A Town I Loved Instantly

I think I remember taking this picture before we traveled to Fort Bragg. This is the town I really loved, and I would move their in an instant. The people, like everyone else we met, were incredibly nice, and it was large enough to have things you want in a city, yet it also had a "small town" atmosphere.

After all these years, I miss that, and I am looking for some place like this to make us a home.

The morning picture was a rushed one after leaving Williams. We were on our way to Fort Bragg to see the coast, and then we wanted to go to Willits for a short stop before arriving at Avenue of the Giants.

Winding a path along the state highway was not done easily, but the scenery was beautiful. It was, however, unfortunate that few places offered a person the opportunity to take any pictures along the way, and besides, we were trying to get to see the redwoods as quickly as possible. That was what we wanted to see on this trip.

But before arriving at the seashore, there were more beautiful pictures to be taken, even if only out the car window while we sped toward the redwoods.As we drew near to Fort Bragg and the coast, there were some small lakes, and then we went through the area called Blue Lakes.

Another thing that amazed me was the idea that you could still see palm trees in Northern California, and the lakes here didn't leave anyone with a question in their mind about how they got their name: The Blue Lakes.

Again, we raced by the area without stopping to take a picture. Imperfections in the photographs actually are an indication of our new digital camera's quality, because we seldom had a camera we could use to take pictures out a moving vehicle. Anything taken out the front window also shows bugs on the windshield.

Though it sounds like I'm saying it because of the scenery we would have missed, I'm glad we didn't attempt to drive this road at night.

It twisted and turned, and occasionally the road took sharp turns at the edge of the lake, not a good idea at night. This part of the road actually was less winding than after reaching Fort Bragg.

Regardless of the road conditions, I would not have missed it, and I would like to drive it again, except next time we will do it at a slower pace. We did the trip in three and a half days, a lot driving for a trip well over 2000 miles, but it was the only thing that time would allow this year. I have no regrets, other than I wish I lived there.

There is, however, one other regret: a wish that I had stopped once or twice to get a scent of the trees and grasses in the mountains before arriving at The Blue Lakes.

I've never been in a place where ripened summer grasses were so beautiful, but I grew up in a different place, which I will always remember fondly, but it was different than what I saw on the road.

The road was so bad as we wound our way into the hills from the seashore to Willits, that I actually felt a bit carsick, which I thought was impossible. I haven't been carsick since I was eight years old, and with the exception of getting really sick in a small plane and a number of times on a fishing boat off the coast of Oregon, I've never reacted that way. And I didn't get really sick, but I did feel it. My Annie however, stopped speaking at one point and grasped a small bag with both hands.

But everything considered, I want to do it again, just with stops to enjoy what I saw.