We started the day by packing our belongings and loading them into the cars. Then we had a last run on our favorite beach, Bastendorff, before heading out of Coos Bay, Sarah to the north and Amber and I to the south. Alas, it was not quite that easy for me. One of the themes of these postings will be, necessarily, observations about aging, gradually losing abilities and functions that served quite well in former years. One such is the processing of information while in potentially confusing situations, for example driving in congested and unfamiliar cities. I not only get lost, but I compound the problem by becoming frantic. Amber seems to have nearly total empathy, so she becomes frantic also. At any rate, I had intended to be out of Coos Bay by 11:00 a.m. and on Highway 5 by noon, but it was 2:30 before we even reached the 5. And nearly 5:00 p.m. before we made it to the California border. Amber never completely settled into the drive, becoming agitated and wanting to stop for no apparent reason.

She had an interesting moment in an Oregon town that featured a wild animal safari of some sort and had a life sized bronze statue of a cheetah near an intersection. Amber went wild barking at it as soon as she saw it--it was quite close, maybe five yards, from where we were stopped at a traffic light. I rolled her window down and she immediately stopped barking when she found there was no scent.

We stopped at a couple of rest stops, and even had a nap at the first one in California, so by 7:00 it was clear that we were not going to make it home tonight. We stopped in Dunsmuir where we are now settled into a most comfortable and attractive motel, Cave Springs, that is just a block from the Dunsmuir City Park. This park has botanical gardens and long trails beside the Siskyou River. Very welcome after a quite grueling day of driving.