Our 2019 Adventures

We finally made our destination by 12 noon local time. First, we need to comment on "what a difference a day makes".  Eastern Oregon is certainly nothing like the central and coastal topography.  As we got closer to the mountains of the Cascade Range, the thicker the foliage and more beautiful our surroundings became. Additionally, the temperature dropped from 37 degrees to 30! In reference to the mountain peaks posted yesterday; we were not sure and did not want to post false information.   As a result we left the names out.   These were in fact Mt. Hood, Powder & Wolf mountains as presented left to right. Today we got pretty close to Mt. Washington: The route taken, could not have been more beautiful.   Glad we were forced to take the smaller state roads to reach the coast avoiding the interstate.   These were winding through the mountains, rewarding us on every turn. ...

This morning at rush hour, we drove through Boise, ID.   Thank goodness most of the traffic (bumper to bumper) was heading in the opposite direction.   For a short time, we thought we were driving through Atlanta.   It appears, that this capital city, is larger than we had thought.   Glad we were not caught in that mess. What seems like "forever", we finally made it into Eastern Oregon. I don't know if this is just a misconception on our part, but Oregon does not seem to be what we had preconditioned our minds to expect.   Many of the pictures previously seen are of thick arboreal areas, very green and forest like.   Well, at least the eastern central part of Oregon is nothing like that.   It is very desert like.   Reminds us of Arizona and Nevada (Las Vegas) type or topography.   Beautiful in its own right, but not those thick arboreal areas previously seen in pictures of the state.   ...

Hi everyone We made it to the "spud" state.    Beautiful ride getting here.   The landscape is awesome with mountains as backdrops, made it a fun ride.  Continuing to see Pronghorns along the way.  They are everywhere in large and small numbers.  We are also enjoying seeing again  Magpies .  Their habitat exists only in the west and we first saw them when we visited Yellowstone National Park a couple of years ago.  Beautiful, large (noisy) bird. In my haste to post last night's blog, I left out the pics from Fort Bridger.  Here they are now. As mentioned earlier, the ride through Utah was beautiful.   We had visited Utah before but only the Southern part of the state.   It is mainly a desert like environment.   However, our ride today took us to the northern part of Utah and it couldn't be more different than the south western desert like environment we h...

Hi everyone Day 3 was an uneventful day.   We spent it around camp relaxing.   We took a morning fast walk around the  neighborhood for about a 1.5 mile.   Great exercise.    Sat outside all day and bird watched.   In fact, we  managed to see a new bird for us, the Western Kingbird .   That evening, we visited the onsite BBQ restaurant  for a great treat.   They had the best Baby back ribs I have had in a very long time.   The meat fell off the bones  and the sauce was out of this world. Day 4 was a long and tiring day.   The 20 - 30 mph head winds made it very difficult and frustrating.   This was due to the constant climbing.   Went from over 6,000 ft. elevation to over 8,000 ft. in a very short time.   Add the  winds and mileage was non-existent.   Now throw in the holiday prices for fuel and you get the picture I'm  trying to portray.    Thanks ...

Hello again! We arrived into Eastern Wyoming - Cheyenne, this afternoon.   What a difference a day makes.   Yesterday we baked in the 90s; today in WY we arrived to wonderful 72F and no humidity.   Dropping to 50sF.   Got to love higher elevations.   We're at 6,125 Ft. above sea level. We will spend 2 nights here relaxing after the grueling 2 day drive.   The wind did not cooperate today.   About mid-morning they started blowing.   This time was a head wind of 12-20 mph.   Needless to say, mileage was really bad and considering this weekend prices, it made my blood pressure rise with every fill up. The one thing that was enjoyable on the road today, was seeing our old friends the "Pronghorns".   Once you enter western Nebraska, they can be seen on either side of the roads.   A pair can be seen captured below.   Pronghorn on middle of pic right of center   The landscape of western NE and ea...

Hi again to all friends and family.   Sorry we have been away for so long. As you all know, we spent the 2017 Winter in Georgia, south of Atlanta.   Since we had previously vacationed in GA, we did not post that trip here and thus our absence. Well, here we go again.   Today we're on our way to the Oregon coast for the summer.   We arrived at our first stop after 1:30 pm since we had an early start.   We are spending the night at a Nebraska State Park - Pawnee State Recreational Area.   A very beautiful park with a good size lake.   The spots are spacious and paved, plenty of trees for shade and most of all, quiet.   We're certain that that will change since it is a Holiday weekend.   The temperature when we arrived, was unseasonably hot at 91 degrees.   Since it is also windy, it allowed us to sit outside in the shade and do some bird watching.  Looking Left from our site Looking Right from our site The ...