DRIVING WITH NO DESTINATION

The lights from houses along the freeway were mingled through the trees in rural southern Oregon.   It made me wonder what these people did for a living and what kind of community existed out there in the dark of the night.   It couldn't be as remote and isolated as Orleans.  Driving north on Interstate 5 at night by ones self can be a lonely feeling with no destination.   It was 1971, when I started working for the Forest Service at Orleans in northwest California along the Klamath River.   Orleans was a remote community with very little for a single man to do on weekends, except go fishing during the day and visit one of the three taverns for a beer or two during the evenings before calling it a day and retiring to the little shanty I rented for $70/month.  

On one Friday after work I decided to get away from another exciting weekend, so I drove east on California state highway 96 to Interstate 5 and north into Oregon with no destination in mind.   By the time I got north of Grants Pass it turned dark with no idea where I was going to spend the night after four hours of driving.   I was driving through a valley before going over one final mountain pass into Canyonville where I notice the lights of houses off in the woods.   Where I spent that night I do not remember.   Somewhere north of Canyonville I drove to the coast, maybe highway 42 to make my way back to Orleans by way of highway 101.   Saturday night I camped out in the Redwood National Park somewhere south of Crescent City.   By Sunday I turned off highway 101 at the small town of Orick and drove over the Bald Hills Road to the Klamath River and back to Orleans.  This road went through part of the Redwood National Park and was paved.   After leaving the park it was a single lane dirt road with very little traffic, if any.  

This was about a 600 mile trip in my old 1963 Ford pickup.   Over the years after this trip I ended up working for the Forest Service in Greenville, California from 1977 to 1979, then at Gold Beach from 1979 to 1988 and then at Cottage Grove from 1988 to 1995.   Now, after 54 years since this trip I feel fortunate to remember some of it and have learned that the best destination is always the trip back home.