diary: may 2002

We try our first RV trip this month, knocking a whole host of vacation "wannas" off our lists. First, we took the Coast Starlight overnight train up the coast to Seattle. Cramped, but cool - worth doing once, but not worth every taxpayer in the US subsidizing Amtrak. North of Seattle, we picked up our dream home - a 34-foot RV - and started back south.  

Our first stop was a night outside of Mt. St. Helens, and the old girl was kind enough to clear her veil of clouds for us to glimpse her decimated crown a few times. The visitors centers really are cool - you can climb down into the heart of a 10-foot deep "volcano" and see, on a 10 ft. x 10 ft. relief map, each of the events of the eruption in detail. I hadn't seen the volcano for over 20 years - since a year after the eruption - and it was amazing how much had changed...and how much devastation was still apparent.

On south, and we stopped in Ashland, Oregon, at the Shakespeare Festival - which really isn't much of one yet. I presume that in the summer it kicks into high gear but, though the plays we saw were great, the whole atmosphere was underwhelming. Until June, I think the whole gig is just the plays, in a theatre, in the middle of a 5 square block pretty little artsy town. No biggie. Still, we had fun navigating the RV through the narrow streets of Ashland. Then on to Crater Lake, and a drive-by sighting of Mt. Shasta & the Klamath Basin, then home. 

And yes, driving an RV is easier than it looks.