June 8-10, 2024 | Photo Album
Having enjoyed several walks in the redwoods, it was time to head back to Medford so that we could catch a flight back home. We packed out of Elk Meadow Cabins and began retracing our route along US 101.
We turned off 101 after Crescent City to rejoin US 199, the Redwoods Highway, which led through Hiouchi and Gasquet onward to Cave Junction. The road is particularly narrow and winding east of Gasquet, and I was glad when, three hours after departing our cabin, we reached Cave Junction.
Back in 2006, I had turned off here to see the Oregon Caves National Monument. However, Wendy and I have been through several caves, and she was content to skip them on this trip.
Cave Junction sits in the Illinois Valley, which had a gold mining boom from the 1850s into the 1870s. As the gold played out, Elijah Davidson found a cave on a hunting trip in 1874. The Oregon Caves were a tourist attraction in the 1890s and converted into a National Monument in 1909, with a chalet and cabins in place by 1926 when Cave City was established at the junction of the Redwood Highway and a branch leading to the caves. It became Cave Junction in 1935.
The town has now surpassed 2,000 and offers the only restaurants and public restrooms I saw after Hiouchi. We had lunch at the River Valley restaurant, which had good food and service, although I wish its dining room had some acoustic dampening.
The remainder of the trip back to Medford was relatively quick, especially once we joined Interstate 5 at Grants Pass. After about an hour, we had reached the Crater Rock Museum in Central Point, just north of Medford.
Crater Rock Museum
Frieda and Delmar Smith founded the Crater Rock Museum in 1954. It grew from a small shed into what is now a 12,000 square foot facility. Wendy enjoyed browsing the large shop. Then we paid $13 ($7 for her and $6 for her “senior citizen” hubby) for admission to the museum.
As one might expect, there were some small children enjoying the exhibits, and Wendy was glad to have earplugs to dampen the louder yammerings of toddlers.
The first displays we saw had some 19th century sand paintings and ivory carvings.
After that, we saw many varied rocks. Here are Wendy’s favorites:
Then we drove south into Medford, relaxed with some ice cream at a Dairy Queen, and then checked into the Homewood Suites by Hilton.
Our suite was the most comfortable of the trip, which made up for how it was situated on the second floor at the farthest back corner of the property. I figured out how to use the courtyard as a shortcut to and from the lobby.
We’d noticed some Asian restaurants on our drive through downtown, and I ordered us a meal via Grubhub from Dragon Express, which was pricey but good.
We had a day to kill before flying out on Monday, so on Sunday we filled up the rental SUV with gasoline, shopped at a nearby Fred Meyer’s, ate at a Five Guys, and I bought Wendy some baklava at the Harry & David store.
Harry & David was established in 1914 and specialized in the Comice pears grown in the area. They became a premier marketer of fruit and food gifts and one of the nation’s oldest catalog mail-order companies. Harry & David is still one of the largest employers in the Rogue Valley.
We were introduced to the company via a Christmas gift a few years ago from Truity Credit Union back when I served on their Technology Committee. Wendy loved the baklava in that gift assortment, so it was fun to visit the home of Harry & David and purchase some in their store rather than via mail order.
Their baklava is made by buttering 60 paper-thin leaves of phyllo pastry with intermittent layers of a filling made from Sumatran cinnamon and finely chopped and toasted English walnuts. The confection is baked until golden and flaky and then bathed in honey and lemon. Wendy loves it.
On Monday we checked out of the hotel, dropped the SUV off at the airport, and had lunch in its second-floor Sky House restaurant. I was glad we did, as I didn’t particularly care for the lunch served later on our flight to Denver, although we both liked the warm Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie in the Sky treats we were served.
We again enjoyed carefree flights home, although we both came down with COVID after our return, making us wish that we had masked up while at the airports and aboard the planes. Those high-risk environments were most likely where the latest variants caught us.
I visited the Pacific Northwest in 1998, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2009, and for our honeymoon in 2016. This seventh visit was again rewarding, and I am certain we shall return to the region to escape some future summer in Oklahoma.
Meador Manor 