We got up early and drove to Garnet Hill. It is about 20 minutes outside Ely. It was cloudy but the rain held off. We searched for garnets for almost 2 hours. I found 2 small ones. It was kind of disappointing. But it was fun looking for them. It hurt my back from bending and twisting so much. Then we showered and checked out of hotel. We drove in pouring rain for 3.5 hours to St George. We stopped and had lunch in Enterprise. I took Beth to buy some garments because they don't have a store near her. MaKayla, Kolten and Amelia came to visit. Mandi took good care of the house while we were gone. They left at 6:30 for Vegas. They are on an overnight flight. Vacation is over and now it's time to unpack and get back to normal life. It was a fun trip!!
Oregon Trip - Day #6 - October 11th, 2026
It was cold and rainy today. We drove to Reno from Lake Tahoe to see the National Automobile museum. Doug has been waiting all week to see all the cars. There was a huge line of cars waiting to get in. We thought this must be an awesome museum. But when we got to the parking lot, the attendant told us the museum was closed for a special event. It was something to do with the Raiders... So we left and drove to Ely. The "Loneliest road in America!" We found a town called Fallon, and outside the town limit was the Grimes Point Archaeological Area. We hiked the path and saw a few Petroglyphs. We made dry sandwiches ( we had no butter, mustard, etc. ) and had a small picnic before we left. It was a long 6 hour ride to Ely. It rained on the way for part of it. When we got to Ely we checked into the Holiday Inn Express. Very nice rooms. We went to dinner at a fabulous place called Ginos Italian Restaurant. It was the best food we have had all week. Also the most expensive. The atmosphere was very peaceful with piano music playing. They had a lot of Tiffany lamps all over the place. Then we came to Beth and Dave's suite and played 2 hands of "Hand and Foot" We downloaded all out photos on to each others computers.
Oregon Trip - Day #5 - October 10th, 2026
We checked out of our hotel in Redding, and drove to Lassen Volcanic National Park. A lot of the turnouts were closed for the season, so we went to Sulpher Works at the end of the park, and saw the boiling, bubbling mudpots. Then we for 3 hours to Lake Tahoe. On the way we stopped in a small town and ate lunch at The Crescent Store. We had BLT's. We are getting tired of driving. Beth and Dave are worried about their house in Florida because of the hurricane, and so we are cutting our trip short by a couple days. We checked into our VRBO and we hated it. The carpets were so gross. We bought groceries for the next 2 days there, but Beth used her Marriott points and got us a nice hotel in Truckee, Ca. We drove to the Zephyr Cove marina and went on a dinner cruise. We had our own little table by the window. The water was a little rough. We had a nice dinner. Dave bought cards and we played rummy until I started getting sick. It was cold up on the outside decks. It was a nice dinner. Then we checked into our new hotel. St George is getting the remnants of Hurricane Rachel up from Mexico. It is going to get very windy and tons of rain.
Oregon Trip - Day #4 - October 9th, 2026
Today was kind of a quiet day. We drove from McKinleyville Ca to Redding Ca. 3 hours total. We stopped at the Willow Creek Flat Bigfoot Museum. It was kind of boring. We only stayed for about 20 minutes. We stopped at a small town and had Woodfire pizza for lunch.( We ended up eating the leftover pizza for dinner...) When we got to Redding, we walked across the Sundial Bridge. The floor is made of glass tiles. It is 99 degrees here. We got an ice cream at the gift shop. We had to wait to check into the Fairfield Inn. While waiting, we watched the weather channel because there is a cat 2 hurricane in Florida. It made landfall tonight in Destin, Fl. Beth and Dave came to our suite and we watched 1 episode of the British Baking Show.
Oregon Trip - Day #3 - October 8th, 2026
After breakfast at the hotel, we drove to Arch Rock. As usual it was too foggy to see much. After being there for an hour, we finally were able to see the faintest outline of the arch. I took a picture of the sign on the trail so we could see what it should look like. Then we drove from Oregon into California. We went to Stout Grove. It was magnificent. I have never seen trees so big around, or tall as these. We hiked through the trees for a couple of hours and never got tired of seeing them. We took hundreds of pictures. The "Big Tree" was over 1500 years old. 286 Ft high, and it was 74.5 feet in circumference. Then we drove and ate lunch at the Blue Ox diner. Across the street was a huge statue of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox. Then we drove down the coast to Klamath, and drove through a giant redwood. We ended up at the Trindad Head lighthouse. We hiked 1 mile to the top in the fog, and found out that they only do tours twice a month and the gate was closed. So we had to hike back down. Mine and Beth's knees and feet were hurting by the end of the hike down. So we didn't get to see the lighthouse... We are staying in McKinleyville for the night. We played cards and ordered door dash. We are worn out.
Arch Rock:
The "BIG TREE"
Blue Ox Diner:
Oregon Trip - Day #2 - October 7th, 2026
We ate at McDonalds, then went to Walmart to get some snacks. We dropped off a huge box at Fedex. It was foggy a lot today. It was about 66 degrees. We went to the Heceta Head Lighthouse. It was a 1/2 mile hike through a spooky forest. This is the most photographed lighthouse on the Oregon coast. It was too foggy to see much of the ocean. Then we drove to the Umpqua River Lighthouse. We took a tour and climbed up the 59 stairs to the lantern room. It is the only lighthouse in Oregon that you can climb up. Then we drove to Coos Bay, but it was to foggy to see anything, so we ate lunch at Millers Cove. Then we drove to the Cape Blanco Lighthouse. It was SO windy that we could hardly walk straight. It was also very cold, so we turned around and didn't make it to the lighthouse. We drove down the 101 highway and stopped and got some beautiful photos of the ocean right after sunset. We checked into our hotel in Gold Beach Oregon and played cards for an hour.
Haceta Head Lighthouse:
Umpqua River Lighthouse:
Cape Blanco Lighthouse: (Which we couldn't see because of the fog)
Highway 101:
