forests were a beautiful mixture of greens, folding in over themselves in different shades on each hill. A good few of the hills had been logged bare but there was so much more that was just beautiful. Our first reasonable summit was reached - Lord Ellis Summit on the 299E - 2263 feet. Skilpad did not even heat up slightly - just puttered her way happily to the top....... now for the downhills! Uuurghhhh.
The road got worse, there were sunken grades, crumbling edges (my side, of course!), no barriers, narrow winding road and then we noticed the smoke as well. These were some of the signs on one short stretch of road: rough road; slides; rock falling; sunken grades; sharp curve; no shoulder; slow trucks; trucks entering; cattle on road; bump; 20mph curve............ there was a time when we wondered why we picked this road! It had been getting increasingly hot but we were not going to complain, still remembering the cold on the beach, we saw rocks littering the road and the smoke really started to black out the sky too.
And then on the side of the Trinity River I spotted some bears! Frank quickly stopped in the well placed pull-off and I jumped out with my camera - straight into a bed of spikey thorny weeds! That will teach me to get my shoes first..... There were four bears, two adults and two cubs. The biggest adult bear left pretty soon, but them mama and cubs stayed while we took a good few photographs. The one cub was brown and the other black and one of the other gentlemen that stopped said that they were grizzlies. Mama Bear allowed us a good few more photos while she stood staring at us and then they all left. What a wonderful opportunity that was! We saw a few helicopters flying with their loads of water and hoped that someone would give us fair warning if the road was closed. The Summit of Oregon Mountain Pass was 2888ft. Still no groaning from Skilpad - just a smooth beautiful ride! The sky was a lovely pink/orange color, the cars still coming from the other side and at the road works sections, no one turned us back, so we relaxed about the fire and concentrated on the road and the views. All the campgrounds around there had been closed because of the fire or were filled up with fire fighters tents and equipment. There were still many firetrucks heading towards us and we saw a helicopter filling its bucket up as we passed one section of the river - much happening in the area and not the right place for us to stop alongside the road - not knowing what direction the fire was headed in. There was also no way we would find our way totally out of the area before dark and so when we came across a beautifully level safety rest stop - that was it for the night. It was well off the road, easy in and out and empty too. A good stop after a long day. The sky was still a beautiful color and the mountains looked incredible with the different light playing over them. I managed to grab a couple of really good photos of the sky color reflected in the Trinity River as well as some of the hazy sunset through the already burned skeleton trees...... That really is such a beautiful drive, especially without the smoke.
So, after starting the morning in mist, we ended it in smoke and a gentle sunset with helicopters dotting the sky and fire engines screaming up the hills. Quite a day. It was good to stop.
Love and Light to you all
Especially U3
Annie & Frank
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