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Westward Distraction: Day Nine

By Thom | January 16, 2008

Florance, OR to Crescent, CA

The morning was quite foggy, enough for me to have to put on the rain gear, but it burned off after an hour or so. I stopped in a small town along the way to Crater Lake for breakfast that oddly enough had fake meat, so I ordered a “beef” patty with eggs (see picture below). After that scrumptious meal, I headed towards Crater Lake, what a great place, simply amazing. Great weather the way up, down, and around. I didn’t choose to go down and touch the actual lake, I just kept cruising. It was great except for the 14 miles of fresh chip seal that I encountered on the way down, that took me about an hour. I did meet a guy named Ralph from Indiana on a BMW that was doing the same Iron Butt Challenge as I was. We talked for a good 15 minutes as he had been to the BMW Rally in West Bend too. Then I cruised through to the Redwoods… probably the coolest part of my trip just rolling through this huge canopy with little sunlight filtering through. I stopped and set up camp and went to find some laundry detergent. On the way back from the store I noticed a side road that led me to a grove of the trees, it was gravel and tight, but I made it. Such an aw inspiring experience. It was amazing to just sit in the grove of trees and not hear anything, nor feel any wind. I took a lot pictures and then retired early after having authentic Pad Thai at a Thai place in town. Before I hit the hay, I met a man named Tom who has been retired and traveling around in his motor home for the last 12 years. He told me never to give up traveling as “thats livin’ man” – but someday soon he’s going to have to stop and get him “a piece of dirt.”

Totals:
Alt 7
Avg Speed: 40.7
Dist: 328
Time: 7:48:28

Lots O pictures: