Breaking away

I am traveling again, so posting again... this trip to Glacier National Park... more on the planning later...

I got into the car at 11:29, and was moving as the clock hit 11:30… This was a bit earlier than expected and a good omen… Traffic was clear… even where it shouldn’t be… I was passing through Berkeley at noon, 28 miles in 30 minutes through San Francisco and over the Bay Bridge.  At one hour I was in Fairfield, 64 miles out.  

Just beyond Vacaville I turned north on I-505… a surprisingly fast road… at 1:00 I was passing the exit for Zamora, 102 miles from home…  a bit later I-505 merged with I-5 and its traffic, particularly trucks… there were trucks passing trucks, trucks driving in the left lane, trucks passing RV’s towing cars... I was frequently having trouble making the speed limit.  The weather was weird… high thin clouds mixed with smoke from fires… weirdly humid, not as expected in Northern CA.

On a whim, I got off I-5 at Orland, taking Hwy 32 across the valley towards Chico… I was hoping to catch a tour of the Sierra Nevada Brewery. It wasn’t quite 2:00 and I was 173 miles from home.

I reached the Sierra Nevada Brewery at exactly 2:30… 196 miles from home in 3 hours… the tours for the day were full… I picked up some beer for the cooler, and headed north on Hwy 99, the old main road up the valley.

Beyond Chico Hwy 99 is a 2 lane road… not a divided or limited access highway… It was a refreashing change… Hwy 99 meets I-5 in Red Bluff… I picked up gas before getting on I-5, but the pumps were limited to $50.00 when you used a credit cars… this left the jeep less than full.

Back on I-5 the press of traffic affects driving style… The traffic was the too many trucks, the badly driven RV’s with their cars in tow, people trying to get somewhere fast, and people driving too slow.  One blue prius would drive too fast, then too slow as the driver took a phone call… One RV (without a towed car) wanted to drive in the fast lane at less than the speed limit… and was shaking his fist at people who would pass him.  It was the worst kind of street theater.  There was a big fire burning east of Redding… the column of thick yellow smoke making it obvious, but no mention on the radio…

Things thinned out quite a bit beyond Redding as we climbed up along Lake Shasta… the lake was very low… the drought is here, and water isn’t and fires are… Welcome to the west.

Looking for information on the fire I find Jefferson Public Radio… for this is the State of Jefferson, a historic idea that very north California and a bit of southern Oregon are too different to be included in their respective states, are too far from their respective state capitals and so are ignored… There was a semi serious attempt to succeed from and form a new state in 1940, complete with armed men and roadblocks.  It fell apart in the shadow of the war.  The concept has new life, now that the “6 states” proposition apparently made the ballot… Jefferson is one of the 6 states proposed in the measure.

I pulled off at Dunsmuir to look around… It’s a classic railroad town… the depot, turntable and shed for show plows all still in place… in a narrow valley with the town climbing the canyon wall above.

Back on I-5, Mt Shasta visible ahead, with wisps of snow clinging… Mt Shasta still has some glaciers, reported to be growing… Glacier National Park is the goal this trip, so a mountain with a glacier is a good omen.

I get to Shasta City at almost exactly 5:00, 440 miles from home… I drive through, find my motel, and settle in… I have dinner at a local Mexican place…  The town has lots of outdoors outfitters and crystal shops, and more than one engineering firm specializing in steam restoration… along with motels and such, but while the little downtown was livly at 5:00 on arrival, by 6:30 they had rolled up the sidewalks.  I went to bed early.

Tomorrow I will head to Lava Beds National Park… I am trying to get in the back way via dirt roads…

Randy