Ashland 7/31

Mile 1699. On July 30th. Yippee. 

Princess & Mr. Sandals at the border. 

Just a mile later....

Tea while waiting out our 1st rain storm. 

"Proncess fire" 1/2 hour after she repoted it. 

Here we are in Ashland. We did 66miles in three days. Reaching the Oregon border was dramatic for Firecracker and Tidy Camper. FC arrived there a few minutes before TC and began to cry. She couldn't let go completely because there were 2 people watching her arrival and eating lunch. They probably did not have a breakdown so she had to restrain hers.   Crying felt appropriate. We have all worked hard to get here, harder than we expected. TC cried before the actual sign so she was all cried out. Mr. Sandals and Princess came up next. They held each other and it was Mr. Sandals who shook with sobs. Princess whispered German into his ears. He has lost a lot of weight but will not quit. Before long TC and FC joined in the tears. It was a touching moment for everyone involved. Next up was Tortuga. He ran to the sign and was all smiles. We had now finished with our breakdowns. Moments after we entered Oregon everything changed. Thunder clouds gathered, it began to rain a bit. The day was humid and muggy. We walked through forests on soft pine covered paths. We still had to climb in the heat but there was shade in the trees. At one point we rounded a corner and a few miles away saw a fire. Tortuga phoned his daughter, the fire info dispatcher and further down the trail Princess was on the phone calling 911. Her confidence and boldness are so big that eventhough English is not her first language she did not feel intimidated by taking things into her own hands. FC sat on a log eating raisins. Mr. Sandals was taking pictures of the fire and Princess talking on the phone. TC was holding the maps for Princess to read road names and other location info. We named this particular fire the Princess fire. We continued walking and the skies opened up and blessed us with rain. We sat under a tree and had some tea. The storm passed us by quickly but we heard lots of thunder and lightening. The next corner we rounded we saw two more fires. There was a bit of air traffic (helicopters and planes) assessing the fires. Every corner we turned fires appeared. By the time we had reached our campsite we had counted 7 fires. Across from where we pitched our tent three fires were blazing.

Our campsite with 3 fires visable. 

Rainbow from our perch. 

Tortuga's campsite without tent. Using our "chrome domes". 

     Oregon was on fire and we were in the middle of it. From our campsite we watched the incredible lightening show. Princess took a video and caught some live lightening bolts. All of the fires had been started by these electrical wonders igniting dry trees. We did not feel that we were in immediate danger. Tortuga was with us and after working for the forest service for 30 years or more he knew a lot about fires and the protocols for putting them out. Princess wondered why the helicopters stopped flying after a certain time eventhough the area was still on fire. Tortuga said that helicopters were not allowed to fly at night. Princess and Mr. Sandals told us that helicopters fly at night in Germany. Hmmm. The area the lightning was hitting happened to be the direction we were going. We found out the next day that a number of people were running and dodging the mighty blots. Moxie said she was running from tree to tree. Glitter did the same thing - he waited for a break and ran across open fields to hide in the trees. Owen found Kat huddled by a tree trembling and sobbing in fear. She was terrified. Meanwhile we are on the other side enjoying the show, whooping it up and taking videos. Same event, different perspectives. Princess said this was her best day on the trail. Mr. Sandals enjoyed it because it was exciting and dramatic. TC said it was her best day. FC could not commit to any opinion due to fatigue induced brain fog but as we hoped and imagined everything changed in Oregon. Everything got better on a number of levels except that Oregon seems to be on fire (we read in the newspaper that there were 37 fires started by the lightning).The 9:00 to 5:00 firefighters are on it. Should we be worried? Now we have heard that Northern Ca. Is also starting to burn.