Our plan was to hightail it through up the US west coast in order to make the most of the Canadian summer. However, awesome people and spectacular scenery disrupted our plans. Six weeks and 5,000km later we managed to tear ourselves away and cross the border. Here are some of the highlights of this leg of the journey. The story is told through the photo captions.
Hi, hi American Pie.
Once the June gloom fog had lifted, the Big Sur was pretty nice!
Bixby Bridge, the Big Sur
We were surprised to see the NSW plates. Morris, actually an Irishman, was heading south. ???
Michael, a pastor from Quebec, was touring north America on his gorgeous Honda Goldwing. He has been known to ride his bike down the church aisle in his parish!
Over 100 metres tall, you can’t help but be in awe of these trees.
A glorious ride along the Avenue of the Giants.
Our first United States national park was Crater Lake. Its depth of 592 meters makes it the deepest lake in the US. In around 5700 BC, Mount Mazama collapsed into itself during a tremendous volcanic eruption, losing up to 1,070 metres in height. This period of volcanic activity produced over 150 times as much ash as the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens and formed a large caldera that eventually filled and named Crater Lake.
Astoria, Oregon lies near the mouth of the Columbia River. This bridge connects the town to the state of Washington on the other side.
In Astoria we stayed with Loren and Myrle who we’d met whilst travelling in Mexico.
Loren loves fishing and here he is showing off just one of the day’s catch.
What a treat! Loren’s divine smoked salmon….even Matt loved it.
We were in Astoria for the 4th of July. Everyone dressed up to celebrate.
A view of Mount St Helens. It had remained dormant for over 130 years when scientists started recording renewed activity in early 1980. On May 18, 1980, a magnitude 5.1 earthquake triggered the largest landslide in recorded history at that time: travelling at 177 to 249 km per hour, four cubic kilometres of rock and glacial ice spread over 62 square kilometres. Fifty-seven people were killed and 200 houses, 27 bridges, 24 km of railways and 298 km of highway were destroyed.
During the eruption, enough timber to build 160,000 homes was blown down. Tall trees were toppled like straw as far as 30km away. Today, many still lay where they fell.
More great riding in Mount Rainier National Park.
We were surprised with the amunt of snow left on the trails in mid-July. It made hiking a little tricky….
Clearly enjoying the warmer weather, these little guys (chipmunks) were everywhere…
…so were the big guys! This was our first encounter with a black bear, Mount Rainier National Park.
Ross and Wendy, our new friends in Snohomish, gave us a precious jar of vegemite. Our supply ran out in Costa Rica!!
A collection of artworks on display at Chihuly Garden and Glass – one of the highlights of our visit to Seattle. Incredible giant works of art made from hand-blown glass.
The photos above also appear in our online gallery.
Our Odyssey Overland 