The RV Adventures Henry Jones Jr.

The Redwoods National and State Parks

Today was a great day, we said as we made our way back to the motor home after stopping for pie at the Palm Café in Orick.  Homemade pies made by Mrs. Martha Peal, owner of the Palm Motel & Café on the Redwood Highway.  We started our day at the Palm Café, each with a Redwood Country breakfast of biscuits and gravy, eggs over easy, golden hash browns and a slab of ham for me and some bacon for Lou.  Coffee was good, too.  Best home cooked breakfast that rated right up with the breakfast we had enjoyed at the OK Café in Tombstone, Arizona some six years ago or so.  We noticed the pies and inquired about them.  Soon as we found out they were hand made by Martha, we promised we’d stop by on our way back.

Our first stop was at the Redwood information center in Hiouchi, just east of Crescent City on Highway 199.  I had planned our scenic drive route the night before and I wanted to make sure the roads were still open and if there were any “must see” stops along the way.  Good thing, too, because we found out about the Stout Grove on the scenic Howland Hill road. that meanders through the Jedediah Smith Redwoods state park.  It was the perfect highlight of our tour.  The drive through these giants was magnificent and the 0.5 loop trail through the Stout Grove was unlike any other redwood grove we had ever visited.  This was called a first growth forest, one that is still growing and the trees are gigantic!  The understory is mainly sword-ferns and some other brush and is kept neat and clean by the regular flooding of the nearby Klamath River.  The rangers at the Jedediah state park visitors center, located in the campground across from the Redwood information center mentioned a bridge on the river that connects the Stout grove with the campground and the beautiful views from the bridge.  They weren’t kidding.  By the time we got there, one of the rangers, Patricia, was already on the bridge and gave us another tip of some otters that were seen up the nearby creek.  So we diverge further from our original trail and wander up the rocky shore of this creek.  I at least have my hiking boots on.  Lou on the other hand is wearing his usual sandals.   I have no problem crossing a downed log across the rushing water of the creek.  Lou avoids a near miss as his sandal loses traction, shredding the side of the log, but regains his balance to make it across safely.  All for not.  No otters could be seen and we didn’t feel like going any further.  We still had to backtrack to the main river and back up to the Stout Grove loop trail. 

Howland Hill road continues through more pristine redwood forest and at times narrows and winds between the trunks of massive coast redwoods.  What a delight!  The sunshine streamed down through the canopy to highlight the forest floor and ravines where more giants shot up to the sky.  Soon this impressive display gives way to an ordinary conifer forest as the road leaves the Jedediah redwoods and we make our way back to Highway 101, just south of Crescent City.  Back along the coast, the fog kept the temperatures about 10 degrees lower and made stopping at any of the vista points or scenic overlooks rather pointless.  Continuing our return south on 101, we again drive through the Del Norte Redwoods state park.  Back in the town of Klamath we notice many RV parks on both sides of the highway, the ones overlooking the Klamath River seemed nice with tremendous views, especially the Golden Bear and Klamath River RV parks.  The stay in Trinidad was obviously too far from all the redwood parks.  Klamath would have  been a better locale to start off from.

Our last leg of our scenic drive tour went through the Prairie Creek Redwoods state park along Newman B. Drury Parkway.  This is a well-paved two lane road that traverses the heart of another strand of gigantic redwoods and we travel south to the visitors center for yet more souvenirs and information.  We find where the best places to see the Roosevelt Elk, second in size after the Moose.  We had seen a “bagged” elk with an 8-point rack in the back of a pick-up back in Trinidad this morning and took a quick picture of it while it was parked across from the gas station we were at.  Beautiful animals!  Living is better, or course, but the day was getting late and the drive out to the coast through open meadowland to Fern Valley, another loop trail, was to be saved until tomorrow. 

Continuing on toward Orick, we notice cars stopped at the side of the highway and people taking pictures of a bull elk in the front yard of someone’s house.  Not wanting to trespass, we stay by the road and take our pictures as the elk lays down to rest under a tree, then scratches his backside ever so delicately with his massive rack.  How cool!  Further down the road, same thing. People on the side of the road, only this time it’s a herd of about 25 does, fawns and youths.  One young buck already has a 5-point rack.  Seems kind of small to be his harem.  They’re browsing on a gravel bar on the Redwood Creek just on the northern outskirts of the town of Orick.  They’re sighting just made our day and we celebrate in town with a piece of pie and milk at the Palm Café.  It may be dinner time, but life is uncertain, so we have a dessert first.

21 miles more to the south and we’re back in Trinidad at our motor home to find more RVs have arrived.  We did notice more RVs on the road today than we have on any other day since we started this latest adventure a week ago.  This coastal area must be very popular with us “trailerites”.  Our neighbors in the Itasca Sun Cruiser left on Sunday and we got new neighbors this evening.  Emerald Forest has excellent cable and we’ve been able to catch up with the SF 49ers and Giants and we settled in for the night with another Giants game and some beef stroganoff courtesy of the Helping Hand.

The Humboldt Redwoods & The Lost Coast

We said goodbye to Bodega Bay and continued northward on Highway 1 to Jenner then on River Road, Route 116, to Santa Rosa to catch the 101.  I had planned on going back to Route 12 through Sebastopol to 101, but before I had time to think about it, Lou had the RV pointed to go left instead of right, so I said, “sure why not?”  The drive was easier than I thought it would be, River Road, along the Russian River was very wide with a wide shoulder for the most part and not winding at all.  The apprehension of driving across San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge, through two narrow tunnels on each side, was a distant memory and I was relaxed, trusting in Lou’s driving and handling of the rig.  Piece of cake.  Really!  He hasn’t hit nothing…..so far!

The drive north on Highway 101, the Redwood Highway, was equally relaxing, it being four wide lanes most of the way, except when you get to the small town of Arnold the “highway” narrows to two lanes after crossing a narrow steel-gauge trestle bridge.  After doing a few slalom runs past some roadside redwood trees, which had obviously sustained being sideswiped by big rigs some time ago, the highway becomes wider and comfortable all the way to the small town of Myers Flat, population 200.

This one horse town doesn’t even have a stop sign on the main road which is called The Avenue of the Giants.  The Avenue of the Giants is a 31 mile stretch of the former highway 101 and meanders along the south fork of the Eel River, crisscrossing the newer highway from Garberville to Pepperwood.  It also runs along the eastern edge of the Humboldt Redwoods state park and is studded with giant coast redwood trees.  We had the sunroof open so we, well, I, could look up at the trees as Lou was drive the car during one of our expeditions.

The Giant Redwoods Campground & RV Park is right on the Eel River with the redwood forested hills of the state park in the background.  The park itself is OK.  Gravel road and pads with full hook-ups.  Every type of camper comes here including a couple from Germany who were on a year hiatus and biking (bicycling) their way around the world.  They were on their way to San Francisco (220 miles away), then to Australia to bicycle there, then to South America.  I’d like to say it sounds fun, but I won’t.  It does sound hard.

Thursday morning we opted for breakfast at the Avenue Café in another small town of Miranda.  Eggs and chorizo for me and an omelet for Lou and we were ready for another adventure.  We inquired about the Dyerville Loop road I kept seeing signs for and were told that it was just another drive through more forest containing smaller trees.  Basically nothing to write home about, which is kind of what I doing right here.  But the storefront owner says the drive out to the coast to Shelter Cove and back is scenic.  So armed with only a tourist map we drive south to Redway to top up the gas tank in the Saturn (bright chili pepper red thing, you can’t miss us) and get a map of the Lost Coast as it is known.  The 24 mile drive is OK, but just as you crest the mountains you see the Pacific Ocean framed by the V-shaped, heavily forested canyons of the King Range.  Gorgeous!  We make our way all the way to the end of the road right on the coast to the edge of a bluff overlooking the ocean and where the Cape Mendecino lighthouse has been refurbished and relocated to.  Nice old three story lighthouse with a red dome top over multiple panes of windows surrounding the top floor.  A pathway leads down to the ocean and a picnic bench offers a quite respite for retirees and for some rather large gulls sitting patiently at the table along with elderly women reading her book.  Interesting, I think to myself.

Shelter Cove is yet another small town right on the coast, which appeared to be on the verge of a housing boom until the bottom dropped out.  Now, some would-be vacation homes remain only partially finished.  The local market and campground appear run down, the large plywood humpback whale on the side of the building is falling apart.  Their RV parking spaces do have full hook-ups, but the steep and narrow drive make these available only to the smallest of RVs.  The smell of the marine air is intense, the sea beckons and my heart is moved by the lull of the ocean waves.  That was a first for me, this subtle beckoning.  I finally understood what it was about the sea that has hypnotized many a mariner.  I wanted to stay longer, but there was nothing else to do in town, nothing else to see.

A kiosk by the old lighthouse shows a map for the King range conservation area, one of the first BLM conservations areas ever established.  Just outside of town, the Kings Peak Road traverses the length of the King Range, northward, and catches the Mattole road which goes back to Highway 101 to form a loop back to the campground.  We had found our scenic loop tour for the day which even included an unexpected 40 mile narrow and winding dirt road drive down through, and out of, a couple of heavily mixed-forest canyons, through these coast mountains.  Kings Peak, at roughly 4000 ft. is the highest point along the contiguous US coast, another bit of local trivia to make you go, “wow!”

By the time we reached the small town of Honeydew, we were ready to go back to the motor home but we still had the narrow state park road ahead of us before we got to the highway.  Actually the drive through this section of Humboldt Redwoods is very scenic and included the Tall Trees Grove and the Bull Creek Flat Grove all part of the Rockefeller Forest.  We’d have to come back tomorrow as we were tired, parched and a bit peckish.

Back at the motor home, I fixed us some snacks of cheese & crackers and some dried sliced salami and slices of a large pear we purchased at the local market.  It was grown over in Pepperwood, we were told, and the store was out of them a couple of days later.  Sweetest pear I ever had.  It complemented the other snacks perfectly.  We kick back in our lawn chairs, reading and watching the afternoon go by.  Big leaf maples and tall white alders bristle in the breeze.  Raucous Stellar jays are defending their territories.  A couple of quails run past us and dive into the underbrush.  They are quick!  Three large, round guineafowl also make their way past our camp.  There is no shortage of birds around here!

For dinner Lou barbecued some pork shoulder strips smothered in hickory BBQ sauce and I made some mac’n’cheese with bits of broccoli mixed in.  We had had a couple of rib-eyes the previous day with some instant mashed taters and sautéed peppers and onions.  Yeah, we eat well, vacation or not, the RV after all is just an extension of our home.

Friday, our last day at Humboldt Redwoods, we drive back to the Tall Trees and Bull Creek groves to view some of the largest of the redwood trees and stroll the Rockefeller loop trail through old-growth forest.  Naturally felled trees have become a valuable resource to renew the forest, their massiveness is just mind boggling.  One final stop at the visitors center to watch the in house movie about the local flood of ’64 when many of the bridges in the area were wiped out, and to purchase those last minute souvenirs.  On the way back to Myers Flat along the Avenue of the Giants, we stop at the drive-through tree.  For 2 buck a piece, we got to drive through a narrow tunnel through the stump of an old tree just to say you’ve done it.  The private park also has a couple of hollowed out tree stump houses with pitched shingle roofs and small doors and windows, perfect of taking pictures with the little ones, in our case, bears.  The gift shop offers souvenirs made of redwood and other gifts.  For the bears, I couldn’t resist the small faux coon-skin caps, splurging for the last five, one for each bear.  If anything, I felt like contributing to this local attraction which helps to support the community.  Many of these small towns are seeing the effect of the downturn in the economy, many storefronts were empty where cafés, restaurants, and gas stations once flourished.

Back in the car, we notice the temperature has climbed to the 90’s.  It’s been nice these last few days, today would be the start of heat wave.  By the time we get to the motor home, the temp has climbed to 102 degrees.  Yikes!  Kick on the AC ‘cause we’re spending the afternoon indoors today.  We watch the Coast Redwoods DVD I bought back at the Humboldt state park visitors center and peruse the news on the internet.  Tonight we dine on spaghetti and meatballs, sautéed veggies, including some eggplant and squash I grew myself in pots filled with compost back in San Francisco!  I clipped them off the plants just as we were about to get underway.

Tomorrow we depart to continue our exploration of the Pacific Coast Redwoods further north to the Prairie Creek Redwoods and Redwoods National Park.  We’ll be staying at the Emerald Forest RV Park in Trinidad, 70 miles from Myers Flat.

The Sonoma Coast – Point Reyes to Jenner

This morning started out with Lou’s famous Hotdog Chilaquiles, a breakfast that has been fine-tuned over the years and is one of my favorites as in I don’t have to cook!  While cleaning up and having another cup of coffee, we heard a helicopter fly overhead, only we didn’t get the Doppler effect that we were expecting.  Instead we heard it slow down as it landed in a field adjacent to the RV park!  It was a Sonoma county sheriff’s helicopter.  After the blades stopped rotating, three sheriff’s deputies in green flight suits marched out toward the entrance of the park!  Seems they land quite often to get a cup of coffee at a nearby coffee shop.  It’s 10:00 am, it’s break time, much to the delight of all of us here at the park.  A very exciting few minutes.  On the way out of the park we wave a friendly hello to the flight crew.  Gotta love and respect those in the service of the public.

Our first full day of vacation we spent touring the Sonoma Coast.  First south on Highway 1, through the small town of Tomales and further along the narrow length of Tomales Bay.  Several oyster farms dot the bay shore with a few restaurants offering seafood as well as fresh oysters served in a variety of ways, barbequed oysters seemed to be a popular dish among the many tourists this beautiful Labor Day.

We drove as far as the town of Olema at the entrance of the Point Reyes National Seashore.  Drove by the Olema RV park to scope it our for a future trip to the area.  Nice meadow-like grassy open area with trees, which is a step above  Bodega Bay’s dirt/gravel pads with patches of dead grass and a tree in between the sites.  That is just a cursory comparison as I don’t know what else they have as far as amenities.  We stopped at the Pt. Reyes visitors center to purchase a few souvenirs and to take a quick look through the exhibits.  We’ve visited on a previous occasion so we didn’t take long this time around.  There is much to see and do at Pt. Reyes, but today was just for touring. 

On the way back to Bodega Bay, we stopped at Tony’s Seafood Restaurant which featured barbequed oysters.  Not being oyster fans, we opted for a light lunch with a bowl of clam chowder and some sourdough bread and butter.  The view out the many windows was spectacular being right on the waters edge of the bay with the forested hills of the Pt. Reyes peninsula in the background.  Several small boats were anchored in the  bay, rocking with the waves and light breeze.  Such natural beauty belies the famous fault beneath these waters.  The San Andreas fault runs along the length of Tomales Bay then straight through Bodega Bay, through the Bodega Headlands and out again to the Pacific Ocean. 

Back on the Highway 1, northbound, we exit in Bodega Bay at Eastshore Road and drive to the length of the Bodega Headlands, the small spout-like peninsula that juts out from the mainland.  Actually the headlands are not geologically part of the mainland as it is on the eastern edge of the Pacific plate, while the town side of Bodega Bay in on the North American plate.  You can really see the striations in the land as you drive south on Highway 1 from the town of Jenner, which was our next stop as we continued north.

Jenner sits right on the Russian river estuary where it flows out into the Pacific.  The scenery along this part of the Sonoma coast is spectacular with scattered rock formations jutting out of the sky blue water with white foam surrounding each rock as the waves crashed around them.  We stopped at the Sonoma Coast Beaches State Park visitors center to find that it was closed.  Still, a small boardwalk behind the visitors center overlooks the estuary and has a couple informational panels.  The day couldn’t have been more perfect for touring the coast.  We continually kept an eye on the road with thought of driving the motorhome along this stretch of Highway 1.  The answer was, definitely, yes.  The drive from Jenner to Olema can be done quite easily even in a larger rig.

Back at the motorhome, it’s almost 6 pm and we get ready to make dinner and settle in for the rest of the night.  Tomorrow we leave Bodega Bay and journey further north on Highway 101 to Myers Flat near the Humboldt Redwoods State Park.

The Mother lode is a term associated with the mining of gold and silver, and refers to a principal vein or zone of veins of gold or silver ore. In the United States, Mother Lode is most famously the name given to the long alignment of hard rock gold deposits stretching northwest to southeast in the Sierra Nevada of California. The California Mother Lode is a zone from one to four miles wide and 120 miles long, which stretches from Georgetown in El Dorado County on the north, through Amador, Calaveras, and Tuolumne counties, south to Mormon Bar in Mariposa County.

Well that’s certainly true.  There is still gold to be found around here, but the cost to extract it, we are told, doesn’t make it a worthwhile venture.  So today we set out to explore our immediate area, Gold Hill and the Coloma Valley, where it all started.

Our first stop is to the American River Conservancy’s Nature Center at the old Kane House across from the Coloma Resort on Main Street, also known as Route 49.  Actually our first stop was at the Coloma Café at the corner of Mt. Murphy Road and Main, right next to the replica of Sutter’s mill.  We stopped for a couple of Icee’s, which we had been hankerin’ for since we arrived.  The woman at the Icee stand wouldn’t let me tell her how to assemble my mixed slushy.  She’s used to taking orders from all the children that visit and makes them as she sees fit to save time.  She mentioned that this particular Icee vendor has the highest amount of sales in all of northern California!  It’s a single machine with four flavors.  I guess when you have a steady stream of tired kids, you’re going to be making a mint!

So, we stop at the Nature Center to see their exhibits and to inquire about a local BLM trail that I had read about but didn’t see the trailhead entrance on our way to Auburn the other day.  She described the general area and the stone entrance and the sign which was set inside the gate and not readily visible from the street.  It’s an informative center with nicely painted murals on the walls and furnishings and a small book and gift store.  They even had some stuffed wildlife on display including a Puma (mountain lion), a Bobcat (linx), an owl and other birds and mammals.  They also had a live rosy boa, a California tiger salamander and a California king snake on display.

Our next stop was the Gold Hill Olive Oil Company.  There is also and Gold Hill Vineyard but we didn’t stop as wine tasting wasn’t something we do often.  We do use a lot of olive oil, though, so it only seems natural to visit a local olive orchard.  The store is set up for tasting and we found one of their blends exceptional.  We purchased some for ourselves and an extra as a possible gift. 

Well so far our day is going rather quickly and we drive back toward route 49 on Lotus Road and make a left at Route 49 toward the town of Cool and start to look for the stone entrance leading to the David Moore Nature Area parking area.  There is no leaflet or posted information about the trail.  You’re pretty much on your own and on this day, we were the only ones on the one mile loop trail.  The trail is easy and the riparian habitat has some spectacular scenery.  It took us about 40 minutes to hike the trail, taking many digital photos to the point where we ran out of battery power.  Still, I think I captured the essence of our hike, the end of which left us ready for a cold drink.  Back in the parking area we suddenly hear a loud crack and deep thud coming from the direction we had initially hiked through.  What was that?  Maybe a bear or maybe just a large tree limb falling.  There was no way to know but it had our imaginations running rampant!

Our search for a cool elixir led us up Coloma canyon on Marshall Road to the gold rush town of Growlersville, now known as Georgetown.  I like Growlersville better and hope someday the name changes back.  By the time we make the nine mile trek deeper into the hills, we were also looking for that perfect snack that would tide us over until dinner.  There wasn’t much to choose from but did find Starvin’ Dog Pizza which appeared to be more bar than pizza.  We bellied up to the bar and ordered a personal size pizza to share, a coke and a beer which was just what we were looking for.  The pizza was very good and they didn’t skimp on the toppings.  The owner, who was tending bar, mentioned how slow it’s been, probably due to high gas prices.  Still, he was hoping summer vacation would bring in tourists who would be more willing then to bite the bullet and take their vacation regardless of gas prices.

On our way back to the resort, we took a shortcut on Mt. Murphy Road which ends right at the Coloma resort, the road narrows then the asphalt gives way to gravel and dirt as we wind up the side of Mt. Murphy (according to a crude map I had).  We couldn’t let a vacation go by without some off road driving and this one allowed us to see the south fork of the American river and surrounding area from above.  Albeit short, the drive was adventurous as we didn’t know the condition of the road ahead or if it actually connected with the section in town.  The map didn’t show it connected because of some printed names on the map, I just assumed it did.  Slowly but surely we finally made our way back to the resort entrance.  The school children were all gone and, now, the weekend, more RVs are finding their way to the resort.  With each one, we hope no one is assigned to  park to our right, which would completely block our view.  Not that it matters much now.  We have had a glorious week here in California’s gold country and will definitely return.

Bonanza (bə-năn'zə) definition:  n. 1. A rich mine, vein, or pocket of ore.  2.  A source of great wealth or prosperity.

The next day we day started off with a stack of hot pancakes, buttered and full of syrup, eggs over easy and crispy bacon.  This is the day that a hoard of school children would be shipped in and camp overnight.  They started to arrive early this morning, attending one of the classrooms scattered throughout the resort and the Discovery Park.  The plan was to make ourselves scarce and visit the Placerville area. 

Our first stop, after coffee at Starbucks (there are four in town, so it must be true that they’re on every corner) was the Gold Bug Mine Park.  The children were here, too, on a guided tour through the short mine.  We opted for the self-guided audio tour.  With hardhats and recording devices in place we started out at the mine shaft and followed the numbered stops and listened to the recordings that went along with each stop.  This type of mine was a load mine, where a visible vein of quartz was mined from a tunnel called a drift that followed the vein.  These underground excavations were called stopes.  Branches of a vein were also mined as much as possible, sometimes straight up into the slate rock that formed the hill.  An air shaft mined to the top of the hill provided much needed fresh air.  Further into the mine, small rail cars were used to load up bits of ore (quartz & gold) and pushed to the entrance to the Stamp Mill.  When a vein of ore ran out, miners would then start a tunnel sideways in hopes of finding another vein.

Gold Bug Mine Park also has a stamp machine on display.  These are large metal weights attached to long vertical metal poles which were driven by a belt, are raised and allowed to fall, piston style, on the chunks of ore to crush it and extract the gold. They had a smaller working replica and the docent turned it on for us to demonstrate how it worked.  What was immediately apparent was the tremendous noise this little model made.  The big one must have been deafening and heard for miles, and, we were told, usually ran all day and all night!  The crushed ore was then brushed with mercury which attracted bits of gold like a magnet to form an amalgam.  Also on display was a retort, used to extract the gold from the amalgam.  Basically a still, the amalgam would be boiled and the mercury vapor would rise and allowed to condense in a downward tube and recovered in a pot for reuse.  The leftover gold would have holes throughout it and was called sponge gold.  The gold was further purified and formed into bouillon and transported by Wells Fargo to the US Mint.  A graph in the Stamp Mill showed that the volume of gold mined in this gold rush bonanza, peaked in 1853 and quickly fell to a low level, only four years after the gold rush began.  There is also a trail around the park where an old silver mine was located and remnants can be viewed.

Enough of the mining stuff, the next stop was Boa Vista Orchard in the Apple Hill area just to the north of Placerville.  This area is just beautiful with vineyards and orchards blanketing the hills and the mixed conifer covered  mountains in the background.  This area must be bustling during the harvest season, but many of the businesses weren’t yet open to the public.  Fortunately, Boa Vista Orchard was open and offered pies and other baked goods, produce, nuts, fruit syrups and preserves, pickled veggies, wine and wine tasting, a veritable bonanza!  A great place to get some goodies for yourself and to give as gifts.  We purchased some Apple wines, preserved spicy olives with names like, “Blister Maker,” “Crying Tongue” and “Burning Butt.”  We also got a jar of pickled spicy Brussels sprouts called, “Frog Balls.”  Their baked pie selection was a bit ragged, so we stopped by The Argonaut again for the last two slices of strawberry-rhubarb pie, least until they bake another one. We noticed a lot more children being moved from place to place in small manageable batches, including one that marched past the pie store and were pining for some ice cream.  One of the adults in the passing line turns to us and says something like, “we’ve been hiking for seven hours, nah, we don’t need any ice cream.”

Back at the motorhome, we decide on hamburgers, potato salad and some “Frog Balls,” which were rather good if you like Brussels sprouts and vinegar.  This adventure in the California Gold Country has been a recreational as well as educational bonanza, rich in history and steeped in fun!

Panning for gold is not as exiting as it sounds. It’s a lot of work hunched over in the sun with your feet in the cold river water. A prospector may spend days, weeks and months looking for that elusive nugget of gold, only to find barely enough gold dust to pay the most meager of appropriations. Similarly, a tourist can spend a lot of time planning a vacation and driving around from destination to destination, looking for that nugget of interest or fun that shapes the overall vacation experience. Once such nugget can be found at the Placer County Courthouse along the Historic Route 49 that runs through old town Auburn. The second oldest functioning courthouse in California also houses a wonderful little museum that takes you back in time to the pioneering days during the gold rush to the mid-twentieth century.

The docent at the front desk there was a wealth of information and very nice. At the small Pleistocene display at the front, she told us about Hawver Cave near Auburn in a canyon below a granite quarry. It was discovered by a local dentist, J.C. Hawver who found some Pleistocene era bones of Saber cats, mastodons, bison, dire wolves, giant sloths, and even 10,000 year old human bones. There is also a room with spectacular cave formations. A relatively new gate keeps out potential vandals. We also visited the old Sheriff’s office and the women’s jail under the front steps going up to the courthouse.

A little further down the road, Old Town Auburn looks pretty much like Old Town anywhere in the Sierra Foothills. Quaint store fronts that resemble the towns of the old west seen in the movies, only these contain antique stores, galleries, restaurants, breweries and other specialty boutiques. Food would be the only reason we would spend any time in Old Town, maybe a souvenir or two, but today like yesterday in Old Town Folsom, we really didn’t have a reason to stop.

The drive to Auburn was gorgeous. The oak studded hills along with pines, redbuds, various kinds of brush and rivers made for some spectacular scenery. The drive included the Auburn State Recreation Area, a granite quarry, still in production, and a town by the obvious name of Cool which, when splashed alongside the name of a business, makes this town, and this area, a cool place to visit.

The temperatures have finally come down from the eighties to a more manageable sixty-something and breezy. With the flip of a switch, we went from air conditioner to furnace in a matter of hours. This section of the resort near the front gate has emptied out and we were the only ones in this block of seven full hook-up spots. The resort is also a discovery school and kids have been bussed in from the surrounding area and trooped through the sites at Marshall Gold Discovery Park as well as some outdoor lectures and learning activities. Thursday will see hundreds of these little ones camped overnight in the tent cabins alongside the American River along with some parents and teachers. It will be a good day to be gone, and so, plan on visiting the Gold Hill Vineyard and Gold Hill Olive Oil companies as well as touring Placerville.

Today was our turn to tour the Marshall Gold Discovery Park’s museum and sites whilst the kiddies were at lunch. We learned more about the pioneers and ‘49ers and the gold rush town of Coloma were it all began at Sutter’s Mill, which was run my James Marshall and whose statue was erected in 1890 a short distance from the visitors center. A life-size replica of the timber mill is also on display alongside the river, where water was channeled through the wheel and where gold was discovered in the mill’s tail race. We learned that there are two types of gold. Placer gold is found in alluvial sediment which has been eroded from it’s original deposits; and, as a lode where it is found in veins of other minerals such as quartz.

The park also offers a working blacksmith, a mercantile and other buildings with people in period dress. One business, The Argonaut Refreshment Saloon, offers sandwiches and locally made pies. We stopped into this original gold rush building, built by a guy named Schulze for his daughter Daisy, and each had a slice of some strawberry-rhubarb pie and coffee while sitting in on the front porch watching what little traffic there was on Route 49. The pie was as delectable as the scenery and went along with our mood, a lazy afternoon with little to do. We went back to the motorhome and I started reading “Gold Rush” by Bret Harte, a collection of short stories which were a smash with his east coast literary audience. Barely able to resist a nap, I closed my eyes to the sound of the San Francisco giants ballgame on the radio. Ah, this is the life! I haven’t had time to read or nap in years, another precious nugget in life’s journey.

It’s late in the afternoon and we’re getting ready to make dinner. We had rib-eye steaks last night and tonight we will be grilling some pork chops. I guess carrying around the heavy Coleman Roadtrip Grill has been worth it. It grills meat up good. Along with the pork chops, cornbread stuffing and a medley of sautéed vegetables. Tonight’s entertainment is the movie, In The Name of the King. Never heard of it. Something about a medieval siege. At least it’s not another slasher/zombie movie. I took all of those the last time!

Finally our first trip of the year. We hadn’t been anywhere since the day after Christmas when we spent the remainder of the week in the Santa Cruz mountains at Smithwoods RV park. I started to write about that adventure a couple of times but never got around to completing it. It’s been such a cold Winter, cold even through the beginning of Spring. The motorhome has been in the shop the entire time, waiting for this tool or that tool or to settle a warranty issue with this manufacturer or that one. Our motorhome was finally fixed with the replacement of the hydraulic pump but then had to wait for the girl who does the warranty paperwork to return from her maternity leave. It’s a small shop but they are a listed Gulf Stream service center and they did a fine job with the repair and the hydraulic system works like it’s supposed to!

We went to pick up Jr. a week before we were to leave. We got a storage spot for it in South San Francisco at the Treasure Island Mobile Home and RV park, only 7 miles from home, so it was now easier to prepare for future trips. One of Louis’ coworkers lives in a mobile home at Treasure Island as does one of our neighbors’ sister. We also just found out that our next door neighbor, here at the RV resort, lives in SF and rents a spot at Treasure Island. Talk about a small world! The neighbors to the left of us were also from SF. We came to get away from the city and a little of the city followed us here. So where are we? We are at the Coloma Resort in the Gold Country foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains between Auburn and Placerville.

There’s a lot of ‘49er and pioneer history in this area. Across the river and route 49 is the Marshall Gold Discovery State Historic Park the site of Sutter’s Mill where gold was first discovered and started the gold rush back in 1849. You can thank my California public school education for that tidbit of information. People can still pan for gold in the river and shops rent equipment to do so along with the whitewater essentials. It’s beautiful country up here, still green from the Spring rains. We’ve also arrived during a bit of a heat spell.

We got here on Sunday evening, thinking it would only take 3 hours or so to travel 145 miles, we didn’t leave until 2:40 pm and there was bumper to bumper traffic on I-80 up through Richmond. I also didn’t do all of my navigating homework and had us going the wrong way that would have taken us through twisty mountain roads east of Auburn. We had to back track south to route 50 then north to the town of Lotus at route 49. From there it was a cinch to get to Coloma Resort. It’s a good thing I called the resort before we got too far past Sacramento otherwise it would have made for an interesting adventure to say the least.

We were disappointed that the “resort” didn’t have cable and we forgot to bring DVDs. The antennae reception was lousy. I’m still hearing about how we can’t watch the ballgame, how we don’t have anything to watch. Boo hoo! We also don’t have cell phone signal which is rather important given that Louis’ dad has been in and out of the hospital and rehab for the past four months. He also needs to keep in touch with his work. So the first order of business this Monday morning is to find buy a cheap phone with a Verizon card which has service in this area. We also had to stop by an auto parts store to get some screw attachment thingies for the mud flap for the Saturn which, for some reason, had almost come off! My guess was the horrible road conditions on I-80 which rival those of I-5. Tax dollars at work….go figure.

We had breakfast at Mel’s Diner in old town Placerville, or Hang town as it is known locally and stumbled upon an auto parts store while driving around, scoping it out for a more in depth return trip on Thursday. Why Thursday? I’ll get to that later. We decided to drive out to Folsom, to the historic Sutter street. Being Monday, the Folsom Museum was closed as were many of the shops and few people were strolling about. Lots of nice shops but nothing we cared about. Snook’s Chocolate Factory was about the only place of interest to us, but didn’t bother. We decided to go onto our next destination, the Folsom Prison Museum at Folsom Prison!

We found our way from Sutter street to Folsom Prison road, just a mile or two away and made our way to the visitor’s parking lot. It’s the same parking lot used by visitors to the actual prison. Prison! As we were driving around getting lost through the employees parking area, it hit me more ominously that we were at a correctional institution. Real prison employees dressed in prison guard green jumpsuits. We actually had to ask one where the museum was and he pointed to an old two-story building just past the checkpoint at the gate. We also had to walk past the Visitors Processing building in the parking area. We were just going to the museum, what was up with this visitors processing and the checkpoint, and, where were the signs for the museum?

Big rigs were waiting to get in and were being inspected before being allowed in. I was having second thoughts but then noticed a couple other tourists in shorts coming out of the museum. We moseyed past visitors processing and the checkpoint looking as innocent as possible and that when we see the huge arched stone entrance and walls and towers of the prison just a short distance down the road, and we’re in their front yard. Oh well, time for a picture! I got my picture took with the prison in the background but Lou didn’t want his picture taken for anything. I guess once you have a mug shot taken you get a little camera shy around a prison. Heh, heh.

The museum itself is pretty small but has a lot of memorabilia as well as an 8 minute video of the history and life in prison. Judging by the hairstyles, this video was made around the time Charlie’s Angels was on TV, when inmates were allowed to box each other and produced crafts for sale, both of which aren’t allowed any more. There’s also a replica of a small cell with Sam the prisoner, a dummy that explains life in prison in the 1800’s. It sounds like that same guy that made all those movies we were forced to see in public school. They also sold souvenirs and are really pushing Johnny Cash memorabilia as their most famous prisoner. Twice. I purchased a few items and was short of cash. They don’t take credit and we were all out of cash. The guy who was behind the counter was a character himself and kept saying, “You sure you don’t have a dollar? Maybe you can rob a bank.” Uh, no thanks, maybe I’ll go without the magnet this time. I’m keeping my nose clean for, like, ever! All things considered, it was an informative and fun visit.

After stopping at a Radio Shack to pick up a near disposable phone and Verizon card, we made our way back to the south of Folsom by route 50 to the Costco to pick up some DVDs for our nightly entertainment. After some dinner, first up tonight, Cloverfield! My only comment before the movie…..”Is the door locked?”

Monday, November 26

This morning finds us using all kinds of water.  After conserving our usage for four days, our waste tanks were full up, code red you might say.  After emptying the waste tanks, we wanted to fill them up again so we could do a secondary flush of the systems.  Made two 12 cup pots of coffee, but barely had time to finish the first when I made my first call to the dealership service center in Livermore to remind them that we’d be dropping off the motor home today.  Needless to say they would only be able to look at it that day as they would be closing down for three weeks in December and weren’t taking any new appointments until the middle of February!  Fish Paste!   They did suggest that we could take it to another Gulf Stream service center.  So I called CoachNet again to get the number and address of a listing in the Bay Area.  Anaheim, San Bernardino and San Diego were their first choices.  Um, anything in northern California?  Gleason RV Service was the only Gulf Stream service in northern California.  Well that’s inconvenient for people in the north, but for us, we could easily alter our travel route to go right through Salinas.  It was only 216 miles from Edison so we took Route 46 to Paso Robles and north on Highway 101

Of course we took the Lerdo Highway exit to get gas and a rig full of flies, only to  find that there is no northbound onramp to continue on Route 99.  Barnacles!  Well that’s inconvenient.  Now we had to drive west to Shafter then north to Wasco to catch the west 46.  We had been using Route 58 through Bakersfield for years but the Lerdo Highway and the Famoso Highway, Route 46, we found out, were void of businesses and malls so that you could really make good time getting to the I-5.  We passed a lot of motor homes on these roads, seems like we just learned what they already knew.  Past the interstate we continued en route to Paso Robles.  We stopped by a Jack-n the Box for a quick lunch.  I have to say those sirloin burgers were one of the best fast food burgers I’ve every had and I’ve had plenty so I’m not talking out of my Angus.

Once at the 1746 foot summit in the northern Temblor Range the road into the upper Salinas Valley in San Luis Obispo country was a mere 6% decline and a straight shot down into the valley.  The terrain of the coast range and the upper Salinas valley was beautiful. We hadn’t driven this way in a long time so it was all very new to us.  From Paso Robles the distance to Salinas was only 95 miles.  We’d be there by 3:30 PM and I was right!  I had done a few Google map searches and found the route to the service center and hand drawn a map on the back of a shopping bag from the Death Valley visitors center.  There would be no getting lost today!  I even had the exit number, only to find that they didn’t put the exit numbers on these signs in Salinas.  No biggie we found the right exit and made our way to East Market Street.  Found Griffith Street and made the left turn but then, what’s the name of the street on the right?  I don’t see a sign that says Commission St.  No name, yet again, so we go forward and we’ve made the wrong decision.  You’d think there would be a law that every street should be identified at every intersection, but that would just make too much sense.  Fortunately the map I drew earlier has a couple of side streets just in case we needed to go around the block somewhere.  Good thing, too, and to not break the tradition, we drive right by the entrance to the Gleason RV service center.  There’s room on the side of the road to pull over and I can walk to the entrance to get the paperwork started.

I tell them what we’ve been experiencing with the hydraulics and the control panel and the ammonia smell coming from the refrigerator.  We also decide to get an oil change and a 6000 mile service.  We’re pretty much already packed our clothes and stuff and quickly transfer our belongings to the Saturn which has been unhitched and ready to be packed for the 105 mile trip back to San Francisco.  Salinas was a perfect location to drop off Junior.  We won’t be needing the motor home until the weekend before Christmas, then we only have to go a few miles to Aromas where my brother and his wife live. 

This trip was another successful and safe one.  Lessons were learned and filed away for future reference.  I got to drive a little, I got really good at calling service people and making arrangements, and I became an expert fly swatter, if I do say so myself.  It’s all in the wrist.  BAM!  Another one bites the dust.

Sunday, November 25

…on a Sunday after a holiday is never an easy feat and today would prove to be one of the worst on record. Even worse than the time we spent three hours on the I-15 between Jean and Baker in sweltering heat. At least then the traffic after Barstow was moving. But it was not to be this day. Being November, the temperature was not an issue and we did have our own bathroom and refrigerator with us and we could stand and stretch our legs if needed..

Just after Baker the flow of traffic was crawling, enough so that I could take over the wheel while Lou went to use the facilities. It would be my first time driving with the car in tow. Not bad at all considering we were only going about 10 miles per hour. You could see people pulling over to the shoulder next to a dense thicket of shrubbery and make a mad dash to the back side of the thicket, then they’d run back to their car as if it were a game to see if they could regain their previous position in traffic. Just then we started going faster and I was soon driving at 55 miles per hour! I was starting to get a little nervous as by now I’m on my third Carpenters song, “I’m on top of the world lookin’ down on creation…” before we slowed down again and we’re able to switch positions. Whew! That wasn’t so bad feeling rather proud of myself. Baby steps. Someday, I might actually be driving whole legs of our trips! Someday, but not today.

Got a call from the RV park we were headed for to confirm my reservation inquiry from the night before. We would probably arrive late this afternoon, maybe even early evening if this traffic ever improves. Off in the distance to the left you can see a road which parallels the interstate and cars are moving at a pretty good clip. We had used that side road many years ago before the motorhome, but now we weren’t so sure. Finally at Yermo we had had enough and exited off the interstate and took this small two-lane road, called Yermo Road. then got back on the interstate at the Calico Road onramp. There’s the Barstow/Calico KOA we stayed at last March on our way back home. Being 4:00 PM it would have been a good place to stop again, but now we had reservations just on the other side of Tehachapi, so onward we go.

Fed up with the traffic jam, we decide to take the old Route 58 following the foothills on the eastern side of Barstow to the new Route 58, bypassing the I-15 interchange further west. It was now dark as we made our way. Signage was good and there were no other cars on this road until we got to a fork in the road that had no signage! What is it with these towns? Why can’t they give proper direction? Pretty soon were going down 1^st street through a narrow steel girder trestle-like bridge that dumped us onto Main Street. Being dark, we have lost all sense of direction, both of us snapping at each other for contributing to our situation. We finally pull into a truck stop and ask for directions. It gives us time to bring in the galley slide once again as it keeps vibrating our at the bottom so that we can put our fingers behind it.

Back on track we’re heading west on Route 58 when traffic once again is jammed up, which is new to us on this stretch of road. I pull out a portable hand-held CB radio to see if the truckers have any insight as to what’s going on. All I can say is what a bunch of potty mouths! They could make a sailor blush. It looks like the lone traffic light at the interchange with Route 395, that and the merging lanes were the problem on this busy night. Oh, it was night time and we still had 130 miles to drive to our destination. At a complete standstill, Lou quickly put the gear in park and went to the bathroom. Only then did the semi in front of us started to inch forward. I got into the seat and started to move the motorhome so we wouldn’t get too far behind and earn the wrath of the trucker behind us. By then Lou is back and we’re moving, waiting for the next stop to switch places. That stop never came. I was behind the wheel going 55 MPH and did I mention it was dark? The road was curving left and right and the oncoming traffic lights was making it difficult to see. I was in the first stages of panic, palms sweating as I tried to keep it between the lines without falling too far behind.

I am reluctant to write about what happened next. Let’s just say that by the time we reached the interchange with Route 14, I wasn’t driving anymore, and probably never will again. End of story. We weren’t in any real danger but the possibilities, the what ifs, the stupidity. I think I aged a year or two that night. Sanguine, the much dreaded trip through the Tehachapi Mountains at night now seemed like a pleasure cruise. You would not hear a peep coming out of me tonight. No complaining about driving too fast or of veering over the drunk bumps. I was never more appreciative of Lou’s driving to all of our previous destinations and of future road trips. Lou handles the rig like a pro and never even flinches at the dark winding roadway going 65 MPH through the mountain pass. I would have been going 25 MPH and white-knuckling it all the way.

At 9:15 PM we are pulling into the Orange Grove RV Park in Edison, just off the Route 58. Of course, we first whiz right by it only to have to make a U-turn and cone back. Seems to be our modus operandi when looking for some obscure entrance to a hidden RV park. Of course it would help if when I say to slow down we actually do just that. You didn’t think I grow a heart and never complain again did you? I did manage not to make it a big deal. I am grateful we are finally here safe and sane. An envelope with my name on it is scotch-taped to the dry erase board next to the closed office door. Our assigned space is just over to the left, down Orchard Lane then right to 163 Sunkist Lane. If we had made it up to Navel Avenue, then we would have gone too far.

Orange Trees line the rows between spaces, go figure. It’s actually a very nice place and the dirt pad we were on was very level. We put down our jacks and were level in less than 5 minutes, record time. We plugged into the very modern hook-ups and heated up some of last night’s BBQ and had some leftover potato salad. We were surprised at the poor quality of the cable’s signal. There were all these channels and they were all fuzzy. It wasn’t until morning did we realized that the antennae attenuator switch was still on. Only after switching it off did we get crystal clear reception. Oops! FYI, don’t leave the attenuator switch on. I didn’t even we had one.

It’s 11:30 PM and I’m still watching this Fearful Planet series with this segment on the Sahara desert.  Really informative show, but it was time for bed.  We had to get an early start as we were to drop off Junior back at the dealership tomorrow.  After nine hours on the road, sleep was never so good.