Travel Tuesday: On the Road Again, 7th Snowbird journey

As the air started to get nippy and the rain began in earnest, we got our lot ready for winter, loaded ourselves up, said our goodbyes to family & friends & headed south. It's amazing that we've been able to do this for six years in a row, with this being our seventh. Where did the time go?!

One of the fascinating things about traveling from the NW to the SW is the variety of landscapes we see. This time I decided to chronicle the changes. When I wasn't driving, I captured several shots from the passenger seat. Although there were a few places where I would have liked to snag a shot while driving, I didn't. I think my collection shows sufficient variety even without them. We typically trade off driving, but Jerry still does the bulk of it. 

I didn't get all of my pictures edited like I often do, cropping for the best view. So, here they are, windshield wipers, glass reflections, screens and all. In the raw! Enjoy the view. It's what it looks like while we're on the road.

Beautiful sunset in Southern Oregon on our way to our first night's stop in Canyonville, OR. In this crazy year of Covid, we didn't do our usual stop for visiting relatives in Oregon. Instead we pushed on while the weather was cooperating.

This is Mt Ashland just south of Ashland, OR. In past years there has been snow on the ground as we drove past. This is the beginning of the big climb over the Siskiyou Mountains. A few miles beyond this is the Siskiyou Mountain Summit at 4310 ft. A rig our size takes this pretty slow! The weather is a big factor in getting over this pass and getting an early enough start helps.

Our first peek at Mt Shasta. No snow to be seen this time! The sign is for Hwy 97 heading for Klamath Falls. We are about 50 miles or so south of the Oregon/California border. We inserted an extra stop in Yreka for the night since the winds were supposed to be very high farther south. Weather dictates when and how far we drive in a day. How windy will it be? What's the nighttime temperature? 

The rolling hills of Northern California is so typical of the area. Lots of grass and deciduous trees

We saw evidence in several places along our way of the devastating fires in Southern Oregon and Northern California. This was the largest burn we saw from the road. Some of the places we saw were a mix of burned and not burned, like the fire did some kind of crazy dance touching down there, jumping up and missing here, spinning to over there.

Because this is out my side window with the screen, it's not very clear, but there are miles and miles of forest, down into a valley or two, up over a ridge. We got pretty high up as we crossed from Northern California up over the Cascade mountain range to Reno.

I loved driving through this corridor of trees. This is likely my last view of huge trees until our Springtime return. These trees feel more like home to me than the desert, but I have learned to love the stark beauty of the desert and the very different vegetation and all of the variety of rocks.

Unexpected rock outcroppings pop up everywhere! 

Here we go into the arid regions. This is just the northern tip of Walker Lake. It is a huge lake and the view as we drove by was beautiful. However, since I was driving, I didn't get to take any pictures. My copilot managed to capture this one. There are places to stay nearby, but we pushed on to make more miles, for a total of 405 miles in one day. We were trying to get to our destination before the big storm hit the whole region. With nighttime temps predicted to drop really low, we determined to push on.

Miles of road like this crosses Nevada. We like to listen to good teaching as we travel which makes the miles fly by. We made a stop for the night in Tonopah, NV at Miller's Rest Area. In the past we've seen several RVs parked for the night and have even run into friends. This year, we had the place to ourselves! The nighttime temps were still tolerable the night we stayed, but expected to drop into the teens the next night. On our way!

Joshua Trees dotting the landscape. I've not seen them before marching along at the top of the hills this way like sentinels! This picture had to be cropped in order to see the trees, so it's a bit of a blur. 

Ah! Finally! After 1268 miles and 5 days of travel, we arrived ahead of the wind and clouds. It sure is a beautiful spot. We were thankful to hunker down and rest up while the wind rocked us for a couple of days. Once the storm passed, it was gorgeous and hot! Finally, Jerry is a happy camper!
 (Photo by Kathy Sweet who joined us after a couple of days.)