September 26 through October 3, 2005

Monday September 26:

The hosts were around early to be sure we were leaving, as the section of the campground we are in is closing today.  We asked about Tsunami dangers...and were told again to run for the high ground.  These folks also told of a rogue wave that injured campers here last year by catching them on the steps from the beach...and it was NOT a tidal wave, just an abnormally high wave. We walked the beach again this morning before leaving Tillicum Beach campground, but it seemed we were both looking out the corners of our eyes for the "gotcha" wave...

That thankfully never came.  :-)  In the background you can see US 101 traffic crossing the bridge over this small creek.  We decided this was a good place to turn back, rather than risk wet feet in a jump....  We are soon on our way, and there are more interesting scenic places to pull off on the way south.  We do not want to miss Cape Perpetua based on numerous recommendations, but there is no reasonable campground there.  We stop for lunch, chat with the rangers in the visitor's center, and receive suggestions on seeing San Francisco.  The view along the coast from the visitors center is breathtaking...

You can see the fog bank lying just offshore, but we are blessed by sunshine where it counts, and really do appreciate the view more because of it.  We continue on our way south on US 101, with beautiful scenery popping up unexpectedly as we top a hill or round a bend.

This one appeared as we crossed a small bridge. We arrived at Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area rather early in the day.    The ranger recommended Waxmyrtle CG was deserted except for the host; we much preferred the Driftwood ATV campground for the company of other campers.  This is another ATV campground, and the folks are very friendly. Several have campfires burning, and we do not mind a bit of machinery noise to signal there is human presence along these misty shores....and the mist is surely coming in as we walk toward the dunes and beach.  It is beautiful, but quite cool and windy, and almost deserted...

When we reach the water, about a mile away, we are ready to turn back toward the warmth of the RV.  We are soon snug and warm, and watching other campers snuggle up next to their camp fires for warmth.  They do not stay out too long either, before retreating to their vehicles.

Tuesday September 27:

In the morning we decided to move to the Oregon Dunes Overlook, and walked a trail through the dunes to the beach.  This day is MUCH improved over yesterday afternoon, as the sun is poking through, and the fog banks are holding off shore; it seems MUCH warmer and more inviting.....

 We can even see our shadows, if not always fully defined.  :-)  We watch a deer walk into the surf, play with the waves, and drink...salt water?

The animal is a good distance away, but it appears to drink, and drink repeatedly after waves chase it back..  I guess they do not need to put out many salt licks here. The trail back to the parking area carries us across some of the dunes.

Here Claire prepares to descend one of them.  The trail back appeared to offer an alternative climb up a dune to the visitors center, so I elected to do it the hard way.....

This was a hard slog, as the sand slipped back half a step for every step I took.  Note the marker pole at the top of the trail, which I took to be a trail marker....I was quite surprised to get to the top and find signs requesting visitors not to walk on the dune...DUHHHH, put the sign where folks do not have to climb the dune to see it!  Geeze!   Oh well, it was a fun climb!  :-)  We moved on to stop at the National Forest Service Eel Creek campground...we definitely prefer the US government campgrounds here over state ones; we get half price at most federal campgrounds with our golden age passport, and this Oregon coast is EXPENSIVE.  Regular price starts at $20 a night....with no hookups, and goes up rapidly with full service.  We are surprised the prices do not come down considering the sparse occupancy of most campgrounds this late in the season....but I guess they would rather close them.  This campground is very quiet; we walk around the campground roads, and enjoy being a bit further inland where the sun shines more and it's warmer.

Wednesday September 28:

We moved down the coast to Coos Bay OR, to the first Walmart we've found in a while.  We bought gas anticipating higher prices in California.  We spent $200 overall here in Walmart..  Oregon and New Jersey are the only states that REQUIRE gas station attendants to fuel all vehicles.  New Jersey attendants are usually content to just stand by and WATCH me do it...but the folks here said I was subject to a big fine if I touched it.  The folks did a nice job patiently putting 14 gallons in after the pump clicked off, after I explained that the tank could only be topped off by filling very slowly .  I learned a new trick from the attendants too…a pencil under the pump fill lever lets it pump very slowly without holding the lever by hand.  They had done this before!!  :-))

Thursday September 29:

We are not going far today.  We notice from the net weather reports that the weather has not cooled off yet in the California desert;  most days are still near 100 degrees, and we are not going there yet!  The drive down the coast is almost boringly beautiful.  :-)

The road is very close to the coast now, with so many awesome views it's impossible to pick the best.

We decide on the National Forest Service Quosatana campground on the south side of the Rogue River in Oregon.  This campground is 13.5 miles off US 101, but has a dump station.  It required a call to the National Forest Service district office to find it, AFTER stopping for a WiFi net connection and looking on the NFS website for a map; their referenced Forest Service Road 33 was not on our maps, nor on road signs off of US 101.  Turns out it is also known as County Hwy  595 or Jerry's Flatland Road, both of which are on our maps and road signs.  We suggested a change to their website!  We shall see... the person on the phone insisted it was not HER responsibility...  :-)  The drive to the campground along the Rogue river is steep and windy in places...I'm glad we took the "flatland road"....  everything is relative, and as we drive east from the coast we enter the foothills of the Coast Range of mountains. :-)  The campground is well below the road, closer to the river.  It is a pleasant place, and we elect to hike immediately after choosing our spot.  The volunteer campground hosts are quite genial and we enjoy talking with them.  There are numerous deer in this park, and they have NO fear of humans.  

This one is licking an open sore above it's tail within 10 feet of me......   There are numerous blackberry thickets in the campground......and the deer appear to be browsing among them eating the fruit.

The thorns are definitely nasty, and I wonder if the deer got it's sore by moving too deep into a thicket, then being scared into bolting...  Of course, the thorns do not stop us from eating our fill even though we must maneuver into the thickets where the deer do not seem to go.  :-)  The berries helped delay the need for dinner, but eventually we drifted back to the RV as dusk fell....

Friday September 30:

Day dawned WARM, but cloudy.  We decided to walk before showering,  and of course found many more blackberries.  There was a flock of wild turkeys along the river too.  

Nothing here seems very shy of humans.  These guys just walked a bit ahead of us...until a tour boat came up the river and scared them with the noise.  

These boats are quite large for the shallow water of the river, and are specially designed with enclosed engine driven "pump" type thrusters rather than exposed props that would be damaged on rocks.  They sure do move!  We saw forest fire teams changing shifts...

We talked to one guy who had worked all night, stopping a 5 acre fire.  The new team did not know where their fire was, but knew they were going to one.  One of Jerry's Rogue River Hydro boats was there at the dock to transport them, as there are not many roads that lead over this terrain into the wilderness.  We had smelled smoke last night but foolishly thought it was from a nearby campfire...oh well, live and learn!    :-)  We went back to the RV, showered, filled water, then dumped before leaving.  As we returned to the coast at the town of Gold Beach, it noticeably cooled.  We again stopped in the restaurant parking area to phone and connect to the net...there had been no phone service at the campground.  We quickly found that the Walmart in Crescent City will welcome us tonight..  :-))  Calling ahead seems like such a good idea, but it took us over 4 years to realize it could be done.   The Walmart phone numbers are in Street Atlas' Point of Interest data base.  We got a GOOD fast net connection here; there are lots of upscale restaurants and hotels on this dock location.  Claire went to watch sea lions.  I worked the net.  The sea lions were on a floating dock well separated from the walkway.  However, the remains of the 98' steam vessel Mary D Hume was sunk and decaying at the dock.

She had been built here in 1881, and served as a cargo vessel, Alaskan whaling boat, and coastal tugboat on the pacific coast until she steamed into her final resting place here in 1978.  A sign proclaims she was placed on the national registry of historic places in 1979... it does not look like this historic place has been very well maintained...  :-).  It was drizzling by the time we left Gold Beach, and the drive down the twisting road on the coast in fog was fatiguing and disappointing after all the good weather we'd had...but this is the Oregon coast we'd been told to expect, so cannot complain.  We are thankful for all the beauty we could see.  Ironically, we entered sunny California on the same note of fog and drizzle we left in Oregon, with real rain forecast overnight.  We still have only analog cell service, so there will be no cell net connection tomorrow.  We'll stop somewhere on the way to connect before going too far tomorrow.  The Crescent City Walmart is occupied by several RVs, so we pull in and are home for the night.

Saturday October 1:

It was still gloomy and cool when we went to Redwood National Park visitors center located in the area of Crescent City that had been wiped out by a 1964 tsunami that resulted from the big Alaskan earthquake.  

We got info on the camping in the Redwood National Park; all campgrounds are run by the state of California,  and do not honor golden age passports.  :-(  They will cost us $13 a night with the winter rate and $2 senior discount.  There was mention that CA with its financial difficulties was not going to lower rates this winter, but we found they had.  We found weak WiFi on the street, but noticed the Library advertised free internet, and moved to a parking area in front of them and found STRONG fast WiFi.  We spent much of the gloomy day here, I working on the webpage and Claire strolling the local area.  I needed to call Verizon to see why the cellphone would not let us make calls.  After an hour on a pay phone with them, I thought the phone was working to MAKE calls, but not receive them.  It turns out it will only make them sporadically.  We must stop in the nearest Verizon store on our route, 300 miles away, and get a new roaming list loaded into our phone.  It can be loaded over the air in digital service areas, but we are receiving only analog service here.  We returned to the Walmart overnight, and there were many of the same RVs here that were here last night.  I guess in this weather it does not make sense to travel...we cannot see anything in the rain & fog anyway....and we're really not in a hurry to get to the still HOT desert...although a l'il warmth would be welcome right now!

Sunday October 2:

Today we decided to view the redwoods in the park despite the rain. We cannot hang out at Walmart forever!  We left early and drove to California State Jedediah Smith campground and paid for a night at the $13 senior winter rate. We suited up in our rain suits...they certainly helped, but the trail suggested by the visitors center was a mountain, with switchbacks.  My camera under the rain suit fogged up at times due to my exertions, so not all the pictures I took are useable.  The trees are no less grand due to the rain....

It is a bit hard looking up into the raindrops though.  :-)  We still enjoyed the day, but almost gave up and turned back before the switchback trail stopped going up and started the return loop going down...on the correct side of the mountain too!  :-)  the GPS does not work well at all in these dense tall tree forests, especially when they are wet.  The signal absorption by the water is too great.  We rely heavily on our pedometer to tell us we really have not gone far enough to start the return loop, and we should persevere and keep going up hill.  Finally the trail levels out, then edges a bit down hill.  We're both pretty tired  by now...

Excuse the fogged up camera, but I want to show the eerie nature of these rain forests under certain conditions, like rain (which they do get a lot of, too).  It is easy to understand how legends like the Sasquatch can get started here....and in this foliage would be almost impossible to disprove!  By the time we get back, we have hiked nearly 4 miles on this 1.5 mile loop trail.  But it is over a mile to the trail head from the RV.  It sorta adds up when we think about it later.  It seemed kinda bad when while we were out there, thinking it was going to be an easy 1.5 mile hike in the rain and the trail just kept going UP, UP, UP.....  :-)  However, we would do it again...a few days of rest later, of course!

Monday October 3:

The CA state parks have generator quiet hours until 10AM, and this means we must conserve electricity for morning heat, which is NECESSARY here now, especially if we want to shower. We are out by noon checkout time, dump and fill water, and stop on our way back to Crescent City at a trail into an old growth grove of redwoods.  These trees are HUGE.....

They are also amazingly close together, and do not fit well in the camera either....  :-)  This trail was as short as advertised, and we were soon back in the RV.

 We either have a tiny motorhome...or a REALLY big tree....  :-))   We returned to Crescent City, moving directly to the library.  I do a lot of work on the net.  We hope to finish the latest webpage to upload on the way out of here in the morning.   Late in the day we move to Walmart for the night.  

PLANS:  This page is completed on 12/29/05.  Time is getting short before we return to the RV on January 8, and I really do want to get all of last trip's pages complete before we must start preparations to go.  We shall see...  :-)

ENJOY!
Barrie and Claire