Our California Dreamin' Adventure

Well unfortunately this Monday lived up to the lyrics... All started out fine, we packed up the tent, grabbed some brekky including a yummy new danish we discovered called a Bear Claw and walked down to Manzanita Lake which is not far from the campsite. Along the way we came across a gorgeous, photogenic little squirrel fattening up on pine cones and the view across the lake was beautiful.

It was time to then get on the road but unfortunately for us, it was not to be far. We had only just driven out of the National Park when suddenly without seeing or hearing anything our car started warning that our tyre air pressure was low. It turned out we had a flat tyre! Ok, we can fix it right? Well we tried to nut out the confusing picture explaining how to set up the jack but it just didn't seem to be right in practice, it was quite a flimsy jack for the size of the car and we were mindful that this was a rental car and we could end up doing damage we'd have to pay a princely amount for.

We called the rental car company and they said they were sending out somebody within the next 45 minutes so now it was a waiting game. We tried to look on the bright side and decided this would give us the opportunity to re-arrange the camping gear in the back of the car for better access. This was a bigger task than it might sound because of all of the different luggage, food stuff and camp gear we'd been in a bit of a rush to put in at the beginning of the trip.

Well we certainly had the time for it because by the time the road side assistance guy came, 45 minutes had actually turned into about 2 hours! It was nice to see that we weren't so hopeless with the jack either. The guy tried a few different ways to use it but in the end opted for his own bigger, sturdier one. Now the problem was that we had our smaller spare on the car and were only 3 days into using the car out of our intended total of 25 days use. This meant we needed to get a new tyre so we could be assured of no more detours required further down the track.

Plugging the details of the closest tyre change place into the GPS we set off. Unbeknownst to us our lovely GPS lady started directing us onto a rough gravel road so we suspected we were headed up a driveway to a little local shop but were worried when we got over the hill and our next direction was to "drive point 5 miles and prepare to drive off road". The scene ahead of us was that of being in the middle of nowhere with the slight remnants of the gravel road to the right and a barely visible outline of a dirt road to the left. I don't understand why GPS systems so often seem to get a bum rap!

Anyway, we got back to the road before the gravel one and managed to follow it on to civilisation in a place called Palo Cedro where a lovely Tire Factory fixed us up with a new tyre in no time. It was now coming up to 3 in the afternoon so the question was how do we make up all the time we've lost. The answer in our minds was to continue on back towards the coast so we could still get to see more of the Redwood area and start heading down the coast. It was the long and winding road, very long, very windy that best lead us back. So many cattle grids, so many tiny half gravel roads... not a petrol station in site, hardly a house in site... and that was for hours! It was amazing to find ourselves alone with hardly a car going by in ages in what seemed to be very liveable areas of California.

Finally it was time to give up driving any further when we made it to some built up areas and a place called Garberville. It was just so tiring after being on this small windy road all afternoon (turned off the 36 to Alderpoint Road). At least we found a nice hotel and were assured that in the morning we were only a few minutes' drive to the Avenue of the Giants. Hurray!

First we drove through some of the redwood forest area and then to the coast following it a little way and stopping here and there for the pretty views such as the lovely town of McKinleyville. We even saw some people doing fishing with a net along the shore.

Our National Geographic California book had recommended Lassen Volcanic NP as a lovely place to see that is not on the regular beaten track of tourists so we thought we'd give it a go particularly since with all the chores of the prior day we hadn't ended up getting to see Crater Lake NP in the north.

So off we headed to Lassen but we knew it was a fair bit of a way inland so it was going to be a day of sightseeing and photo snapping from the car! By the afternoon we were in need of coffee and took a pit stop in a cute little town within the region of Weaverville. The Garden Cafe provided us with a reasonable coffee. By the way, US coffee is hard to get used to, it seems very weak and they always want to give you that filter coffee out of a jug which really doesn't do it for me, ;oP urgh. Whoa, but when we asked for a slice of the carrot cake they also gave us about half a tray worth! It was very yummy and more than kept us going.

Nearing the start of the main area of Lassen Volcanic NP we started to see tonnes of what appeared to be volcanic rock in the fields everywhere. We kept thinking we must be nearly there now but the road went on and on. Finally we got to the gate of the National Park and we asked how far it was to the campgrounds that we were staying at for the night. The ranger told us it was on the other side of the park; a beautiful, scenic 29 miles along the main windy road through the best part of the park. Somehow instead of coming in via the west side, we had gone further south and were now at the south entrance. The drive took us further up on the mountain with some beautiful views and we even began to see snow by the side of the road. This meant that our camp was definitely going to be a lot cooler than the previous night so we were thankful when we stopped at the store near to the camp there were some souvenir beanies to buy.

Even though it was cool outside, we had made sure to get a tent and mummy sleeping bags that were for 3 season use so with our new Lassen beanies we also managed to have a warm night's sleep too.

Having arrived in Medford and collecting the car the prior night, it was time to get a few chores sorted. First having breakfast at the hotel and trying our hand at a cool new device we hadn't seen before in such a scale... a waffle iron, yum!

Second, we had to get the darn laundry done which kind of fit in whilst we waited for the opening of the Blackbird store recommended by the locals to buy our camping gear. "Just go down to the main road, follow it a little while until you see a HUGE black bird in front of the store, you can't miss it" they said. That was for sure, a huge bird playing music out the front!

Once the laundry was done we were off and running, time to wreak havoc upon the unsuspecting store. Thankfully when it came to the tent there were only a few main choices and the tent we'd already researched was there, decision made! Ok, now we needed some expert advice on all the rest so we could get it all together and get on with it, we had a reserved campsite we needed to get to for the night! Thankfully we managed to get all the main gear together; sleeping bags, inflatable mattresses, gas cooker, esky (cooler or ice box I think they call it), cooking pans, camp table and stools all from Blackbirds and they gave us a nice discount for buying so many things in one go coming to around USD 320 for the lot. They also recommended Winco for our camping food supplies and that was really valuable information because when we rocked up at Winco we realised this place is humungous! It was like stepping into a huge warehouse full of food, high aisles stacked with products, so many options and so cheap too. We managed to get a whole stash of food supplies for camping as well as wash bucket, food storage box and cooking utensils, all for just around USD 80 dollars.

Finally, it was time to drive to our very first campground at Panther Flats within the Smith River National Recreation area and not far from Crescent City. How kind that the weather decided to turn a little for our first camping night (insert sarcasm here). We only just had time to have a quick walk down to the lovely little stream nearby before the sun was setting and it started to spit. It was a steap learning curve on putting up our new tent but we made it! We then sat down to a lovely salami sandwich; no cooking stove was to be fired up, we were happy enough that we had shelter!

On our final day in the Yellowstone area, we drove to Idaho Falls to drop off the car and get on our plane to Medford hoping to go via the scenic byway from West Yellowstone. We started seeing signs to the scenic byway and then signs for the scenic byway information. Turning off to the scenic byway information area, we found two big signs that provided us with information about the history of the area, what to see, pictures of historic times but gave no information as to the fact that the road further on from the sign that looked like a smaller road to a dump was actually the scenic byway.

Therefore with doubt in our minds, we turned back to the main highway and continued on towards Idaho Falls airport. On the way we actually came back to the Fort Henry Historic Byway and found the St. Anthony Sand Dunes which seemed unreal in a way as you had many fields and crops being harvested nearby making you assume there is good soil and then suddenly you're upon a huge area of sand dunes. Many people come to this area to race around on quad bikes on the dunes due to the expansive area they cover.

Moving on, we found the Yellowstone Bear World. It's a nice little place where you can drive around and see bears, wolves and other animals from the safety of your car as well as feed baby bears if you have the dough for it. Its probably quite a treat if you weren't as lucky as us to have seen the number of different animals we saw in Yellowstone. We had some spare time before we needed to be at the airport so decided to check it out. The baby bears were adorable and it was amazing how nimble they are at getting about on the tree logs.

It was then time to head to the airport for our flight to Medford with a quick stop over in Denver. Arriving in Medford, there was only time to pick up the car (a silver Ford Escape) before heading to our hotel for the night.

We decided to go for an early morning start in order to best see animals around Yellowstone and it definitely paid off. Only just into the park we came across another bear moving about amongst the trees and tearing at a tree stump.

We also had the benefit of seeing steamy geysers with the early morning mist and it really seemed to make a difference as compared with seeing them during the day. There were so little people around as well which made it more special.

Moving on to the star of the park, we made it to the Old Faithful Geyser in time to only have to wait about 15 minutes before it erupted. Afterwards We walked around the basin area whether there are other less known geysers and were about to leave the Grand Geyser when it went off which was so exciting! It is less predictable than Old Faithful, usually having a 15 or 18 hour interval (not sure exactly) between eruptions but the eruption is higher and longer and it is followed by a second geyer's minor eruption in the same area. Heading back to the main area where Old Faithful is, it kindly put on another show for us as well!

Having seen a few geysers and hot springs we were keen to check out some waterfalls particularly since they kept showing up in brochures about Yellowstone so we then progressed to the Lower and Upper Falls area followed by the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone which were all lovely features.

The final cherry on the cake was made when we checked out the Grand Prismatic Spring, it has so many colours and is huge! You have to see it (and even better than we did, make time to see it from above) to really get an idea of what its like.

Making our way back to West Yellowstone for the night we also saw some more elks. What a day!!

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