October Happenings (10-2018)

Very soon after arriving home in October, Paul's  brother Tom and his wife Sue stopped by for a few days. They are now retired and have a motor home. We look forward to meeting up with them along the way!


Of course we made time for a trip to the Desert Bar before they left....

Our daughter Jess moved into a new apartment in Los Angeles, in October, and needed some of her household items that were being stored at our place, so I took a short road trip and met her about halfway,  where we transferred her stuff from my car to hers. There may have been some shopping done as well, haha.

Back at home, the hummingbirds were hungry enough to eat from the handheld feeder. Pretty cool.

The weather wasn't great in October in Havasu... we did manage to take the boat out, and hike a few times, but it wasn't too long before we decided to go on a road trip.

We loaded up the truck camper and headed to California.

The  route we chose was fairly remote, with few campgrounds along the way. In fact, most of the towns we were going through didn't have any television reception, which we considered vital that particular night. We called places until we found a campground that had cable (only in the clubhouse, but that worked) so we could watch the Red Sox win the World Series.

Our first stop was  Giant Sequoia National Monument, where we walked the Trail of 100 Giants.













This wasn't a particularly long trail but it was an interesting one.















Our second stop was Sequoia National Park.  Here we spent several days exploring and hiking. We found it astonishing that neither of us had spent any time here!

We couldn't have asked for better weather, and one of the perks of traveling in the truck camper is that its easier to fit into campgrounds that are IN the national parks, which really adds to the experience.

Many of the trees and groves here have been given names...The Senate, the House, etc. And of course, General Sherman tree....the Largest tree, by volume, in the world.  Note the car in the picture of this tree.

As impressive as the trees were, the trail with the best view was the granite dome called Moro Rock.

This trail wound around the granite, all the way to the top. Or, at least I assume it goes all the way.  The trail got a little narrow for me, and the railing was a little low for my taste,  so I waited for Paul just below the crest.

Even driving around the park was interesting...

 After a few days of hiking, we moved on to our final destination- Fresno, and the fraternity brothers.

Kirk was building a hot tub shack at his cabin in the mountains, so the guys got together to help, while the girls played Rummikub and provided the men with refreshments.

 Once the weekend was over, we headed back to Havasu.

A Mini Road Trip (04-27-15)

We left Havasu with the bed of the truck completely empty- it felt very strange not to have the camper or trailer with us- even the tailgate was gone, because one of the stops on our road trip is to pick up the camper in Fresno.








 But that’s getting ahead of myself.   Our 4 day trip took us through 3 states and over 1000 miles. 










Our first stop was Laughlin Nevada where we met with Mike and Julie to attend a ZZ Top concert….












  which just happened to take place on Mike and Julie’s 39th wedding anniversary!

We were very happy to celebrate with them, and we all enjoyed the concert.

These band members have been together since 1969 are the original members of  ZZ Top, so they are old- like us- and the concert was over by 10 pm- just Perfect!

We sadly said goodbye to Mike and Julie, and took off the next morning for Seal Beach CA, where we met up with more friends to celebrate a 60th birthday. We arrived in town early enough to have lunch with friends and still have time to take a short nap before the big party.

The birthday girl, Margie, has been friends with Paul since their college days.

Margie’s kids’ went all out,  hiring a DJ for dancing and serving a full dinner at a local country club.











We had a great time dancing, and took advantage of the photo booth in between songs.  I didn’t have my camera with me so my pictures are pretty much non-existent.

The next morning the weather was perfect for a long chat over breakfast.  As we said our goodbyes we all realized that we should continue the tradition of these types of celebrations. So many of us are used to seeing friends and family only at wakes and funerals, and it was so much fun to get together for a happy occasion.

Everyone knows Paul likes to have a good time, and on his 50th birthday, we had his party in Las Vegas, and most of his family and lots of his friends flew in for a 3 day celebration.  We had an awesome time and he is already mentioning that he is turning 60 on his next birthday……it could work out to be our first blowout party in our new house…..we’ll see!

Our final stop on our mini road trip was Fresno, where we picked up our truck camper.

 

Once again we had dinner with friends, and as much as we enjoy their company, we can’t stick around.  With no camper or trailer attached to us, we have been staying in hotels, so we left Dozer in the trailer in Havasu.

4 days is the longest I like to leave him, so we really need to get back. 

So, if this is what a mini road trip looks like, what does a MAJOR road trip look like?  You’ll have to wait for my next post for the answer to that question!

Short Stop-in Havasu (04-23-15)

Life is quite busy right now, and our stop in Lake Havasu was a brief one. We arrived in town just in time to meet up with our friends Kirk and Karen, who were on their way back to California from Mexico.

We showed them around town, and of course stopped by the model home to show off what our new house will sort of look like.

One of the things we like about Havasu is that there always seems to be something going on. 





  After Kirk and Karen went on their way, we realized that the coming weekend there was going to be a Poker Run, featuring  boats that attain speeds in excess of 160 mph. {Update; This year's Shoot Out  Race winner topped out at 182 mph}

Although we wouldn't be in town for the actual races (Next year!), we heard about the Desert Storm Street Party.  The main road in Havasu was closed to traffic, and many of the race boats were on display.

These boats represent some serious money….

and as Paul said “some serious testosterone”.

Many of the “players” showed off their cars and trucks as well-

We saw a Maserati, a Ferrari and a GT, among others.

As I said, we would have loved to have been here for the races, but that’s OK- we have some awesome plans for the weekend and were quite happy to head out on our mini road trip.

House Update

When we were last in town, the grading of the lot had been started but not finished.  It is now done and here are the before and after pictures.  What a huge difference!  We weren't completely satisfied with the job the grader did, so we asked Wes to meet us at the lot. 

 He explained that a few areas will have to be finished later, once the house is started, but also agreed with us that they stopped short of the lot line, and need to bring in some more fill to finish the job.

Here’s the view looking towards the lake-before-

and after-

Here is looking towards the street- before-

and after.

While we were in Vegas we looked at granite, and once we got to Havasu we started trying to narrow down some other items.  We have chosen the exterior color ( a very light sandy looking color):




And we have also chosen the roof color. The company we are working with sent us around town to look at houses that are the same color as the ones we were interested in, so it was easier to make a decision.

We looked at a lot of floor tiles and think we have a decision made, but we will revisit it some other time.  We really need to look a the granite, floor tile, wall color and back splash all together to see if it works for us, but we don’t have the time right now.  At least the basic exterior colors are chosen!

Hanging around Pismo Beach (03-15-14)

   On the way home from Hearst Castle, we stopped along the shoreline to watch the elephant seals for a while.  There were hundreds of them strewn all over the beach. 

They were quite noisy as they chattered away at each other.
During breeding season they do not leave the beach to feed, so they live on stored fat.  When they are in the water (80 % of their lives) they can stay under for over an hour and a half at a time.

The males are much larger than the females, weighing in at about  5000 lbs compared to the female weight of 1600 lbs. This area of the coast is one of the nursery areas so there were a lot of pups around as well.

We also managed to find a reasonable hiking trail in the area and hiked the 4.5 mile roundtrip hike up to the top of Bishop’s Peak, the tallest peak in the area.

Once the weekend arrived, we were joined by our friends Kirk and Karen, from Fresno.  We took advantage of the great weather and walked along the boardwalk in town.

Kirk and Karen are thinking of buying a trailer, one that they would leave in the Pismo area as a “vacation home” so shopping was high on our list of things to do.

We went to several dealerships where we discussed the good and bad points of quite a few trailers and Kirk and Karen tried to get a sense of what features are important to them.

Of course, we have to eat at some point!  We were invited to Terry and Annie’s for dinner where the women relaxed and enjoyed the warmth….

…..and the men barbecued while watching the sun set.  It was an awesome weekend!

We are now in Fresno, where, in between all the socializing, we are starting to figure out what we’ll need to do to the truck camper over the next month or so to get ready for our trip north.  Tomorrow I fly to Boston for 10 days, so Paul will have to start the projects without me!