Day 17 Continued: Crescent City, California and Grants Pass, Oregon
*Images are from during the day because this entire post is about the evening events*
Catching rain drops
Before climbing into the nearby mountains, we grabbed some Hawaiian BBQ for dinner. I would like to point out that this restaurant was of my choosing and it was a success. I don’t want to credit Chad for all of the awesome places we eat, even though his track record is pretty good.
Hitting the road after dinner, it had started to pour sheets of rain as we drove towards the only road that will get us into Oregon as safely as possible. Cranking up the audio book, Chad concentrated on the curves, inclines and sudden declines on our path as the rain kept coming down. As we worked our way into the mountains, I recalled that it would take us around 2 hours to get from Crescent City, California to Grants Pass, Oregon. Boy, was I wrong.
The rain began to freeze and the snow plummeted down, decking the pine trees around us in a pretty white glaze. The road brought us in and out of the forest to overlook large drop-offs to a creek below. The snow began to thicken and Chad charged on knowing that we could not stop in this mountain range until we made it to our destination.
The audio book distracted us both and we sat in comfort listening to the story. We saw a few cars here and there passing us, but hardly any behind or in front of us. We were solo travelers until we came across one of the largest pine trees I have ever seen resting across the entire road.
The car came to a halt in front of the tree and outside of a Wild Cat’s building; it must have been a tourist trap that was closed for the winter season. I immediately thought the parking lot to this place could wrap around to the other side and bypass the tree. But, a Subaru Outback hosting 3 mountain teenagers, rolled up and tried to go around, just as I had imagined. They only made it about 20 feet before immediately reversing back onto the road. There was no way our small cars were going to get through the thick snow.
Ok, so that back up plan was out. Looking forward to stare at the tree in our high beams, I noticed the pine had fallen from the left onto the road, but by doing so, had fallen onto a power line. Not only is there a tree in the road but there is also the reality that someone could be electrocuted if the line was still active.
Chad and I racked our brains for any information we knew about electric emergencies or how to deal with them. All we could come up with is the rubber of our tires are the only thing resistant to the electrical current. But that wouldn’t help much because if Chad decided to drive over the tip of the pine tree, the branches would totally touch the side of metal car and could potentially electrocute us. We were stuck on a mountain.
Chad is wearing the green jacket
Cars were starting to accumulate on both sides of the fallen tree and there now was plenty of light to see how massive this obstacle was. One of the three local mountain boys pulled out a chain saw from the back of the Subaru and was heading over to start hacking away the top of the tree. Chad got out and went to warn him about getting anywhere near the tree with the potential live current.
Drivers from the cars behind us started to come investigate the tree, walked right up to it and were touching the branches. Chad deemed this action as ‘safe enough’ and went to go look with the other guys standing around. The mountain teenager reared his chainsaw and marched over to the rescue. All of the guys that were standing around started to help clear the branches away as the kid cut.
I watched in amazement as the tip of the tree was slowly cleared away, and with every branch removed, there was more hope that we wouldn’t be stuck on this mountain.
I glanced over to see what Chad was up to, and right as I looked over, a branch Chad was tossing into the ditch came back to aggressively smack him on the left side of his face. I flinched for him and saw the culprits on the other side of him. A few other guys were throwing branches into the ditch when Chad was throwing his.
When I asked Chad hours later, he said that their branch had fallen onto his branch which caused it to immediately kick back, hitting him in the face. The only damage suffered was a few small cuts around the eye, the side of the left temple and small bruising that became prominent the next day.
Hail!
The right side of the lane was almost clear when someone had grabbed a hold of the branch the chainsaw was cutting. The pulling motion derailed the chain on the saw and the process immediately stopped. Everyone started to go back to their cars and Chad bolted for our car.
He wanted to be the first one through to make sure he wouldn’t be stuck behind people he couldn’t trust driving through the mountain.
Passing through the tight space on the road, we were immediately stopped by a mountain police officer that was waiting on the other side. This was one of the worst mistakes this officer could have made.
The snow had been falling heavily this entire time and when we came to a stop next to his vehicle, it was likely we wouldn’t be able to pull forward without sliding into his car.
He apologized for making us stop (for literally nothing other than to look at us through our window) and we attempted to drive forward. We slid towards the cop car, stopped and retried until we scooted by without a scratch. Phew.
Driving away was easy and we flew down the road with adrenaline pumping through our veins. I didn’t think we were going to get out of that one!
While driving on this road trip, we ask people on the side of the road it they need help and most of the time they say they have it covered. There was a car with hazards flashing and a guy looking under the hood of his car. The snow was still coming down relentlessly and it wouldn’t be stopping anytime soon. To think the tree was bad enough, what happened next topped anything we have encountered on this trip.
Winter storm weed
The car in distress had apparently run out of gas. The nearest gas station was 20 miles away, and with road conditions the way they are, it would take over an hour to get there and maybe not even make it back. The man was maybe in his late 40s, dressed in dark winter clothing, his face well-worn and was missing teeth. Looking inside the car, the passenger seat held a woman who I thought was his mother and instantly began to worry about their safety on a night like this.
Me caught popping a squat because there were not bathrooms in sightChad gallantly wrote his name in the sand and took a picture to share his art with me. Guess how he made it?
Chad offered to give them a ride to their house, which was only 3-ish miles up the road. I looked at him with horror. You can’t trust anyone anymore and you are not supposed to pick up people on the side of the road if you value your safety/life. This was happening and they were getting in our car.
Chad and I cleared our sleeping gear and bags out the back seat and packed the trunk completely full. The two people piled into our car and the air instantly filled with the skunky smell of weed. Getting a closer look at the woman, she was almost the same age as the guy she was with and I assumed she was the girl friend. She also was missing teeth (I could only see 1 or 2), wasn’t dressed for the weather and had a voice like a practiced chain smoker.
All of the alarm bells were going off in my head. What did we just do? Chad continued to drive steadily for the longest 3 miles of my life. The people in the back seat wouldn’t shut up and the girl was talking 80 miles an hour.
We openly discovered, without having to hardly ask any questions, that they both were weed dealers and they thought we looked like Trimmers. Apparently, Trimmers are traveling people who come to cut the leaves off of the weed plants. The informed us that we were in Oregon and were laughing about how we didn’t know weed was legal in this state. This was, in their opinion, the best place in the whole country to grow weed because of the climate.
They went on and on and on about their varieties, selling patterns, growing seasons and asked multiple times if we would like to purchase their products. They weren’t paying any attention to the road and I had to keep reminding them to tell us where to go. We dipped off the road onto an unplowed dirt road that had only been driven on by the big super duty trucks.
The momentum from the small hill was the only thing keeping are car going forward and Chad hammered on the gas to propel us through the deep snow. Thank goodness for these freaking amazing Canadian snow tires. If a tree didn’t stop us, this deep snow would and it almost did. The girl apologized for making us take this way because, “I always take this road and didn’t think about the snow.” Well no duh lady.
We dropped them off outside a shack and they rolled out of the car. Chad got out to check the back seat with his flash light and found the guy’s wallet sitting on the seat. Wow. They thanked us, told us how to get out and we were on our way as fast as possible. We almost got stuck trying to get up a hill that lead to the main road and had to accelerate rapidly to barely make it onto the road.
If I was driving this entire time, we would have been toast. Now extremely exhausted from the drive all day and the few hours’ events, we trucked out of the mountains as safely as we could. It took us 4 hours to get out of the mountain when it was supposed to take only around 2, but I can’t complain because we never slid down the mountain, crashed into a tree, froze to death or had to spend the night with the weed dealers to wait out the storm. Completely shot, we fell instantly asleep at a truck stop not caring too much if people saw us sleeping or not.
The audio book distracted us both and we sat in comfort listening to the story. We saw a few cars here and there passing us, but hardly any behind or in front of us. We were solo travelers until we came across one of the largest pine trees I have ever seen resting across the entire road.
The car came to a halt in front of the tree and outside of a Wild Cat’s building; it must have been a tourist trap that was closed for the winter season. I immediately thought the parking lot to this place could wrap around to the other side and bypass the tree. But, a Subaru Outback hosting 3 mountain teenagers, rolled up and tried to go around, just as I had imagined. They only made it about 20 feet before immediately reversing back onto the road. There was no way our small cars were going to get through the thick snow.
Ok, so that back up plan was out. Looking forward to stare at the tree in our high beams, I noticed the pine had fallen from the left onto the road, but by doing so, had fallen onto a power line. Not only is there a tree in the road but there is also the reality that someone could be electrocuted if the line was still active.
Chad and I racked our brains for any information we knew about electric emergencies or how to deal with them. All we could come up with is the rubber of our tires are the only thing resistant to the electrical current. But that wouldn’t help much because if Chad decided to drive over the tip of the pine tree, the branches would totally touch the side of metal car and could potentially electrocute us. We were stuck on a mountain.
Drivers from the cars behind us started to come investigate the tree, walked right up to it and were touching the branches. Chad deemed this action as ‘safe enough’ and went to go look with the other guys standing around. The mountain teenager reared his chainsaw and marched over to the rescue. All of the guys that were standing around started to help clear the branches away as the kid cut.
I watched in amazement as the tip of the tree was slowly cleared away, and with every branch removed, there was more hope that we wouldn’t be stuck on this mountain.
I glanced over to see what Chad was up to, and right as I looked over, a branch Chad was tossing into the ditch came back to aggressively smack him on the left side of his face. I flinched for him and saw the culprits on the other side of him. A few other guys were throwing branches into the ditch when Chad was throwing his.
When I asked Chad hours later, he said that their branch had fallen onto his branch which caused it to immediately kick back, hitting him in the face. The only damage suffered was a few small cuts around the eye, the side of the left temple and small bruising that became prominent the next day.
All of the alarm bells were going off in my head. What did we just do? Chad continued to drive steadily for the longest 3 miles of my life. The people in the back seat wouldn’t shut up and the girl was talking 80 miles an hour.
We openly discovered, without having to hardly ask any questions, that they both were weed dealers and they thought we looked like Trimmers. Apparently, Trimmers are traveling people who come to cut the leaves off of the weed plants. The informed us that we were in Oregon and were laughing about how we didn’t know weed was legal in this state. This was, in their opinion, the best place in the whole country to grow weed because of the climate.
They went on and on and on about their varieties, selling patterns, growing seasons and asked multiple times if we would like to purchase their products. They weren’t paying any attention to the road and I had to keep reminding them to tell us where to go. We dipped off the road onto an unplowed dirt road that had only been driven on by the big super duty trucks.
The momentum from the small hill was the only thing keeping are car going forward and Chad hammered on the gas to propel us through the deep snow. Thank goodness for these freaking amazing Canadian snow tires. If a tree didn’t stop us, this deep snow would and it almost did. The girl apologized for making us take this way because, “I always take this road and didn’t think about the snow.” Well no duh lady.
We dropped them off outside a shack and they rolled out of the car. Chad got out to check the back seat with his flash light and found the guy’s wallet sitting on the seat. Wow. They thanked us, told us how to get out and we were on our way as fast as possible. We almost got stuck trying to get up a hill that lead to the main road and had to accelerate rapidly to barely make it onto the road.
If I was driving this entire time, we would have been toast. Now extremely exhausted from the drive all day and the few hours’ events, we trucked out of the mountains as safely as we could. It took us 4 hours to get out of the mountain when it was supposed to take only around 2, but I can’t complain because we never slid down the mountain, crashed into a tree, froze to death or had to spend the night with the weed dealers to wait out the storm. Completely shot, we fell instantly asleep at a truck stop not caring too much if people saw us sleeping or not.