Days 21, 22 & 23: Southern OR & Northern CA

Monday evening: Hope Christian Church, Central Point, OR
Tuesday noon: Rogue Valley Christian Church Seniors' Lunch, Medford, OR
Wednesday morning: games and lunch with the 39+ group at Christian Church of Ashland, OR
Wednesday evening: Dunsmuir, CA Church of Christ

Monday the 8th, we stayed in our Hotel room until noon, taking advantage of the free wi-fi and organizing suitcases. Then we drove downtown to find a post office and discovered it was Columbus Day! We only had a couple of hours to drive and got to the Central Point church, set up our display, and were met by our hostess for the next 2 days. We had a nice roast beef dinner and went back to the church for the evening session. That evening we watched our first episode of "Dancing With the Stars!" Wayne Newton bit the dust!

Louise was a lady who had every kind of collection you can imagine, all artfully displayed around her home. She had dolls, clowns, Barbies, Elvis, Green Bay Packers, US quarters, and many, many more!

Twenty-three years ago, after Phil taught as Missionary-on-Campus at Ozark, we took three young people to Chile to spend the summer there as interns. Tuesday we finally got to meet the parents of one of those interns, Tony Ketchum. We had a good visit. That's them in the second picture.

Eleven years ago while Phil was doing this same schools of mission, he was taken to eat at a beautiful restaurant by a retired preacher and his wife, Bernard & Audrey Plumb. It was called Bel Di's, and is a lovely wood place nestled among trees and evergreens beside the Rogue River. Since we spoke during the day for a Seniors' Lunch, we had the evening free. So Phil took Emilee and me out for a date. Before we headed out to eat, we visited Harry and David's Country Store! WOW! What yummy samples. Medford is H and D's home office and much of their fruit is grown in this area.

On Wednesday we headed to Ashland where we met with the 39+ group and had a blast playing Skip-Bo. This will be on my Christmas list. Fun game. The minister, Jim Larsen, was a real encourager. After Phil's presentation (third picture), we shared lunch with these great people and then headed south for our only church in California. Dunsmuir is a quaint little town nestled under Mount Shasta (fourth picture). WOW! Impressive views everywhere we looked (first picture). We were met by the preacher and taken to his son's volleyball games. We won!!! After a very quick piece of pizza, we did the presentation and headed home with a wonderful couple. He was a retired preacher with a house FULL of books. They joined the Book of the Month club!

Next morning we headed for the CA coast, going South to Redding and there began one of the prettiest days drive yet! But we will save that for our next blog. Don't want to miss that one!

Susan