I did it! (10-30-14)

About 3 years ago,  a good friend of mine gave me his entire music collection- over 90 gigabytes of songs.  Both Paul and I are music challenged. What that means is we have no idea which songs by which artists are on our “wow I love that song” list.   So we ccouldn'tjust say we like John Mellencamp for example.  In fact, had you asked, I would have said, yeah, I like his music.  Well, it turns out, there is only one of his songs I liked enough to keep.

So for the last 3 years I have painstakingly added this music a batch at a time to my iPod.  As I listened to each song I made a note as to whether I should delete it or keep it, and if I keep it, what type of playlist should it go on.  Originally Paul helped me, but he finds it too stressful to listen to bits of songs while he is driving, so I did most of it on my own.

  And I am finished. 

Pinnacles National Park (10-21-14)

We’ve been to the largest of our country’s national parks (Wrangell St. Elias) and the oldest of the national parks, and now we can say we’ve been to the newest national Park.

Although this area has been a national monument since 1908, and the CCC built the trails and the day use areas in the 1930s, Pinnacles has only been a national park since 2013.

As we’ve visited the national parks, we’ve realized that a) they are all awesome in their unique way, and b) there is a reason why they are a national park.



Pinnacles is a nesting area to the California Condor. Weighing in at 20 pounds, with a 9 foot wingspan, the Condor is one of the largest birds in North America.

I was frustrated with my lack of decent pictures until I read that they can soar at an altitude of 15,000 feet, at a speed of 55 mph. These guys were way up in the sky.

Sitting along the San Andreas Fault, the Pinnacles are also known for the fact that millions of years ago this area was part of a larger volcanic field, but it broke apart, and this section has been moving north with the Pacific plate ever since.  So far, it has moved 195 miles.









But anyway,  we were here to get some hiking done.  Paul heard there are caves here, and it took no other enticement for us to pack up the camper and move up here for a few days.



Within the first mile the High Peaks  trail took us through Bear Gulch Cave.



















The fun wasn’t over once we were back out in the sunshine.  The trail led us up and down narrow staircases,

and around massive boulders.






Along the way, the views were awesome, and the weather was perfect for hiking.







The next morning we were up and hiking early, trying to beat the 88 degree temperature that was forecasted for the afternoon. The trail to Balconies Cave is not as spectacular as the Bear Gulch trail, according to the ranger, but it was a fun hike nonetheless..

















The caves here are Talus caves-caves that are created when boulders slide down a slope and become wedged above the ground.























After two days of  hiking it was time to head back to Fresno and put the camper away for the winter.  It’s been a busy two days, getting everything ready to head out tomorrow morning. We aren’t going too far on our first day- just a few hours down the road to see our daughter one last time before we head to Texas..

40 Years and some projects (10-19-14)

Paul’s 40th high school reunion took place while we were in Fresno.  His high school is in Sacramento, so we packed up neither the camper, nor the trailer, and drove the 140 miles north for the reunion.

Although none of his close friends attended, we still had a great time talking with people and looking at old pictures. After dinner they did the usual lining up of graduates for a more “formal” picture.






After a nice night of dancing, we headed to a hotel suite that is larger than our home. 

  Sunday morning we took a stroll through Old Sacramento. Along the side streets that were line with old buildings, we came across a sight that, at first glance, seemed very strange.  A dozen young ladies posing in doorways and assorted other places.

It turned out to be a photo shoot.  It wasn’t for anything specific- it was a mutually beneficial outing for young models and budding photographers.

And then …..we wandered into the largest and most colorful candy store I have ever seen!  I was in heaven and Paul had to drag me out of there- especially since the owner told us we could sample any candy that has a blue tag- and that was about a third of the store!  Yummy!



On our way out of town we drove by the house Paul grew up in.  He was happy to see that the two Redwoods he planted when he was young are the tallest trees in the area. 







Back in Fresno, the celebrating continued with the birthday party for our friend Kevin.  Kevin turned the big 6-0, but we don’t tease him because we are right behind him (some of us are closer than others though!).








We are wrapping up some of our projects on all of our rigs.  Two of them required Paul to climb under vehicles. The camper project was a planned one.  He was changing out some parts to the water system.

The truck project was not a planned one and was a little spooky.  The truck wouldn’t start one morning- it turned over, and then just died with no notice, and a warning sign came up on the dash.  Google to the rescue, when I punched in what the warning said, the results were all about the EGT sensors in the 6.7L Ford engine. Apparently in early production vehicles, the sensors go bad and need to be replaced with an upgraded version.

Luckily we had borrowed a car for the weekend and we still had it, so after a bunch of online searching and talking back and forth with the local Ford dealer, Paul took off to the dealership to get the new part. He was not a happy camper, with thoughts of what could have happened if we had been on the back roads of Alaska when the truck died. He did contact one of the directors at Ford that he used to work for, and discussed it with him.  Apparently they are aware of it and working on a solution.

One of our chores was to clean the carpets in the camper, but the carpet cleaner that we borrowed stopped working.  Karen and I relaxed with a glass of wine while Paul and Kirk pull it apart- to no avail.  It’s next stop was the dumpster.

Paul’s biggest project of the week has been a long time in coming.  The toolbox we have in the bed of the truck is enormous and at times it interferes with maneuvering the trailer in tight corners.

Paul decided it was time for a new one, but he couldn’t find exactly the size he wanted, so he bought one, and then modified it.

The new one doesn't sit as far over the top of the bed rail as the old one, giving us  much better turning abilities.  Unfortunately, it also doesn't go all the way down to the bed of the truck, and that’s a problem.  We need it deeper, to fit the boat engine.

So he cut the top part off and bought another piece of diamond plate.

He sleeved the new piece into the existing toolbox, and after some riveting and gluing….

Voila!  A custom made toolbox!

Hot Times in the City (10-8-14)

While I am not going to complain about the record high temperatures here in California, it does boggle my mind that it’s October and the temps in Los Angeles were consistently over 100 degrees. 








(By the way, my family and close friends are well aware that bad weather follows Paul and me. Someday when I am bored and have nothing to blog about, I’ll tell the story of how that knowledge came about).

It was worth  braving the brutal temperatures to see the smiling face of our daughter Jess!

Once we figured out a good time to go see our daughter, I did some research and learned that, not surprisingly, a decent hotel room in the Burbank area costs about $140 a night.  If we wanted to see her for more than a day, that would get pricy pretty quickly.  Luckily we own an “apartment” (terminology credited to our niece who wanted to know why we took the apartment, not the mansion to L.A.)

So, pretty much as soon as we got the camper unpacked, we packed it back up again for this short trip.  We stayed 3 nights at the Burbank Elks, a mere 2 miles from Jess’s house.  Total cost- $45. We used her car so the truck sat parked the whole time we were there.  It worked out very well!

The first order of business was to go for a hike.  In theory that was a great idea- we all like to hike- but we got delayed, and by the time we got on the trail, it was almost noon, and about 97 degrees outside. 

Great views notwithstanding, I cried uncle after a mere 40 minutes of hiking.  Although we were close to the coast, there was very little shade and the views weren’t that great!

Not being gluttons for punishment, we had made arrangements to spend the following day at Paul’s brother’s house, about an hour from L.A.  We haven’t seen Tom and Sue (yes, there are two Sue Porters) for quite a few months.  When they heard we were coming, they made it a party.

   Did I not mention that they have a pool? I told you we aren’t gluttons for punishment.

  Anyway, we had a great time visiting with family and friends.

Way too soon it was time to head back to Fresno, where numerous projects were waiting for our attention.