We drove south on Highway 5 toward Redding CA. passing Mount Shasta, a potentially active volcano, the 35 mile long Shasta Lake, and the nearby town of Shasta with a soft drink associated with it.

Shasta Lake is a reservoir located 10 miles north of Redding and a popular spot for kayaking and fishing. It’s a beautiful area surrounded by pine trees.

Shasta Lake

Also a mecca for houseboat rentals apparently.

We stopped at the Antlers Campground in Lakehead, named for it’s position on Shasta Lake. Our campground was virtually empty, summer coming to an abrupt halt the week before.

Not much going on in Lakehead, but they did have a restaurant that specialized in pickles. Pickled eggs, green vegetables, even watermelon, which is all you need when it’s the only restaurant in town.

One of the “hot spots” in Redding was the Sundial Bridge at Turtle Bay Exploration Park, one of the largest working sundials in the world, designed by Santiago Calatrava and built at a cost of $23.5m. It serves as a pedestrian bridge over the Sacramento River

The glass decked, cable-stayed suspension bridge (free-standing) reaches 217′ into the sky and spans 710′ across the river

The Sacramento River is one of the principal rivers in California and flows for 400 miles before reaching San Fransisco Bay

Sacramento River

We drove into Redding for some shopping, they have the best Target here. It’s also home to the Cascade Theater, once named the “Finest Cinema House in California”

It was at this point we had to decide our next move, whether to go east or west, across Death Valley and into the desert (east) or toward the west coast of California and Napa. The weather made up our minds, cold and wet descended on the path west, so off we went into the desert. Also the price of fuel had increased to $5.25 a gallon, there’s expensive California again. We’ll go west next time.

We left Redding CA on Highway 5 south, then turned right on Rte 20 to Colusa, a small town whose main attraction is the Win-River Casino and the industry is rice crops, almond and walnut trees.

The free RV parking lot was behind the casino and you only had to step outside and a golf cart would appear to drive you the short distance to the casino.

Of course we played the slots for a while and won, enough to pay for dinner, then went to the Bingo area.

It was a bit more complicated than we could have imagined, but there were plenty of people around to help.

There were plenty of people playing  and it went on for hours. We didn’t win anything but it was very entertaining.

Bingo

Now we’ve had our Bingo fix we can make our way to Nevada for more debauchery!!