Home again

The drive from Reno through the east side of the Sierras was wonderful. We found ourselves in Ponderosa Pine forests and broad meadows with gorgeous views of snowy peaks. Bob and I even got to see Mt. Lassen for a brief time. At higher elevations, the snow was still along the side of the road, but the road surface stayed clear and dry the whole way. Mt. Shasta was also out in all her glory.

As we crossed over the Siskiyou Summit into Oregon, it started to rain. Ah, the Pacific Northwest – looking and feeling just as it did 16 months ago. Everything was green, cold and very soggy. We spent a night at an RV park along I-5 in Oakland, OR, and headed for home in the morning. It was cold and still raining with very low cloud cover when we left, so the mountains were all hidden from us. No glimpses of Hood, St. Helens or Rainier. Boo Hoo.

When we arrived home, we found that our house sitter had been able to move out and there were clean sheets on the bed, so we didn’t have to stay out in Harriet as we had expected. It was chilly in the house, but so good to see Franny and Lester, my cats.

Poor Lester is in kidney failure and down to 7 pounds from his previous 16. We are glad to be here and spend some time with him before he goes.

Right now we are busy doing yard work, cleaning up the house and trying to settle back into the old homestead. There is so much to do! And the weather is so cold! It’s like February here instead of April.

We’ll sit down and do a recap blog in the next few weeks. Many blessings to you and we hope that you are having a wonderful spring.

Eastern Sierras and Reno

If you ever have the chance to drive Hwy 395 from Reno to LA take it.

The road is good, and the scenery is great anytime of year. The Sierras from the east is a beautiful dramatic steep wall of granite. The high desert runs right to the base of forest topped granite walls. The area has also remained largely undeveloped and looks just like it did on the opening credits of “Then Came Bronson”.

We made a quick overnight stop at Keough Hot Springs before attempting the higher passes between Bishop and Reno. They have a few camping spots and the water in the large pools was very warm, but it could have been a little hotter for Mary. They did have a neat hot water spray over the main pool that was like a warm heavy rain.

In Bishop we stopped at the famous Schatt’s Bakery and loaded up on fresh bread and other goodies. After Bishop the road rises up to over 8000 feet and the snowy peaks were fantastic. We also drove through areas were the snow came right down to the road. The visitor center at Mono Lake was closed, but we spent a little time looking at the lake and enjoying the view.

It was a lot of fun visiting with my sister Margie and her family in Reno. My brother Tim from Auburn, CA even made a trip over the pass to visit with everyone for a couple of days. We stayed in the RV park at the Grand Sierra Resort and Casino and we were delighted to see that they were hosting a dog show this week. The RV next to us had five giant mastiffs and two boston terriers, and there were dogs walking around everywhere.

We had planned to leave Reno today, but due to snow and high winds in the passes, we stayed for one more day. The front brought the temps down and it is pretty cold, in the low 40s mid-day. The weather should be better tomorrow for our drive through the Sierras to Oregon.

Family in Camarillo, CA

Once we got through Banning Pass with all the windmills, it was kind of nostalgic for me (Bob) to drive through the LA basin. I grew up in Thousand Oaks, which is about 50 miles north of downtown LA, and about 15 miles northwest of the edge of the LA basin. From San Bernardino to Woodland Hills it’s just one huge metropolis with nearly identical municipalities following one after the other. The same stores, the same restaurants, the same bland architecture, and the same bumpy concrete freeways. Yet, there were some highlights. Pasadena at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains is a green, well-treed Victorian oasis amid the urban sprawl, and it IS fun to see the famous vestiges of Hollywood wiz by as you drive down the freeway.

Once out of the San Fernando Valley, and into the Conejo Valley where Thousand Oaks is, it was amazing to still be able see the same undeveloped hills and trails where I rode motorcycles as a teenager. Spring is the best time in Southern California, especially, if they have had some rain and wind. The hills are green and the sky is clear. Southern California mountains are really beautiful when they aren’t all brown and obscured by the summertime haze and pollution.

North of Thousand Oaks, Hwy 101 drops down onto the coastal plain in Camarillo. This area was almost 100% agriculture in the 1960’s. It has seen a lot of development, but there is still a surprisingly large amount of agriculture still in operation. In the few days we were here, they were harvesting, celery, cabbage, broccoli and strawberries. And, everyone seems to have orange, lemon and avocado trees in their backyards.

We were here to visit my sister and nephew. My nephew’s fiancé recently passed away, and we wanted to spend some quiet time with them. It was good to just be with them for a while and offer some support. We all went out to Lake Casitas near Ojai for a picnic on the boat, but it was too cold and windy to go out on the water.

We’ll be heading home via Reno to visit my oldest sister and her two daughters that live in the area. We missed them last winter because of bad weather. We were going to take our time and stop in Bend, Oregon and visit Breitenbush Hot Springs, but Mary’s 18 year-old cat Lester is experiencing kidney failure and we will head right home after a couple of days in Reno.

Borrego Springs - again

This is the third time Bob and I visited Borrego Springs on this trip, and it is the only place with that distinction. There is something so sweet and funny about this little town in the desert that we keep coming back. The weather was warm and sunny and although the wild flowers were past their peak, we still saw lots of things in bloom. We even managed to find an early agave bloom that stood about 12 feet tall.

We hiked up Palm Canyon like we did on our first trip here and once again found the beehive in the rock wall. There were way more bees now than last year. We also saw 5 Peninsular Big Horn Sheep hanging out on top of the ridge for the few hours we were in the canyon.

We had some interesting neighbors at the Palm Canyon Resort. A group from Oshkosh Industries (not the overalls) was here to test the prototype vehicles that will be replacing the HumVee for the Army. These four door units seemed very stout with high ground clearance, heavy armor and small strong windows. We managed to get few pictures while they were parked.

A new treat for us was the trip over the hill, through Anza Borrego State Park to the mountain town of Julian. The hills in the mountains were covered in yellow flowers, blooming yuccas and blue flowering shrubs. We spent a few hours walking around town and had lunch at the famous Julian Pie Company. It WAS the best fruit pie of our whole adventure. (I’d still give the chocolate pecan pie in Dorr County, Wisconsin the blue ribbon for all pies.) It was quite cool up in Julian, around 58 compared to 82 down in the valley where we were camped.

We planned to bike around Borrego on our last day to enjoy the cactus blooms and nice flat roads, however a big storm was predicted with high winds and gusts to 75 mph, with zero visibility. That caused us to get up early, buy a few bags of delicious grapefruit at the local stand and head for the hills. We made it through the pass north of Palm Springs with only moderate wind as we hit the road for Camarillo, CA to visit Bob’s sister and his nephew.

Sedona

Sedona is a very unique and wonderful place that Bob and I just adore! Driving in you are greeted by red and white rock walls and spires, and with each mile the vistas change and expand. It is a dynamic and ever changing view.

We were anxious to see how we felt about Sedona after our winter in Florida. We still love it! So this makes our decision about where to relocate even harder. I had hoped that we would not be as enthralled as we have been in the past, but no such luck.

The thing we love the most about Sedona is the hiking trails. They are everywhere and this time we experienced a host of new ones. We were very surprised by the West Fork Trail that runs through a thick pine forest along a branch of Oak Creek. As we climbed to over 5,000 feet we ran into pockets of snow along the path, which was quite odd when the temps in town were in the low 80s. We had many water crossings on this hike that were really challenging, but we made it back with dry feet.

Bob is not a big fan of snakes and is always on alert in areas where snakes live. In our year on the road, we had only seen two snakes and neither of them were poisonous, but this week we encountered a three-foot long rattlesnake on the trail. So Bob finally got to experience a wild and deadly snake, that didn’t even rattle at us. He just slowly moved to the side of the trail. I got a few pictures before we turned around and let him have that path.

The weather here was perfect, sunny with blue skies and daytime highs in the upper 70s and low 80s. We saw the hottest days of 2011 so far.

Besides enjoying the many restaurants here, we made some new friends. We were able to meet and spend some time with Linda, from Dolphin Heart World. We also reconnected with a lovely couple we met at Lake Powell last year. They said they lived in Sedona and might be interested in moving to the northwest. We said we live in the northwest and might be interested in moving to Sedona. They have a fantastic estate here in Sedona, and have put heir home on the market. It’s definitely out of our price range, so no swap in the making.

Bob and I did spend an afternoon looking at homes with a realtor. The prices have really come down in the last two years, but we didn’t find one that we couldn’t live without. We still have some thinking to do about the Sarasota versus Sedona decision. It’s funny how we can be so attracted to such different places.