Tuesday, September 9, 2008:
Very foggy morning, but I didn’t hear the foghorn or notice any wind when Daisy and I took our walk. Temperature was the same old 56 degrees and the humidity 78%. This morning I read that in 1998 Oregon Parks were suffering from a lack of money and so in a referendum, the voters decided to use the profits from the lottery to fund the parks. As a result, the parks are in good shape and money is available to purchase more land. This seems like a better way to spent lottery money than some I know. We left the campground and visited the Umpqua Lighthouse at the mouth of the Umpqua River. The river flows southwest as it enters the ocean and as a result, the jetties are also skewed. From the seaward end of the jetties for about a 1/4-mile inland, the seas are quite rough. As we were watching the waves (all this in the fog) I noticed a white-hulled ketch of about 50 feet leaving the harbor. We watched with fascination as she tried to motor through the waves, one of which almost stood the boat on her transom. I couldn’t help but think what would have happened if the engine quit. She seemed to make it through the jetties to the ocean, but we lost track of her as she became lost in the fog. There were numerous bikes on the road today, but the one tandem bike we saw brought forth the question as to why do the guys always seem to ride in front? My answer to this is if the girl were in front, they would stop at every art gallery and never get anywhere. We met a group of bicyclists on a tour that had started in Seattle and would finish in Los Angeles. We saw them all day in a game of the tortoise and the hare. They kept plodding along, not seeming to stop to view the sights while we roared from viewpoint to viewpoint. This particular tour had bright yellow shirts and the bikes were equipped with red strobe lights. I complemented them on the equipment noting it made them much more visible to the cars. A good portion of our trip passed by the southern section of the Oregon Dunes NRA. US101 sometimes runs through and sometimes is on the east side of the dunes, but the common fact was that the sand was moving east and while not yet encroaching on the road soon will. We know from seeing this happen at the south end of Lake Michigan and the White Sands National Monument in NM that the sand is unstoppable. OHV’s and ATV’s are allowed in some parts of the Dunes, and there are numerous rental places for this equipment along US101. The Oregon Coast is full of tsunami warning signs, either telling you that you are entering or leaving a danger zone. After 2 hours, we didn’t have a clue whether we were in danger or not. There is a large fishing industry presence in the city of Coos Bay and the smaller town of Charleston on the other side of the river. We liked the local canned tuna that we bought in Garibaldi OR about a month ago (seems that it cannot be that long) that we bought more plus fresh tuna in Charleston. The tuna in Garibaldi was much cheaper but we thought we’d try this. We continued south, but took a detour from US101 to follow a beach road that led us to Cape Arago SP. On our way, we stopped at the Simpson Reef lookout to view the reefs.


Wednesday, September 10, 2008:
It was 52 degrees and clear this morning, and Daisy and I took our walk out to the Cape Blanco Lighthouse and took a few pictures. When we returned, we packed up the RV and headed to the laundromat to wash an incredible amount of dirty laundry. While we were at the Laundromat, we were told that Cape Blanco is the westernmost point of Oregon. True, but Cape Flattery WA is the most western (and northwestern) point of the lower 48. After laundry we continued down US101 as the mountains came right down to the ocean, forcing us inland for a bit.



++OR.jpg)
The wind had sculpted the beach sand, making for interesting shapes.
++OR.jpg)
++OR.jpg)
Thursday, September 11, 2008:
This morning it was 55 degrees and heavy fog. There was no wind and no sign that it would burn off quickly so we caught up with paperwork. We also had wifi, and I was able to publish last week’s blog. This area is called “The Banana Coast” and is generally warmer than the rest of the coast, but not today. For breakfast we had hot cereal and cocoa, making a dent in the cold. We finally left the campground just before noon, and the fog was still thick as pea soup. Driving south on US101, we filled with gas at the last Shell station before we crossed the border. We had been warned about the CA prices, and a few miles south of the border this was confirmed. CA as was $4.27/gallon as opposed to $3.87 in OR. We went to Crescent City CA to get information about the federal and state redwood parks. These parks are a joint effort of federal and state, and we were able to find great information. We were a bit concerned about the CA State Parks, but it seems there are plenty in the areas we are heading into. While in Crescent City, we visited the Battery Point Lighthouse, built in 1856; the ink hardly had time to dry on the CA Statehood documents. The lighthouse is accessible by foot only when the tide is out.


We then left US101 and took the Newton B. Drury Scenic Parkway through a forest of old growth trees, especially redwoods. The road has numerous twists and bends as it winds along avoiding the redwoods. We noticed several named groves of redwoods, but don’t know for whom or why they were named. On the right side of the Parkway was the Murrelet State Wilderness Area with several trails to the interior. The Marble Murrelet is a bird that we learned about when in Olympic NP in WA. It is a water bird, but requires old growth trees to breed. It may nest 30-40 miles inland, but flies to the ocean to provide food for its young. We entered the Prairie Creek Visitor Center but it was closed. We continued to the Elk Meadow Campground, so named because elk come to this area during the evening.

Since it is mating season, the males are a bit testy, and we were warned o stay away, a long way away. Unfortunately we did see any, or did we hear any music from the males as we did in Rocky Mountain NP in Colorado when camping there with daughter Diana and husband Paul. As the sun set, the fog started to roll back in so who knows what tomorrow will bring. We worked hard on our blogs with the hope we can be done completely tonight so we can get an earlier start tomorrow than we did today.
Friday, September 12, 2008:
Once again it was heavy fog in the morning when I took Daisy for her walk. A pleasant surprise, we were able to see the ‘Roosevelt Elk’ (named after Teddy for his efforts in saving them) in the far end of the field. Just a brief history on Roosevelt Elk, which live only on the Pacific Coast in WA and OR. They were hunted almost to extinction in the late 1800’s due to the desire for meat and hides. The remaining few were in the area that is now the Redwood National and State Park. Through his efforts and some wealthy people, more habitat was purchased and added to the state parks and more stringent hunting regulations put in place. Now there are about 2,000 Roosevelt Elk, and their survival seems assured. The fog had lifted enough for us to move the RV to Visitor Center. At the Visitor Center, Susie talked to a ranger about the marble murrelet. The Ranger told us that they have nicknamed them ‘the flying potato’ because of the body size and flying technique. We moved on to the Big Tree Wayside and took a hike of 3 miles through the magnificent trees. The Big Tree is 287 feet tall and a diameter of 23.7 feet.




There was a story of a homesteader in the late 1880’s who wanted to cut down a very large redwood and use the base as a dance floor. Other people in the area stopped him. The redwood and sequoia trees are of the same family. Neither species has a taproot, but rely on a large growth of roots that are close to the ground surface and spread a great distance from the tree for stability. If it rains too much, softening the ground, and a large storm comes throw, both are liable to fall. The major difference between the redwoods and sequoias is the growth pattern. Redwoods grow tall, but the sequoias grow to a certain height and then the trunk diameter increases. So for trees of an equal height, the sequoias provide much more wood. But since they are mostly protected, it is a mute point. We left these wonderful trees and headed south after having lunch. We passed a dozen cars pulled off to the side of the road to take pictures of elk. Some of the people seemed too close, given our experiences over the last few years. We continued south, and as we approached the ocean the fog came back. We then turned east on CA299 and headed towards Redding. It wasn’t too long before we realized that the temperatures had risen from the mid-50’s to the lower 90’s. We had planned to stay in a USFS Campground, but it was too hot. We passed through the Coastal Range, where forest fires were very active this year. Most seem under control, but it sure was ugly. We pulled into a campground in Weaverville where there was electricity and thus air conditioning. The owner said that he has had almost no business this summer due to the forest fires and smoke. Tomorrow we head further east to Lassen Volcanic Park.
Saturday, September 13, 2008:
Daisy and I took our walk at 7:15am, and I noticed a slight smell of smoke and the sign at the high school entrance that said 54 degrees. We had breakfast and left the RV Park at 10:00am, noticing that the temperature had risen to 80 degrees. I am sure it was well into the 90’s before the day was done. Driving east on CA299, we stopped at the Ranger Station, but it was closed and then through the town of Weaverville. As we exited the town Susie spotted Susie’s Café and Bakery so we turned around to get some goodies for the drive plus something for tomorrow morning. We continued on towards Redding stopping to visit the Shasta State Historical Park. Shasta was a boomtown during the gold rush, but lost its glory when the county seat was moved to the town of Redding in the 1870’s. The town has had the distinction of being burned to the ground 3 or four times depending who is doing the counting. There is agreement that it burned in 1852, rebuilt and burned again in 1853. After this fire, it was decided that the main street should be widened to establish a fire break, all buildings be built of brick with steel shutters and roof construction sandwich of tin sheets, overlaid with dirt or sand and finally covered again with tin sheets. Obviously it was not enough as the town burned to the ground again in 1878. There was another fire in 1968, but while it took an historic building, it didn’t take the whole town. This year, there was a forest fire that started in late June and was brought under control in late July. All the artifacts and records were removed on July 9-10. The fire never was closer than a mile, but the way those fires move that was not much of a safety gap. The Museum reopened in early August. Included in the Museum was the town jail and photos of robbers who were hung by local vigilantes.



Sunday, September 14, 2008:
Another beautiful morning; not a cloud in the sky. The low temperature for the night was 47 degrees. We left the campground at 8:15am and drove south on CA89 towards the southwest entrance to Park. A few miles into the drive south we passed areas covered with angular rock of a size that would fit in a box with 9-inch sides. Not much was growing, and we suspected the rock was from the 1915 eruption (turned out to have been from an event 300 years earlier). As we drove further south, there was volcanic dust, and the vegetation was more prolific. Out of curiosity, we stopped at the Lassen Peak Trailhead (elevation 8,500 feet) for the climb to the top of Lassen Peak (elev 10,457 feet) by means of a trail that was 5 miles long. Looking up at the trail it seemed very steep, and I am glad we were not trying it.









Monday, September 15, 2008:
Another great morning, and we packed up and left the Lassen Volcanic NP with a wistful glace in the rear view mirror. We headed to the Turtle Bay Exploration Park, arriving at 9:45am in an attempt to beat the heat (we didn’t). Most of the exhibits are outside and while the locals might not mind 95 degrees (it’s the humidity, stupid!) it did get to me. This facility is a mixture of different exhibits: butterflies, birds,


No comments:
Post a Comment