SNOW--What's up with that!

January 11, 2011

We got back Tues. the 10th  at 2:30 pm. Spent the rest of the day unloading.  You load gradually so you don't realize how much stuff you have.  I have it down pretty good, except  for clothes. Still take way to many. The bad thing about having a lot of storage is that you have a tenancy to fill it. Our closets are almost as big as we have at our house.

The evening we got home it went down to 29 degrees. Way to cold for us. Last night the  snow started around six and didn't stop until just before  we went to bed.   At least it is now raining. A good thing.  It is quite a coincidence ( we think) that we left the day before it snowed and got back the day before it snowed.

One thing I have to say about Los Angeles. We noticed it last year and it is still the same. The  TV weather and traffic ladies wear their clothes a little too short, a little too tight and a little too revealing. Not really very professional. The anchor women dress nicely. If there is a  TV traffic guy or weatherman, they dress in suits. Very professional.  We saw a lot of  TV people we recognised from Seattle in both Ca.and Oregon. Also on the national weather channel. Going up in the world, I guess.

I don't know why, but, we seem to sleep better on the road. No matter how tired I am, it takes forever for me to get to sleep. On the road, I go to sleep right away.  Denny goes to sleep right away, but wakes up anyway from 3-4:30 am, 5 if he is lucky. On the road, he sleeps in later.  I don't know if it is because we are more relaxed or what.

 This will be my last posting until  we leave again next fall/winter. We spent  $1250 on diesel.  We traveled only 3500 miles. Of course, we were only gone 7 weeks. Last year we were gone 5 months and traveled 12,000 miles.  What a difference. I just found out that it is suppose to be 80 degrees in Palm Springs this weekend. Seems wrong to me!

I'll  send another email out when we start traveling later this year. Take care

BRRRRRR..........

January 8, 2011

Can't believe how the weather turned since we left Palm Springs. It was suppose to be 65 degrees the day we left. Today, 68.  Made it to Patterson, Ca.  Woke up this morning to 39 degrees out.  I know we haven't had real warm weather since we left, but 39 was a tad cold for us.  Had to put on our jackets. Made it today to Phoenix, Or. We hadn't planned on going this far, but the weather was so good for the Siskiyou's.  It has been cloudy for 2 days. Just before we got to Weed, our first destination, the skies cleared and it was 53 degrees.  Amazing for January.  Decided to go for it. By the time we got to the Summit, it was 29 degrees and cloudy, but no snow.  We were so lucky. In Phoenix it is 32.  Not liking this. We knew we had to be concerned about the Siskiyou's, but never thought about Seattle. The Times said it could snow on Sunday or later on in the week, 6 to 12".  NOT LIKING THAT AT ALL!

Going Home

January 6, 2011

 These are views from the entrance of the park.  Taken around 4:00pm.When we left in the morning, there was not a clud in the sky.

Tomorrow we are heading home.  My dad isn't doing well at all. He has health issues,  but when we left he was doing as fine as he could.  A few days later, he took a turn for the worse. He is 92 and my mom is 89 next month. I talk to them everyday, but it isn't the same. Ray and Mary, my brother and his wife, went over for Thanksgiving and have never left.  They are living there 99.9 % of the time. My Dad needs so much more care than he did when we left. Ray is doing an excellent job, but I feel I should be there to help.  We have many years to go traveling.

The park has now got all the electrical problems fixed except for a small area. They turned off the power in the entire park for 2 hours to get it done. We are so lucky to have been in a full power site. A lot of people were in the pool and hot tub to keep warm. We went twice just because we like it.  Park models don't have propane, so they  lost all  of  their freezer and frig food.

We really  like Palm Springs. The weather was 65 degrees today. We went to old Palm Springs today to get a pair of sunglasses. Last year, I bought a pair of bifocal reader sunglasses. I use them all the time.  I bought it in 3 different areas, but liked the ones at Palm Springs the best. They broke a few weeks ago. Surprisingly, even tho it had been a year, we went straight to the shop. Unfortunately, they were out. Won't get a new shipment in for 2 weeks. My luck! Oh well, there is always next year. We will definitely be back.

It will take us 5 days and 4 nights to get back. Hopefully the Siskiyou Mountains will be okay. They are between Oregon and California. They are the reason we like to leave early to get across them before snow.

One of the Mysteries of Life -- Solved

January 4, 2011

We make our coffee up the night before so all we have do to is push the start button in the morning. I don't program it because we never know when we'll get up. We have a Grind and Brew Cuisinart.  Ever since we started out, there has been a little clear water on the counter.  Couldn't figure it out. Last week when we got up in the morning, there was no water in the reservoir. I  have such a terrible memory that I just thought I forgot to fill it the night before.  On the 4th morning, I distinctly remembered filling it the night before, but it was empty. After further investigation, I discovered the cupboard beneath our stove was on all wet.  I guess there is a crack in the coffee pot and by morning it was all leaked out.  At least I wasn't forgetting. Time for a new coffeepot.

That solved one of the Mysteries of Life, but the one  from last year I never have figured out. How come my bathing suit and other clothes srunk in the drawers over the winter?   That didn't happen to Denny. I'll never figure that one out.

OH NO, I weigh 365 lbs!

December  28, 2010

I'm catching up on some posts because at Wilderness Lakes, it took forever to upload pictures so sometimes  I gave up

When we went to the museum at Diamond Lake Reservoir, they had a temporary space exhibit. I put in a quarter and found out how much I weighed on different planets. On Jupiter, I weighed 365 lbs. YIKES! What's up with that? I don't think I'll ever move there.  On another planet, I can't remember which one, I weighed 9.9 lbs. That is a little on the thin side. There was a coke can that you lift and it showed the weight on different planets. We could hardly lift it from Jupiter.  On the last blog of last year, I wrote my first goal was to lose the weight that I gained. Well, let me tell you, that never happened. Putting it into perspective, I'm happy with what I weigh. At least, I don't live on Jupiter.

 This is the longest 5th wheel we have ever seen. It was in the storage yard. When we got back there to take a picture, another RV had pulled in on the other side so I couldn't really get a good picture. It is 45' long and has 4 axle's.

 We see a few women traveling alone, but not very many. They usually have small motorhomes. This lady pulled in beside us. Only have seen one other lady pull something this big. She had been a trucker and was pulling a 40' motorhome.  This lady is in her 50's ( we think).  Notice the little doggy door to the left of the big door. She has 4 little yippy dogs. You can't tell by the picture, but the ramp goes into a wire pen. I don't really think I would travel by myself.

I had never seen an RV such as this. Notice the tent like structure sticking out the back on the right side.  These are what the pop up trailers have. Never seen it on a regular RV.

We need a new navigator

January 5, 2011

I failed as the navigator yesterday. I'm the one that figures out which  roads to take wherever we are going. Most of the time (99.9%) I do a pretty good job. Well, not yesterday. We left Wilderness Lakes at Menifee, Ca. and traveled to Palm Springs.  The  1st freeway looked way out of our way, so I chose a different road.  It looked good on the map without many towns along the way.  WRONG!  It was like Highway 99 in Seattle. Stoplights almost every block.  It took us over an hour just to get to the 2nd freeway to Palm Springs. The maps really didn't match the streets so I got us lost in Hemut TWICE!  I had Denny turn when we should have gone straight. It is a little tough to find places to turn around with the Monster.  Then we were almost to the freeway and I missed the on ramp. This little connecting freeway wasn't even on the map. At least, not that I could tell.  That was a tough one to turn around, but Denny did it.  Because of my bad judgement, it took us over 2 hours to go 67 miles.  Never made 3 mistakes before.
Bad Girl!

When we finally got to the park, over half of the sites didn't have electricity.  The people at the gate didn't tell us which ones, only that some had it, some didn't.  We found a spot and we were backing in. We almost got done when the next door lady came over and said that the site didn't have power. If they didn't get it fixed tomorrow, they couldn't fix it for 4-6 weeks ( had to order a part). They were going to a motel because he needed oxygen at night. They were in a park model, so they couldn't change sites. They were pretty upset.  Denny has a meter but didn't think to check it.  We decided to go to another site. A guy who was also moving  had a map of the good sites. They had given it to him at the gate. Not us, what's up with that.?  Anyway we went to a good site that we liked even better. Denny checked the power before we backed in. It was good. The problem is all the parks were built many years ago. RVs weren't as big as they are now and there is much more electrical stuff in them (computers, air conditioners etc). They haven't upgraded. It isn't just this park, but all of them.  Then got the dish set up for TV. It was one of the best  receptions we have had. I was watching it and all of the sudden we lost the signal.  The guy next to us had pulled his motorhone in so deep that it blocked our line of sight. That took another hour to find a good signal. All total, it took us 3 hours from the time we got there until we finally were done. It usually takes 20 minutes.  Very frustrating after getting lost.

Today is beautiful. We have the door open. We just back from our first hot tub for the season. They have mineral hot springs here so all the water comes out of their own well.  The well is 186' deep.  Water flows thru it and pumps it daily so it changes completely several times an hour. Not sure I understand it all. It was very  nice, around 103 degrees.

Finally wearing my flip flops and capri's again,  YEA! The weather this week is suppose to be 65-68 degrees.  Cooler than usual, but wonderful to us.

Every site in our area is surrounded by a 7' hedge. RV's are taller, but at least it gives you some privacy. Not many people taller than 7'. 

Diamond Valley Lake

December 27, 2010

On Wednesday it was a beautiful day, so we decided to go for a little sightseeing. First we went to the Winchester Cheese Factory.  All it makes is Gouda Cheese, but it is excellent. The owner came over from Holland and makes it like the old country. We bought 2 varieties. SO good on crackers. YUMM

Next we went to the Diamond Valley Lake Reservoir. It is the largest fresh water reservoir in Southern California. It is 4 1/2 miles long and 2 miles wide. It covers 4500 acres and holds 260 billion gallons of water. It is huge. They also stock it with fish, but your body can't touch the water. This lake can deliver water to all of Southern California.

When they were digging out the lake, they found thousands of fossils and bones from the Ice Age.

 This is the head of Zena, a 16,000 year old mammoth who had not reached full adult size.  Isn't it huge!  Elephants are the descendants of mammoths.

This is the head of Max, the largest mastodon found in the US.  They are a little smaller than mammoths, but still are big. Look at how big the head is compared to Denny.

The dam on the left is the northern boundary of the reservoir.

The mountain on the left is Mt. San Jacinto. It is 10,533'  high. You can see by the white lines how low the reservoir

The dam is 2000' wide and 280' high. It is the western end of the reservoir and its deepest point. As you can see by the sky, it was a beautiful day.

It is amazing how fast it warms up here. It can be 34 degrees when we get up, but in just a few hours, it is over 50 and climbing. Most of our days now are between 60 and 65 degrees. One day it was 70. I know you are jealous.

Stinky, Stinky

December 28,2010

Denny decided we needed new tires so off we went to Costco.  After we got home, we went for our daily walk.  I smelled what I thought were sewers backed up because of all the flooding.  It wasn't too bad, but definitely not a fresh smell. Later we were watching TV.  I smelled something even inside the RV.  I looked at our sinks, nothing there.  I opened the door and, let me tell you, I closed it as fast as I could. The smell was overwhelming.  I finally was experiencing what I had heard about.  There is a dairy farm north of us. I have heard that when the wind is just right, the smell is overpowering. Well, it certainly was.  It was the most potent smell I had ever smelled.  PHEW!  Now that I know what it was, I have smelled it before, just not too bad.  I opened the door, very slowly,  before we went to bed. No smell.  Once the flooding went down, this is a very nice park.  At least it was before the big smell!  It still is, but I could do without the smell. At least it is only once in a while.  We like it enough that we would come again.  On the other side of the dairy farm is a very exclusive gated community.  The front gates face the farm. If we smell it, I'm sure they can. They are just as close. I would think anybody that could afford those homes, wouldn't like the smell. Can't imagine why people would buy there.

This is the view from the back of our RV. There are canals going thru the park

I took this from inside the RV. You can see the glare. This is the view from the other side. The geese slept like this for quite a while

Once they woke up, they walked right in front of me. I took this standing on the steps.  They wander all over the park like they own it.



Denny bought me the flowers. What a surprise. I think I'll keep him

When Denny went to Bank Of America to get quarters for the laundry,  he noticed something a little strange. The tellers are all behind 1 and 1/2" Plexiglas.  They do all the work below the glass in a pass thru at the bottom. Never seen that before.

For  parking at the Rose Bowl Parade and Game, the local golf course opens the greens for cars to park on. I have never heard of that. Golf courses groom the greens so much that I would think the weight of cars would do a lot of damage. There is room for 2000 cars.  We thought it was a little weird.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

January 1, 2011

We really missed seeing any fireworks. We get the LA and New York  feeds on Direct TV.  LA doesn't do anything. I guess they put in all the effort for the Rose Bowl Parade and Game.  New York has the ball drop and a couple of fireworks, not much.  Seattle usually has some spectacular fireworks. Saw a few pictures of it in the Seattle Times. Looked really nice. Speaking of the ball drop in New York, we never saw the ball actually drop. We saw it twice and it was lit up and they had the countdown.  No actual dropping of the ball. What's up with that?

We had done a little wine tasting the day before. One of the places we went to had a sparking syrah. We bought that for our toast. It was a beautiful red color.  And tasted mighty good.

Such a rich ruby red color

The wine tastings around here are quite expensive. $12 to 15. for 5 tastings. We went  to one place and couldn't even get to the counter.  The next one was busy but we got to the counter. We were talking to the couple next to us. She is the one that suggested the Ruby Curvee. She also gave us an extra ticket for 5 more tastings. That was very nice of her.

The next one we went to because it is the only woman owned winery in California. Unfortunately we really didn't like the wine, except for one, which also turned out to the the most expensive. Her wines were more expensive than any of the other wineries.

We decided to go to the next one because of the history. It is called the Cougar Winery.  It is named after Cougar Mountain in Issaquah.  Small World. The couple lived in Bellevue before moving here and opening up a winery. The logo has cougar prints on it.  We got the glasses as part of the tasting. It was very good and reasonable.

Tomorrow we are going to a Sunday Brunch at the Country Club. We haven't done a brunch in years, but we thought it would be fun. I called on the dress code because we didn't really bring anything real dressy. No suit or dress. It is casual. There are 2 golf courses. They look good, but I know nothing about golf.

Happy New Year to Everybody