Tom had been to Crater Lake many years ago when he was in Oregon during his college days and he wanted me to see it too. We had checked and rechecked the weather and fire reports and decided this would be a good day to make the drive. We got an early start, 8:30 am.
Even though there was fog in the Gold Beach area, we knew we would soon drive out of it. The fog was heavy but we drove on.
Just on the other side of Coquille, we were treated to a herd of majestic elk!
Five beautiful bulls and just a little further out,
a larger herd of cows and one huge bull. Wow! What a wonderful sight!
Even though this is an evergreen area, there are some trees beginning to show their fall colors.
It’s a brilliant sight to see the outstanding yellows peeking out from the forest greens.
We pushed on next to the Coquille river,
lush farmland In the Coquille valley
and towering pine trees.
A gas station where we stopped to get gas offered gold mining supplies, maybe we should have taken them up on their offer!
We were encouraged to see where the trees had been harvested, new trees had been planted for a new generation.
Although we knew there was “extreme” forest fire danger,
we thought we were well south of any possible fires. Even Smokey warned us.
As we continued on through Roseburg on our way to Crater Lake we began to smell smoke. There is on coming traffic, so they are coming from somewhere.
But as we drove on the smoke got more and more dense.
Soon we came upon a line of cars stopped by some firefighters. We asked if we could make it to Crater Lake, but were told the road was closed. Well, nothing to do but make a u-turn.
Back in Roseburg and after a quick drive-thru lunch we were on the road back home.
Another destination aborted by wildfires.
Back in Gold Beach, we made a run by the fishing boats.
After watching two catches we headed home.
The day was not a total loss, we saw elk and beautiful scenery.
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