At breakfast, I chat for a while with the Native American bass player from the camp band. Improbably, he is called Gordon McQuirrie, so perhaps there was some integration with Scottish settlers in his ancestry. He works at the camp fulltime and when I mention that I will have to find work when I get home, he says that they are always looking for people at Kamp Klamath. I am sure that the pay isn’t great, but I am beginning to see my life as a choice between wealth and fun. Gordon is hoping to buy land to build on some day, but I have my doubts that his Kamp Klamath salary will ever be enough for him to buy anything in this part of California.
Also on the patio at breakfast is a family from Oregon with two teenage girls. The eldest of the two, who may be 15 or 16, spent much of last night screaming hysterically and sparking some angry complaints from neighbouring campers. It was something to do with her boyfriend in Oregon apparently. This morning though, she seems perfectly cheery.
I overhear the family talking about doing the jet boat ride and wondering what it is. Explaining what little I know about the water propulsion system that a jet boat uses, recommending the Klamath trip I had done, while mentioning that jet boats are especially popular in New Zealand. This leads me onto other things in New Zealand, like my stop at the Hobbiton set from the Lord of the Rings films. ‘Are hobbits real?’, asks last night’s hysterical screamer. She then tells me that I have a nice smile, which pretty much puts an end to the conversation as I am taken aback by being flirted with by a teenage girl in front of her parents. I am not sure if the parents were in any way embarrassed, or if it’s not unusual in these here parts.
Leaving Kamp Klamath, my Sat Nav directs me to cross a bridge that was washed away by the river in 1964 and is now just a bridge head monument. I am going to drive through Six Rivers Forest National Park, but this is a more direct route than I planned.
Driving the valley roads overlooking the rivers is another dangerous drive, not because of any shear drops, but because there are so many places where I want to stop. I have fallen in love a little with north California.
I will be leaving the US in a few days, having given up on the idea of going from coast to coast as I only had funds for six weeks in the US and haven’t even managed to leave the west coast. I start heading back to San Francisco.
I stay in Weaverville, a historic gold rush town, and the county seat of Trinity County. However, first impressions are that it is now a town of lodges and motels, being conveniently placed for visitors to the forests and rivers nearby.
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