Shasta Dam & Driving Into a Lake That Isn’t There!

Golly, what an intriguing interesting adventure we had Friday.  For some reason we both went to bed at 8 PM and were ready to get up at 5 AM.  “Well, we’re up.  Ready to go?”  By 6:30 AM we were on the road for the 60 mile drive back down I-5  through the mountain pass towards Shasta Dam and Lake.  Those early morning drives, when it is quiet and the sun is just coming up, are always so enjoyable. 

Doug found the Big Dipper Café in Shasta Lake City on the internet so we decided to try it.  Don’t let the name fool you.  It was very small, very old, very outdated, and located in this very small town.  The owner is also the cook and makes what items he can from scratch.  What a pleasant surprise.  The food and prices were great with HUGE portions.  As a child, I loved leftover mashed potatoes made into potato pancakes.  I have never seen that on a menu anywhere, until now.  So I had to try it.  It was enough to feed 4!   I don’t like to see food go to waste so I should have remembered to ask how big they were so I could have ordered just one like I do with pancakes.  We certainly didn’t need lunch or dinner after that meal! 

The drive to the dam was just up the road.  Usually you can see Mt. Shasta from the dam, especially if it is covered in snow.  But because there was no snow left but a tiny bit and it was so bright and hazy, you couldn’t see the mountain.  However, I do have a nice film picture from 2004 similar to the postcard picture below.  I wish it looked that beautiful now.  You can also compare the water levels.

  

 

I love mountains, Doug loves dams.  If there is a dam that we know of, we have to go see it!  So yes, we have been in the Hoover Dam, Grand Coulee Dam, Glen Canyon Dam, and this one.  Shasta Dam still offers tours so we decided to go again.  You have to walk out over the dam to the second tower to take the elevator down.  We were the only ones on the 9 AM tour so we had our own personal guide.  Shasta Dam is the second largest concrete dam in the United States at 602’ tall.  It took nine years for 4,000 employees to build the dam.  The dam is 9 miles northwest of Redding, CA, on the Sacramento River.

 

We drove behind the dam to the boat ramp.  What ramp!?!  Boaters made their own ramp!  We drove down to get some pictures from the lake level and here is an old dog just taking everything in stride.  Where there is water, a boater will find a way to get to it!  The lake is down to 38% of the total capacity and still receding at 9” a day.  I can only imagine what it will look like by the end of summer.

  

The guide at the visitor center told us where to go to see how the water levels drastically change the landscape, so we headed out towards Antler’s Resort on one of the arms of the lake.  Lake Shasta has 365 miles of shoreline and 40,000 acres of surface area. On the way, we got fooled by Tom-Tom GPS, again.  We wound up on a gravel road that eventually connected to the road we were supposed to be on.  That was alright because we got to see 2 HUGE jackrabbits as big as a fawn.  The biggest we have ever seen and in an unlikely place.  We also saw deer and drove right up to a large hawk in the road that had just killed a squirrel for his lunch.  Then it got interesting!!  We were just awed by the sights!  We drove right into a lake where there wasn’t one!  The black dot in the 2nd picture is a car!  Oh, my gosh!  It is hard to fathom the idea of how much water isn’t there!

 

Where is the resort that is supposed to be right here?  We were going to find out!  If those cars were driving on the lake bed, we were going to drive out there, too.  All sorts of roads had been carved.  Gee, getting out there was down and around a rocky, very narrow (I don’t like those), bone jarring, dirt road carved into the lake sides.  We kept going and going, determined to find the resort.  The sign at the bottom of the middle picture says “this way to Antler’s Resort”.   You’re kidding, right?!?  Not!  Good thing we hadn’t cleaned up the truck recently.  Just all part of the adventure.

 

We finally found the resort!  Turns out it is a completely floating building and docks.  They call this a resort!?  I guess all the die-hard boaters liked to use their imagination on this one! Funny, everything is just floated along as the water recedes, no matter how far it has to float.  Notice the dead trees in the 2nd picture sticking up out of the water. 

 

We drove to another area where the results were the same.  Only we discovered “relics” that are referred to when the water is this low.  They are things like old road bridges and this old train tunnel. 

  

Wow, what a unique day that was!  We missed the beauty of the lake, but the views were just as interesting and striking in their own way.  We can mark this down as something we won’t forget as we head back to the RV park with more views of Mt. Shasta to end our day.