Tonight, campsite 53 at the Upper Pines Campground at Yosemite is vacant because we didn’t make it. When we learned that Yosemite would be cold and snowing the next few days, Brian and Amy convinced Greg to skip the visit. At least Amy and Greg got to Yosemite in September.

Plan B was a visit to Sutter’s Mill, the site of the California Gold Rush of 1848. But Brian discovered that there would be a Winter Snow Warning for the Siskiyou mountains on Friday, advising people to avoid all travel.

Plan C was to take I-80 east and return inland. But I-80 was closed at the Donner Summit. That was out, especially considering the bad omen of getting stuck at the Donner Summit.

Plan D was to outrun the winter snow and get to Medford, OR tonight. In the best case scenario, that would take until 10pm. More likely, we wouldn’t outrun the snow, and we’d have to drive through 2-4 inches of snow in the mountains around Mt. Shasta.

Plan E was to store R2V2 (the motorhome) in Sacramento - alongside Noble Spirit (the trailer), and fly home. But the flights were outrageously expensive, plus the costs and hassle of storing the motorhome.

So now we’re on Plan F: we’re driving home via US 101 on the Pacific coast. The trip will take R2V2 from sea to shining sea! The last few years when Amy and Greg went to California in December, the coast was always the worst-case-scenario. And here we are.

Today, we drove from Joshua Tree to Ukiah; at nearly 650 miles, this was the second longest stretch of the trip. As a consolation prize, Brian and Greg may stop at Redwood National Park tomorrow morning. And we should get home a day early.

Hopefully, we won’t have the same problems when we return in 11 days…!

Finally, since it was a very long day of driving, there are no photos today.