Hello Oregon

I'm trying to type this with a purring siamese kitten on my lap... we'll see how it goes.

I started the coffeepot and got all my things together and in the car. Then I sat at the picnic table and typed a little in the quiet morning before hitting the road. The redwood forest is very quiet with very little bird or frog noises... and I thought I had woken up early because it was so quiet, until I went to the bathroom... then I figured out it wasn't that early - there just weren't any kids over in my part of the campground to make a racket.

I checked out with the same guy who checked me in (who needs to read up on his own literature) and he didn't have any suggestions for my day, but the guy through the window told me not to miss Oregon Caves and to be careful at Crater Lake because those bastards with X would try and sell me a campsite with two feet of snow that I couldn't even park my car in (!). Whoa. I had heard from one of Mel's friends that it was still snowy, but this guy was saying the snow was up to the picnic tables! We're not there til the end of the week... but Crater Lake could be adventurous... and cold.

I parked at a pullout next to the river and did a short hike down to the water's edge. The Smith River is the largest undammed river in the United States.... lucky becuase most of it falls within a national forest or national park (I think I drove a great length of it on 199). I stopped at a redwood carving place to see if I could get a peice of wood for James to turn, but he was not interested in selling me any because he wanted to turn them all himself... and his bowls did not look nearly as nice as James's.

I continued on and on 199 east. The road wound (winded?) through the gorge next to the river with canyon walls so high that most of the time I could not see blue sky. I had left the redwoods behind and most of these were douglas firs, still bigger than east coast trees. I stopped at the Welcome to Oregon sign, but there was no visitor center. I got tired of listening to fuzzy radio stations so I actually listened to my frog call cd a couple of times to study for my upcoming test. Frog calls are pretty boring until you try describing what they sound like - one of them sounds like wet flip flops.

Eventually I came to Cave Junction to make the turn towards Oregon Caves National Monument... 19 miles up around a 35mph curvy hairpin road I made it to the parking lot. I was able to get on a tour that started in 15 minutes so I only spent a few minutes wandering around the historic chateau with the stream running through the middle of it.

Oregon Caves National Monument is pretty unique because the caves are made of marble, the metamorphosed form of limestone that most other caves are made of... other than that its pretty much like other caves you and I have seen. This one does have a fast flowing stream barreling through it which made the first part of the tour have a nice soundtrack. The formations are similar to other cave formations and it was a nice tour. I had a small group which was nice and the ranger was very knowledgeable and had previously worked at Carlsbad.

After Oregon Caves, it was seeing where I could get to. I headed north to Grants Pass where I found out that you don't pump your own gas in Oregon. Then I got on 5 north for a bit, stopping at a place my book recommended called Heaven on Earth Bakery. They have cinnamon rolls there as big as some of Karrie's wedding cakes! I got a small one, a marionberry pie, and a coffee for early dinner and hit the road again. Mind you that all of this driving is through mountains and is quite pretty.

I took 42 west to get back to the ocean on another pretty road winding through the mountains and eventually reached Coos Bay and the Pacific Ocean. Couldn't really see the ocean because of the monstrous sand dunes of Oregon Dunes National Wildlife Refuge, but I could smell it. Traveling north on 101 was up and down hills with the sand dunes or trees to the left and lakes and more hills covered in trees to the right. Pretty peaceful - that and I have discovered very few people are on the road after 5pm.

101 winds up the coast and sometimes you can see the Pacific and sometimes you can't. I was heading for Newport to surf with Sev and Alyssa and didn't have time to stop anywhere (and nothing was really open), so I admired the views of the coast with the setting sun. Had to stop this place though because there were like 7 places with this name - a campground, boat ramp, trail head etc... and it made me giggle. Sound it out.