Getting There

Saturday
Our trip would take us along a route that has become very familiar. The group that would gather in Oregon, for our fourth annual crab fishing adventure, would be the same as last year. However, this trip would have a little different twist. Our first stop would be to pick up Tom's boat. Even though we would be towing Tom's boat to Oregon, we would not be traveling with Tom and Nora. They had been on a summer-long trek to the East Coast of Canada. They went directly from their cross country journey to the Oregon coast.

When we arrived to pick up the boat, Kevin was waiting to give me a helping hand connecting the boat to our motorhome. With the boat connected to our motorhome, it was now time to check the lights. As luck would have it, none of the lights on the boat trailer worked. It took a short time to discover that the female receptacles on my motorhome's connector were slightly larger than the male pins on the trailer connector. All it took to get the lights working was to squeeze the motorhome connector with a pair of pliers. With that we were on our way to the freeway. The boat immediately felt heavier than when I pull my boat, but it was towing okay.

We were about 30 minutes behind our schedule to meet Nilo in Cordelia, California. When we arrived Nilo was patiently waiting for us along the side of the road. He was pulling his boat behind his motorhome just as he did last year. After a short visit, our small caravan found its way onto the freeway with Nilo in the lead.

Our small caravan is formed at Cordelia, California

Our trip north on I-5 was mostly routine, however, we did have a couple of events along the way. We were given the opportunity to drive through the rain and we saw a forest fire. Shortly after passing by Shasta Lake, the clouds began to get heavy ahead of us. Lightning was flashing in the distance from cloud to cloud as well as from cloud to ground. After a while, a dark cloud appeared with a column of rain hanging below as the cloud moved across the landscape. The boat was towing nicely with the boat cover rippling a small amount. This was the first time I had towed something I could see in my rear view mirror.

Our first stop to refuel in Corning, California

As we approached the rain cloud it appeared as if we would miss the rain. As luck would have it, the highway turned toward the dark cloud allowing us to catch up with the storm. It not only rained, but a barrage of small hail stones peppered our motorhome for a brief time. The rain came down in a torrent for about ten minutes. Nilo's motorhome disappeared in the rain and a swirl of water-spray coming off the road behind him. I could see, in the rear view mirror, that the cover on Tom's boat was getting drenched.

We are entering a rain storm. Mt. Shasta is in the distance covered with clouds

The heavy rain lasted for a very short time, however, we would be driving through scattered showers off and on during the remainder of the afternoon as we drove toward Oregon. The sky began to get brighter as the clouds began to break up. It wasn't for long though. Shortly after entering Oregon we were greeted by another rain storm. This storm would not be as intense as the one we experienced in California. In a short time the rain passed and the sky cleared up to a light overcast with occasional views of blue sky.

The first weigh station we saw, after entering Oregon, was closed. That meant that we could pull our motorhomes in to weigh them. The State of Oregon leaves the scales running even when a weigh station is closed. As I suspected, our motorhome had a weight equal to the gross vehicle weight. Then I pulled the axle of the boat trailer on to the scales.

The scales read 2400 pounds and that didn't include the weight on the trailer hitch. Now I knew why the gas milage had dropped so much on this trip. On previous trips we got 10 miles per gallon, but now we were getting as low as 7 miles per gallon. The heavier weight also explained why the transmission downshifted to second gear on an incline. On previous trips the transmission would only drop out of overdrive into third gear while driving up a mountain slope.

It was now late afternoon when I saw smoke coming from the forest ahead of us. As it turned out the highway was leading us directly toward the smoke. The motorhome was traveling directly into a scene of forest fire fightng that I had seen only on television. Our route was taking us through a narrow valley. Fire could be seen in the trees on the west side of the highway with several columns of smoke swirling up through the trees.

A forest fire on the west side of I-5

On the east side of the highway there were three helicopters hovering in a row with big buckets hanging below. I wondered why the choppers were just hanging in the sky holding their position. Then I saw a small twin engine airplane swoop down into the smoke over the tops of the burning trees on the west side of the road. Having seen a story on television, a few days before about fighting forest fires, I recognized the small plane as the plane that leads the way for a fire retardant tanker plane.

After the small aircraft had dropped down just over the tree tops it swooped up over the highway passing directly over our motorhome about 100 feet above the ground. I was looking for the flying tanker when I saw it following the path of the small plane. I readied my camera as we drove on I-5 at about 60 miles per hour. Just as the tanker released its load of fire-retardant chemicals a tree appeared between our motorhome and the tanker blocking my view. As soon as the tree was out of my field of vision I clicked off a photograph of the borate bomber flying low over the trees with a colorful cloud of fire-retardant chemicals falling down into the forest.

A fire fighting bomber has just dropped a load of fire retardant chemicals

As soon as the tanker had cleared the airspace, the helicopters began moving into position one at a time to empty their buckets of water over the flames in the forest. The movement seemed to be choreographed almost like a ballet. I was able to see only the first helicopter move over the highway on its way to fight the fire. The second 'copter began moving toward the highway as we left the exciting scene behind.

Nilo and I came to an agreement earlier that we would bypass our planned stop for the night at the Valley of the Rogue State Park. We stopped in Grants Pass for dinner. While we were eating a rain storm moved over and gave us a display of lighning and some rain. By the time we returned to our motorhomes the rain had stopped and the air was filled with that great fresh aroma that follows the rain. The sun was dropping below the horizon as we return to the Interstate and headed north once again.

We drove into the night as we looked for the exit we would take at Sutherlin to head toward the coast. I turned off the freeway at the highway 138 exit and drove toward highway 38. This is normally a very scenic drive, but we would not see much of the scenery as we drove in the dark. All I could see, along this beautiful route, was in the tunnel punched through the darkness by the headlamps of our motorhome. Without the scenery to view, the trip to the coast seemed to take longer than on past trips.

Nilo and I passed the time by talking using our CB radios. We chattered all the way to the coast. Finally the lights of the town of Reedsport glowed in the mist ahead of us. In a short time we were on Highway US-101 heading for Florence. We all decided to spend the night in the Fred Meyer parking lot. We arrived at our destination at about 9:30 pm. It felt good to stop for the night.

Sunday
Both motorhomes were in a familiar parking lot with sand dunes as a backdrop. Nilo and I considered waiting for part of our group to drive by so we could surprise them as we were not expected to be this far north so early.

A familiar place to spend some time

By 10 o'clock the others had not come by yet. So we decided to get underway to the campground to see if we could get in early. Our destination was a little over 30 miles north. When we arrived at the McKinley's Marina and Campground Nilo and I drove through the campground directly to the overflow area.

This has become a very familiar scene as we enter Waldport

It was found that none of our team had arrived before us. I disconnected Tom's boat so I could go into town to fill the fuel tank on our motorhome. I like to begin our RV camping experience with the full tank of fuel. This allows us to leave at the end of the week without a delay for refueling. When I returned to the campground Nilo took off to refuel his motorhome.

We entered the campground a bit early

Shortly after Nilo returned to camp the rest of our crab-fishing crew began to arrive. One pair of motorhomes arrived from the north while the other pair came from the south. I found it interesting that the two pairs of rigs arrived within 15 minutes of each other coming from opposite directions and only 30 minutes after we entered camp. It was good to see all of the wayward travelers again. Charlene came out to greet us all with a big hug. It had been a fun beginning for our fourth crab fishing adventure.

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