Red Bluff
Today was even smokier than yesterday. How is that possible? The skies were so smoky when we got up this morning that I could take a photo directly at the sun and get an image of a red disc and not a blown out white mass.
We only drove a little over 200 miles today to Durango RV in Red Bluff, CA. Somehow, the skies got even smokier as we dropped over the pass south of Ashland and into California. We could only see outlines of the mountain ranges to the east and west because the smoke was so dense. The valleys were completely filled with smoke. Lake Shasta looked like a giant bowl of smoke. We never saw Mt. Shasta through the smoke. We drove through one area where the fire had jumped I-5 and burned a short distance on the east side also. There were even signs to turn on our headlights because of the poor visibility.
As we continued south, we passed through Redding, which is where the largest fire in California has been burning. That guaranteed that we wouldn't lose the smoke before we reached Red Bluff. We stayed in Red Bluff on our way north but hadn't planned to camp here on the way home. We were supposed to be in Mt. Lassen National Park this week, but we cancelled because of all the smoke. It was a very short day to Red Bluff today, but trying to make it to our next stop was too long a day. We pulled in at 2:00 and relaxed for the rest of the day.
We've done our mountain climbing for the trip (except for the Grapevine), so the rest of the trip should be an easy drive. We have two days driving down the Central Valley and then we cruise through L. A. and down I-15.
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