( Mileage Today 8)

Tomorrow??? 

Clean Car

Jen identified these as Steller Jay's

Now Jen - What is this little one?

 

(Total Mileage – Over 5899 to date) – Yesterday, Wednesday, we drove from Santa Rosa, through Oakland and east to the edge of the Sierra Nevada mountains.  We are staying in Oakhurst, CA about 15 miles from the south gate of Yosemite.    On Thursday morning we headed into the park and first visited the Mariposa grove of Sequoias. These trees are fantastic!!

 

 

 *******Sequoias and the coastal Redwoods we saw early are part of the same family.  They are both members of the Cyprus family.  The redwoods are the tallest trees in the world but the Sequoias are the biggest living things based on their overall girth and height.  It’s also noteworthy that the Redwoods have great commercial value for their lumber while the Sequoias don’t have such commercial value.*******  

 After a hike through the Sequoia grove we headed north to Yosemite Valley.  On  the way we got a real close look at a black bear which crossed the road ahead of us and then stopped to look things over.   The Yosemite pictures will have to tell the story of the valley.  It was great seeing all the place we had heard about like El Capitan and Half Dome.  We spent the day in the valley and then headed up to Glacier Point for a late view of the valley.   

 

Crossing the bay into Oakland

Headed to the Sierra Nevada range

 

Mariposa Grove

Mariposa Grove of Sequoias

California Tree Hugger

California Tunnel Tree

Black bear crossing

Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View

Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View

El Capitan from the valley

Telephoto view of El Capitan - 60 feet from the top!!!

Views at the Ahwahnee Hotel

Guest at lunch at the Ahwahnee Hotel

El Capitan

Mule Deer

Half Dome from Glacier point

Yosemite Falls from Glacier Point- not much water

Blue Birds- Jen???

Hiding out in the rocks on Glacier Point

(Total Mileage – Over 5500 to date) – Yesterday, Monday, we drove down US101 the “Redwood Highway” into the Sonoma valley and to Santa Rosa.  The area and the weather are beautiful – fields and fields of grapes.  Today we drove through the Sonoma and Napa Valley areas to see the countryside and do a little wine sampling.  It was a really nice day & I did buy a few bottles after careful research.  I think the highlight for Patti was finding that one of the vineyards had some sheep also.

 Tomorrow we drive to YOSEMITE!

BIGFOOT Again!! - We can't seem to git rid of this guy!

Redwood Highway

 

Entering wine country

Monday Dinner at “The Brasserie” in Santa Rosa

Wine Country views

Wine Country views

Patti's favorites

Patti, take me home!

Wine Country

Wine Country

Wine Country

Sonoma Lake

Coppola Winery

Coppola Winery

Coppola Winery

Lunch at IN-N-OUT Burger brought back memories of our time in San Diego

(Total Mileage – 5135 to date) —  EUREKA!!! — We have gone over 5000 miles and we are in Eureka, CA.    Patti & I walked on the beach in Bandon, OR before heading south on highway 101.  The coast is dramatic with large rock formations in the sand. 

 We entered California near Crescent City and went into the Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park.  We drove in about 7 miles to the Stout Memorial Grove – an area of ancient & giant redwoods.  We hope you enjoy the pictures but it’s hard to capture the effect of this giant forest.  As we drove into the area we felt we were entering another world – or a Spielberg movie set.  I was awestruck by the experience and we thoroughly enjoyed the 1/3 mile walk through the grove.  The closing song at mass the other night was “America the Beautiful” – as we see the beauty of our country on this trip that song has an new and deeper meaning – we have much to thank God for.

 We are staying in a great Best Western Hotel on Humboldt Bay in Eureka.  Tomorrow we head into California’s wine country. 

 PS: I added an update on Bigfoot at the end of the pictures.

 ***********Beach views in the morning at Bandon

**********Oregon coast views

**********REDWOODS

Driving through the forest to the grove

That little guy is Tom

About 300 feet up

Just a little taller than Patti - once it's laying down!

Hope that one doesn't fall!

Not a redwood but kind of interesting.

I felt a little small next to these guys!

It's amazing what regular ZUMBA classes can do!

California coast

Elk along the road to Eureka.

 

Sunset over Humbolt Bay from our hotel room.

************BIGFOOT UPDATE*****************

After our encounter yesterday look at the Sunday paper headline that greated us

in Eureka.   I’ll be watching my back in the woods this year!

(Total Mileage – 4922 to date) For the first time on the trip we woke up to some real rain and some very low Oregon cloud cover.   Fortunately we ran out of the rain later.  We also hit a lot of traffic on I5 south out of Portland and it took about 2 hours to make the first 40 miles.  We went south to Eugene, Oregon and then headed west to the coast.  The drive to the coast was through lush forests with a lot of moss on the mostly evergreen trees.  In Florence we had a late seafood lunch, went to Mass at St. Monica’s church in Coos Harbor and are staying the night in Bandon, OR in a nice Best Western with a view (kind of) of the ocean.  I did get down to the beach for a cloudy sunset an a few pictures & we can hear the surf in our room.

 Tomorrow we continue down the coast highway, US101, into California and the Costal Redwoods.

Seems you can reach up and touch the Oregon clouds

Moss covered trees near the coast

Moss covered trees near the coast

Lunch stop in Florence

Florence

Lunch stop in Florence

 

First real look at the Pacific

Fr. Peter O’Brian at St. Monica’s (From Wyoming)

 

*******Evening on the Oregon Coast near Bandon********

(Total Mileage – 4679 to date) We have enjoyed Washington state and learned that it was named for George Washington – never thought of that before.  Patti got very excited when I read her the state motto.  She thought it was “Buy and buy” but it’s really “By and by”. 

 We came up out of Yakima and headed west into the Wenatchee National Forest toward Mount Rainier.  We had a very distant view of the mountain as we were leaving town but didn’t see it again until a great viewpoint high in the range.   We got an number of great pictures. Mount Rainer is really impressive with the view of snow & glaciers near the top.

 We headed further west to I5 closer to the coast and traveled south a while before heading back east to Mount St. Helens. The views, displays and 2 films at the Forest Visitors Center and at the Johnston Ridge Observatory were great.  The mountain erupted May 18, 1980 so there is a lot of recovery in the area.  Even so, the effects are still spectacular and we were able to get much closer to the mountain than we expected.

 We also learned that we went through the area near Mount St. Helens where Bigfoot, “Sasquatch”, lives.  We stopped at small Museum/Gift Shop where they had maps & plaster casts of footprints.  Very impressive!!!  In fact, Patti & I are pretty sure we saw Bigfoot at one place we stopped.  He was driving a very old RV with Alabama license plates.

 We stopped at a Fairfield Inn just below Portland in “Lake Oswego” Oregon.  It was a long day and we are going to rest a bit tomorrow and probably head for Crater Lake.

 

Wenatchee State Forest/Tieton Lake

Mount Rainier

Mount Rainier

Mount Rainier & Handsome couple

Distant view back

Getting close

Lave flow area miles from the mountain

Lave flow area miles from the mountain

View from Johnston Ridge

View from inside Johnston Ridge Observatory

View from Johnston Ridge

One more view on our way out

Bigfoot Headed toward his RV???

Bigger than life

(Total Mileage 4351 to date)  A little over 400 miles from Missoula through Idaho and eastern Washington State to Yakima, WA about 50 miles from Mt. Rainier.   The first picture we got was the sign going into Idaho but we traveled about 60 miles across the narrow part of the state without ever seeing a potato!   

 

To our surprise the eastern part of Washington we drove through is very arid.  The rainy/cloudy part of the state is west of the Cascade mountains. There were a lot of fields (most irrigated) and some cattle but other areas were rocks & tumbleweeds.  Farmers were tilling the fields and raising dust storms as they did.  In one area of about 20 miles there were signs on the various fields indicating the crops being grown.   After 5 hours of traveling this was really exciting.  Crops included Sweet Corn, Field Corn, Alfalfa, Beans, Timothy, Wheat, Garden Beans, Potatoes and even Peppermint

 

 

We crossed the Columbia river over Lake Wanapum named for the Indians who lived in the area.

Lake Wanapum

Not long after we headed into the Yakima area.

I90 Bridge over Lake Wanapum looking south

 

 

Vally north of Yakima

Tomorrow we head out to Rainier.

(Total Mileage 3947 to date)  We left the east side of Glacier NP & drove through the park on the “Going to the Sun Road”  which runs roughly east to west for 50 miles through the park.  On the way we hiked to St. Mary Falls.  It’s impossible to describe how big and beautiful everything is but hopefully the pictures give you some idea.  We continued on to Missoula, Montana and finally found a great little Italian Restaurant, Ciao Mambo, where the food was great.  We miss Italian food & tried to find a place in Great Falls.  The closest we got was a place that claimed to be Italian but under the heading PASTA on the menu the top item was “Macaroni & Cheese”.  We left and went to Applebee’s.     

St. Mary Falls

St. Mary Falls

(Total Mileage 3732 to date)    After a lot of discussion the night before Patti got convinced to try a hike through “Bear Country”.  We had breakfast and left around 9AM for a 2.6 mile hike up to Ptarmigan Falls with an option to continue on another 2.3 miles to Iceberg Lake.  It was a lot of uphill rising from around 4900 ft t o6100.  We did meet some other people on the trail and on couple was about 75 yards ahead of us when we heard them shout and clap.  The noise is supposed to keep the bears away.  A black bear ran across the trail about 35 yards in front of them.  Patti was not disappointed that we didn’t get to see it.  We did get a good SCAT picture to include below.  We made the whole 10 mile round trip, with sightseeing, in about 5 hours.  The last mile was hot and our feet were tired but it was a great trip.  We cleaned up, rested and had a great steak dinner in Babb, Mt. after seeing a black bear on the way.  Then we both finished the evening sipping on a gin & tonic but also got some  good pictures from the lounge balcony around sunset after a brief rainstorm move through.

 

Chippy says "Why do Tom and Patti have to leave Glacier so soon?"

Starting the 5 mile hike up to Iceberg lake

Glacier view

Ptarmigan Falls

Chippy the Columbian Ground Squirrel

View at Ptarmigan Falls

Climbing up to the glacier

Black Bear Scat – FRESH

Climbing up to the glacier

View at Iceberg lake

View at Iceberg lake

View at Iceberg lake

View at Iceberg lake

View at Iceberg lake

Wildflowers

Wildflowers

Wildflowers

Black Bear on the way to dinner

Good Day - Good Night!

(Total Mileage 3705 to date) We left Great Falls and headed northwest into Glacier National Park.  The trip included a lot of farm and range land, gently rolling in some places but getting more dramatic as we neared the park.  There are a few pictures included below but it’s really hard to capture the overall feeling of the land. We entered Glacier and went to our hotel, the “Many Glacier Hotel” built in around 1915 with a Swiss chalet design.  It feels like we are in the Alps. The views are spectacular!!!  After lunch we took a 1 ½ hour boat ride on Swift Current Lake & Lake Josephine.  On the cruse we saw a mountain goat (Ram), a Grizzly Bear with 2 cubs and a loan Black Bear.  It was really exciting.  I did get some pictures of the ram & black bear and we were able to watch them all with our binoculars. We had a lot to talk about while having a great dinner in the Many Glacier Hotel.

Montana Farmland

Montana

Many Glacier Hotel on Swift Current Lake

Views on Swift Current Lake

Views on Swift Current Lake

Views on Lake Josephine

View on Lake Josephine

Mountain Goat – Ram

Black bear

Bird == Ptarmigan???

Hotel area view

Hotel area view

Evening view from balcony on our room

Hotel Lobby