Day 15 - The Shasta Dam

The Tired Travellers (4,300 kms behind them)

Today we left John and Margaret's at 10:00 am and drove til about 1:00 pm. At that point we saw signs for the Shasta Lake. I knew I recognized the name and shortly after I saw signs for the Shasta Dam. Since we *are* on a Rambling Road Trip we decided to take a side trip and follow the signs.

I am very glad we did because we ended up seeing the second largest dam in America!

The View From the Centre of the Dam

We walked across the dam and I got a brochure and read the important facts to the boys. This dam used 5,000,000 cubic metres of concrete and 803 feet across the base!

Anyway, after this we kept driving til about 6:00 pm. We left California's warm weather behind (in Shasta it was positively hot) and headed North to Oregon. Here we encountered snow. Apparently 5 days after we drove through that area they had a couple feet of snow!! There were still snow drifts on the side of the road, in some places! I am very thankful I missed that!

Distant Snow

We found a little no town called Canyonville, Oregon. It had nothing in it except a casino and a hotel. But I called the hotel in advance and it was a Best Western. After our last getting burned with a grungy hotel I had decided to call ahead and find out about it.

Me and My Bro

Learning to Dive

Austin had a wonderful trip. I spent one night in the hot tub (me, get in a cold pool? Not!!) showing him how to swim under the water. He went from a few second submersion to where he is like a little fish. He can do somersaults and flips around in the water, plus jumping in and swimming under the water across the width of the pool. He tried in summers past to learn, but we learn in a lake and it isn't the nicest place to learn. His big brother also got more comfortable in the water from this trip.

Relaxing in the Hot Tub

This hotel was great and only six years old. They had a nice little indoor pool and hottub, so the boys got to go swimming tonight. Because of their colds, coughs etc they have only been swimming two other times! So maybe we will try to get a nice place with a pool again tomorrow.