Day 1 - Sylmar, CA to The Dalles, OR - 1072 miles

I got going early, 00:26.  The morning air was nice and cool as I blasted over the Tejon Pass on my way north.  Pretty uneventful, just a blast up I-5 through the central valley.  Since my dad lives east of Sacramento, I go up and down I-5 south of Sacramento fairly regularly.  I just about have all of the exits memorized.  In Dunningan, I removed the clear shield and windbreaker.  It seemed like just a short time after I was getting off the freeway in Redding to stop at Whiskeytown-Shasta-Trinity NRA.  The VC is at Whiskeytown Lake.  I was running a bit early (07:45), so I got gas in town and got some food to eat.  I went up to the VC and ate my breakfast.  The VC doesn't open until 09:00.  Whiskeytown Lake has an unusual arrangement of curtains, one at the inlet and one at the outlet that force the cool incoming water to the bottom of the lake and out the discharge.  Apparently the Chinook Salmon didn't like the warmer water from the lake and this is an attempt to cool the water for the spawning grounds back to the original pre-lake temperature.  The rangers in the VC saw me standing outside with my passport book and invited me in early.  So I was able to get my stamp and be on the road at 08:40.  Redding marks the start of the mountains for I-5 after 460 miles of valley riding.  The mountains will last until Eugene, 310 miles north.  This was a blast, traffic was light enough that I wasn't held up for any length of time.  One other pleasure was seeing some of the last few semaphore signals on a mainline railroad near Drain, OR.  Railfans will understand what that means.  Oregon only has a max of 65 mph, but traffic was mostly moving a bit faster.  Oregon also does not have self service pumps, but starting last year, motorcyclists are allowed to pump their own gas.  Most of the time, the attendant wanted to set the pump up and hand you the nozzle.

I needed to get to the McLoughlin House NHS by 16:00.  I was doing well, a bit better than an hour ahead of that.  Stop and go traffic on I-205 near Portland held me up, but I was able to make it at 15:20.  After a quick look around, I was back on I-205 crossing the Columbia River into Washington.  I got off at the first exit and went west for a few miles to Fort Vancouver.  Whew, it took 985 miles to get here, and finally I will get a stamp from the remaining corner state.  I got three stamps there.  I already had an Oregon NHT stamp, but this stamp was different than the other ones that I had seen, so I put it into my book.  There may have been a Fort Vancouver NHS stamp somewhere, maybe at the fort itself.  I didn't realize that the stamp I got was for the NH Res instead.  People who had gotten stamps a few years before had a Fort Vancouver stamp, but not the one I got.  Maybe it was updated.

The pictures were taken at Fort Vancouver (the VC is about 1/4 mile north of the fort).  They are the fur storehouse, the ovens in the bake house, and a view of Mt. Hood.  By 16:45, I was back in the saddle, heading up the Columbia river.  It was a bit windy in the gorge.  Some people were out on the water wind sailing.  I-84 through the gorge is another beautiful ride in my book.  The interstate runs along the river at the base of the cliffs on the Oregon side.  A railroad is also running along the shore.  On the other side in Washington, there also was another railroad and a state highway.  Since the Columbia has been tamed by a series of dams, the westbound lanes were sometime built on fill in the river.  I got gas at Cascade Locks, and then did the final few miles to The Dalles and the Super 8 where I would be spending the night (18:20).  The girl at the motel counter signed my witness form.  1,072 miles for the day.  17:54 total time, 15:19 of that was spend riding.  I averaged 69.9 mph while riding.  I got some food from an Albertson's supermarket and had a picnic in my room.