Don’t Take My Sunshine Away

It is no exaggeration to say that the undecided could go one way or
another.

RVers are so very good at making plans.  This was the plan.  We were going to stay in Napa for about a week.  After that we had planned on moving just north of Sacramento to Lake Minden for four or five days.  That was the plan but do you think we really stuck with the plan?  Of course, not.

Thursday morning rolled around with a sky full of clouds.  This was moving day.  A quick check was made with our favorite weatherman who resides in my phone. We discovered rain was forecast over the next few days!  Rain!!!  Rain would spoil all our outdoor plans for sure.  We wanted sunshine.  What did we do?  We changed our plans, of course.  The sunshine for the next week was hanging around northern Oregon and southern Washington.  That’s where we needed to be.

The rain was right on schedule.  Just as we finished our unhooking and hooking, raindrops started to fall.  We knew we could get a head of it.  Our change of plans put us heading for the Rolling Hills Casino in Corning, CA.  Once close we changed our plans again. Why not a few more miles to the Win River Casino in Redding or maybe the Elk’s Lodge there?   We didn’t make either of those as we discovered a Camping World just south of Redding.  That’s where we stayed instead.  Sound familiar?  Sometimes nothing works out as planned.  We’re really good at planning but not necessarily at sticking with those plans. 

Just one of our Camping World purchases  -- a table for the Weber at the “cabin”.

Whoever thinks staying in a parking lot at a Wal-Mart or Camping World is free should think again.  These places are more expensive than most RV parks.  This little spot on the bare lot at Camping World with tons of highway noise had no amenities and no hookups but it cost us well over $100 to stay there.

We followed part of the 2-2-2 rule.  We traveled less than 200 miles and arrived before 2:00.  However, we had no plans on staying two days.  Our plan  for Friday was the 7 Feathers Casino in Canyonville …. or maybe it was the SKP park at Sutherlin or maybe it would be Cabela's in Eugene.  We weren’t quite sure.  We did know we wanted to get over the Siskiyou Mountains and ahead of the storm that was coming in.  

The scenery soon changed!

Did we stick with any of those plans?  No.  We didn’t do that either.  We did stop at Canyonville and had lunch but since we had also started out that morning much earlier than planned we decided it was too early to stop for the day.  We continued driving …. through Sutherlin and even through Eugene.  We hit Portland just in time for the heavy work traffic but we certainly weren’t going to stop there either.  We moved right on across the 205 bridge and were welcomed into the State of Washington.

Oregon Sheep grazing on GREEN grass.

That 2-2-2 thing didn’t work again.  It was about a 450 mile day, we didn’t arrive before 2:00 PM but we can say we’ll be here for way more than 2 days.  The best part of the day was having dinner that evening at Olive Garden with our kids and their families.  We’re “home” and this snowbirding season is now behind us.

We’re back in logging truck territory!  Not many of these in the Arizona deserts.

Saturday?  Saturday we check on the cabin.  Hopefully, there’s been no winter damage.  Hopefully, the three humidifiers did the job they were supposed to do.  Hopefully, there isn’t much clean up.  In the meantime the Vancouver Elks is a wonderful place to be.

‘Tis life on the road.

We Didn’t Leave Our Hearts In SFO

 

Women and cats will do as they please.  Men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.    

Monday was ferry day.  We took the ferry from Vallejo to San Francisco.

Alcatraz Island

There are many ways to visit San Francisco.  After all, there are many things to see in San Francisco.  However, if you’re traveling around in an RV and have a dog, it’s a little difficult to see it all.  It’s a pick and choose thing.  You’ve got to pick out the easy things to do and the things that don’t take all day.  It’s not that we haven’t been to San Francisco.  We have.  We didn’t really intend to head into town on this trip anyway so that wasn’t a problem.  

We were staying in Napa and knew a trip into town alone would take a while.  After all, there’s lots of traffic around here … and with close to 50 miles from where we were staying, it would definitely take a while to drive to the center of San Francisco.  What we really wanted to do was just take the ferry.

There are several ferries that transport people across San Francisco Bay to the main Ferry terminal located near the center of downtown San Francisco.  Traveling by ferry is an easy way to get there with no traffic to fight and no worry about finding a parking place.  Parking is free at the Vallejo ferry terminal.  It’s almost like a tour within itself as the boat travels by Alcatraz Island with the Golden Gate Bridge visible in the distance.  That’s what we decided to do and the Vallejo departure point is just 16 miles from Napa.  It was a beautiful day for a ride across the bay in a fast moving catamaran.

Tuesday we took a drive to Sonoma.  We had not been to Sonoma before but it was only 15 miles so we really had to go.  You might guess that the road to Sonoma also had more vineyards and rolling hills.  Along with the vineyards came more wineries.  We only stopped at one but it looked so fantastic from the road.  We had to turn around and check it out.

We really liked Sonoma. It was easy to see why the little town attracted so many people.  It’s not just because of the wineries either.

Rolling hills and wineries are everywhere!

Here’s one that definitely looked like a French Chateau.

We ate lunch at Murphy’s Irish Pub.  We both opted to have typical Irish fare.  Terry had the shepherd’s pie and I had corned beef and cabbage.  Both dishes were fantastic …. even though we did have to admit that Toni’s shepherd’s pie still is the winner in our book.

I’m sure if you were to spend a month in this area, you still wouldn’t have time to see all there is to see.  We’ve been running ragged trying to see everything.  The weather has been fantastic and that has sure helped too.  However, I’ve got to admit we’re ready to move along again.  Now we’re hanging around until we get our mail.  It’s coming.  It’s on it’s way.  When we get it …. those wheels will roll once more.  Isn’t that what we have an RV for?

‘Tis life on the road.

We’re Doing It All ! Let The Good Times Roll!

"My formula for success is rise early, work late, and strike oil."

 

We’re loving this area of California.  Napa Valley is so beautiful.  Of course, that has something to do with the perfect temperatures and being in a nice location.

The little town of Napa is gorgeous.  It definitely is a tourist town.  Unique shops are tucked in little alleyways plus they have all the bigger named stores around too.  It has just about everything including beautiful rolling hills, loads of greenery, gorgeous spring flowers and right now the most awesome weather.

We have been through this area many times before but have never spent more than one day in the past.  Our RVing friends had mentioned more than once about the Jelly Belly factory which is just down the road from Napa.  I love, love, love black licorice jelly beans.  That’s where we decided to go on Friday.  It definitely wasn’t a good day to go.  Kids packed the joint.  Was it spring break or was it just an outing from the school?  We weren’t sure but there was no way we were going to stand in that line.  It would have been fun to see how the jelly beans were made but the line was way too long to even consider it.  So, we walked around and then left.

Made with jelly beans!

So much for factory outlet shopping ... cheaper at Winco at $6.65 per pound!

Right down the road from the Jelly Belly factory was an olive oil tasting place.  We went there instead.  We learned a lot about the different olive oils.  Everyone knows how good olive oil is for you but we really didn’t realize the huge health difference with some of the oils and not so much the others.  

The higher the phenyl content the better for you.  Of course, phenyl content is not required to be displayed on the bottle.  Matter of fact, there is no FDA labeling control over olive oil.  Olive oil should be under one year old when used otherwise health benefits decrease.  I didn’t know that.  I guess I really didn’t know much about the real difference in olive oils regardless of whether or not the “extra” was on the bottle.

We’ve started buying little postcards every where we spend a little time.  We should have started this earlier but we didn’t.  However, we have a few saved up now.  The reason for the collection of postcards?  We’re sending them to Justin with little notes on the back of each one.  It’s easier than writing a long letter and pictures say a lot more.

Saturday was a typical day for anyone.  It was laundry day.  It was an educational day too.  I discovered where some folks get their clothes.  It’s from the unattended dryers at the local laundromat.  You can guess how I discovered that.  The rest of the day was spent reading,  sewing and messing with the computers.  It was a good, normal day but also just an ordinary day.

Sunday morning we decided to take a drive.  We were off to look at a few more wineries.  We weren’t off to do any tasting but just for a drive to enjoy the beautiful countryside around Napa.  The fields are beautiful and the some of the buildings are just awesome.  We were out to explore a different area. 

The other day we drove down Hwy 29.  Sunday we decided to do one of the other side roads.  It was definitely a beautiful day for a drive.  

This was the Chimney Rock Winery

 



Gorgeous rolling hills, spring flowers and vineyards were everywhere.




 

 The winery that really caught our attention was the Darious Winery.  I bet you can see why it caught our attention.  The inside was as elegant as the outside. 

Darious Winery

Just for kicks we also priced some of the wines … not that we were interested in buying but we were interested in pricing.  There’s no way you’d find any of their wines at a grocery store. One bottle of some of their wines would pay for a month at a few RV parks.

Enough wineries …. Monday  ….. we’re taking a ferry ride to San Francisco.

‘Tis life on the road.

Napa Wineries and the Culinary Institute of America

 

A lot of people are afraid of heights. Not me, I'm afraid of widths.

 

What a whirlwind adventure we are having.  Finding time to read and write blogs has been difficult but I’m trying to keep up.  After all if I don’t keep up with the writing, I’ll get way behind.  That’s my incentive to keep current.

They have remotes for my GoPro Hero Camera!!

We stayed in Vallejo two nights.  Part of the plan while there was to take the ferry across San Francisco Bay to the main ferry terminal.  We didn’t make it.  We did make it to the terminal in Vallejo but weren’t interested in going the day we had planned.  It was overcast with occasional showers.  Matter of fact, it was the only day that was overcast and the only day that had showers.  We didn’t think that would be the best day to cruise by the Golden Gate Bridge or take another peak at Alcatraz.  After all, what kind of pictures would we get?

On our way back to the motorhome we drove by an area that had been blocked off with a SWAT team, dozens of police cars and a helicopter hovering.  That was our excitement but we certainly weren’t interested in getting too close to anything like that.  

Napa Elks 

After two nights at the Elks we moved on down the road to the Napa Elks.  Now that’s a nice Elks and we have a perfect spot.  The RV park there is even a “gated” community.  Since it was only a 15 mile drive north, we were in our site and ready to check out the surrounding area pretty early.

There is so much to see in the Napa Valley. The wineries are gorgeous. Fields and fields of grapes wind up and down the hills and along most of the roadways. There must be hundreds of wineries all competing for the tourist trade. We walked through several of them and checked out the gift shops and the wine barrels. No …. we didn’t do any wine tasting. We more interested in being fed than wined. We had a late lunch at the Greystone’s Culinary Institute of America.

Like I said there are hundreds of gorgeous wineries around here. We intend to check many of them out while we’re here. Along with the wines there are other things to taste. Dipping oils, sauces, mustards and jams are common. This is definitely a place for people who like food and we love food.

The highlight of the day was definitely the stop at the CIA …. Culinary Institute of America. First we had to check out the gift shop and what a gift shop that was. Just about everything a chef would need was for sale. These weren’t the items you’d find at Wal-Mart either. Terry found a couple little things he had to have …. of course.

Beringer's Winery

Culinary Institute of America

We almost were tempted to get some of the chocolates the chefs put out.  However, we were on our way to lunch so didn’t taste any but we sure enjoyed looking at them.  I’m guessing they were very, very rich.

Top notch chef accessories

Chocolates, chocolates and more chocolates.

Lunch?  The menu was limited but it had something on it for everyone from appetizers to starters and entrees to desserts.  Then, they had the main selection of the day with a choice of entree.  That’s what we both ordered because it was a full course lunch.

 

Appetizer -- Potato	Butternut Squash Soup
Terry's hamburger	My Chicken

It was wonderful. It was expensive but the food and service were amazing.  What a fantastic dining experience it was. However, we were now stuffed and tired.  It was time to head back to the motorhome for a much needed nap.

We may have been mighty full but we couldn’t pass on the crème brulee.

So, we're now at one more place where we'll be following the 2-2-2 plan.  

Phyllis had mentioned the other day in a comment she left that their 2-2-2 plan wasn't for staying two days but for staying two weeks!  Now that one we'd rarely be able to follow!

‘Tis life on the road.

A Trip to Santa Cruz

Trying to be someone you're not is a waste of the person you are

Instead of waking up to another beautiful sunny day, on Monday the fog had rolled in.  The fog was already starting to lift when we headed out.  We were thankful for that but we also knew clouds were expected to roll in by early afternoon.  We still wanted to take another trip to the beach but this time we were going to head a little north of Monterey.  We were going to take a “quick” trip to Santa Cruz.

Lots of fog but no fog horn !

Artichoke Capital

Loved this little farm

It had been many years since either of us had been to Santa Cruz.  It had been so many years we couldn't remember much about the town.  Well, we knew that the beach had a boardwalk, lots of rides and was pretty popular for water sports.  We also knew it was well known for the younger crowd during spring break, summers and weekends the place would be packed.  

Santa Cruz was only 35 miles from where our motorhome was parked.  We couldn’t pass it by this time.  We had already skipped it in October when we were flying down the coast.  Well, we weren’t really flying but we were on a mission to get to Pismo Beach and pick up the new inverter we had ordered after our other one had died. (By the way ... Pismo Beach and Monterey are two of our favorite stops.)

One thing I have to admit is that it sure is pleasant being in this part of the country right now. We left the Arizona desert just before the hot, hot temperatures arrived.  Temperatures are definitely cooler along the California coast.  It is "cooler" but definitely not cold.

There were a few people on the beach at Santa Cruz but not very many. There were also a few people on the pier but not very many there either. However, it was early, cool and it was a Monday. We saw more sea otters than we saw people but that was really a good thing.  It was still before noon and it was cloudy.  That may have had something to do with not having a crowd.

 

This group of otters looked like they were still napping.

I read Donna K’s comment about the sea otters at Moss Landing just after we had returned from there.  That really was a great place to stop.  Not only did we see more of them, we also found a great place to walk along the beach. 

Other than that we made a few more stops on the way back to our RV.  One stop was at a fruit stand.  We had noticed several of these  on the way to Santa Cruz so on the way way back we made a point to stop at one of them.  We bought some butternut squash for 49 cents a pound. Terry picked up some luscious strawberries and I loaded up with grapefruit.

Another stop was to take a look at a few “interesting” motorcycles.

It was just a short detour to also swing by and pick up something for Sabrina.  We should have bought it yesterday when we were in Monterey but we didn’t.  We had never seen a similar t-shirt.  I should have known Sabrina would want it.  She did so we made a stop back to pick it up.   This is what Justin does for the Navy so, of course, she had to have it.

Cryptologic Technician ..  

We ended the day with a trip to Home Depot for a new water hose (which we discovered leaks).  Home Depot happened to be next door to Famous Dave’s.  Guess where we went for dinner?

We spent two nights at the Salinas Elks.  That’s what we said we’d do and we actually stuck with it. (There you go, Paul!!)  Tuesday morning we decided to head a little farther north … 126 miles.  We moved just north of San Francisco to the Elks in Vallejo.  I think we’re going to be hitting that 2-2-2 thing again.  We did arrive by 2:00, drove under 200 miles and will be here for two nights.  I think we’re doing good.  No ... we're doing great!

What are we going to do here?  Not much ... we have one day with a little moisture heading this way so we thought we'd just sit it out and let it pass us by.  Thursday we move again.  Napa Valley here we come.

‘Tis life on the road.