Yosemite National Park - 2016 Trip - Day 08

Start Location: Susanville, CA
Ending Location: Bend, OR
Miles Today: 348
Trip Miles: 1916
States Visited: 4
Provinces Visited: 0
Low Temp: 51.7° F
High Temp: 87.4° F
Min Elevation: 3455'
Max Elevation: 7671'

Route Map:

Today we had to deal with 5 more road construction delays. There were three in California, one in Oregon and then a fifth in Crater Lake National Park. All of them involved one lane of traffic and having to wait for a pilot car. Unfortunately the largest one was in Crater Lake Park. We had planned to take the route around the wets side of the lake but, shortly after we started on that route and after we had passed the first overlook, we encountered the delay and were unable to stop at any of the other overlooks. Actually we could have stopped but then would have to wait another hour or so to get back in a string of cars going our direction. The other problem was that this was not a simple construction where we had drive on one side of a reasonably good road. There was no road only gravel and pot holes - this was not fun on a motorcycle. The construction zone extended all the way to the end of the route around the lake. We were actually glad to leave the park.

After that we a relatively normal ride to Bend, OR where we planned to spend the night. Bend is interesting because when we first stopped at Bend probably 25 years ago it was just a small vacation type of town. It is now a very large town - I think between 80,000 and 90,000 population. St. George in Utah is very similar.

We had a nice dinner at a Carino's restaurant and planned to head for home in the morning.