Back to the Heat

Did you wonder if we had fallen of the ends of the earth? Actually, we fell into a beautiful park of trees and chipmunks at Chama, NM. The one drawback to the park was that the Internet was very intermittent. Thus, the reason the blog has not been updated since the wedding. Leaving Olympia, we traveled to Baker City, OR where we visited the Oregon Trail museum which was great. Then we proceeded to Brigham City, UT and Grand Junction, CO on our way to Ouray, CO. There we met Mike and Beth for about 4 days of jeeping and enjoying the mountains. We left for a week in Durango where we rode the train and rested a week. Following that, we moved on to Chama, NM where Chuck trained to be a docent on the Cumbres and Toltec scenic railroad. We stayed there for the rest of the summer and Chuck rode the train 25 times...happy man! I enjoyed the cool, walked the dogs and crafted at a local quilt shop. We were sad to leave when Labor Day came around but it was time to come back to reality. I'm back at work ...busy, busy, busy and wishing summer was here again.

Introducing Mr. and Mrs. Mike Dixon

Hood River

We moved north to the Hood River Valley and found a beautiful county operated campground on the Hood River. It was nestled among vineyards and orchards of all kinds. We rode the Mt. Hood Railroad and rocked along on top of the train in an old dome car. Instead of the clickety-clack we gently swayed and weaved back and forth like a drunken sailor. The view was beautiful. The train stopped at a small park in the town of Parkdale for a dinner of BBQ which was good.

The dogs really enjoyed this park. There were miles and miles of roads (just ask my feet) to walk and plenty of bushes to hide squirrels, rabbits and even a bobcat. Our next stop is Olympia. We should arrive the Sunday before the wedding on Saturday. We will stay in the same park from last year. Hope the sun shines on Saturday.

"Come out, little rabbit"

Yreka, CA to Crater Lake Oregon

Yreka was just a short stop before entering Oregon. Many of California's museums are closed because of their budget crunch. We definitely found that here. The only museum we found open was one at Ft. Jones. It was a nice community museum in a very interesting rock building. The campground was mainly a parking lot but it was new and clean. Best of all there were new shiny washers and dryers for a reasonable cost. This is important when dirty clothes pile up in one small trailer.

We have now moved on to Crater Lake Resort in Oregon. It is a beautiful campground. We have visited a logging museum which was fantastic. It had a number of very interesting old log cabins. We also drove up to Crater Lake National Park. As we climbed to the top of the mountain it was snowing. The lake in the crater of an extinct volcano was shrouded with fog and we did not get many good pictures of it. The snow was still very deep and I guess it will be July before it is gone.

Gorgeous Graeagle, CA

We traveled through some more lovely country and arrived at Graeagle. CA. The campground was nestled in among tall pines and spotlessly clean. The temperature was in the 70’s and the sun shone in a beautiful blue sky. We added two days there because we were meeting some friends from Lincoln, CA, Mike and Joanne and of course, the boys’s friend, Zoe. We met them in La Junta, CO last summer and discovered we were both bound for the same places and had the same interests. Being able to visit again with them made the stay at Graeagle so much fun. We traveled to Lake Tahoe about 60 miles from the campground. What a gorgeous sapphire jewel nestled among the mountains! We also saw the Donner Party museumWe visited a train museum at Portalo at which Chuck put his camera through a workout. Another historical highlight of the trip was the Kentucky Mine Tour. This mine and mill was wonderfully preserved. It was run by a father-son team for many years. We got to walk into the mine and watch some preserved machinery power up. It is amazing the inventiveness of people in the 1890s. This waterwheel powered a generator to deliver air to hydraulic drills. Then we entered the ore crushing stamp mill from the top and worked out way down to the stamps with an enthusiastic and knowledgeable guide. It was in remarkable condition and could still be run again. Graeagle was such a nice place I would have been glad to spend the summer there. The dogs had a great time sniffing around a large pasture area that was the dog walk. Ulysses spotted some cows just as Chuck slipped off the leash to let him in the trailer and was away like a flash. He dashed under the barbed wire fence and caused quite a stir among the cows. He had them running but when they stopped and turned around to glare at him, he hightailed it back to the fence. He really is quite a “chicken”. It was comical after the initial heart attack suffered by his owner. This is a lovely place and we hated to leave it.