November 23, 2005 at 7:10 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Eleanor asked me if I would lose my interest in the big trees if we lived here. I don’t think I would. They keep surprising me, and I keep wanting to explore every little redwood grove we see. And there are dozens of groves, many of them marked with little signs and tiny pull-outs so you can hike among them.
I got up early again to do some business over at the Ray Jen cafe, got the oil changed in the Nissan. Because we are towing a lot, I am trying to stick to a schedule of 3,000 mile oil changes. In the afternoon, we basically hung out waiting for Jonathan and Shelby to show up with our new faucet.
They showed up around 2 pm and Jonathan made quick work of the faucet while Emma and Shelby played a game. Now our water problem is entirely solved.
It was a dash from there to Eureka, 90 miles south. We had just enough time to make some quick stops, one at the Elk Prairie Campground Visitors Center (and yes, there are really a LOT of big elk roaming around there — wish I’d had a telephoto lens), and another stop at the Redwood National Park headquarters to get our national parks pass stamped.
I was utterly amazed when we pulled into the Eureka post office at 4:54 pm, the day before Thanksgiving, and managed to pick up our forwarded mail in less than 4 minutes. We had expect we’d miss the post office and have to camp in Eureka for a few days. With this bonus, we decided to press on for another hour and get a little further south because we need to be in Suisun City (300 miles from here) on Saturday.
It’s a drag when we have to be on a schedule. I would have liked to explore the old downtown of Eureka and see the famous Victorian houses. But the compensation is that we spent another night camping among the redwoods, just off the famous “Avenue of the Giants” that parallels Rt 101 in Humboldt County.
November 22, 2005 at 6:44 pm · Filed under Places to go
Sorry for the repeated delays in posting. We are wrestling with Internet access and other communications issues. Crescent City is a place where our phones “roam” and the fog is dense, so we don’t get voice mail notifications, our mobile Internet doesn’t work, and dropped calls are commonplace. So I have to post when I get a chance.
Tuesday morning I woke at 3:30 a.m. for no good reason at all, except I suspect that the Ray Jen Cafe, where I am getting my Internet fix, put regular coffee in the “decaf” Hazelnut I ordered the night before. Returning to sleep was impossible so I got to work at about 5 a.m. on the dinette, and then headed over to Ray Jen again at about 8 a.m.
Mid-day we headed out to the Ewok village, um, excuse me — I mean Stout Grove, a particularly famous area of Redwoods nearby. The road itself is an adventure: one lane, twisting between massive redwoods, enveloped in fog … downright magical.
A few miles down, we parked and hiked through Stout Grove and beyond. Here’s Emma walking along a downed redwood, probably 300 feet long. It was probably over 700 years old when it fell.
If you are in the area, this is a hike to take. The Stout Grove trail and the little extension we did was an easy two-mile roundtrip along the river, with endless beautiful scenes. I didn’t spot any Ewoks, though.
November 22, 2005 at 7:31 am · Filed under Uncategorized
I wish I could report the day we wanted to have, hiking trails among the giant old-growth trees, but one of those unfortunate situations cropped up. I suppose in seven weeks of travel we had to have one systems failure, and this was it. When we turned on the water last night, the kitchen faucet sprang a leak. This wouldn’t be a major occurrence but there is no shut-off for the kitchen faucet, so the only way to stop the leak was to turn off the water pump, and that meant the entire trailer had to go dry.
We patched up the problem as best we could with tape and a bucket, but realistically we had to get it fixed before we could continue to enjoy the trip. Jedediah Smith SP is one of those marvelous places where cell phones do not work, and so our only means of communication with potential repair assistance was via a single payphone across the campground. But at least we could make a few calls in the morning to ascertain our options.
Fortunately, everyone was helpful. The nearest Airstream dealer was 250 miles away in Sacramento, but Airstream said, “We can’t leave you without water in the middle of your trip, so get it fixed wherever you can and send us the bill.” The camp host provided the business card of a good local mobile RV repair service and graciously refunded us our second night’s camping fee.
We drove out to nearby Crescent City and met Jonathan the repairman at the local Wal-Mart, where he arrived with his 5-year-old son Shelby (who was bearing a Star Wars light saber). Emma and Shelby quickly began to play together and we chatted with Jonathan while he diagnosed the problem.
The problem required complete replacement of the Moen faucet, but since Moen offers a lifetime warranty, we were able to call Moen to have a new unit shipped to us. We had to pay an extra $12 for FedEx to get it here before Thanksgiving, though. Jonathan removed the bad faucet, capped off the lines so we could once again pressurize the system, and we were off again ““ sans kitchen faucet. We’ll meet Jonathan again on Wednesday when the new faucet arrives, to complete the repair.
With all that, we needed to revise our plan. We decided against going back to the State Park, since we will probably need to make some more calls over the next couple of days, so we are now parked at a commercial campground near the harbor.
It lacks privacy, ambience, and trees ““ a bit of a “Wal-Mart on the water” ““ but at least the location is central: to our west, a working harbor with barking sea lions; to the south, surfers practicing in the small waves; to the north, fishing boats, and stacks of crab traps; and to the east past the hotel strip, a twisting road through the redwoods, where ““ as everyone in town has told us ““ they filmed the Ewok village scenes in one of the Star Wars movies. No wonder Shelby has a light saber. It’s a local industry, sending tourists out to see the Ewok village.
November 21, 2005 at 8:25 pm · Filed under Places to go
It was a wonderful day driving down the last leg of the Oregon coast on Sunday. We started off again in the beach near Port Orford, so Emma could hunt for sea stars and we could all get in a good long walk before getting in the car. The tide was higher and we didn’t see the starfish but the beach itself was fascinating, soft brown sand tumbled with giant rocks.
In the background, the unusual port of Orford. They don’t have a sheltered harbor, so each boat that comes in is lifted by a crane to a giant concrete pier and stored on top.
We deliberately left ourselves only about 90 miles of driving so we could once again stop off anywhere that seemed interesting. That was a good strategy once again, as the Oregon coast is strewn with beautiful scenes and amazing vistas.
We stopped for lunch in the town of Brookings, and visited the local seafood shops for some red snapper and Cajun spiced salmon. Those prizes went in the fridge for later. I remember thinking that the Airstream made a nice foreground for the Hwy 101 bridge behind us, with the sun reflecting off the Airstream’s skin and brilliant blue skies above “¦ and I thought “I’ll snap a picture of that after lunch.”
Whoops. I had forgotten the famous Pacific coast fog, which sneaks in and turns warm sunny days into grey cold ones in minutes. Sure enough, during lunch I looked out the window and the photo was gone. Heck, even the bridge was gone!
By the end of the day we pulled into Jedediah Smith State Park and set up amongst the towering redwood trees. This campground dates (as so many state campgrounds do) from around 1930, and so the roads are narrow and the sites are small. A site which is claimed to fit a 30-foot trailer does ““ but not much else. Still, the reward is sleeping with a 500-700 year-old redwood tree on either side of your bed. I wouldn’t want to see a single tree harmed so I could have an easier time parking!
Emma is impressed by old-growth redwoods but not as much as we are. To her, they are merely big trees. She doesn’t see how rare they are (only 4% of the historic territory of the Pacific Redwood still exists), and she doesn’t recognize how tenuous their existence is. They grow only one place in the world: the Pacific coast, below 2000 feet and near the foggy damp air. And there are only a few hundred acres of them left, 45% of which is national and state parkland in northern California.
A redwood is one of the living things closest to immortality. They resist diseases, insects, earthquakes, and fires. In fact, they thrive on the occasional fire, using it as inspiration to reproduce. The oldest ones have been growing for 2,000 years. How can you stand amidst these immortals and not be humbled? To them, we are just a blip in their centuries-long lives. Someday Emma will appreciate their message. I will show her the picture of her standing in the middle of three redwoods and suggest that she find them again with her children.
November 20, 2005 at 12:56 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
[There was no Internet access when I wrote this, so I’m posting it at my first opportunity with the date and time of when I wrote it.]
It’s good to be moving on, especially here on the Oregon coast where it is uncrowded and scenic. When we started this trip we figured we’d settle into a spot for 2-3 weeks, but so far the only placed we’ve stayed more than five days was Denver. For some reason, after a week in a spot, we usually have the itch to explore some more.
So this morning we hitched up and headed south on Rt 101, the coastal road. Our goal was “no place in particular,” the sun was shining, and for the first time in weeks, we have no schedule at all. It’s a nice feeling. We are free.
Our travels today took us past several lighthouses among the dunes, and I couldn’t resist the photo opportunities. Lighthouses are just too easy.
Then a dramatic bridge, a still lake reflecting the pines trees, a historic house “¦ We let the whole day go like that, covering less than 100 miles but stopping so often that it took until 3 pm to arrive here, at Humbug Mountain State Park.
After parking the Airstream, we still had some light so we took a road less traveled: an unmarked one-lane dirt trail that wound its way up Humbug Mountain from the campground. With absolutely no idea where we were going, we climbed the switchbacks for half an hour, never exceeding 15 MPH. To our left, precipitous drops of 50-500 feet. To our road, a deeply scalloped edge along the crumbling mountainside.
This went on for several miles, until we finally intersected China Mountain Road, arbitrarily chose to go left, and eventually (a few miles down) found a paved road back to 101. It was a fun detour. Eleanor was white-knuckled half the trip, but Emma was only wondering when we would get to the hike we had promised. I was only disappointed I never needed to engage the 4WD.
Although we are right by the coast, there are few places one can get to the beach because of tall sandy cliffs. During high tide, there is no beach at all. We found some scenic viewpoints but never figured out how the surfers managed to get down from their cars parked by the highway to the thunderous waves below. Then we saw this intrepid fellow cruising on the soft sand in his truck.
Finally, we found a bit of beach access by the town of Port Orford and did a little sunset exploration.
What a bonanza of sea life! We found sea caves everywhere, colorful orange and red starfish, green sea anemones, and other creatures. We found a sunflower sea star, too — a creature that looks sort of like a large starfish but it has something like 15 arms. We ran out of daylight before we ran out of energy, so we headed home (soaked to the knees, all of us) and agreed we’d look again in the morning.
With the long cold evenings this time of year, we are trying to find ways to keep ourselves entertained after dark. Tonight we decided since we were all in wet clothes, we’d get right into our pajamas and have “Pajama Fun Night.” We watched an old campy movie, “The Pied Piper of Hamelin” (a musical, with Jim Backus!), I made popcorn, and Eleanor and Emma baked up some cookies. (By the way, if you are wondering where we get these movies: We subscribe to Netflix, but the really bad old movies like this one come from the bargain bin at Wal-Mart.)
Emma discovered that she has a loose tooth in front, which has thrilled her to the point of bouncing around the trailer like a superball. We can clearly see a replacement coming in behind. Her six-year molars are also showing up. She has pledged to tell everyone she meets about these things.
One other thing: our good friends Adam and Susan called today, just to say they’re following the blog and to send us good tidings. That phone call gave me a huge boost, and reminded me to say to all of you that the support we’ve gotten from you is a huge part of what makes this trip fun. It gives us a greater sense of purpose to share the experience with you, and so almost every day I’m eager to write down our impressions of the day. It’s not work to keep up the blog, with you along for the ride. Keep writing and commenting ““ we love to hear from you. Thanks!
November 18, 2005 at 8:11 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
OK, the work is done … and so we are off again, checking out the local scenery. There was a bit of sunlight left and it was a beautiful day so we drove 7 miles south on Rt 101 to an access point for the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area (Siltcoos Beach).
Fabulous. Just what one needs at the end of a stressful week at work! The light was terrific for photos and Emma was happy to oblige as foreground in most of them, so I spent the next 90 minutes shooting until there was no light left.
These dunes are huge and gorgeous. Some are over 100 feet tall! You can drive on part of the beach to explore them, and the recreation area even has “sand camping” areas further down the road. I’m going to check those out, and see if we can camp at one of them this weekend.
The beach was dotted with little birds that I would call sandpipers but I don’t really know their name. They are cute little things, scooting along the reflective wet sand so smoothly they look like a bunch of white ball bearings cut loose on oiled metal.
It was a spectacular walk and a terrific way to wrap up a working day. I think Eleanor and Emma agreed.
November 18, 2005 at 9:33 am · Filed under Travel / lifestyle musings
OK, I gave you fair warning: this would be a quiet week for the blog. The reason is that once in a while I have an overload of work and can’t maintain the even schedule I strive for. I just posted an essay on Gather about “work/life balance” which you can read by clicking the “Gather” link (to the left), but as it turns out, that essay is really an idealized account of what my life is like.
In reality work doesn’t go on an even keel when you are mobile. We’ve been constantly busy and moving around for two weeks, which meant that a major project due on Nov 20 was looming and nothing was getting done about it. This week it came to a head: I had to set everything aside and get the project done. I hate deadlines for big projects but I’ve never missed one yet and I wasn’t about to miss this one either.
So instead of exploring the central Oregon coast — Haceta Lighthouse, Seal Caves, Oregon Sand Dunes SRA, Florence’s old downtown and river port — I have been hunkered down in front of my laptop, working, working, working.
This is the dark side of traveling and working. Each morning at about 8 a.m., I ride my bike from campsite #140 through the tall pine trees and damp morning air of coastal Oregon. It’s about 3/4 mile down to the “Activity Center” where I can get a desk and free wifi to the Internet. I stay there all day, trying to concentrate on my work, while retirees come and go, playing the occasional game of pool, and working the jigsaw puzzles. Only full-timers roam Oregon this time of year, and we’re the only ones who aren’t retired.
Around lunchtime, Eleanor and Emma show up bearing lunch, and then I’m back at it. In the evening, we hang out in the Activity Center for a while before returning to the trailer for dinner and a movie (last night: Sahara — a bit too violent for small children but fun for adults). It’s a dull life compared to the last month, but a good chance to catch up on everything: phone calls to friends and family; trip planning; laundry.
Eleanor and Emma have had a chance to explore a bit, and they’ve taken some photos that I might get uploaded before we leave Florence. I have learned bits and pieces through them. For example, “sneaker” waves are a phenomenon of the Oregon and Northern California coastline, big surges that come between smaller waves. Here they warn you never to turn your back on the ocean, lest a sneaker wave knock you down. No swimming at most beaches.
The project will be done this afternooon and I’ll be able to resume a more normal schedule which mixes fun and work. Starting on Saturday, we plan to roam down the Oregon coast into Northern California, stopping at Redwoods National Park and Eureka, at least. Should be some awesome photo opportunities along the way: sea lions, rugged coastline, Victorian houses, redwoods, giant sand dunes, etc. Stay tuned.
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