2006-07-22 - 1:18 a.m.
Ok....so I think I need to clear up a few things:
1."Sans pants" means: I'm not wearing any pants.
2. "I think I have Bird Flu" means: I'm a hypochondriac.
Don't worry, I'm still alive and itching. I'll just have a hangover in the morning.
For those of you who stopped reading after the phrase, "I'm not wearing any pants"...well, I'm not wearing any pants.....
comments??? (4 so far...) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~2006-07-17 - 8:02 p.m.
Yep, I'm pretty sure I've got it: West Nile, Bird Flu, Malaria, Black Water Fever.....
I've lived in Playa for 5 years and never had one mosquito bite. I've always been told they spray the wetlands here. Never been bit. But I think those Mozzies (mosquitos!) from Crater Lake hitched a ride with me. Those were some serious industrial strength mosquitos. I now have at least TWO DOZEN bites all up and down my legs! HUGE! (The bites, not my legs!) The result of sitting on my deck for a cocktail one late afternoon.....sans pants. (Hey....it was hot!)
So, you know, now I'm going to die of whatever it is that they're carrying these days. Actually, I probably won't die....I'll just suffer! So, being the hypochondriac that I am, which disease do you think I'm most likely to get????
comments??? (5 so far...) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~2006-07-07 - 4:54 p.m.
Crater Lake, Part 2
So as we drove the next two hours up the mountain, we began to wonder if at the end of this trek, we'd end up sleeping in our car. Oh sure, they had told us we could check in as late as we wanted.....but they had also given us extremely wrong directions on how to get there. Also, our gas tank was edging ever closer to *empty* the further we got from the last gas station we had seen.....over an hour ago. Hmmm. I was pretty sure I could get us there....but not so sure I could get us outta there.
Finally, at midnight, we arrive. The place is dark. Closed.
Alan gets out to investigate as I ponder the fact that we are essentially out of gas, we have no ice for the cooler, we may have to sleep sitting up because I have a full load in the car and our seats won't recline, we've been in the car for almost 10 hours, our last meal was at some dreadful taco joint, and the cat really really needs to use the catbox....and she's not the only one! (And who really wants to pee outside in the snow during a lightning storm in a place where there are warning signs for bears all over the place!?)
But God was smiling on us. Our room key was taped to the office door. Hallelujah!!!
After that, the trip was pretty uneventful. There is a gas station at Crater Lake, a store, restaurants....oh, and mosquitos! How could I have forgot to mention the mosquitos???! They are the size of humming birds!!! And DEET, the repellant that can melt plastic, does not DO A THING. The mosquitos LOVE it. And when they bite, you can count on welts the size of silver dollar pancakes. I am not making this up! So if you're going to Crater Lake, be sure to bring you bee keepers suit, eat tons of garlic and brewer's yeast, lay off the red meat, and do whatever other home remedy you can find because there is no escaping them. I think we even still had a few buzzing around in the car when we got to San Francisco!
Anyway, I think that's about all I have to report on our C.L. trip....except that it is an amazingly beautiful beautiful place, well worth all the torture to get there. Tomorrow I'm off to Los Angeles. Hopefully that trip will be a bit less eventful. But stay tuned, people, one never knows what will happen next!
comments??? (1 so far...) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~2006-07-04 - 3:10 p.m.
So we left Astoria with plans to stay at Crater Lake on our trip back south. Since the lodge itself is booked usually months in advance, we felt like we'd won the lottery when we found a room at their Mazama Village Motor Inn with only a few days notice.
Now, as you probably all know, I am not an early riser. And when I get ready to leave Astoria, it takes me a while to pack up and load the car (to put it mildly), so I rarely leave before 10am (ok, I mean noon, or 2:00, or whenever I feel like it!) So we left a bit late for (what we thought would be) a 7 hour drive. No problem though, that meant we'd be getting in by around 9:00 or 10:00pm. I'm cool with that.
So we've got the GPS going. It's one of those super~duper, extremely high tech ones that speaks to you as you drive. (I had bought it for my parents for Xmas one year, but they gave it back to me because it was too high tech. Bonus!) It directs us exactly to where we're supposed to go, we arrive at 10:00pm.
Oh, but there is just one slight problem.
The address that we had programmed in, is TWO HOURS away from where we're actually supposed to be!!!!
Apparently, when I made the reservation and asked where they were located, I was talking to the *business office.* So I got the address to the *business office* and not to the *Motor Inn.* Oy. 10:00pm, after 7plus hours of driving, and still two more to go. In the dark. During an electrical storm. Lightning. On twisty, windy roads up the side of a mountain.
Too be continued........
comments??? (8 so far...) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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