Statistics

Statistics

We were gone for 29 days.

We travelled over 5,400+ miles

We had one flat tire and no mechanical problems.  Praise God!

We visited 6 states (ok, we were barely in New Mexico).

We visited 6 National Parks;

Grand Canyon

Petrified Forest

Painted Desert

Channel Islands

Redwoods

Lassen Volcanic

And numerous State and local parks.

We spent 8 nights in hotels.

We accomplished 7 days of school (we are only a week behind thanks to starting mid-summer).

We saw the worlds largest canyon, largest trees and largest ocean.

Did I mention we drove over 5,000 miles?

We spent...well, we will not talk about that.  I'm not sure I want to know.

Strange and odd things

Strange and interesting things we saw on our trip.

No, the tree isn't growing out of the truck, it was beside the highway and when I took the picture a truck just happened to be passing.  This was west of Salt Lake City.  See the salt flats?  The white ground?

This was in a McDonalds on the Navaho Nation.  I guess they don't want you hanging around.

No words...none at all.  

Ok, maybe just a few.

"Have a Ball!"

In Phoenix, McDonalds would not let you use the bathroom without first asking.

This car was for Case Security and Detective Agency.  Don't most detectives try not to draw attention to themselves?  Especially on a stakeout?

Poop fairy?  

Oddly painted van at the Santa Barbara Harbor.

You don't see these in Kansas.

For some reason, Californian's like painting their vans.

Ever see a gas station advertise different prices for cash vs. credit?

That isn't just a gold car, those are fish scales.  No joke!  Click on the picture to see it bigger.

And last, but not least...

Last Days

Once at the cabin we took a couple of days to regroup and to shut it down for the winter.

It snowed the second night we were there.  By dark it was almost a blizzard.

The boys were ecstatic to see the snow.  In one weeks time we went from swimming in the ocean to snow.  Unfortunately, or fortunately, however you look at it, the snow melted by the next afternoon.

Some large bucks hanging out in the yard.  Chad pretty much drooled.

We also got to see two bucks fighting later on that day.

Sunrise on the day we left.

We had left our small trailer in Colorado for the summer along with the Jeep.  We brought both home on this trip.  There is a farm stand in Lamar, Colorado that we visit every year at the end of the summer for their cheap onions.  Sandy and I loaded up.

That is 150 pounds of onions and 5 pumpkins!

What I came home to.  

While we were gone the basement flooded and Chad had to move almost everything upstairs.   Its a good thing he did, because our amazing house sitter, Glorie told us that we were coming home to more flooding.  

So far it is not too bad, but it will most likely get worse over the next few days.

Back to Colorado

We left our amazing hosts, the McHenrys, early on Wednesday morning and headed east.

First through Nevada.

Then the Utah line.  

We were headed for Grand Junction, Colorado but when I called ahead the hotels were booked.  So, we swung south through Moab, UT and crossed the Colorado boarder late that night.  We pulled into Durango at about 1:30 am and collapsed into bed.  We had crossed 3 state lines and driven 16 hours.

Visiting the McHenrys

We spent the night at Janet and Craig McHenry's.  They were good friends of my parents when we lived in California.  Their daughter Rebekah and I were best of friends in our youth and spent many a day dreaming of owning horses.  

Janet and Craig had turned their garage into a beautiful guest house and offered to let us stay the night.  Rebekah and her kids came over to visit with us over dinner.

Here is Craig teaching my kids to play baseball with the help of Rebekah's.  Thankfully no windows were broken.

Rebekah's kids and mine altogether.

Rebekah with her kids.

Rebekah and I.

We were sad to leave the next morning.  Next time we will have to spend more time there!

Loyalton

After Lassen we headed to Loyalton, my hometown.  It has been 30 years since I have lived there and 25 since I have visited.

Sierra Valley.

Loyalton sits tucked away in the corner of Sierra Valley.  If you look at a map and look for the crook in the eastern border of California, Sierra Valley sits to the north of that by an hours drive.

The valley sits at about 5,000 feet in elevation with a population of 3,200 for the county.

When I was a kid there wasn't a single stop light in the entire county.  As best as I can tell, that hasn't changed.

The economy is centered mostly around cattle ranching.

The Golden West Motel and Resturant.

Not much had changed in Loyalton.  I was happy to see the town in good shape.  While the population is small and you have to drive to Reno to major shopping, the town itself was in good repair.  I expected to see the buildings a little delapatated and worn, but that was not the case.

Our old church.

Sierra Brooks was the neighborhood we lived in outside of town.

This was our house, although it was hardly recognizable.  My dad built it when I was pretty young and we had no trees and no fence.  

Castle Rocks, our favorite hiking destination.  It's kinda hard to see, but it's in the middle with a lone tree out in front.

Lassen National Park

After staying the night in Redding we headed toward my hometown of Loyalton.  On the way we stopped at Lassen National Park.  Can you tell I'm milking the free National Park pass for 4th graders for all it's worth?

It was about this time that I discovered that the kids were National Parked out.

"Another sign?!!"  They would say.

"Mom, are we done yet?"

Having left behind their buddies and partners in crime, traveling seem to have lost its appeal to them.

"But it's a live volcano!!"  I would say.  "How could you not think this is cool?"

The boiling sulfur pits held their interest for a few minutes but the smell drove us all away.

Lassen was our least favorite park.  We just were not that into it.

Redwoods

Here we are at Redwoods National Park.

It's hard to see in this picture, but this is a set of elk antlers sticking out of a tree truck.  Some time in the past a bull elk got his angers stuck in a tree and died.  The tree grew up around him inclosing his skull and part of his angers.

Look in the bottom right of the picture for a car.  It gives you perspective and scale to the size of these trees.  And the trees in the picture are mostly Ponderosa Pines, not Redwoods.  Redwoods are even bigger.

We took a hike through the Lady Bird Johnson Grove.

Tim, Nathaniel and Chad.

The area must be a hot spot for Bigfoot sitings.  We saw Bigfoot carvings, The Bigfoot Motel and building murals showing the Bigfoot working along side Native Americans.  These forests being so dark and mysterious its easy to see why people would think one exists or one could easily hide without being found.  Makes you wonder, doesn't it?

After seeing the Redwoods we stopped in the coastal town of Eureka for dinner.  I used my phone to pull up TripAdvisor and searched for their #1 restaurant.  When we arrived we were told that unless we had a reservation we could not get a table till 8 and it was 5:30.  So I searched up Eureka's # 2 restaurant and we headed to the Sea Grill.  We arrived and got seated.  I then realized my mistake, I should have looked at the menu online first.  The prices were starting at $22 a meal and when up to $45!  But, being as that we were already seated and I didn't want to cause a scene, we stayed.  It was shockingly the best seafood I have ever had!

After that wonderful, pricey meal we drove inland to Redding to stay the night.  Maps can be so deceiving. What looked like some mildly curvy roads turned out to be some hair-raising mountain driving - in the dark.  Later on we were told that the mountains we drove over are called the Trinity Alps.  Thinking that was only an nickname I looked it up, and they are really called the Trinity Alps!

Northern California

Out of the cities, and out of Southern California!  

A good way to tell you are in Northern California is logging trucks.

We stopped at a beach north of Eureka to stretch our legs and walk the beach one last time.  We were pretty far north by this time.  We were just two hours shy of the Oregon border.  It was starting to feel like the northwest at this point.  Dark forests, moss, ferns.  The beach above was much more wild than the beaches of Southern California.  The surf was huge, pounding and cold, and not a single person in a bathing suit was around. 

My dream, right there.

Nathaniel and a crab shell.