Our month long trip to California and Oregon

They told us that it would be near the end of July before the east rim road at Crater Lake would be cleared of snow, and it will certainly be longer than that before the trails stemming off of it are open.  A lot of tourists thought it was great fun to have snowball fights on Independence Day!

Since we are expecting a new little guy in the near future, we had to sell our 177 as it would just be too cramped for the four of us.  Next summer will be out of the question for camping trips, but we'll see how it goes after that.

After driving there for a few days, we spent some time in Sugar Pines State Park at Lake Tahoe.  The campground was great, modestly secluded in the pines, and showers were available for $1 five days a weeks (they are closed on Tuesdays and Thursdays if I recall due to the drought).  We saw a black bear (it was actually brown) about six feet outside on our first morning, and our daughter loved it!  The section of the park that goes by the lake itself was just spectacular.  It really showcases lots of the Caribbean colors of the lake.  We also enjoyed the Nevada state park on the east side of the lake (can't remember it's name) since it also showed the colors and had some very interesting rock outcroppings.  It gets very busy as well, and the locals said that the parking lot for 300 cars fills up almost every day in the summer by noon.

We then made our way to Yosemite.  It was our first visit, and I must say that it must be one of the most beautiful, majestic places on the planet.  The waterfalls were really going since the snow pack was very good in northern California this past winter.  Hiking up to the top of Sentinel Peak wasn't easy, but the views there are simply breathtaking.  The entire valley can be seen in one sweeping view from there.  We were some of the very lucky people that were able to make reservations back in February for a campsite in the valley itself, and this really helped us out with early starts.  Our biggest complaint at the park was the crowds.  They weren't too bad early in the morning, but they really slowed down driving by noon, and from 2:00-6:00, traffic moves at a crawl.  It took us 45 minutes to travel a little over a mile at 4:00 one day.  It really pays to get moving early here and not drive in the valley after noon.

We then drove down to Fresno, which was alright, but folks told us later that Fresno is dealing with lots of gang violence now, so I don't know that I would recommend it as a destination.

Our next stop was Kings Canyon and Sequoia.  We stayed at the Azalea campground, which was fairly nice, but there was no dump station and no water fill up available.  I don't believe that showers are available there either.  Since we don't typically travel with a full tank of fresh water, this would have been a major problem for us had I not found a water spigot next to the restrooms that enabled us to fill our fresh tank.  Kings Canyon itself was the low point of our trip.  The drive to the canyon was about an hour and the terrain was very desolate and uninviting.  I can see how the canyon itself where the park is would be nice, but it was very smoky as there was a planned fire going on in nearby Sequoia, so visibility was very limited.  We didn't really do anything there as a result.  But we thoroughly enjoyed Sequoia.  Climbing up to Moro Rock gives you a fantastic view of the high Sierra mountains and far down into the surrounding areas.  Giant Forest was incredible with all of the enormous trees and the beauty of the forest itself.  As with Yosemite, crowds were a major problem by noon, and people were waiting a long time for a parking space at the visitor's center at the Giant Forest.

We then headed east to the coast and Monterrey, where we spent one night at the city fairgrounds.  For being an urban campground, it was actually quite nice and definitely the least expensive campground in the area.

We drove down to Big Sur and spent two nights at the Big Sur Campground.  This was the most expensive campground we ever stayed at, $78 a night for partial hookups (no sewer).  But that is in line with overall prices of the area.  This was a relaxing place, and that's good because we didn't find much to do in the area besides that.

Our next stop was north in Sasalito, just north of San Francisco.  We had a great time in the city, and enjoyed Alcatraz, Chinatown, and the Pier 39 area.  The next day we were able to make it over to Muir Woods by 8:00 a.m., which was good since locals said that it fills up by 9:00 to 10:00 every morning.  It was one of the most tranquil, awe inspiring places we've ever been to.

We then went up to Napa and enjoyed some great food and seeing some beautiful vineyards, but we're not really into wine and didn't want to spent $50-100 to do a tour of a winery.  The Napa market was really fun though, and we got some great cheese and pastries there.

Our next visit was to one of the lesser visited national parks, Lassen Volcanic.  It was a cool place, but the snow pack here was still very deep, and nearly all of their hiking trails still had some snow on them in some areas.  Bumpass Hell, a very geologically active area with mudpots and fumaroles, was still closed due to all of the snow.  One of the lakes by the road close to the summit was still frozen over!  Consequently, we didn't stay here long, but we took a lovely trail to a grand waterfall and enjoyed the sights.

We headed back to the coast and spent nights in Eureka, Klamath, and Crescent City while visiting Redwoods national and state parks.  All of the natural areas were lovely, but the Avenue of the Giants was the most spectacular of all.  Our stay at Klamath River Campground was probably our most lovely one in terms of the views from the campsite.

Finally, we made our way up to Crater Lake.  The lake itself was spectacular, but again, the snow pack had closed much of what we wanted to visit.  The east rim road is still closed, and many of the hiking trails and sights are on that road.  As a result, we only stayed at Mazama campground for one night before we left and worked our way back home to eastern Washington.

The Pod itself was great for us.  Everything worked properly, and the space was just enough for the three of us.

Something I wanted to share with everyone is the value of doing reviews on campgrounds.  While we had made reservations at campgrounds for every night of the trip, we wound up making a lot of changes due to our daughter (can't do as much outdoors with her as we had planned) and had to find several new ones along the way.  I was surprised at how few reviews there were in many places.  Please do your best to post reviews on campgrounds that you stay at.  These can be of immense value to others.

If anyone has questions about any of these places, feel free to ask.  Happy Podding!