day 1 – sunday

We left my sister’s house in the San Francisco area later than we had anticipated. Someone was having a rave in her neighborhood, and the music was on all night, so it was hard to get any sleep. We took smaller roads and highways to reach the interstate, passing through the Petrified Forest, although we didn’t stop because the park was closed. The windy road was quite beautiful and the scenery well worth the slow down. We stopped for breakfast at a tiny town called Maxwell and had breakfast at a mom and pop’s place called Topsie’s. We ordered chicken-fried steak and eggs for breakfast (indulgent!), which Topsie served to us, all the while calling “baby” or “babies.” We reached Interstate 5 at about 9 am, stopping in the town of Corning at a place called the Olive Pit, where we tasted different olive oils. I was surprised to see that they carried a Moroccan brand, which tasted somewhat nutty. So I bought a couple of bottles. Then we continued along, stopping again right after Lake Shasta which was just about the biggest lake I’ve seen. And quite beautiful too. The tree leaves varied from green to brown to red to yellow. After that, we continued all the way to the town of Ashland, which is right at the border between California and Oregon. We checked into our bed and breakfast and explored the town. It was pretty quiet because it was a Sunday. Ashland has a reputation for being liberal, and I saw quite a few signs that said “Invade Iraq? No!” and so on. We had dinner at a little neighborhood restaurant, this time sticking with salad. And then we went back to our room and listened to some classical music until bedtime.