Category: California

Death Valley, CA – Monday April 1, 2019

On our first day in Death Valley we decided to go north.

Drove across one of the high valleys in Death Valley.

Ended up at a Father Crowley lookout point which is over a canyon the Air Force uses to practice flying.

This shows how steep the canyon is in this area.

We stood on the edge and watch several planes fly along the valley. A fighter and a C130.

Here are some pictures of the fighter.

The C130

We stayed and watched 3 fighters and one C130, it was getting to be lunch time so I figured they were all on their way back home to get something to eat.

Barstow, CA – Saturday March 30, 2019

On our way to Death Valley

Today’s drive end up much longer then planned, I will write up the story tomorrow. Don’t know when we will have internet again so it maybe after we leave Death Valley before it is posted. The short version is we drove up Hwy 247 30 miles to a road closed sign, closed for construction until Monday 4/1/2019.

Redlands, CA – Saturday February 16, 2019

Long day 618 miles.

Highway CA-37 opened traveling east about 7:30 this morning so that is the way we traveled over to I-5. When we go to the rest stop north of LA where we planned to spend the night it was closed. You’d think they could have put a sign at the previous rest stop saying this one is closed, it is closed for 6 months.

Not really knowing anything about the area we continued south looking for a place to spend the night. The next rest stop we pulled in fixed dinner and were settling in for the night when I looked at the weather report. We are at the top of “The Grapevine” Lebec, CA with snow coming.

First Campsite pictures

Snow on the ridge above us

Here is the weather report.

This was not going to be a good place to stay and I was not looking forward to driving into LA at night but as they say, “It is what it is”.

This is Lebec weather report this afternoon.

And good thing we didn’t go to Bakersfield and high desert.

Today’s drive

Where we spent the night.

Travel time 7:30 a.m. to 9:00 p.m

Ukiah, CA Fair Grounds – Friday February 15, 2019

Long drive today.

243 long miles. The weather is wet cold which adds up to snow. I don’t mind driving the pickup in the snow but we came this way not to drive the Motorhome in snow.

Saw one car slide off the road and a van in the middle of the road on it’s side after rolling at least once. I think he most of hit a large puddle of water while going to fast.

Got to Uriah at 2:00 and decided we would be better off spending the night here rather than driving through the Bay Area during Friday evening commute and trying to find a place to spend the night in a major city. Early Saturday morning sound better.

Watched the local news and found out one of the roads I was going to take is flooded so with google maps I think I found a way to get to Vacaville to Sacramento and south on I5. With the cold, rain and wind we will not go east from Bakersfield into the high desert but go south into LA get I10 east.

The rest of the trip should see improving weather.

Crescent City, CA – Thursday February 14, 2019

Last night before we went to bed I made the call to drive around the Siskiyou’s. Between the snow, rain and wind it seemed the right thing to do.

We get to see the ocean, lunch stop view.

Drove 298 miles and got to Cresent City at 3:30 staying at Shoreline RV Park right on the ocean. This includes for no additional fee rain and wind. The wind was supposed to drop after dark but hasn’t.

Campsite 79.

Today’s drive.

Looking at the weather radar this afternoon it looked like some snow on Hwy 299 which would take us over to I-5 at Redding. So I think we will go further south to Hwy 20 which will hit I-5 at Williams.

Overall I would have to say the weather sucks everywhere, here and in Washington State. Back on the road in the morning.

Added site picture 2/15/2019

Red Bluff, CA – Rest Stop Sunday November 11, 2018

This morning we could see a little smoke in the air. When we got out of the high desert it was really smoky and in Stockton visibility was a mile. From Sacramento north the smoke seemed to holding at a layer above 1000 feet. Crystal clean at ground level.

We stopped at the Olive Pit in Corning and decided to stay here where it is going to get down to 40 degrees rather then 22 degrees at Weed.

We were on the road at 5:30 a.m. this morning and got here at 4:15 p.m. had some pretty good cross winds for a three hours this afternoon.

The drive:

Don’t know what the new yellow line is for, when we get to the big house and I don’t have to watch data usage I’ll spend some time and figure it out.

Campsite:

Boron, CA – Rest Stop – Saturday November 10, 2018

We have stayed at this Rest Stop several times going both north and south.

California is having another terrible time with fires.

This is the 4:00 pm sun though the smoke from the LA fires. As the sun got lower it got redder.

Our original plan was for a long day’s drive (478) north to Corning, CA and then to Medford, OR. With the fire east of Chico burning the whole town of Paradise 7000 homes we will drive to Weed tomorrow 600 miles. The goal is to be on the road by 5:30 a.m.

Hesperia, CA – Wednesday February 14, 2018

This morning when I went out to check on our front end oil leak, it was back.  I called the people who did the brakes and they were not at all interested in our problem.   They did give me a name of shop in southern Cal.  This shop could not look at the coach for 4 weeks, however they gave me the name and number of a shop in Hesperia, Ca (right next to Victorville, Ca).  Range RV said he could at least look at the coach on Friday and there is a empty lot across the street from them where we could spend the night.  We headed out on the 47 miles to Hesperia, Ca and Range RV (I really really like my GPS).

When we got to Hesperia we pulled into the empty lot and I went across the street to see Brian at Range RV to let him know we were there and be in his shop in a matter of minutes.  I went back to the coach to unhook the pickup, I pickup’s transmission would not re-engage.  So we where off the Victorville Ford dealership.  Ford spent a lot of time trying to get a trouble code out of the transmission.  They finally got the transmission engaged however now the system is working so no trouble codes.  They would not take any payment for the time they had spent working on the truck.  I went through the steps to disengage the transmission, the light on the Neutral Tow switch blink as it did it’s test procedure, the transmission dis-engaged and then went out, it is supposed to stay on.  At this point the tech’s at the dealership hooked up another computer and got a test code for “Neutral Safety Switch” in the transmission.  Again they would not take any payment for the time they had spent.  Larry the service writing said at this point they could not look at the pickup until next week and any dealership I went to would change me for trouble shooting because they are not going to believe the last dealership.  It is really to bad that one dealership can not talk to another and believe each other.  Oh well, we can now tow the pickup to Goodyear and see about getting it fixed.

We drove back to Range RV, unhooked the pickup and settled in for a couple of days.