Blogs from Grants Pass, Oregon, United States, North America

Ah, Oregon. I made it to Grant's Pass last night, an hour or so from the California border, and I've come to an important conclusion about Oregon. Oregon, see, is the embarrassing hillbilly cousin of the otherwise delightful west coast. Washington and California, those are fine upstanding states whose scenery is matched by their charm and civility; Oregon, though... This whole state is the green room for the television show "Intervention." I'm from east Texas, and I've never been in a sadder, more meth-y place. Even the women here are too rough-looking for me, and that's kinda my thing lately. The scenery is low-key lovely, but all the fulsome hills are scarred and pocked by ad hoc logging cuts; need some money for Junior's new false teeth? Well let's cut a mess of them trees for ... read more

Picked up the hire car: Mazda 5 Auto, loads of room yay! (I'd gotten tired of struggling with manuals on top of all the other challenges of driving on the wrong side of the road). Having packed the night before, we loaded up the car, said our fairwells and hit the road around 9:45. It has been a pretty special and magical stay, with almost everything being even cooler and more fun than I'd imagined. A 3 hour drive along the I5 was smooth and uneventful. I drove at the 65mph speed limit, which was unnusual with either other cars going much faster or the trucks going slower (by law). There was enough traffic to necessitate regular changing of lanes. We stopped at Grants Pass, fast-food place called Carl Jr for lunch. It was much better ... read more

After recruiting friends and neighbors to watch the homestead for the duration, we departed Tuesday morning, Dec 1, 09, for our snowbird adventure to Arizona. We have cameras, motion sensors, telephone triggers, alarms, etc. And a couple of sheriff’s deputies living in the ‘hood. Our 5th wheel rig, Uncle Joe, was in the driveway for three days before departure. We loaded it up and got it ready to travel. Four months; can you imagine that? I can’t; so we will see how this trips out. On Tuesday, we put in what for us was a long day. We expected sun breaks, but found more fog and low hanging clouds. At least the road was bare and dry. We circumvented Portland by using the 205 Loop, connecting with I-5 south of the city. We knew we were ... read more

Some of the wildlife we have encountered thus far. Are arachnids wildlife? Dave--funny. Now back on the meds, dude.... read more

. After yesterdays adventures with the weather we were hoping that things would be better today, hoping, but not really all that optimistic. We opened the door first thing and there were a few patches of blue, but after chasing them all day yesterday we learned our lesson - they are fleeting! The big question was - will there or will there not be snow at Crater Lake, our next destination… Statistics Starting Destination: Reedsport, Oregon Ending Destination: Grants Pass, Oregon Ending Destination GPS: N: 42° 26.249’ W: 123° 17.832’ Elev: 101’ Miles Driven: 362.7 Depth of Snow Waded Through: 6-8 inches Sand Dunes… img=http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/2193/web... read more