RV Winter Rambling 2006-07

Homeward Bound……..


North to Reno with one night in Hawthorne enroute – at an old casino, El Capitan whose RV parking area was teeming with other homebound snowbirds. A short drive the next morning took us to Reno, a shabby and rundown city, with more resident homeless than gambling tourists. I remember when the sidewalks were full of people waiting to cram into each casino – there was raucous music and the clang of machines emanating from the open doorways and the blare of car horns from folks impatient to get parked and start playing. Now it’s a ghost of what it used to be and it’s depressing.

So we stayed at The Nugget in Sparks, three miles from downtown Reno; the downside is that the RV lot is right beside the mainline railway tracks and the tooting and the screeching kept us awake most of the night. Fernie had the surprised gratification of playing Texas Holdem at a table with a professional poker player. After three hours of play, he rated the nine players at the table and he appraised Fernie as number two. However, with discussion he discovered that all the other players were locals that played together frequently and that Fernie was the only newbie. With that, he changed his rating of Fernie to number one. He’s a moneymaker!

We were up early the next morning with the help of the trains and were on the road by 7:30am. We didn’t intend to drive such a long day but we ended up driving all the way to Seven Feathers Casino in Canyonville, Oregon – 365 miles. We had planned to phone our new Rogue River friends to see if they could meet us but we were exhausted when we got there so instead we had an early night.

Our favourite place in the world beckoned – the Sea Perch RV Park right on the Pacific Ocean 20 miles north of Florence, Oregon. I phoned and made a reservation for three days. We had been in the desert for so long, we’d forgotten how beautiful the Pacific northwest is especially after a rainy season. The drive from the freeway over to the coast by Highway 138/38 was spectacularly beautiful and the sporadic misty rain didn’t detract from the splendour. A mosaic of colours lined the winding road; icy green moss dripping from the barren tree branches; hanging vines of varied greens clung to tree trunks; emerald green lichens covered the areas missed by the moss and vines; the stately bottle green elegance of the tall dark evergreens towered above while masses of ferns covered the banks and the forest floor. Here and there, a dogwood would appear in full immaculate white blooms. Willows drooped their long wispy fronds over the wide deep, dark Umpqua River. The dark green river of unfathomable depths circled with duelling currents would periodically change to a gurgling, gushing mass of rapids.

Deep gorges forced our road into narrow confines and then we’d turn a corner to a scene of pastoral enchantment; hilly mounds of velvety green grass; sheep grazed serenely, their bodies sleek after shearing; horses frolicked in the cool air behind spotless white fences; dappled clouds spread across green clad hills; white clapboard farmhouses with green or red shutters made me imagine the cosiness inside beside a smouldering fire; lily pads developing after a long winter covered mirror-like ponds After driving beneath a tunnel of filmy tree branches, a bright red azalea would pop a blast of colour, causing me to gasp. I slid the window open and I could smell the pungency of the moist earth and foliage and could feel the dampness of the cool humidity on my skin. The last stretch before we reached the ocean was deep dark rain forest. The ferns and mosses covering every branch and trunk were thick and fur-like. In the last deep canyon, my GPS struggled to catch a satellite signal – we were in a nether land. Elk meadows, vast and green, offered comfortable roofed viewing areas to spy on the graceful giants. Arbutus trees, (known as madrona in the USA) their peeling bark exposing shiny red trunks started to appear – a signal that the ocean was near. I was experiencing rapture – it’s as if we’d never seen such a sight before. After four months in the arid desert, our senses were arrested by the scenery and overwhelmed.


The rain abated and the clouds thinned to display an occasional spot of blue as we arrived at the glory of the seashore. Yellow gorse dazzling like golden sunshine was in full bloom along the shore. The waves crashed relentlessly on the rocks and sand – a cacophony of sound. I had forgotten the smell of salty sea air and how the sea mist shrouded the horizon and crept into the shore in an instant. But the sun kept trying to force its way back through the mist.


We pulled into Sea Perch early by 11am and settled at the front just a short distance to the wild sea. Ecstasy! That first day, we didn’t do much more than watch the scene out of our huge front window, sipped wine and I caught up some blogging. A storm had blown in and our cozy nest was welcomed. The following morning, we awoke to a sparkling clear and warm day and we couldn’t wait to walk the length of the beach. Caesar behaved like a puppy dashing along the sand, through tide pools, being caught by the occasional wave. He too was happy to be back.


We prowled the coast south on a Geocaching afternoon – discovered some wonderful hideaways, learned about the flora and fauna, and drooled over some of the houses overlooking the ocean. It was Easter Sunday, and families were out on the beaches enjoying the warmth. Our last day, we organized some Geocaching in Florence, 18 miles south and ended with an early dinner at the famous ‘Mo’s’ – a seafood restaurant.


We’re ready to head home now – not that our wanderlust has lessened, but there are people we miss and home is the next stop on our rambling lifestyle.

posted by O'Leary @ 8:57 PM