See now why I have to keep moving right along? If I stop too long anyplace I think something is not quite right, I could be picked up for muttering and loitering.

To keep out of trouble we escaped across a freedom of the road geo-political border into Oregon, where as only Alaska and Maine, there is no sales tax. No sales tax above a ‘highway tax’ on gasoline, from pumps that legally require (what did we used to call attendants?) a gas station employee to fill-up a 70-gallon tank—at noticeably cheaper than California prices? 

Knowing I more than had the gallons needed to do 350 miles in one day made me feel tempted to dash on up to Portland to see my daughter, Bernadette, a very talented travel brochure designer for South Pacific Airlines and Fiji’s exclusive Turtle Island Resort, but in our real time would take much longer. My other daughter, Colette, also has been successful in the travel business with her independent tour company in Alaska, but she is now in New Zealand developing off-season packages for a client base that adores her attention to detail.

So it took us two months to complete this sentimental journey home. When younger we as a family had flown across these highlands in a station wagon on the way to visit grandmother. It was my young poet Bernadette who compared her experiences flying in Alaska, with that of coming out of a broken wall of mist, and looking way, way, down to the ocean, as almost equal to being in a helicopter. 

Not only does the traveler benefit from lower gas-sales-travel taxes in Oregon, Highway 101 is in better condition, especially when crossing over coastal headlands belonging to, and developed through plate tectonics associated with the San Andreas Fault of San Francisco earthquake fame.

Oops, put that thought right out of your head, or you will miss the fun —as in Mendocino— of trying to place where you have seen a particular curve, or pullout overlooking the Pacific, before. This section of the Wonderful 1’s has been used many times since my first ever experience with one of those new-fangled TV sets in 1953, where Dinah Shore magically appeared out of a slow to warm up BxW CRT, singing in perfect sync, “See the USA…,” in a commercial filmed at Ophir, Oregon, not that far from the black sands of Gold Beach.

That was a “Wow!” soon eclipsed by 3D movies, hi-fidelity sound, and Tri-X film that had jumped from a speed of ASA 64 to an astounding 200 ISO, which allowed indoor photography without flood lamps or flashbulbs.  Know, however, that I said “Wow” not long ago when looking out at the “haystacks” for an uncountable time.

P.S.
I mentioned the size of my gas tank. Ouch! This means you have the opportunity to ask the RV owners most embarrassing question. I drive a GM vortex engine, with Banks system add-on, well tuned, with properly inflated tires. By keeping the speed down to what Oregon’s Governor McCall recommended, “a pleasant way to travel is 55 MPH,” during the First Great Gas Price War, we sometimes can claim 9 miles per gallon.  

Note: to American motorhome manufacturers soon to be competing with foreign interests following the lead of Mercedes Benz providing a Class B diesel chassis that gets 21 MPG.

Some Quartzite (AZ) Crazies are just waiting for the day Workhorse will sell their new “flat floor” fuel-efficient chassis so they can home-build their own “box,” complete with multiple solar panels replacing a whacking big generator aboard just to support two top-heavy air conditioners, easily replaced in the desert by 12-volt evaporation coolers. To add to a water supply beyond supplemental five-gallon containers, instead of cleaver way to hide an onboard washer dryer, they want a roof rainwater collection system feeding, at the least, a gray water supply for showering, so as to save on buying the “potable” stuff at 20¢ per gallon.