Drifting Horizons

More urban camping! This time in a mall parking lot – along the river walk in Eugene. I was quite surprised – I never expected Eugene to be such a beautiful place. The trail along the river and the ease of access for biking was wonderful!

I spent more than I’d have liked to at the mall here, but I really wanted a tripod and a polarized filter. In hindsight, the filter probably wasn’t as helpful as I had imagine it would be – A couple lens protectors would have been more useful.

Still learning the camera settings and nuances, I set out to try out the 300mm lens. Nearly every picture had the focus in the wrong spot. It was subtle enough not to notice in the viewfinder, but very prevalent in the larger images. Only a few came out alright – I’m still unsure why this happened – though for now I’ve been relying on manual focus and the “quick AF” setting which seems to work more like my sx20is – point it at something to focus on, then move the camera to frame your picure.

After my trusty point-and-shoot refused to turn on, I figured it was time to “upgrade” to a more modern camera. I camped out at a Walmart again the night before and browsed the internet for electronics stores, big-name stores, and finally Craigslist looking for a camera. After hours of searching and deliberation, I decided to go with a Canon T5 on Craigslist – with 2 lenses! for $300. While the sx20is was still not functioning properly, this next set of images were a crash-course into working with the T5 and the two lenses.

Lessons learned – The wide-angle and versatility of my old sx20is is amazing. I also need to get a tripod.

The sx20is has multiple issues – the one that made me believe it was gone for good turned out to be the small switch for the battery door. I fixed it by dis-assembling the switch and permanently jumping the leads that tell the camera that the door is “closed.” This got the camera to turn on again! However, it still has frequent “Lens Error” issues, and can take a while to get started.  I like the sx20is, but I’m not going to fight with it for a half an hour every time I’d like to take a picture. If it doesn’t want to turn on, I have the T5 now.

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Leaving Riffe Lake – I took a very long detour on my way to Walmart.

Sediment Dam – Designed to prevent a constant stream of loose soil deposited by the eruption from flowing down stream.

Mt. St Helens

Lots of venturing this day – even found a free dump station along the way, though unfortunately no potable water. Still had half a tank of fresh water left, so I continued on.

The next morning I stopped by the laundromat and then headed to the coast!

Riffe Lake WA, fed by Mt. Ranier via the Cowlitz river. During the colder months this rocky lake shore is often submerged under water.

It had been a while since I’d found a nice camp spot, and since I’d been covering a lot of ground and moving through Washington state fairly quickly, I decided to stay for nearly a week to relax and catch up on things.

 

By the time the weekend came around, this area became full of people – many of them loud. I decided to head out to a Walmart – a bit of a routine that has emerged for my trip, staying on Sunday nights to use their free WiFi to catch up on the latest Game of Thrones.

I also needed to head back to civilization due to cell phone problems – I was unable to check my voicemail or make outbound calls for some reason. A few days back-and-forth with StraightTalk tech support yielded no answers other than “Restart your phone”, or “Take the SIM card out and put it back in”. Straight Talk has been terrible. I pay for 10gb/mo and am cut off way before that, sometimes at 4gb. Their 2g claim isn’t 2g. No pages will load, just the occasional asset. Some data may trickle through at 2g speeds, but

 

 

6/12

This area was between Yakima and Seattle – it was raining when I arrived, and rained much of the time I was here. Mud everywhere on the RV.

I’m guessing since it was only about an hour from Seattle is why it was so crowded. I got lucky and found a campsite that someone had left earlier – the campfire rocks still hot.

I hiked along the woods near the river looking for a good place to take pictures. It’s easy to get lost in such dense forest – lucky there was a big river as a landmark.

My camera has also been having more frequent “lens error” issues since Salt Lake City. It has become a chore to get it working.

I had planned to explore Seattle more, but there was no “safe” place to park the RV. Most places charge for parking, and I was fairly uncomfortable leaving the RV unattended and riding the motorcycle downtown. It was fun, but I couldn’t enjoy myself when I was worried about the RV.

Also, $40 to go up into the Space Needle and an hours wait? Forget that. I’m trying to avoid spending money where I don’t have to. Especially with a potentially large upcoming expense (Camera).

Seattle was great – I really did like what little of the city I was able to see. There were very little of the “I shouldn’t be here” signs that I’ve become accustomed to in Baltimore. Trucks are very popular out here, and I was surprised that so many people would leave things unattended and unlocked in their truck beds.

6/8

Passing through the northeast corner of Oregon. Stayed 2 nights at Morgan lake, a wonderful campground. I hiked around the lake, but beyond that there’s not a whole lot there as it’s a fairly small park. The grade to the campground was very steep – 17%. The RV crawled up the hill at about 10-15mph.

 

Leaving Morgan Lake and heading into Washington state towards Yakima.

Wendover to Jerome

snake river