November 17th - or so. Transition south.

Yeah, we fell off the earth.  It's been a crazy month.  Now that we are settle  in SoCal, things should start happening for us again. 

Just before we left Eureka, we made a final night at Humbolt Cider Co. There was a night of live jazz with a gentleman who came in and stood in the upstairs balcony and played some cool jazz on a sax with recorded background.  It was pretty good. 

Laurie finished her final shift and then we packed up and closed the camper.  Back on the road.  We pretty much drove straight through.  The two big fires were in areas we didn't have to go near.  The one in the north was way off to the east, and we didn't go anywhere near Malibu.  There was a lot of haze in the air where ever we went, though. 

The contrast in driving conditions between driving through a forest, over mountains, and semi-arid deserts was something.  I chuckled when I drove through the Angeles National Forest that consisted of scrub brush and a few scattered short trees after being up in the Redwood National Forest.

Driving down through the San Joaquin Valley, I noticed a lot of farmland that was just not being used.  Worse, a lot of the orchards and vineyards seemed sick and under watered.  This is the result partially of drought, and partially of State Government taking water away from the valley due to concerns over an endangered small fish that gets caught in the canal filters.  As we drove through Kern county, there were many protest signs declaring "Farming is not wasting water" and blaming the State politicians of mismanagement of resources. Sad.

We got down to El Centro and Rio Bend in the evening.  A security guy put us in a short time pull-through until we could settle up with the office in the morning.  The owners put in new managers and changed a bunch of rules and tossed out all workamper contracts from last year.  Because we couldn't reconcile there offers with her work schedule, we decided I wouldn't work and we got our preferred site and got moved in.

Here we are.  We participated in bingo one night and attended the park's Thanksgiving dinner.  We were also able to have our first Magic the Gathering night in San Diego.  I found out that there are four new geocaches in the immediate area. That should be fun.

There should be a lot more to come.

Jazz at Humbolt Cider Co

Her final night at work

Some random final shots of Eureka

A cool old car project found at BNS

October 14th - The Avenue of the Giants

We took a day to do a little sightseeing.  I have a lot of interesting and pretty pictures, so I'm going to break this into two posts.

South of us is the Humbolt State Park.  Hwy 101 runs down through it.  There is a side road scenic drive that was actually hwy 101 at one time. We have such better road construction skills now that they made the hwy somewhat straighter.  The older section is called "The Avenue of the Giants"

As we got into the drive, we stopped at the first pull off we found.  A plaque speaks of this section being dedicated to a local person.  There are many little grove areas dedicated such.  Sometimes, there are informational signs explaining local shrubberies.  

We soon came to our first geocache of the day. GC190X6  Albino Redwood Tree .Just south of the town of Pepperwood there is a turn-off.  In front of the wall of trees, was a nearly white redwood.  Back in the foliage was a path that led to a little opening.  After a bit of searching, we found the tricky guy.

Although it's all just winding roads and very big trees, It's still breathtaking.  

Just a bit down the road, there was a turn-off that headed back to 101.  We stopped there and trekked into the woods to find  GC1RFA1  Redwood Drop   Just a couple of quick finds. 

The Eel river runs along the avenue and we stopped at one point to document it.

Later, we came across a clearing where there was a little souvenir shop.  At that location was "The Immortal Redwood".  The tree is over 900 years old and has survived fire, loggers, and flood.  There were acouple of others sights such as a hollowed out trunk you can walk through and a very cool chair. 

I'll bring more in our next post.

There are hugh leaf clover patches everywhere

Geocache here

Eel river

September 25th - Walking and cycling

A great day outdoors.  We finally got the bikes out and drove back to Fortuna.  When we were there by the river yesterday, We noticed there were a couple of geocaches on the trail.  

We unloaded the bikes and took them across the street to get the tires fully pumped up, then hit the trail.  There is a little picnic spot next to the trail and we found our geocache there.

GC6X5PT  Something's Fishy on the Eel

An easy cache. Right there on the Eel River.  Logged it and rode down the trail for a bit.  It was a nice day but I think the view would have been nicer if the river was really running.  A second cache was supposed to be further down, but I wasn't able to find it. I've noticed a lot of what looks like wild raspberry bushes on  our travels.

We finished our little jaunt and loaded the bikes.  Then we drove into the old town area.  There is a railroad museum next to a park. Rohner Park
The truck was parked and we decided to walk the trees a little bit.  If you wanted to, you could spend the entire day walking here.  We attempted to find another geocache here.  We never found it though I'm sure I found the right spot.  These things happen.  Not a great geocaching day (1 for 3) but it was a wonderful day.

Afterwards, we had fish and chips at Eel River Brewing.

Picnic area

Found!!

Riverwalk.  On bikes.

Wild raspberries

In case you can't find the trail?

Fish and Chips. Great.

September 7th - Idaho and Washington (not to mention Oregon)

We spent Thursday night at a Montana rest stop on the border of Idaho.  "I wonder if there is a geocache here?) is the functional question.  There was.  We found it.  A great way to start the day.  It was early and we soon headed west into Idaho.

Rest 1 geocache GC1PAEA

This trip and our last one home are routes we haven't been through before.  Instead of catching I-15 out of Butte, which takes us through the toe of the Idaho boot, we continued on I-94/90 crossing the top east to west.

As we were crossing the final part of the Rockies up there, we became aware of a number of small towns stuffed between the highway and the mountains.  These towns are pretty old.  They are logging or mining towns.  Every town has a local volunteer fire dept.  You often see the constructed opening of a mine shaft that may or may not still be in use.  We got off at one of these towns and drove around a bit before heading on.  We hope to stop for a longer visit when we return this way.

We crossed into Washington state at Spokane and Coeur D'Alene.  The Coeur D'Alene lake is huge and we stopped for gas and fought rush-hour traffic and road contruction. Nice.

No stops in Spokane this time.  We traveled south west to the tri-cities of  Kennewick, Pasco, and Richland.  There are also three rivers here, Yakima, Snake, and the huge Columbia.  We stopped at a place called Ice River in Kennewick.  Trendy, but weak brews.  The building was an old railroad warehouse.

The drive down along the Columbia seems interminable.  The interstate never seems wide enough and winds and turns around the bends of the great river as well as going past a number of ancient bridges that never expected an interstate needing room there.

Eventually, we made it to Portland and stayed the night in Vancouver on the north side of the river.  There is a great craft brewer there called Ghost Runner.  They put spent valves and parts on the tables to fidget with while you imbibe.  They make for great still life compositions.

Tomorrow, we'll head south through Oregon and maybe make it to California.  Humm, it looks like rain....

And thank you to all you who read my postings.

geocache at this little rest stop

Ta-daa!!

Idaho. Finally.  

Mining town. Osborne, ID

Lake Coeur D'Alene

Spokane

Sprague Lake

Dust devil.  there were many playing in the fields

The columbia river curls up off the Oregon border and embraces the Tri-cities

Kennewick, WA

Later that day, we finally made it to Vancouver, Washington

still art

Amazing sky.  Rain coming.