Final leg of the four month adventure.
We had breakfast with my cousin, then we had to say good-bye and head for home. We are planning to make these next few days travel days so we can get home by the weekend. As we left Arlington, which is north of Seattle, the traffic became very heavy going through the Seattle area, even though we took the freeway that went around the main part of town. Things cleared up the farther we got south of the Seattle metropolitan area, then we went into Portland, OR. It had just as much traffic as Seattle with stop and go for miles. It was only Wed., but we think there were some folks trying to get a jump on the Labor Day Holiday weekend, as well as the usual work day traffic. We spent Wed. night in Albany, OR at the Blue Ox RV Park. It was a very nice camp with concrete pads and a cute little seating area with the blue ox mascot and a nice shady area to sit and enjoy the surroundings.
On Thursday morning, we continued traveling south toward California. Driving on I-5, we heard a strange sound. We looked around and, just next to us, a tent trailer blew a tire as he was passing us on the left. We slowed down so he could get to the right side of the highway shoulder, then we stopped to check if anything had hit us and to help, if they needed it. It turned out that this was a younger couple with three girls age about 6 - 11. They were heading to Crater Lake, OR, from their home in Seattle, for the Labor Day Holiday. We assisted some while the dad of the family changed the tire. We had had blow outs on other trailers, so we knew what they were going through and they were glad to have our company on the busy highway.
Once we got on the road again, we followed this RV from Oregon and were trying to figure out what they were carrying on the back of their CRV. When we enlarged the photo, we could see that there was a name on the items. It turns out that these are some very expensive recumbent tricycles that are hanging on the bike rack bottom to bottom. They are by a company called Catrike, if you care to look it up online.
Everything was going very smoothly until just after we got into CA. You may know that California is in the third year of a drought and the forests are primed to burn because they are so dry. Well, there are several very large fires burning in Northern CA and southern Oregon right now. Here is what the sun looked like.
I did not crop or enhance or color the above photos on purpose. This is the color that the sun looked through the smoke. You didn't need sunglasses to look at it because the smoke from the many wild fires in the northern part of the state was so thick. A couple times it completely blocked the sun. While I was sorting through my many photos, I noticed that I could see what looked like sunspots, which really surprised me, since I do not have a real fancy camera. It is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-2525. Basically I use it as a point and shoot camera and adjust the automatic scene setting once in awhile. Anyway, I did some enhancing of the following photo and if you enlarge it, but not too much, and look closely near the center of the sun, there are two sunspots that can be seen as darker dots to the left and right just below the center. Moving the screen on the laptop back and forth to change the angle that you see the picture may help you see the dots more easily, also.
Now that you know where to look, they can also be seen in the first sun picture, above, but you have to look closely. Below, you can see how thick the smoke was that the sun was trying to shine through. That is smoke, not clouds.
It was so dark from the smoke in the sky, that traffic had to turn on their headlights and the street lights came on, too.
Eventually, we got past the plumes of smoke, but we could not see Mt. Shasta or Mt. Lassen, the two higher mountains that are usually snow capped. Mt. Shasta is reasonably close to I-5 and is easily seen on clear days. Mt. Lassen is farther away and not as high, but is also easily seen on a clear day. I told you that we are in a drought in California and Lake Shasta, a huge reservoir, is the lowest that we have ever seen it. They do have to let water out to fill the Sacramento River to provide the fish with water to swim and spawn in, but soon they will not even be able to do that.
We spent Thursday night at the Redding RV Park in Redding, CA. This campsite is located on a terraced hillside. They claim to have views of Mt. Shasta and Mt. Lassen, but there was no viewing in the distance, while we were there. The atmosphere had way too much smoke. I took this photo just before we closed up to leave on Fri. morning. My guess is that, if we could see one or both mountains, it would show up in the distance at the right of the picture.
The rest of the drive home was uneventful, except for heavy traffic near Sacramento and in the Bay area. It is, after all, getaway day for the Labor Day weekend.
We have been home for a few weeks now and I am trying to catch up with my blog. If you have been following us, there is more to come as I try to add new photos and info by back dating the posts to when they actually happened. Stay tuned for updates.
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