So Disappointed

We left the beautiful Oregon coast this morning heading inland—as we drove the miles the temps rose, not drastically but enough for you to know you had left the cooling ocean breezes behind.  The drive on Oregon highway 42 was another one of those egg scrambling roads but with absolutely stunning scenery.  Ainslie, (he grew up in Powers) this one is for you:

A short driving day for us—160 miles—and we pulled into Diamond Lake USFS campground, finding a spot for our big pink bus in spite of the young woman at the entry check-in station efforts to keep us out.  That’s a topic for another blog post!

My dear father loved Oregon, he came to Oregon from Arkansas in his early twenties and worked in the timber industry meeting life long friends.  He went back home to Arkansas for a visit, started dating my Mom and although he always longed to return to Oregon, plans just never worked out.  In 1972, Mom and Dad along with we three children, me at age 17, my sister Ann at age 14, and my brother Ross at age 11 came out west on a vacation.  Dad had so much to show us and one of the places he delighted in was Crater Lake National Park.  There are family photos of we three kids playing in snow in July here at Crater Lake and of the family posed on the edge of that deep blue lake. 

I was so looking forward to seeing that deep blue lake again but unfortunately the forest fires in the west had other plans—I am extremely sad and disappointed.  It is so smoky it is almost impossible to see anything, the mountains are almost obscured and the water in Crater Lake is gray instead of beautiful blue. 

You can just barely see the faint outline of Mount Thielsen in the background of this photo.

I am praying for rain or wind from the right direction or something to make all this smoke go away—we will see what it looks like tomorrow morning early.