Driving east to ship to UK, national parks along the way

After crossing the border from Baja back to the US we plunged into taking care of business. First thing, COVID vaccine, onto time with family and friends then to lining up truck repairs (more on this later).

https://aidenjamescustoms.com/ graciously fit us into their busy schedule and fixed many of the issues caused by our first build.

With our second vaccines scheduled and a sense of optimism we re-started our overseas adventure plans. Currently we have a potential ship date of June 26 from Baltimore to Southampton with International Vehicle Shipping Services. We will follow the vehicle mid-July. In the meantime, we continued our national park checklist as we made our way up the west coast and now are headed east. (Our route is a little wonky as we are fitting in family and friend visits).

Channel Islands National Park - views along the Potato Harbor and El Montanon loop trail. 10 miles of beauty. “To unpathed waters, undreamed shores.”

Next stop was Pinnacles National Park - probably our least favorite national park to date but worth seeing once.

Views along the Old Pinnacles Loop trail. 10 miles of scrubby hills.

Still heading north! Back to what was our home for 25 years, re-visiting Redwood National and State Parks with spectacular beaches and the gigantic trees.

Coastal view south of Crescent City on 101 - our coming home view for years.

Requisite sunny day at a Northern California beach selfie.

Best road for intimate driving in the redwoods - Howland Hill Road in Jedediah Smith State Park.

Boondocking on our way to Lassen National Park.

Chaos Crags hike in Lassen - 4.25 miles outside of Manzanita Lake area (one of the few areas not currently covered in snow).

Mid day hiking stop on our way in Oregon - Diamond Creek Falls loop in the Willamette National Forest - leaves from Salt Creek Falls viewing area.

Slid in a visit with our daughter Claire in Oregon - in her happy place with her current ride. She prefers grass eaters over gas guzzlers.

After Mother’s Day with Andy’s mom in Bend, we begain our true eastward journey. Two weeks to get to Charleston, trying to hike every day and not drive more than 7 hours.

Stopped at John Day Fossil National Monument - amazing fossils in the visitor center and lovely short 3 mile Blue Basin loop hike.

Rattled at us on the trail so Andy removed him with a stick - kids behind us.

Huge shout out to https://www.overlandsolar.com/ in Boise. We are so grateful for people who have supported our build along the way. One solar panel wasn’t working and they diagnosed a problem with the initial install where the professional builder drilled holes through the panel and despite that replaced it for free for us. Good people!

Dispersed camping on BLM land on the Snake River, Idaho.