California Here we Come

It is beginning to feel a lot like home! On Friday we hoped to visit another National Monument near Merced OR. However, we could not find the visitor center, so did not know how to get there. It is called Cascades-Siskiyou NM. Anyone been there? I guess we will have to come back when we figure out where it is.  

So we did some shopping in Merced and headed south again on I-5. For some reason the trucks did not seem so bad and the drive was fairly painless. There were some long steep grades over the mountains. It reminded me of the Grapevine near LA. We caught many glimpses of Mt. Shasta in the east. We stopped in Redding CA – the gateway to Lassen NP. We did make a stop at Shasta Dam (actually it is on the Sacramento River). It has the world’s largest spillway and was quite a lovely spot.

On Saturday we spent some time exploring Redding. It is on the Sacramento River and has a beautiful city recreation area called Turtle Bay. There is a nature center, arboretum, museum, playhouse, etc. The prime attraction is a walk bridge over the River, designed by Santiago Calatrava, called the Sundial Bridge. It is one of those bridges that is supported on one side by a massive column and cantilevered out with guy wires. The floor of the bridge was translucent so you felt like you were walking on the water. We enjoyed visiting it, but did not want to pay for the other attractions so we left!

The temperature was approaching 100 deg, and we couldn’t leave the dog in the van, so we decided to continue our drive to Sacramento. We switched over to Highway 70 and we did make a stop in Oroville. We followed the Greenline tour (an actual green line painted in the pavement that led you to all the tourist attractions in this small town on the Feather River). I am beginning to appreciate how hard some communities are trying to strengthen their economy by attracting tourists and providing beautiful places for the locals to visit, also.