Carl Henning

Baby, It’s Cold Outside. No, really. very cold. And this made for an unpleasant return trip with sights closed or too cold to stop at. The GPS said the fastest return home was east on I90 in Washington over Snoqualmie Pass. I thought that might be a problem even though it’s only at 3,015 feet. So instead we took a slightly slower route (by 20 minutes) through Oregon and Nevada. And wound up going through 7600 feet outside Austin, NV. In a blizzard. With icy roads.

En route to Weed, California, we had lots of views of Mount Shasta. The best views were in Weed, behind the grocery store.

Tule Elk State Natural Reserve just off the 5 in California hosts a herd of (you guessed it) Tule Elk. They are a subspecies of elk found only in California where they forage exclusively on fruits and nuts. (Actually I just made that last part up.)

There is Joshua Tree, the tree; Joshua Tree, the town; and Joshua Tree, the National Park. As we began our trip to Washington, we hit all three. Going through the Joshua Tree National Park and then north let us skip all of the LA traffic. So what if it took a couple hours longer.

In contrast to The Exit Not Taken last year, this year we took the exit. Yes, we stayed in the home of Garth Brooks! We know because when we entered Yukon, OK the sign said Welcome to Yukon, Home of Garth Brooks. OK, we stayed at a Fairfield Inn by Marriott… again.

Where there’s a way, there’s a Will… Rogers, that is. Turns out our unsuccessful visit attempt to the Will Rogers Memorial Museum last week (Tuesday with No Will) was the first time they’ve been closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. Today being Sunday, we decided to skip the world’s largest totem pole and visit the museum. I called first, this time.

We didn’t realize that George Washington Carver was born in Missouri until we discovered the George Washington Carver National Monument. He was born a slave near the end of the Civil War, but as a slave there is no record of his birth – no date, not even a year. He and his mother were owned by Moses Carver. George and his mother were kidnapped from Moses’ farm. He was returned but his mother was not; she was reported as dead. Moses and his wife took George and his brother into their home and raised them.

While at Fort Leonard Wood for Jacob’s graduation we visited the US Army Engineer Museum.

Jacob graduated from Basic plus Advanced Training. He is now a Combat Engineer.

The rest of the group arrives tonight. In the meantime, we stocked up with groceries at Walmart.