Our trip is winding down as we head into the final stretch, a few days spent with my son Keith and family in Houston, TX. We will head back to KY next weekend. It's been a wonderful trip filled with so many special memories for Jeryl and I. We've seen new places and experienced the wonders of Mother Nature up close. We will both treasure the memories we've made for years to come.
I haven't been able to keep up with the blog due to a lack of internet at our KOA's. I'm a few days behind so I am only going to write about the highlights. I'm also going to include a couple more videos within this entry. So keep reading and enjoy.
The first video is taken in Glacier National Park, in Montana, and is of a river running through one area, and of the continental divide we made it to, despite my tears and fears. The 2nd video shows my attempts to drive the jeep through a Redwood tree in California, with Jeryl videoing. She later told me she wouldn't have been brave enough to drive through the tree and I thought, "oh, great, now she tells me." That probably would have made me scared too but I'm glad I did attempt and drove through. It was pretty harrowing.
Now onto my blog entry: Our drive down the Oregon Coast into California was absolutely breath-takingly beautiful. We were high above the Pacific Ocean and had a bird's eye view of the coast line. Near the shore, huge black rocks sat like silent, ancient guardians. I had never seen a coast with boulders before and I never grew tired of gazing at it as we drove along. We made it to our KOA in Cresent City, CA for the evening and stayed in a cabin right in the midst of the giant trees. It was a story book setting indeed. We almost expected to see a dragon perched atop one of the majestic trees or Hansel and Gretel come skipping up, looking for the gingerbread cottage.
After checking in, we drove over to the Redwood National Forest and were amazed at the height of the giant trees. We stopped here and there to snap pictures. At one point we stopped and got out, walked a trail through the forest and had so much fun seeing all the giant trees spreading out before us. It was very quiet and felt very ancient, like we had stepped back in time. Each tree seemed to tower over the one before it. Jeryl and I tried to figure out the width around a couple of the trees and we stood with our arms spread wide and circled the tree, counting. One tree took us each 6 times to get around and back to each other, for a total of 12 body widths.
That night we enjoyed a campfire at our cabin, sitting among the giant trees. It was a cool evening but the campfire and the towering trees made it very cozy.
The next day we headed to San Francisco but took a side trip to see a redwood you could drive through. It cost $5 to see and drive through the tree. I was the brave one and Jeryl took the video and pictures. I was worried about my jeep fitting through but Jeryl kept assuring me I was fine. I had to fold in my rear view mirrors and I drove very slowly as I watched on both sides to make sure I wouldn't scrape the paint off. It was scary and I thought to myself that if I got stuck, there would be no way for me to get out of the vehicle. But I made it safely through and it was so much fun, I did it again.
Our trip to San Francisco took about 4 hours longer than we thought, due to traveling on a 22 mile curvy road to the coast and back. We wanted to drive the Pacific Coast Highway one more time, but to get to it, we had to leave our interstate and travel across the 22 mile road. It took us about 2 hours to get to the coast highway. We drove along it for another hour and decided we had enough of the heights and curves. Back another 2 hours to the interstate and on to Frisco, where we arrived about 11PM at night. Another long day on the road. The check-in clerk said it should have taken us about 4 hours to get to Frisco, instead we took 11 hours with all the little, curvy, mountain roads we had driven on. A word of advice, stay on the main interstate when traveling in California. We sure learned our lesson!
We stayed in Frisco for 2 nights. We took a tour of Frisco the next day, from 9am til 6pm. That was a great way to see the city and not have to drive. Some of the places we saw: the Golden Gate Bridge, Ghirardelli Square, The Presedio, Pier 39, Haigh Ashbury, Seal Rocks, Pacific Heights, The Crooked Street, a cable car, and Fisherman's Wharf. We got to ride a cable car down a couple steep streets and that was alot of fun. They are actually run on cables in the ground. I'll include a video of that and the Golden Gate Bridge tomorrow.
We also stopped at the bridge and got to walk out on it. The height made it very hard for me to walk out very far but I at least wanted to say I had been on it. We could see the old prison, Alcatraz, in the distance, silent and alone, the prisoners long gone. As we stood looking out at the bay, the bridge swayed and groaned beneath us as thousands of vehicles traveled across. That feeling was a little unnerving so we headed back to the safety of our bus and the parking lot.
It was alot of fun seeing the city and all the neat houses, packed so close together. We learned each house has to be built with 1 inch between it and the houses on either side. It's a city code. That's how close most of the houses in the city are. We passed the little park area that is shown in the opening of the old series, Full House, and I recognized it before the tour driver mentioned it. It was smaller than it looked in the show. For lunch we stopped at the Fisherman's Wharf and Jeryl and I ate at a Johnny Rockets, which is a 50s-like diner. We ate at the counter and the food was great. We had 2 hours to walk around and see the shops. At one spot, you could see many sea lions basking in the sun out in the bay and Jeryl snapped a few pictures. The tour ended with a drive through the Presidio, an old military base that is now public housing.
From Frisco, we headed to Vegas for 2 days. We stayed at Circus Circus, a popular hotel on the strip featuring circus acts every 45 minutes in a free area in the arcade. The hotel is filled with resturants, casinos, shops, and a big arcade and amusement park area for the kids. A highlight of that stay was meeting a fellow teacher, Janene Smith, from Palmdale, CA. Our 6th graders have corresponded as pen pals the past 2 years. I had never met Janene, but randomly picked her class from a pen pal site. I contacted her when I knew we would be coming through her area and she came to Vegas for one night to meet us. We had a nice supper together and she spent part of the next day with us too. It was great fun getting to meet my "pen pal." We have some ideas for this year's pen pals, including email and a possible web cam conference. We didn't do much gambling except for penny slots. We won $20 but mostly just enjoyed the atmosphere and people watching.
On the 4th of July, my son Michael's 23rd birthday, we headed out of Vegas and onto Arizona, where we stayed in Benson for the night. We arrived in time to get some sandwiches at the local Subway and then head to the city park for their fireworks show. It was a beautiful 30 minute show. Oh, another highlight of our stay was seeing 2 tarantulas up close. I couldn't believe how big they were. Probably bigger than a hand spread out. Jeryl spotted the first one and we watched it for awhile. She dropped her car keys near it to get a size perspective and she took pictures. Later as we walked to the bathroom, we saw another. Of course I just knew one was going to get inside our cabin that night and I took care to look under the beds and check the walls. As far as I know, we slept tarantula-free that night....hopefully.
Today, Sunday, we drove to Van Horne, TX and got in fairly early for us, about 5:30. We had time to relax and get some food at the local grocery store for supper. Our KOA has AC and a tv, so we are in 7th heaven. Tomorrow we head to Houston......hurray!!!! Enjoy the videos that follow.....
Happy Trails, R & J
