Here we are, on the road: We’re in Santa Clara, CA

November 23, 2011 Lorraine’s report

I’m having too much fun being a grandma to write right now, maybe next week.

Thanks Lorraine

10/23/11 Chuck’s report

We are here in California close by where our daughter, grand daughter and son-in-law live. We have found an Elks lodge in the area that has a small RV park where we can stay. We only have 30 amp electric power and water with a sewer dump available but it works for us because it’s close to where they live.

We spend Sunday thru Wednesday at Laughlin with Joe and Alice, going to the casinos, eating at buffets and just chilling out. On Tuesday we drove about 30 miles to the town of Oatman. This used to be a big mining town, now it’s just a small tourist trap type place with it’s biggest draw the “wild” burros that roam the town. Years ago the burros were used in the mines but when the mines were played out, the people moved on but left the burros. Over the years, they have increased in numbers and now come to town every day because the tourist feed them.

The burros are wild only in the sense no one owns them, they are pretty tame as they roam the streets, looking for food handouts from the tourist. The males are rounded up and sold as pets once they are at least a year old because they can be too rough on the tourist. Most of the shops sell bags of carrots and these burros know who has something for them and they really crowd around them.

There is also a shoot out with 4 or 5 cowboys twice a day. Afterwards they pass the hat for donations to the Shiner’s Hospital, a very good cause. It’s pretty hooky but fun none the less. And of course, there are those shops with Tee shirts and stuff. Lorraine was able to find a couple of things she wanted.

There is a free slot tournament every weekday at one of the casinos this month. We tried our luck but didn’t even make the cut off at 6000 points until later on Wednesday. Joe was able to finally break the 6000 point barrier with 6200 but Lorraine got 7412, both winners for sure we hoped. We had to return after the tournament was over to check their standings, sometime after 7pm. We stopped by and found neither one were in the money, Lorraine missed being in 6th place by less than 200 points, close but no winners this time either. Oh well, at least it was free except for the money we lost of the real slots. You don’t think that’s why they have these tournaments in the first place, do you??

Thursday we left Laughlin and headed West. We had a great drive, almost perfect weather, sunny and not too hot. We stopped for the night at Bakersfield Orange Grove RV park, our usual stop when we make this drive. The trees were pretty loaded with oranges but of course they are still very green this time of the year. The oranges ripen in December and folks can pick then when they stay here, we have gotten some good oranges in past years.

Friday we got here to Santa Clara, got checked in and set up in time to head to Kaitlyn’s school to pick her up. She was really excited to see Nana but I think Nana was even more excited to see her. They played games, colored and just had fun the rest of the afternoon. Susy came by after work and they all continued playing together, a good time was had by all, I think.

Kaitlyn spent the night with us, sleeping in our bed between us. She sure squirms around when she sleeps, she kept Lorraine from getting a good night’s sleep, from the squirming, kicking and snuggling.

Next morning Susy came by and we headed off to Kaitlyn’s dance class in Sunnyvale. She has taken Ballet lessons and now is taking Hip Hop dance lessons. Our son in law joined us while we were waiting and we made our plans for the rest of the afternoon. Susy had bought tickets for the Stanford football game later in the afternoon so we knew we would all meet up there. Mark and Kaitlyn took off to eat and go to the game early, they have a place for kids to play with bouncy houses and such.

Susy, Lorraine and I had to come back to our place to walk the dogs, eat a sandwich and get some snacks and water for the game. We took off for the game, lots of traffic but Susy knew where she was going and wasn’t affected too bad. We were surprised when she got a phone call, it was from Mark and he happened to be right behind us in the traffic, they hadn’t gone to the park as early as planned after all.

We got parked and walked over to the stadium to find a place to sit. Our tickets were general admission, allowing us to sit in any seats in three given areas, we chose the area under the overhang so we would have more shade while the sun was still out. I can’t say it was a good game as Stanford won in a blowout, I think the final score was 65 to 21, Stanford had more rushing yard than the Huskies had in total yards. Stanford is still undefeated this season, they haven’t even been behind at any time in their 7 games so far. Guess they really were the better team! But the Huskies still have a chance to have a good enough record this season to make it to a bowl game again this year, here’s hoping for that anyway.

Kaitlyn spent the night at our place again last night, this time I think she was pretty tired and she wasn’t as squirmy and we all slept better. Kaitlyn and I spent some time this morning doing some projects then she and Lorraine have been playing, watching kids shows on TV and such. I think the plan is to meet with Susy for brunch later then shopping for the gals and more football for me.

The weather in Laughlin was really nice, upper 90s in the afternoon, upper 60s at night with plenty of sunshine. The forecast for this area is for upper 70s for a couple of days then cooling off to lower 70s for the rest of the week, pretty nice for us. I often say we are chasing the 70s, both in lifestyle and temperature.

Our plans are to stay here until after Halloween then head down to Santa Barbara for two weeks. There is some thing happening that might change our plans but more on that if/when it happens.

Now to add some pictures, get this posted and get on with our day.

On the road to Oatman.