Day One ~ Atascadero to Redding
Today, Thursday, August 7, 2008, we left Atascadero about mid-morning and headed out on an adventure my mother was kind enough to treat us to as a sort of "last big hurrah" of the Summer.
We took Highway 41 east from Atascadero all the way through the Cholame "Y" and up over Cottonwood Pass and through Sunflower Valley to Highway 33 which we then took up to Avenal to Highway 269 which we picked up and then took it north over the Kettleman Hills to Interstate 5. There we used the big new travel center before getting on the freeway and heading north.
We traveled uneventfully up Interstate 5 through Kings County and then Fresno County and then Merced County and then Stanislaus County and then San Joaquin County.
At Stockton we noticed the rather dramatic burn area where the roadside fire along the shoulder of northbound Intersate 5 escaped in high winds late last Spring and burned into adjacent neighborhood damaging or destroying seven homes and twenty condos and one triplex.
Some reconstruction was clearly underway but there was till a lot of evidence of the fire.
At Highway 12 we left Interstate 5 to avoid the Sacramento-area traffic and headed west through the Sacramento Delta area through Rio Vista and over the southern terminus of Highway 113 which we then took north to Midway which we took west to Interstate 505 and then turned north on it in the Vacaville area and headed north.
Nearing our next stop, Dunnigan, we entered the Dunnigan Hills which are created by the active Dunnigan Hills Fault. As neared clearing the far side of the hills at Interstate 5 we could clearly see the Sutter Buttes in the distance up ahead of his which was cool given our love of not only volcanoes but geologic quirks and oddballs which is what the Sutter Buttes volcano was when it was active.
We got on into Dunnigan where we briefly rejoined Interstate 5 but immediately got off the freeway and took a break at Bill & Kathy's Restaurant which we've been using for nearly 20 years when traveling through the area.
Following that break we headed on up the road but for a time took the old Highway 99 West which is the old road on this side of the Sacramento Valley. We got gas at a gas station on that road on the south side of Willows and then got back on the freeway from there and headed north out of Colusa County and through Glenn and Tehama Counties and into Shasta County where we ended the day in the Redding area.
Along the way we espied Mount Lassen in the distance which was dwarfed by a huge storm cell beyond it. A bit later we first made out Mount Shasta through all the smokey haze and scattered storm clouds but even then in the gathering gloam it still looked mighty cool.
Our destination for the night was the Fawndale Lodge & RV Resort north of Redding near Mountain Gate at the Fawndale exit.
Mom and I stayed here several times over the course of 2001 and 2002 and it was nice to be back again. It had new ownership who knew nothing about the previous owner's six-clawed cat who became our buddy during that time. The new owners had clearly sunk plenty of money into the place since our last visit which was nice to see. The room we three shared was nicer than ever and we could see that contrast having stayed in that same room before.
We highly recommend this facility which is located over the hill to the south from Lake Shasta and is situated in the forests of that area and is laid out like a lodge next to a campground and is very clean and quiet.
After a take-out dinner from a nearby pizza joint we all went to bed absolutely exhausted.
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