West coast road trip

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With the company of my friend, Vireak, from New York, we've decided to rent a car and go for a 10-day winter road trip, starting on the New Year's day.

Day 1, 1/1/09: We drove south on highway 5, then highway 101 to Astoria, Oregon, hoping to get the best scenic drive possible. It was cloudy all the way but we still could enjoy the view. Vireak has a permit and wanted to practice his driving skill. So we switched driving. About 2 hours later, Highway Patrol officer pulled us over. Apparently Vireak's driving on the serpentine road wasn't smooth enough which caught his attention. So he asked Vireak if he had been drinking and he said "No". I tried to explain to the officer it was his first time driving since his last driving test. Not convinced enough, he asked Vireak to do Alcohol test. He passed. So the officer let us go and recommended me to drive instead. So I did.



We passed many small towns that look like a different part of the US. We were driving along the Pacific coast, enjoying the view of the ocean, when it stared to rain as soon as we got close to Astoria. We crossed the beautiful Astoria bridge over Columbia river that divides Washington and Oregon. The darkness started creeping in and the rain stared to pour more. So we decided to get back to Highway 5 and drove to Eugene, OR, which was our final stop on the day. All the way back to Eugene was the most stressful driving as the rain poured on like crazy and the visibility was low. We could hear the beating sound of the rain on our car. But we stayed alert and slowed down and eventually reached Eugene where we stayed at Motel 6 for the night.

Day 2, 1/2/09: We checked out and left Eugene around 9:30am for Crater Lake National Park. The weather was partly cloudy and sunny. We first drove on I-5 to Roseburg and then took highway 138 E to Crater Lake. We slowly ascended onto higher elevation. The temperature was getting lower as we got higher. At about 4000 ft., we were driving on snowy roads. The snow was nicely plowed, however, which made driving possible. There were a few other cars coming and going. We got to Crater Lake around 2:30pm and it snowed lightly there.

Although we could not get a glimpse of Crater Lake because of the heavy clouds, we still enjoyed the magnificent view of the snow on the mountains and pine trees along the way. It was just serene and peaceful which reminded me of my last road trip from Kansas City to Seattle.

Photo Credit: Vireak


At about 3:30pm, we left Crater Lake and headed to Crescent City, Northern California where we would stay for the night. It started to get dark soon after. As we got close to Crescent City, we drove through Redwood highway accompanied by the many huge and tall trees. They look amazing, yet intimidating. All we could see from our car's headlights were these giant trunks which make us feel insignificantly small.

For tomorrow's destinations: Redwood National Park, Nappa Valley and San Fransisco.