January 2, 2007

Our first blog of this trip is after 5 days of travel through 4 states – Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and California.

Our last job at home was to make the call to cancel our phone. As soon as I got off the phone and handed the phone to Tony so he could call his brother before we began this trip, the phone was no longer in service, so………we left Moscow. We plugged in every electronic piece of equipment we had – and as if that wasn’t enough we stopped at Wal-Mart in Pasco to buy an indoor/outdoor thermometer (wanted to watch the daily high and low temperatures rise as we travelled south). You can imagine the wires we have with a laptop, inverters, battery chargers, cell phone chargers and booster antennae, Wi-Fi booster, and GPS attached to MS streets & trips as well as the external drive when needed.

Our first "tour" stop was at the Stone Henge replica in Maryhill WA.

Since we had seen the real Stone Henge in England and the infamous "Car Henge" in Alliance….this seemed an appropriate place to take our first "trip" pictures.

As we drove, we saw all the Christmas decorations still up around the countryside, and most of the flags at half mast in honor of Gerald Ford’s passing.

Next "picture" stop was at Multnomah Falls – the 2nd highest year around falls in the nation. As we anticipated, we stayed in the Redwoods (http://www.deancreekresort.com/) for New Year’s Eve after a stop on the Pacific Ocean to walk along the beach and a short drive through the "Avenue of the Giants".



New Year’s Day we made a few stops (the "one log tree house" and the "grandfather redwood tree") before arriving in Santa Rosa to see Bev (Tony’s cousin) & Tim where Bev works – Safari West (http://www.safariwest.com)/. It has been said by people going on an African Safari that they see more African animals at Safari West in two hours than they did in Africa in two weeks. Tim & Sharon rode in the back of the pickup on hay bales for more open, better views and picture taking. Tony and Bev in the front with Bev driving. We saw elands, giraffes, gazelles, ostriches, limas – all VERY up close. Because the pickup we were riding in was the one that delivers feed to the animals, they were more than happy to see us arrive.

We took a scenic drive around San Pablo Bay and San Francisco Bay before getting to the Golden Gate Bridge. Because of this drive, we didn’t find a place to stay for the night – so we pulled into a high school parking lot – the San Rafael High School – home of the "dogs" with a sign going into the football field "no dogs allowed". Sunrise (picture) we saw at this parking lot was amazing.

Wireless mouse not working correctly and seemed to be disorientated this morning for Sharon with the laptap – rebooted computer – Tony mentioned that if Sharon turned the mouse around it would work – thought I might as well include this story, since Tony will tell everyone later anyway.

Going across the Golden Gate Bridge was an experience – I was prepared with money in case it was a toll road – surprised it was $10.00 – but prepared anyway. Tony wasn’t prepared for the "motorhomes go to wide lanes" at the toll gates – we were lucky to see the sign in time to stop and look for the "wide lanes". After getting over to the right "wide"lane, paying the fee, and getting going again, we missed the highway – which put is right in the middle of downtown San Francisco – and how happy do you think Tony was for that drive.

We kept on going through the streets and drove to Mountain View – we had read that Mountain View was "wired". Google is located here and they have made Wi-Fi free and possible everywhere. We drove to Wal-mart, got on-line and located the only RV park within miles, back up the road about 10 miles. RV park host was very friendly – told us how we could travel the USA and work along the way through workamper.com – maybe another when the gas goes up just a little higher.

We took a drive in the car before meeting Sharon’s cousin (Donna) – wound up at a small 1850s museum (http://www.sanmateocountyhistory.com/) . Interesting place with a dentist drill (cable controlled from a foot pedal) – also saw the oldest sewing machine we had ever seen. Spent the evening out to dinner with Donna at the Los Altos Inn.