Happy Labor Day first of all. I hope you’re enjoying the fruits of your labor whether you’re retired or still working toward retirement. It’s hard to believe I retired more than six years ago, but I’ve enjoyed every bit of retired life!
In my last post, I left off when we pulled out of Crescent Junction RV Park. We drove south on US97 to Kla-Mo-Ya Casino near Chiloquin, Oregon – a trip of about 70 miles. We stayed overnight there three years ago, but I hardly recognized it when we pulled in. There have been changes made to the parking area and a new motel is on the north side of the lot.
We had a loose plan of spending one to three nights there to get through the holiday weekend. Holiday weekends can be a bit of a pain when you’re on the road. The weekend warriors book most of the available campgrounds well in advance while we tend to be a little more spontaneous over the summer months. Casinos are usually a safe bet – no pun intended – as families don’t tend to congregate there for a long weekend.
When we stayed here before, there were only a couple of RVs in the lot until evening. Not so this time. There were a few RVs already there when we arrived and several more pulled in during the afternoon. We parked next to a National Tradewinds motorhome and met our neighbors. They were Don and Karen from Rochester Hills, Michigan. Small world, we lived in Rochester Hills in 2009-2010 before we bought a house in Shelby Township. We enjoyed conversation and cocktails after dinner with them. Several horsetrailer-camper rigs pulled in before dark. We guessed they were headed to a rodeo. They all pulled out early Saturday morning.
Donna and I took a drive up OR62 in Midget-San to the south entrance of Crater Lake National Park. I had visited Crater Lake before in the year 2001 on a motorcycle trip from Arlington, Washington to Monterey, California for the World Superbike races at Laguna Seca – but we entered from the north side then. The trip to the park was about 40 miles and the road was smooth with mostly sweeping curves and gorgeous views. We thoroughly enjoyed the drive under clear skies and 80 degree temperatures.
The lake was formed about 7,700 years ago when a 12,000-foot tall volcano erupted, then collapsed. The caldera filled with water from rain and snow – no rivers or streams empty into Crater Lake. The intense blue lake is considered to be the cleanest large body of water in the world. Crater Lake also has the distinction of being the deepest lake in the USA with a measured depth of 1,943 feet – followed by Lake Tahoe at 1,645. A later eruption formed Wizard Island in the lake – a cinder cone near the southwest shore.
The photos of the lake below are not enhanced or saturated for color – that’s the color of the water straight from the camera. The shoreline doesn’t have beaches. The sharp waterline along cliff faces looks un-natural and is surreal.
The holiday weekend meant crowds in the park. When I visited here before, we came mid-week and found it to be mostly empty. Not so on this weekend – we had to search a bit before we found a place to park.
We walked down to the Crater Lake Lodge intending to get lunch and fully expecting to have to wait for a table. Luck was with us though – we were led directly to a table for two with a window view of the lake. The food was excellent and service was great. I had the grilled chicken and provolone melt with sweet onion marmalade and spicy slaw while Donna went for the Crater Lake Cobb salad. After lunch we walked along the paved path on the rim of the lake behind the lodge. The lodge also has a deck overlooking the lake where you can enjoy cocktails from 1pm to 9pm.
We came home and watched more of the US Open tennis tournament and came up with a plan. We figured we should head further south on Sunday to position us closer to Carson City, where we are meeting up with the Alpine Coach Association rally on Thursday. If we waited until Monday, we thought the holiday traffic might be a bother while Sunday traffic on a long weekend would likely be light.
On Sunday morning, I watched the Formula One race from Belgium and became so engrossed that I forgot about our plan until Donna had the interior of the coach nearly ready for travel. I didn’t have much to do in way of preparation. I secured Midget-San and put away our camp chairs. After checking tire pressures, we were ready to roll – it was nearly noon. I topped up the fuel tank at the travel center next to the casino – our next stop will be in California with higher fuel prices. The travel center had B5 diesel which is my preference. I try to avoid B20 biodiesel.
We drove south on US97 along the eastern shore of Upper Klamath Lake. In Klamath Falls, we hit OR39 to the California border where it became CA139. The elevation back at the casino was about 4,200 feet above sea level. Our route had us climbing and then dropping back down. It seemed like we climbed more than we dropped and I thought we would net a fair amount of elevation gain as we drove through the Modoc National Forest.
Most of the traffic on the road was in the northbound lane. There were very few cars on our side heading south. We noticed a number of cars and RVs were filthy – covered in a light tan powdery dust. Some were so heavily coated, it looked like off-white mud. We wondered where they might be coming from.
At the town of Canby, we hit CA299 which took us to the small town of Alturas. We found the Desert Rose Casino there on the border of the Modoc National Wildlife Refuge (NWR). The Desert Rose Casino is on a small plot of Indian land – no more than a couple of acres. They offer free RV parking on a level gravel lot behind the casino. We were the only RV in sight when we arrived. I parked on the east side of the lot at the fenceline of the NWR. We didn’t net as much elevation as I thought – we’re just under 4,400 feet above sea level here.
Donna and I went into the casino for happy hour. The bartender solved the mystery of the dirty cars and RVs. She told us they were coming from Burning Man. Apparently, the popular boondocking event in Nevada results in clouds of dust.
Today we’ll take a drive through the NWR and look around town. The forecast calls for a high temperature of 90 degrees this afternoon and tomorrow. We’ll stay for at least one more night – we’ll come up with a plan later today. The biking looks like it would be great here – except for the numerous goathead stickers. We know from experience in Albuquerque that unless you have Slime tubes or Stan’s sealant, a flat tire is guaranteed. I should have installed Slime tubes on Donna’s new bike.
It was a pleasure to meet Donna and Mike at the casino. We are the two individuals that were in the trade winds that they mention in his blog this run. We enjoyed our conversation immensely sitting out in the Cool Breeze of Oregon. As Mike said the casino was barely even two or three RVs when we got there but it was completely full when Mike pulled in. Mike and Donna gave us a lot of information on different places as we had South in California. We appreciate it very much.