Day 1 began with us departing home at 1pm for Woodland, OR. We needed to stop at Dave & LJ's for a part for our captain's chair, so decided we'd spend the night at Columbia River RV Park in Woodland. Our cat, Cassey is not a car rider, much less an RV rider, so she didn't take well to the first couple hours of the trip. There was lots of hyperventilating and howling going on, even though she wasn't confined to her carrier. She settled down some when she decided she'd sit on Dave's lap or on the front dash. A lot of her discomfort was that she was cold. The more sunshine or direct heat vent she got, the better. Once we parked for the night and turned on the house furnace, she settled right down. Columbia RV Park is very nice, right on the Columbia River. We got a pull-through site that faced the river, so spent our dinner hour in the front seats watching the river (though most of it was in the dark). It rained on and off throughout the night, the train came by frequently (a couple miles away, but still noticeably noisy), and Cassey was restless, so not much sleep for either of us.
Day 2 started with some rain, but by the time we left, it was just cloudy. Headed south on I-5 toward Seven Feathers RV Park in Canyonville, OR. Cassey finally agreed that riding in her carrier with all the doors open, between the front seats was not such a bad idea. Not much noise or activity from her today. Hopefully each day gets better for her. It was nice easy driving on a Saturday. Not much traffic, spots of sunshine and only about a 5 hour journey. The hillsides are all nice a green for this time of year with pockets of low fog in the valleys. Checked into the campsite a little after 2pm. Quite a nice spot. We were escorted to our site that is a paved pull-through with lots of grass and trees (for those not RVers, concrete pads, grass and trees are a big deal!). When we stopped at the entrance to register, Dave and I both got out of the RV. When we pulled into our site, we couldn't locate Cassey anywhere. We called, looked in every nook and crawl space we could see in and no calling made her announce her wereabouts. Though she isn't particularly interested in the front door, we got worried that somehow when we got out she escaped unnoticed. Dave started back to the registration desk while I continued with the flashlight to see if I could find her. I was down on my hands and knees with the flashlight under the bed, when I heard some noise up front. Somehow, she'd gotten behind and under our one sofa. It sits pretty close to the wall, so when she finally decided to exit, she didn't have enough room to get a jump up back to the top of the sofa. I pulled her out and immediately (in tears by then) called Dave to tell him she'd finally surfaced. Now we know her hiding place and have put something behind the sofa that she can jump on to get herself out. Geez..some people's kids!! Dave and I went over to the casino for a short time. Gambled some and broke even, so went in and had dinner before more damage was done. The pass looks like it will be clear enough for us to continue down I-5 tomorrow. Hope there's no surprises.
my new best friend...the portable heater..heaven!!!
Day 3 was our most eventful so far. We talked to a lot of folks in the campground and they all said wait til after 9:30 to leave for the pass. The road report says clear and dry....and we were off at about 9:30. Now that Cassey has found the carpeted spot under the sofa, she's perfectly happy to ride there (at least we know where she hides now). The skies were clear and bright blue today with patches of fog and an occasional cloud cover. The drive over the pass was pretty uneventful and a relief for Dave as he's been anguishing over this part of the drive for months. Roads were clear and dry, heavy truck traffic, but we just went slow anyway so it didn't matter. Oh yah..forgot to tell you our toilet flush valve broke this morning. We stopped at more rest areas than usual today and wondering how we're going to fix it. Dave took part of the toilet apart to see if he could determine what we might need to fix it. Of course, it's not that easy. Decided to stop at Camping World in Redding and see if we could find help to fix it or get it fixed. The service department was closed on Sunday, but the store manager helped us. The repair kits were special order and would take 1-2 weeks. Guess what? We are the proud owners of a brand new toilet!!! We did save $80 by installing it ourselves and outside of the tight quarters it wasn't too hard to do (Dave refused to put out the slides so we were maneuvering 2 toilets down this tiny narrow hall, trying to avoid hitting woodwork or counter tops). Needless to say, there were a few words exchanged while attempting this project, but we survived it. We pulled into Rolling Hills RV park at about 5pm. All pull-through sites and only $28. Celebrating a stressful day with wine!!!
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