By this Author: brendagerber07

Day 17 on the road from here to there. (Ft Bragg to Santa Rosa) Since we were a little ahead of schedule on the “Master plan”, today was empty of activities. We knew we needed to get to Santa Rosa for the night, but we really didn't have plans for the morning hours. Wynn said that these kind of days always make him a little nervous, so we try to look for “gems” along the way that are unexpected. I used the Alltrails app and found a hike along the Mendocino Headlands trail. We read up on several blogs about the path and figured this was one we could do. It was just shy of 4 miles and started in a Presbyterian church parking lot.

Of course when we woke up, we couldn't even see across the drive of our hotel. The misty fog still fascinates me. I can't figure how it can settled so hard and then around the bend be clear and sunny. We saw both on our trail today. We got up as usual and had our breakfast before packing up the Van. We drove about 10 miles up the road to the church and discovered that this was a popular location. The trail to the left went down to a beach and surfers were busy here. We took the trail to the right and found a wonderful gem in the fog. You will see some pics of the rugged terrain and rocks jutting out of the water. There will be some roaring surf, so use your imagination or check out the videos on FB. There was foaming water, light blue pockets of water, caves and natural bridges. Some pics will be clear and some will be filled with fog. Enjoy the walk along the Mendocino trail.

Wynn and I did not climb down the narrow stairs that led to the waters edge…no guardrails either! Did you feel the spray in the air as you walked along with us? We saw some skunk cabbage, blackberries and pretty flowers as we trekked along.

When we finished the trail, the fog had really settled again so we finished our walk by going through the town to get back to our vehicle. We saw some very old water towers and the Cal Fire truck in town.

So then we spent about an hour winding down Hwy 128 towards Santa Rosa. We drove through another beautiful forest of Redwoods and saw a lot of winding signs. We once again took advantage of the “turnout” spots for slower vehicles so the locals could speed down the curly road.

Once again we saw some huge logs of Redwood at the lumber mills. As we finished the drive from the forest, the terrain changed again into headlands and vineyards as far as the eye could see. We have arrived in Winemaking country and we passed many wineries and tasting rooms. I will need to read up on when the grapes are harvested here. I cannot believe how many acres of grapevines we saw and can't imagine how much pruning would need to be done.

Upon arriving in Santa Rosa, we had the hankering for BBQ the last few days. I looked up a place only 2 exits from our hotel that had great reviews- The Red Bee BBQ. It was a BBQ Fusion place and the pulled pork, coleslaw and cornbread was outstanding! Plus they had a lunch deal going that worked great for us! It was in the 70's and we were able to eat outside the joint. The positive reviews were not wrong!

When we got to the Holiday Inn Express, we check in and found out the elevator was on the fritz. We made a few trips up the stairs and it didn't hurt us any. Wynn got busy grilling Brats and hamburgers for the next few nights in Mariposa and Yosemite.
Now it is time to watch the Guardians. We have not seen any of their playoff games yet but have kept up with scores. We just hope to sit with our feet up, drink some water so we don’t get dehydrated and cheer on the Tribe! Nice to have an early night…
Wandering through the grape country,
Wynn and Brenda

We continue to find wild, weird and wonderful things to do on our adventure. Today was no different. I love Pinterest and find all kinds of things to consider when researching a new area and looking for things to do. I found the Skunk Train on Pinterest several months ago. Wynn and I took the pumpkin tour that left Willets, CA at 10:30am. We had to take yet another winding road for about an hour to get to the station.

The station was a quaint little building with several murals and of course a gift shop. We saw the conductor making his rounds and checking off his list before we heard the “All Aboard!”

We handed in our tickets to get punched and also were given a little goody bag. We chose seats on the left because the reviews said the scenery was better from this side. We agreed. I told Wynn that I kept thinking that someone was watching me…it was this little scarecrow just above my line of vision. Oh my…silliness!

As we left the station, we passed under the city arch, the award winning campground and the lumberyard. You could smell the wood. we saw the deciduous trees turning golden before heading out of town and into the pine/redwood forests.

We wound around and through the mountain. Wynn and I headed into the open air car when it was time to go through the tunnel. We saw redwoods up close and personal as we rode through the narrow trail.

Only two wildlife sightings …

When we got to the midway point of our trip we disembarked while the train engine got moved to the back of the train to take us home. We were let off into a little pumpkin land where each of us could pick out a pumpkin and get some fall pics taken. We passed on the pumpkins since we didn't want to carry them in the van all around the country. But we did take a few pics.(of course)

I took that last pic to show how blue the sky was! It was low 60’s today and just beautiful. We did find Mr Skunk's home on the way down.

It was called Skunk Train in 1925 when the trains transitioned from steam locomotion to self propelled rail cars. Locals started calling them skunks because of their pungent odor produced by gasoline and the oil burning potbellied stoves on board. Folks said “you could smell them before you could see them.”

When the ride was finished, we headed back to Ft Bragg, stopping at the Sea Glass Museum in town. I knew my grand kids would want to know about Glass Beach. I saved a pamphlet from the museum to show them. After lunch, we drove to Glass Beach and spent a couple of hours walking the shoreline, climbing up and down and bending over looking for glass. This beach used to be the town dump until 1967. The ocean waves continue to break down the glass and smooth the rough edges. We found a small bag full. Then we just sat on a piece of driftwood made into a bench and watched the waves, listened to the birds and relaxed. What a great way to spend the afternoon.

So as the fog rolls in again, our sunset will not be visible. We say goodnight from Glass Beach…
Loving the Wandering,
Wynn and Brenda

We have been looking forward to Day 15 for awhile now. So when we woke up this morning and looked outside we were disappointed to see rain steadily falling. Wynn, bless his heart, loaded the car in the rain while I checked the weather apps to see if the rain would clear. As we drove out, it was still raining lightly, so we had high hopes. There was a lot of mist/fog in the air as we started heading up and down Hwy 101.

We saw some rugged coastline, and look closely at that last pic, there was a small ribbon of blue sky! We pulled into the parking lot of the Trees of Mystery and Paul Bunyan and Babe were there to greet us. We decided the weather was not cooperating and we didn't want to wait for another hour for the park to open. We kept driving.

We left Hwy 101 and turned into the Avenue of the Giants. We were immediately awed by the trees in front of us!

We stopped at the entrance and picked up an auto touring guide which proved to be very helpful. It gave us 10 points of interests and listed some hikes to take as well. We stopped at the first site and it was a hike through the forest. I talked to a gal just walking in and she said it was the prettiest of all the hikes in the region. She said she hikes here all the time. It was just under 3 miles of beautiful, quiet trails through the forest floor. And can you believe that it stopped raining and we did not get wet!! Thank you, Jesus!

We saw some interesting shapes and items as we walked along. Doesn't the first one look like a unicorn? The benches along the way were carved out of large logs. We saw huge clover patches and soft green ferns. The scene here certainly looked like something out of the past. I believe some of Jurassic Park was filmed in the Redwood fern patches.

The walk was just magical…

We took a second trail overlook and ran into a marathon/ten K race. We still saw the bridge, but the river was low.

We stopped to see the marker of the flood pole from December 1964. The first pic is the marker and the second one shows the height of the flood. Look all the way up to the striped line at the top.

We stopped in at the visitor center and took pics of the three kinds of Big trees. The Sequoias are not natural to this area, but some were planted to show the difference.

Our final walk of the day was at the Founder's Tree and Trail. The founder tree is 3461 feet tall and 12.7 feet in diameter. We walked around the trail and also saw the giant downed tree. We walked along the whole length.

We drove out of the Avenue of the Giants and back onto Hwy 101. It was still extremely winding and we had to go slow. I really wanted to go to the Chandelier Tree, even though we knew our van would not fit through. We still wanted to walk through and see this huge tree. The park also had some interesting carvings. I especially loved the underside of the drive through.

We are staying the next two nights in Fort Bragg. Our hotel is called the Seabird Lodge. We are glad to be in one place for two nights. We went out to dinner at a little place called Angelino's. Wynn had a Reuben sandwich and I had a roast beef. So good! Then we watched OSU lose to Oregon. So bad! Now we are ready to head to bed. We go down early and wake at 7am pretty much every morning. Tomorrow will be no different as we have a morning train ride.

So good night from Ft Bragg…
Wandering southward,
Wynn and Brenda

Good morning from Medford, Oregon! As you can see if you have been paying attention daily to the blog, I did not post yesterday. We spent a delightful day with our niece, Carissa, her husband Dylan and their 5 month old son, Dashiell. We will honor their request to not post any pics of Dash, but we can show you the wildlife we encountered when we pulled into their development.

Wynn got up early enough to go get our oil changed as the little light thingy flashed on last evening. Then we headed to Carissa's and spent the day playing with the baby, visiting, playing with the baby, going for a walk in the neighborhood, laundry and did I mention playing with the baby. It was so fun to be around a baby again and to see Carissa and Dylan as parents. They are doing a great job. Dash is a little mover and shaker and laughs out loud when Uncle Wynn plays alligator with him. They have a little dog, named Teddy who likes to chase the acorn woodpeckers off the house. We caught up on all the birds there in Medford. Veggie pizza completed our evening and we had to say goodbye. What a sweet time to catch up and slow down for a day.

Our adventure today (day 14) started with a beautiful and somewhat harrowing drive to the Oregon Caves. We stopped at the visitor center and found we did not have to buy tickets there but 28 miles down the road (50 minute drive) to the actual entrance. I kept my eyes on the road as Wynn skillfully got us up and up and up the mountain.

We saw this cute little waterfall outside the entrance so I included it. We also had a friendly deer on the path who let me take her pic. President Taft set aside this National monument. Our tour guide, Gweneth did a great job telling us all the cave tour rules…mostly just, “Don't touch the cave walls!”

As we went in the entrance of the cave, we were told that this was an unusual cave because it was limestone baked into marble and the walls and ceiling were quite beautiful. Of course there stalactites and stalagmites as well as other cave formations.

My personal favorite was called cave bacon.

Wynn and I had decided early that we were only going to go for the first half of the tour. This tour was listed as moderately strenuous. We did the moderate part and left before the strenuous part. We saw enough to be wowed! But not so much that we were wiped out. There are cave critters and insects that live in this cave…thankfully we didn't see any. The big eared bats are the most common.

So we climbed out through this exit and headed back to the visitor center before having lunch by the forest. We have eaten our lunch in a lot of interesting locations for sure!

We made our way back down the winding mountain road and had about an hour's drive into California. We certainly did enjoy our stay in Oregon and saw a magnificent display of God's creation. We both have remarked how thankful we are for the great weather we have enjoyed and the safety on the roadways. Today we saw a guy taking these winding roads in a motor home. Even though the signs said NO! What a nut!

It wasn't long into California before we entered the Redwood National and State Parks. We stopped at an info station and were given a great tip for a drive off the beaten path and a walk along the river and the floor of a forest grotto. We were blown away!!
The redwood trees are soooo huge, (tall and in diameter)

As we drove out of the pathway and back onto Rt 101 we passed through a couple of tunnels and bridges. We entered Crescent City and got settled into our hotel, The Westward Inn. We decided to make Aunt Joleen's pizza casserole for dinner, complete with Hawaiian rolls. Tomorrow we are looking to drive the Avenue of the Giants.

So tonight we have wandered as far west as we can go. California coastline is beautiful. 2 weeks in the book and enjoying it all!

Wynn and Brenda

This pic says it all…Crater Lake did not disappoint! I am so glad that we took the extra time to come back inland to see this beautiful location. We drove around 4 hours East from Bandon and followed the Umpqua River through and around the mountains. Wynn once again is my hero because he did all of the driving. There were many places where the road was skinny, high up in the mountains with no guard rails! I told myself to breathe and relax, while holding tight to my seat. I really didn't realize how nervous I am in the heights! Although we woke up to a thick misting and fog in Bandon, we drove out of it and God gave us the most beautiful blue skies.

As we got closer to the North entrance of Crater Lake, we drove through several burned hillsides…looked like a tree cemetery. It was eerie looking! We also saw Mount Thielsen peeking through the burned trunks. We decided to come in the North entrance and started down the west rim. I took a pic of the map so that we would know where the points of interest were. There was no one manning the north entrance.

The first thing that impressed us here were the mountains surrounding us in front and behind.

But once we saw the Lake, there was no turning back. I absolutely could have sat and stared all day. We were sooo high up that I stayed firmly behind the fence line. We decided to take the East Rim drive since we had so much sunshine. The lake was the truest blue and took my breath away the first view I had! I am just going to post a ton of pics and hope you get a glimpse of what we saw.

There were a couple of islands in the middle of Crater Lake. One was small and looked like castle peaks from afar.

The big island in the middle is called Wizard Island and it is actually a volcano. Since Crater Lake was made when a volcano imploded, that makes Wizard Island a volcano inside of a volcano. Here are some fun facts about Crater Lake. It is the deepest lake in the United States. It does not have any streams or rivers flowing into it. The water is replenished by rain and snow. This is why the color stays so blue. (No impurities coming in from other sources. Since blue is not absorbed by the water like red, yellow and green are, the water reflects the blue light back to us. There are fish in Crater Lake, such as rainbow trout and Kokanee salmon. I read that there is black bear, elk, cougars and mountain lions in the park,but we did not see them. We also didn't see any bald eagles or golden eagles. This was not for lack of trying!
We did see one small waterfall along the drive. (Vidae Falls)

We stopped at the Rim visitor center and saw this little guy, but that was it for the wildlife.

As we drove out I did wonder at all the little stacks of dead wood along the way. I wonder if they come in and collect it all. Seems to me it would be a fire hazard. The wildfire alert was at moderate in the park today. I can't imagine the destruction one cigarette butt could bring.

Here are a few more photos just because.

We drove out the south end of the park and headed to Medford. Tomorrow we will see Dylan and Carissa and meet Dashiel (Dash) .
We are staying at a Ramada in town and are glad that we will be somewhere for two nights before having to load back up the Red Van Baron.

As we drove along, we once again saw beautiful river sights as we followed the river down the mountains.

Goodnight from Medford.
Wandering in circles…
Wynn and Brenda