Update thru 8-29

We spent the weekend 8-23 thru 8-25 at Ogden UT visiting brother T and V. They are negotiating to purchase the practice of another Dr., which would make them the only allergists in Ogden, but they have plans to staff up and actually work a bit less. We spent the weekend with them visiting their horses, taking a bike ride up in the mountains, and touring the area with them. A good visit.

8-26 Mon.: Drove to Starvation State Park, UT. Route 35 across Utah especially scenic, crosses a 9000' pass at Wolf Creek, and drove along a long ridge of beautiful overhanging cliffs. We've learned some geology on the trip so far, but wish we knew more.
Our campsite was right on the shore of a large reservoir with a sand beach. Would have enjoyed it more but the wind was blowing a full gale out of the west. It even broke the bracket for our little flagpole. No canoeing, for sure, or we'd gone directly the the dam downwind. We just hunkered down. Trailer shook overnight, as if we were on the boat.

8-27 Tues.: 38 degrees in a.m., wind abated. NE Utah is desert, mostly interesting rocks, but not like yesterday. Drove to Dinosaur Natl Monument on border of Utah and Colo. The source of many dinosaur bones on display in museums e.g. Smithsonian, Denver and N.Y. They dug out bones 1920 til about 1960, then dug just enough to expose the thousands of leftovers on a nearly vertical cliff and they built a building around them so we could see them in situ. Fascinating. Also visited a couple of sites with petroglyphs dating to about 1000 a.d., mostly human images, some animals and symbols. Underway again, passed two billboards 1/4 mile apart. 1st had a picture of a woman, "ONLY female OBGYN in the Basin", 2nd with pics of 3 men "Your first choice for women's health, delivering 70% of the babies in the Basin". Stopped at a State Park on the Yampa River in Colo.

8-28 Wed. Put canoe in the river in a.m. once it warmed up, but could only go a short distance upstream or down: too shallow. Drove across N. Colo. desert (saw a coyote) and crossed Rocky Mtn. Natl Park. 50 miles of extraordinary mountain scenery, topping at 12000'. Camped at RV park in Estes Park. A good dinner out.

8-29 Thurs.: Signed up for an all-day educational minibus tour of the Natl Park, and it turned out we were the only ones aboard. Our guide was a young naturalist who knew her stuff. Learned a lot about the plants, geology and history of the area, and saw deer, a marmot, pikas, and a herd of ;;200 elk. Stunning glaciar-carved mountains with many spots of permanent snowfields.

Thur. 8-22 to Pocatello

Unable to light the stove for coffee this morning. Discovered both propane tanks were empty. Had checked them a few days ago and had about 1/2 full on one tank and second tank was full. Clearly, I had a propane leak. Fortunately, the RV park had propane, and the owner found that one of our tanks had a bad valve, which allowed all the gas in both tanks to leak out. I bought a new tank from him and solved our problem quickly and cheaply. Most RV parks don't have propane, and those that do don't have tank exchanges, so we were lucky.

A short drive today, so we were disposed to stop for anything interesting. We stumbled on Experimental Breeder Reactor 1, the world's first nuclear power plant, built in 1951 two miles off the highway in the desert. Decomissioned in 1966 and maintained in pristine condition as a museum. It was built to test Enrico Fermi's theory that a reaction of uranium could produce plutonium, also a nuclear fuel, faster than the fuel was used to produce electricity. The experiment was a success, of course, and the facility produced electricity for its own use while research continued. Very very interesting, and we were the only visitors at the time.

A cloudy day in the desert, and we could see ribbons of rain falling from the clouds with only sparse drops reaching the ground. Kept the heat down, though.

Wed. 8-21 Craters of the Moon

Another day of desert weather: 40's in the morning, 90's in the afternoon.

We got ourselves up and out pretty early to drive 20 miles to Craters of the Moon Nat'l Monument. A huge area of lava flows from eruptions every 2000 years or so (about due). We did a ranger hike up a cinder cone volcano with a great 360-degree view at the top. S got out of breath once, but I think it was just the elevation. Later we took another ranger hike to a lava flow cave. Rough walking and climbing, but well worthwhile. If you have any questions about volcanos or lava minerals, ask now. What I forgot since Mt. Lassen in the Sierras I relearned today.

Apollo astronauts trained at Craters of the Moon, and the Mars Rover was tested there too.

Back at the campground we met some interesting people including a couple from NH on their way back from a 2-month-and-counting trip to Alaska with a cartop tent. They report AK had a warm summer and so many berries for the bears to eat that they(the bears) didn't bother catching salmon.

8- 20 Challis Hot Springs to Arco, Idaho

The campground is on a quiet paved road, so we did a bike ride this morning out to the main highway. Been a while since we've been on the bike, and we felt it, especially with the 6000' altitude and a few sharp hills, but fun ride anyway.

Broke camp early afternoon and continued south. Left the Salmon River somewhere and passed through several very large valleys with high mountains all around, separated by rocky canyons. Cattle and hay country, large scale irrigated fields. Mountains are mostly treeless but many different colors as the sunlight shifted.

Short drive so no hurry, and we paid attention to the historical markers. One invited us to turn up a dirt road for 2 miles and promised an earthquake site. Highlight of the day- Turns out there was a major earthquake here in 1983 (7.5), which raised the mountains a foot and lowered the valley 7'. The dirt road ended where there was a 20' wide crack in the earth, now a deep ditch which extends 21 miles. Once we knew what it was we could clearly see it extending into the distance (can see the crack on Google satellite view, too). The earthquake cause many new springs to form in the valley (already known as the Valley of 1000 springs), and get this: 400 billion gallons of water suddenly gushed to the surface. Put your calculator to work: that's about 3 miles across and 100' deep.

Stopped at campground at Arco, a little town with a moment of fame: In 1955 Arco was the first town in the world ever electrified by nuclear power, in 1955. It was an experiment, using a research reactor off in the desert nearby. Many of the retail businesses here call themselves Atomic this and that.

8-19 N. Fork to Challis Hot Springs

A short drive along the Salmon River. Beautiful mountain scenery. A near-deer encounter: spotted a buck about 100 yards away running toward the highway from my left on a collision course. My instinct told me I had a better chance of passing ahead of him, so I sped up. He turned abruptly to his left just as he reached the road. Close call.

Stopped at Sacagawea Center in the town of Salmon. Good information about her life and the Lewis and Clark expedition, which passed here on the way west in 1805. Also info about her descendants to the present, and their tribe. Continuing south, finally left the Lewis and Clark route.

Reached our campground early afternoon. Site is right on the Salmon River. Several people told us it was OK for a canoe, but what we could see was too shallow and rough, so we passed on that. A warm afternoon reading in the shade of a cottonwood tree.

8-16 to 8-18 to N. Fork Idaho

Fri. 8-16 a beautiful winding climb along the Clearwater and Lochsa rivers. Mountains on both sides. Lewis and Clark sites everywhere. Not much has happened here since then. Crossed Lolo Pass into Montana, and stopped at a Lolo Creek, a Natl Forest Campground. Fine wooded site, no electricity or water, so quiet and dark.

Sat. 8-17 Chilly morning. Drove into town of Lolo to scout out a church and do some grocery shopping. Otherwise, relaxed in the woods and read. No phone signal so no internet. e-books from the St. Pete Beach Library aren't accessible unless the app is kept open continuously. Stayed chilly all day, and light rain fell at midday. First rain in a long while.

Sunday 8-18.  42 degrees in the morning. Broke camp and drove down to Lolo for Mass at a little mission church. Nearly everyone came over to meet us and find out our story. I don't think they get many visitors. After church drove N to Missoula in search of breakfast. Found a poor one. Drove S along Bitterroot Valley with high craggy mtns to our west, some with bits of snow still. Climbed to Chief Joseph Pass at 8700'. All the way from Portland to that point, we'd been on the route we cycled in 2013 on our way across the country. We turned back down into Idaho and descended for a few miles to a good campground on the N. Fork of the Salmon River. Afternoon temp near 80. Did laundry, and then I put the canoe in the river. Made some progress upstream, but it is shallow, rocky and fast here, so didn't get far. Was good to get it in the water, though.

Update through 8-15

Long time no blog. On Sunday, Aug. 3, we drove to Portland to visit son M and his family, and stayed until Monday, Aug. 12.

We spent the week greatly enjoying the company of M&K and their 9 and 7 -year-olds. We played our ukuleles, went camping in the forest for two days, visited the Portland Art Museum, went canoeing in the Columbia River, and saw Portland's women's professional soccer team win a tight game. We had a great visit with M&K, and their children 9 and 7. K home-schools the kids, and is doing a good job of it, using a lot of online resources and local afinity groups. The kids are smart, happy, and thriving. M is doing well in his job, but the kids are clearly the priority focus for them both. Too soon, we were leaving and starting to miss them once again. 

Leaving Portland, we drove east along the Columbia River. For the next few days we'll follow the route we rode on our bike tour across the U.S. in 2013. Even without the many familiar sights and happy memories, the spectacular Columbia Gorge is one of our favorite routes.

We camped Mon. and Tues. at Hat Rock, named by Lewis and Clark on their way down the river because it looked like a hat. And it does. On Tues. we did a short hike to the rock and a short canoe paddle in the River.

Wed, Aug. 14 we continued east into Washington, back to Oregon, and then into Idaho at Lewiston, the furthest inland seaport on the Columbia system. I looked at our old transamerica cycling blog, and when we passed this way six years ago it was June and all the immense wheatfields were green. Now they are golden brown, and mostly harvested. We camped on the shore of Clearwater River near Kamiah, Idaho.

Aug. 15. Will stay a second night here.This campground has the best showers ever: roomy and clean, with enough hooks and shelves. It's a holy day, so we drove a few minutes into town to a little church with an African priest. Couldn't understand more than a few words of what he said. Two women and their cute small children made up the choir. A good breakfast in town. Found my long-lost altimeter- we're at 2700'. Not yet in the mountains. In the afternoon we took a drive on a somewhat scary gravel road out of the river valley to Nezperce, a small town with several large grain elevators. The whole area is wheatfields, larger than I could have imagined. We'd intended to put the canoe in the river, but it was too hot, then too windy, then too tired, then too late. A mostly lazy day of reading.

We're at Long Camp, a historic site. On their way to the west coast, Lewis and Clark emerged from the mountains here and prepared to travel the rest of the way by river. They buried their supplies, built dugout canoes, and lent their horses to the Nez Perce Indians. On their way back the next year, they dug up what they'd cached and waited three weeks for snow to melt before setting off across the Bitterroot Mountains.

8-2 to Sisters, OR

We entered Oregon within the first few miles today.

Our route for the last week or so has been in eastern California, in the shadow of the Sierras and later the Cascades. We're glad we chose to come that way; cool weather, beautiful terrain and little traffic on the roads.

We were aiming for Bend today, and having trouble arranging a campsite because we're heading into a summer weekend. But we finally did get a callback from an RV park north of Bend.

Although there were still low, round mountains around us, the valleys were very wide and more fertile than we've seen. Large scale truck farms.

We ended up north of Bend, near Sisters, named for the three prominent mountains nearby. The RV park is about twice as expensive as we're used to. But they have a pool and spa, the whole place is landscaped with flowers, they pick up trash at the curbside every morning, and they even have room service- if you want firewood, for example, just call the office and they'll bring it to you. Silly.

A rooster has been crowing since we arrived. I wonder if it will get any sleep tonight. Or if we will.

8-1 to Tulelake, CA

Not much to report today. We drove north to the only campground we could find at the right distance for the day. The route started in high mountains with small high valleys between them, and gradually gave way to low rounded mountains, larger valleys, pine forests, cattle, and occasional large scale hay operations, producing the huge 8' bales we learned before are made to fit into containers and ship across the Pacific.

The campground turned out to be part of a fairground currently hosting a firefighters camp, complete with catering tents, shower vans, etc. Our space is spare but grassy, and does have electricity and water hookups. OK for one night.

Tulelake is a dying town that shows no sign of ever having been very alive. Most of the stores on Main St. are closed, and no name-brand retailers have taken their place. The houses are small and dilapidated. Very depressing. But Tulelake is the horseradish capital of the world, growing over 1/3 of the world's production.