The long haul home

We spent last night in Coeur d'Lane Idaho and we are camped tonight in a delightful National Forest campground about 50 miles east of Idaho Falls. We drove over 400 miles, through Montana mostly. The speed limit in Montana is 80, and the roads are excellent. We stopped for lunch near an alfalfa field and let the dogs out for a run. They went bounding out in grass over their heads and it took over half an hour to find them!

This will probably be our last cool night. With 900 miles to go, we start the long push for home.

Liz Meyer

Point Roberts

As small towns go, Point Roberts, Washington is one of America's best kept secrets. In 1864, when the United States and Great Britain made an agreement to draw the borders of Canada and the United States along the 49th parallel, nature provided one small glitch – a point of land about 9 square miles big, attached to mainland Canada lies just below the 49th parallel. This small town, surrounded by water on three sides and Canada to its north, is Point Roberts. One has to go through customs to enter.
Most of the residents keep a boat in the well-kept marina and travel to Seattle or the San Juan Islands from their town.

We took the night Ferry from Nanaimo, Vancouver Island over to the mainland of Canada and drove down to Point Roberts late at night. The next morning we found the place so enjoyable we changed our schedule and drove around enjoying the parks, views and the town.  If one loved the sea, this would be the town to retire to.

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Whale watching!

While the folks in 29 Palms and Phoenix were suffering with record heat, we were getting dressed to stay warm and dry on our all-day excursion around the discovery islands. What a day it was! We were fortunate enough to run into two humpback whales frolicking off the southern point of Quadra Island. For 15 minutes they would dive deep and come up breaching, swim around slapping their dorsal fins, which were bigger than I am, blowing a spray from their blow holes, and doing it all around our little boat! Wow! How do you top that?? Well, the day didn't end there. We were able to stay down wind of a grizzly bear and get quite close to him on the shore, also a black bear, a small herd of elk, and lots of eagles. We had a picnic lunch on the porch of a small country store on the remote end of an island and all day long enjoyed spectacular waterfalls and scenery. This day was definitely a highlight of our trip.

Quadra Island B.C.

Liz Meyer From the porch of Fred and Kristine's house, the view is breathtaking- all day long we can watch the eagles fishing and lots of seals sunning on the rocks at low tide. To the west the distant mountains are snow covered, then nothing but green trees in between. To the immediate West is a privately owned island that is inhabited by only one family. This island is the sanctuary for the Eagles that fish right below us. The currents in this inland waterway are amazing as the tide ebbs and flows, there are amazing water flows with whirlpools and strong currents. We leave within the hour for an all-day boat trip around these islands in search of whales, bears, and whatever we may find. Stay tuned.

Best Dad Ever!

Liz Meyer There is a reason I inadvertently call my son Jeff by his father's name "Dave". Like his dad, Jeff is intelligent, fun loving, kind, and very wise.
On this trip I have watched him get up an hour before his daughters to walk the dog, get their breakfast and organize camp. This whole trip was planned by him and every detail has worked out well ( except when I tried to find a campground in Portland) he is patient with his girls but also very engaged in teaching them and giving them wonderful experiences. There are no guide books on how to be a great dad, but you know one when you see him. Happy Father's Day to all the other great Dads. Love, Liz

Olympic Forest National Park

Liz Meyer Driving for miles in a forest with every imaginable shade of green, alongside a lake shining every shade of blue, under a sky of blue with white puffy clouds, and all of it spiked with bright sunlight made the 30 or so mile trip into Sol Duc Hot Springs campground a most pleasurable journey. We count ourselves fortunate with the sunshine, because, looking around, the prevalent moss covering everything hints at the amount of rain that occurs in these parts. Looking up, the height of these pines makes one dizzy. To be sure, we have left the desert behind!

A rainy day in camp

While there is a hot weather warning for 29 palms, I am sitting in my van, under a blanket, with the heater on, and rain outside. The weather isn't perfect all the time, regardless of where you are. We are in an RV camp in Pualsbro, Washington. The region is an historic logging area, founded in the 1800s. The town is charming. Letting the weather dictate the day, we slept in and went to a Norwegian bakery in town for a late breakfast, bought supplies, and came back to enjoy a quiet afternoon in camp.

With lots of time for reflection, I smile at my blessings of good health, my wonderful van, and the opportunities they both offer me for adventure. A special aspect of this trip is traveling with my son Jeff and his two girls, Lauren and Katelyn. They are great travel companions. We will pack up and travel again tomorrow, still heading north.

Liz Meyer

Back in the forest!

Liz Meyer Ahh....camping - i'm back in love with it! An easy drive yesterday brought us to this campsite next to Bainbridge Island, Washington. The island has a delightful little town with a major ferry service across the sound to Seattle. We are camped in a redwood forest with beautiful trees and ferns. We plan to stay three nights here, so we arrived in time to set up a comfortable camp. Later today we will take the ferry into Seattle for some sightseeing. Life is good!
NOTE: if you are interested, the address to my blog site is: liz.meyer.920.vango@blogspot.com. Signing up will assure you get each blog.

Portland

Not every day of a camping trip is stellar. This day ends with the hope that we never have another day like it! It started in the beautiful National Forest near Shasta with the only sounds being the waterfalls nearby. With our day's destination being a campground near Portland, I decided to be helpful and search for one, so that we could set our GPS coordinates for the day. Googling "RV campgrounds - Portland OR" gave me a list from which to choose. Only one had a rating (4 star), so I picked it. It's name was "caravan studios", a strange name, which should have been my first red flag. The second red flag should have been it's address – in the middle of Portland. But how could google be wrong? Hitting Portland at 5 o'clock put us in the nightmarish rush-hour traffic, searching for a campground that turned out to be a theater in the middle of the city! Thank goodness for the radios that Jeff and I communicate with, or we would still be looking for each other in that city! We fortunately found each other and a parking lot big enough for Jeff and his trailer and my van to pull in to recover from the trauma, and decide on Plan B, which was to keep on driving up into Washington, adding more hours on to what already was a long day! We finally found a park with one space left, which we were able to squeeze both our rigs into. Instead of waterfall sounds we will be sleeping tonight with the sounds of I-5 just across the wall! On a brighter note we are safe and all's well that ends well – sort of. Good night! Liz

Liz Meyer

McCloud, CA Lake

Liz Meyer The rain chased us, faced us, and skirted us all day, but in the end we were rewarded with a perfect camp site, just short of Shasta. Upon entering the campground, we were enticed by signs to the "upper falls" and the "lower falls" of the McCloud river. The picture is of the lower falls, not so impressive after seeing the Rogue falls west of June Lake. It is cool and beautiful! Love, Liz

June Lake

Have you ever seen a flying crane? Not the bird type, but helicopter type. Wow! What an impressive machine! After settling in to our campsite at June lake, we drove west up the canyon to find that the June Lake ski resort has been converted into the staging area for this behemoth helicopter. Designed to attach and transport big tanks of water for firefighting, it is now being repurposed to carry big equipment up the mountain ridge to try and contain a waterfall gone rogue with the heavy spring runoff. The waterfall is immense and clearly outside the limits of its normal range. Down below where we were, both sides of the road are swamped with runoff, rarely, if ever, seen before. There is still a lot of snow up there and warmer weather coming.

We had a great day, we have a delightful campsite at Oh Ridge, and we are now settling in for an early start tomorrow.
Love,
Liz Meyer