Dinata Misovec

It was all downhill today – Prospect at 2,566 feet to sea level. It was also one of those drives I’ll never forget. We took US62 from Prospect, Oregon (near Crater Lake National Park) the road followed the Rogue River, winding through the mountains. At first, the roadsides were filled with fir, pine, and a few other trees. Sometimes we drove through valleys with farms. I saw some crops I could not identify and, after browsing Google images for a while, I think they are either young grapes vines, hemp, or cannabis. Then we turned north on Interstate 5 to the town of Grants Pass.

The most spectacular part of the trip was US 199 from Grants Pass down to the Pacific Ocean and Crescent City. This road follows the water down to the ocean. There were a number of small resort towns, but the closer we got to the ocean, the narrower the gorge and the larger the trees. Eventually, we were in the redwoods. Sometimes the gorge was so narrow that it was only as wide as the two-lane highway and the creek, between two steep mountainsides. Often, those mountainsides showed signs of previous landslides. That was creepy since it was raining lightly.

Of course, I didn’t take any pictures while driving so I found two with Google images. Here is one demonstrating why it is creepy to drive through those narrow, steep, landslide sections.

• 

The section through the redwoods is magical. Again, from Google Images.

We are staying in an RV park right on the ocean tonight.

The emphasis here is on park, as in parking lot. But, we have a full hookup (water, electric, and sewer) and we can see the ocean waves out the windows.

It is named Crescent City for the crescent-shaped beach on the south end of town.

It was a bit foggy and misty today. The beach is wide and long. There were dozens of surfers, but the waves did not look too big and exciting to me.

The city has placed several double-sized picnic tables along the road.

There is a large artificial harbor here, formed by huge rock jetties. These seals were barking (I say singing) loudly for a long time.

This gray one was responding with its own aria. The brown one with the flipper in the air raised up and, apparently, told it to shut up.

These cute Christmas decorations were probably too cute to take down. Those are some sort of fishing (or crabbing?) baskets. We saw a woman using one when we took a walk.

There is a lot of driftwood art in this town. These two pieces are in front of the Chart Room Restaurant where we had excellent seafood dinners.

It was raining in earnest when we finished eating, so we hid out in the RV until it stopped. I thought the town was tired of people running into the light poles in the parking lot. Andy suggested that these large logs are to protect the light poles from Pacific Ocean waves. Yikes.

I spotted more unknown (to me) flowers. These are ankle-high and about the size of violets.

There is a small Coast Guard Station in the harbor.

The gulls here are large and have a bright red spot on their lower beak. The head and chest are exceptionally white. The legs are pink, marking it as a Western Gull.

The gigantic rock at the end of the road had hundreds of these on it. I thought they were large, brilliant white flowers from below. But, after looking at the photo I took with my zoom lens, I see they are some kind of succulent.

While looking them up, I not only learned that they are Dudleya, but are also endangered and protected. People have been poaching them and selling them in Korea, Japan, and China for $40 to $50 per plant.