Leaving McCloud and Visiting Yosemite National Park
The theme for Sunday was “We tried.” We planned to go kayaking and decided to check out McCloud Lake. The water level was very low. We drove quite a ways around the fingers of the lake (meaning, a windy road) before getting to the damn where the road ended. As we reversed our trip, we realized we missed the parking lot near the beginning of the lake. Due to the very low water level, it was a long, steep hike to the lake. We didn’t want to take our two heavy kayaks or our injured, geriatric dog down and back up that trail so we headed back to Lake Siskiyou. Lake McCloud is a beautiful and isolated location; it is worth visiting again.
I had read about a place at Lake Siskiyou where the locals went to avoid the crowds. We found it after a drive on a bumpy, dirt road. Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, the water level was very low there too, creating another steep decent to the lake. We took a short walk but, as you can see from the photo, it may have been too long because Iris started limping quite a bit. It was also a beautiful drive and location.
Two strikes and we decided to call it a day on kayaking and just go to lunch. We went to Mt. Shasta Brewing in Weed, CA. It was fantastic! One of the benefits of camping and vacationing during the late shoulder season (some campgrounds close on October 15) is the lack of crowds. There weren’t many people at the brewery, Iris had shade, and the waitress was great. A thought for next time: get the taster tray again, it’s large and the beer is very good.
Monday was a travel day and not great. We drove to the Hodgdon Campground in Yosemite National Park, about a 7 hour drive. Gas is ridiculously expensive. In fact, we got gas last night in the Park so we’d be ready for today’s adventure, and the gas station only had supreme gas available. We paid over $7/gallon. When I calculated a rough estimate of what we might pay in total for gas on this trip, Mike literally choked. But, the high gas prices are likely keeping the campgrounds and parks emptier. When we made reservations, these campgrounds were fully booked - they’re not full in reality. Also, we don’t have much of a choice because we want to spend most of our sabbatical with Iris and roadtripping is our favorite option.
Monday’s not-great travel adventures include: a successful but not easy trailer dump at a Safeway fuel station; a super windy, long and terrifying road up a mountain with a drop-off on one side that I drove half-way up and then had to pull over for Mike to finish because I was driving too slow for the traffic following us; a dinner at a mediocre brewery (Around the Horn Brewery) with OK beer but not OK food and a lot of very annoying flies, where we also first discovered the truck was not charging the trailer battery for some reason and the battery was dead so Mike had to pull out the solar panels to charge the battery just to run the refrigerator while we were at the brewery, and where Iris was a total pain in the butt because she was stir-crazy from not walking; and when we finally go to the campground, the site was so unlevel that it took us three tries to find the best spot where we only had to put one tire on three leveling blocks and also learned the available “potable water” meant a facet in a restroom building where you could fill water jugs but not connect a trailer. So, we now have an iffy trailer battery (at best) and no water in the trailer. That’s two of the three urgent needs - at least we have propane. But, we’re in a national park that is absolutely gorgeous and fairly quiet, and there is a large sequoia tree across from our campsite.
