You brought back so many memories of a trip that we took when Emily was about 5. We went from Santa Clarita up past Shasta and cut over to 395 and took that north on our way to Spokane. Em doesn't remember it much, but even if we could do part of it, she might recall it. I remember somewhere in NE Oregon, we were driving along in late afternoon surrounded by fairly flat ground and we saw an ornate bridge all of a sudden, just as we were about to cross it. From what we could see crossing it, there was this deep crevice - abyss, even, and then the flat-ish, rolling hills resumed on the opposite side. We were following friends and couldn't stop, but I've always wanted to go back and check it out. I still really do not know the exact location, but I'm fairly sure that it was on 395.
I heard from someone in the environmental biz world who grew up around Shasta that there is a motherlode of gold that got caught up when building the lake/dam during a series of storms and now it's under silt somewhere in that vicinity but protected because of the dam. Good tale, anyway!
I spoke to my cousin last night and we're heading up to Montana via Yellowstone in June, so that part is "sketched out" a bit.
Thank you so much for reminding me of 395. I'll have to haul out the maps and start looking. Keep sending ideas- they're great!
Beth