Casino, baby!

After Diane's last post we did spend the night near Eureka, at the Bear River Casino.

Most casinos allow free RV parking in their parking lot, even if you don't gamble. In most casinos where we have stayed I get the impression like they are doing us a big favor by letting us park in their parking lot for free.  Which is actually true so i can't complain.

Bear River Casino is a very nice place. It is the first casino where we are treated like valued guests. They opened the doors for us and even told us to call the front desk to have their shuttle come pick us up at the RV parking lot. To qualify for free parking we had to get a (free) Players Club card which had bonus $10 free gambling. Ours went unused, but we did have lunch at their restaurant.

For the last few days we had been traveling inland, away from the ocean. ("Long time no sea").  At Eureka we are back with the ocean in view and will stay that way for many miles.

From the Bear River Casino we went to beautiful downtown Eureka, Ca. There is not much there but we needed a few things from Walmart and Diane was in dire need of a Starbucks. I was not in dire need of a Starbucks so i waited in the RV and checked my emails while she went in.  One of my emails was from Georgie from Texas, our new friend who is biking from Florida to Washington. She said she was at a Starbucks in Eureka... Sure enough a few minutes later Diane came in and told me she had seen Georgie.  I went in the Starbucks and said hello to Georgie.  She was happy to see us.  By the way, her blog is at

http://gpeachykean.blogspot.com/

if you want to follow her adventures too.  She is a great writer and writes from the heart.

After a quick trip to Walmart (and a bonus trip to Bed Bath & Beyond) we continued our northern expedition.

We spent last night at the Cher-Ae Heights Casino, near Trinidad, Ca. The RV parking lot is surrounded by huge Redwoods and a great view of the ocean. We were treated very nicely too. 
We are now within a day or two drive from Oregon.  We are ready to leave California so we might do a long day to reach Oregon or at least Crescent City, the last big town in California.

One way this trip is different from what I expected is that the trip is turning out more expensive than i had planned (surprise, surprise). The biggest reason for that is that I thought there would be more places where we could just park and spend the night for free. But most rest areas we have encountered don't allow overnight parking. Walmart was going to be a big part of our overnight plans but most Walmarts don't allow overnight parking either. I hope as we get out of California we will be able to find cheaper (free) accommodations.

Stay tuned.