Due to various circumstances day number three is now almost 5 days ago...
Day 3 of the sister's epic road trip had us getting up at friends D & K. I was early so figured out the fancy capsule coffee machine (I would advertise, but have forgotten the name) and had a lovely cup of coffee in the quiet of the morning. The sun attracted my eye to a precious piece of this particular family's life - a painted rock. It so reminded me of the couple that I have and proudly display, one from each son. I have a "thing" for rocks anyway with random, unlabeled piles throughout my home, so this touched me.
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| A's rock |
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| Breakfast at Katerina's in Auburn |
Then we were off to meet up at a cousin's house with our traveling partner, FL, for a 3 day adventure in Northern California, main goal the redwood trees. Both parties arrived within 5 minutes of the other and by mutual agreement decided to skip lunch and simply get on the road. A very wise decision as events would prove.
We proceeded up Highway 29 to cross over onto 101 headed North through the famous Napa Valley. We did a short stop in Healdsburg to have a coffee and snack at the "Shed".
The first sign of a potential problem was when I saw a road sign saying "slide on Highway 101", but we didn’t really pay much attention to it. Had texted a classmate from my high school boarding academy that we
were on the road as he lived in the area where we intended hiking. (I had renewed his acquaintance via Facebook and when I realized that he would be close to where we were intending hiking contacted him). Went passed Willits (FL had done the economic planning for the
by-pass so enjoyed riding over that) and there was another sign that the road
was out on 101. I mentioned that and we did finally pull over at about 20 miles
past Willits and tried checking info. Turns out that there had been a bad slide
on 101 south of Garberville and the road was totally shut. So we had to turn
around and re-trace our steps past Willits to Highway 20 and go up I-5 to 299
to Arcate and down to Eureka.
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| It truly was an end of sorts as we had to start back-tracking and go well out of our way. |
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| Map of the day's driving |
(Our original route Williams - Willits - Eureka up 101
What we had to do: leave from above Willits on 101, back down to Highway 20, across to Williams, up to Redding, then left across 299 to Arcate and down to Eureka)
Bingo and the hard-researched trip was down the
drain. Timing of course was also shot.
As we had skipped lunch we all agreed that we needed to stop for dinner in
Redding to cheer ourselves up and keep ourselves primed for the detour over
Highway 299, especially when we found out that there had been slides there as well and
that there were a couple of places where there was bi-directional traffic at
roughly 1 hour intervals! My sister researched eating places and came up with
Moonstone Bistro. FL meanwhile had her also text someone that he was
mentoring for her suggestions in Redding. We checked her recommendations and
all three decided that we preferred Moonstone Bistro. It was conveniently
located not far from Highway 299 and we had a wonderful meal. K. had the vegetarian
burger that for once wasn’t dry. FL and I had the normal burger and they too
were to die for with lovely marinated pickles, a choice of cheeses etc. I ordered the salad, K the fries and we
split. Tanya – a hostess or manager – gave us the latest info on Highway 299 when we inquired of the waiter what news was on the slide. She was VERY helpful,
so after a delightful meal, we buckled down and started over Highway 299 stopping for
sunset pics of the mountains.
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| One of many docks along Clear Lake on Highway 20 |
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| Sunset from Highway 299 |
An interesting, long and grueling night it
turned into. Several things helped us retain our sanity including being lucky enough as we arrived at the first
major slide area to only
have to wait about 5 minutes for our line to go through giving me just enough
time for a few photos.
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| line of cars as we waited to go through |
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| At the site of the slide |
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| Not a small machine! |
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| blurry photo of the machine halfway up the mountain above us |
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| blurry but then we were hurrying past the slide itself |
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| moving on past the slide |
It seemed like a never-ending night with FL driving
through thick and thin. But we were all three good at the never-ending remarks
and jokes about our situation. Throughout cellular service loss and cuts K
negotiated the cancellation of our Garberville BW hotel for the next night as
there was no way that we were going to be able to get there; the request for
two nights at our BW in Eureka and the cancellation of the dinner reservation
for that night. We finally arrived at 23.05 at our hotel in Eureka! Literally
checked in, went to our rooms, I dumped my luggage, grabbed a flash light so as
to not wake up K upon my return and took FL for a more than deserved beer. Finding that was
also a challenge as, although Applebee's had been open when we came in, it
wasn’t when we tried. Adel’s equally not so we went down to the pub streets
that he knew. Even there it took cruising up and down several parallel streets
for us to find a pub that was still open -Steve & Dave's in Eureka. Beer greatly appreciated! When I
returned to the hotel I also needed to check on e-mails and answer my classmates (we
had called just before we found out that we couldn’t get through) so it was 1
in the morning before I hit the bed – and was out like a light!
It was a true adventure, but then I seem to specialize in those!
A video posted by Facebook user Wendy Kornberg shows the dramatic slide. She can be heard encouraging the Caltrans workers to run as slide increases in size, finally exclaiming “Oh my God! Holy cow!” as it comes to and end.
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