Northern California

Day 52 - 263 Miles

A brief sojurn to my own domicile. We'll take a few days rest here, catch up on blogging, mail, and general correspondance. I brought my spouse flowers and a 250 lb anniversary gift, meaning moi. ;^D

Well, first, it turns out we were lucky at Crater Lake, because the next day, the wind turned and all of southern Oregon was socked in by California fire smoke, and you couldn't even see the lake from the crater rim.

Our trip from Medford into Northern California was both hot and smokey. We saw a four engine flying boat in Shasta Lake, and just north of the city by that same name, a field that had been converted into a "combat" helipad, 20+ pads in fact. Each with a chopper equipped with fire-fighting buckets. We saw Chinooks, SkyCranes. The opportunity to take our own pics was missed, but here's a couple that we saw.





I was told by people along the way that the smoke was "better" but you could have fooled me. I never even caught sight of Mt. Shasta, which you can usually see it from 50 miles away and I never saw it even from a couple of miles. And Black Butte didn't appear until we were well into Weed California.

The gas in California is definitely the highest so far... and as it was likewise the highest for a long time after I left. But only in California, so far, are the trucks and most of the cars on the Interstate, actually curtailing their speed and trying to improve their gas mileage.

The ride was short, but the heat and smoke took all the starch out of us and we'll probably turn in early

Total Miles: 15,090