Had a few errands to do first thing in the morning, so by the time we'd finished them and got the cars loaded up with our remaining junk, and hit the road it was 11 am. We drove all day until 8 pm and made all the way down I5 to just north of Sacramento, stopping only briefly at Cottage Grove McDonalds (where we bumped into Sallys ex-neighbor Larry!) for lunch, Ashland for gas & the incredibly beautiful Lake Shasta (above) for dinner.Portland was really grey and miserable when we left and had been raining overnight - a nice reminder of why we were leaving. We had to go 200 miles south before we saw the first patch of blue sky poking through a break in the clouds, but by the time we got into Medford / Ashland it was beautiful for the rest of the trip.

We figured we had to do at least 450 miles each day to stay on track, so we tried to go longer the first day to save time later and ended up doing just over 500 miles.

Total Drive Time so far: 8 hours.

Mo status: She's surprisingly good, eventually getting out of her carrying crate and exploring the new surroundings of the hotel room we spent the night in.