Here we are, on the road: We’re in Bakersfield, California

Dec. 1, 2013 Lorraine’s report

It's Sunday evening and it's time to write another blog. Yes, we traveled today; left Susy and Kaitlyn in Santa Clara. We left before 10 am and traveled on into Bakersfield, CA, the Orange Grove RV Park. And yes, the oranges are getting good and ripe. Chuck went and picked some and the tangerines were really good and juicy. The guy said they are just now ripening and to go ahead and get some.

And man oh man, were the roads really crowded with everyone and his uncle trying to get home from where ever they were, especially on this nice sunny afternoon. The road out of the bay area was packed, bumper to bumper. It took us over an hour or more to go 30 miles or so. Really, really, really full of California drivers!

We will travel again tomorrow, but this time on into Palm Springs, CA, Hey, Dorothy, I sure haven't had a chance to call, but I hope we can get together before we have to leave there and head back to Susy's for Christmas. I hope you are not too busy. I will call you though.

So these past 11 days absolutely flew by for me. I think I kept Kaitlyn for sleep over two times, I picked her up from school by 1:30 to 2 pm at least 6 times, where we played; Papa was drilling her on her multiplication tables every day and she also read from her book during that time. She is learning the multiplication tables, not very willingly, but she is doing better. And of course, her reading, she needs to keep up with the reading. She is in the 3rd grade, and they expect them to do lots.

So one day we had to go to get Chuck his prescriptions, meet his new doctor, and make appointments for other things. He is now taking his blood draw after eating, they want to insure his diabetes is not getting worse. Not sure, but will know more after his physical.

Then one day I had to go see my doctor and do all the same stuff. I wasn't quite as fortunate in getting some of my appointments; I have to go to Palm Springs for some of the needed tests. They are too many people in the bay area that need some of the same tests I need, sooo, it took me a bit to get some there in Palm Springs. Who knew?

We were out on the day after Thanksgiving to a mall, and my oh my, was the crowded, noisy people TOO much! After a short time, we were all happy to leave that packed area and head home. We had to drop Papa off so he could watch some more football.

Susy & I took Kaitlyn to see the movie, Frozen. What a fun movie for Kaitlyn. But we went to a small theater, and found out when Susy got the tickets, that there were only 28 tickets left for that showing. We managed to find good seats, but everyone once again thought it wouldn't be so full of people, and it was totally sold out. Oh well...

I need to let my son, Rick, know his package for Christmas is on it's way. It should be there to you by December 9th or so. Susy and I have been wrapping off and on during this time, as well as other things. Thank you Susy!! You know I hate to wrap Christmas packages! But I love to be with you! Thank you, honey for all you do for us....

Saturday, we went over and put up Susy's Christmas tree. She sure does a nice tree, with lots of Disney ornaments and such. As I said before, this week has just flown by and we still have more to do before Christmas.

I have to say to Breta, since we went on the road, we go out to dinner on Thanksgiving. Susy doesn't like/eat turkey. I have not cooked a turkey since we went on the road, so I do not get turkey sandwiches, which I really like, but oh well.

I guess that's it for me, hugs to all...

Lorraine

12/1/13 Chuck’s report

I sent out a note Sunday morning saying we didn’t write our blog this morning. So here it is after our travel day and we are working on our blog.

We are in Bakersfield on for an overnight stay, on our way to 1000 Trails at Palm Springs. Watching the weather forecast for the Bay area, it appears we are leaving at the right time, cold temperatures are coming. They are even talking freezing in some of the areas Tuesday – Saturday, whew, we don’t need that.

We wrote our blog on Monday last week. Since then, it’s been more of the same for a couple of days. We picked Katie up from school on Monday and Tuesday. Her school was closed for Thanksgiving on Wednesday thru the weekend. Katie really likes Nana to cook for here so we’ve had some very good home cooked meals for the past two weeks while we were there.

Monday we took a package full of Christmas gifts to mail to our son, Rich, who is in Alaska. Lorraine has found out over the years that we have to get packages mailed fairly early in order to get there without paying the overnight or other special prices. Too bad he couldn’t get down for Christmas this year.

Tuesday Lorraine had a doctor’s appointment at the foot doc who first worked on her ganglion cyst this spring, before she had it surgically removed in late June. She is still experiencing pain everyday and wanted the first doc to give his suggestion. He checked it out, said he wasn’t sure why she was still getting pain but gave her a prescription strength cream to rub on it three times a day. She noticed an improvement after the first application and we have hope this will be “the” cure, she’s fought it long enough. He also ordered X-rays and said if anything showed up, he would call her but we haven’t heard anything from him so maybe no news is good news.

After we picked up Katie from school, we headed to Fry’s electronic shop to check things out, didn’t find anything we had to have however. I did try to purchase a new computer but they wouldn’t sell it, appears it was on special for Black Friday and they had them all in back. I tried to get them to sell it to us at a “ we match any internet price” but they wouldn’t budge, I went to the area manager and even talked to the store manager, seems they would want to sell one for more money vs waiting to sell in on Friday for less. Doesn’t make too much sense to me. Afterwards, we went to Susy’s place where Lorraine and Susy wrapped some Christmas presents after dinner while Katie and I kept busy in the other room.

Wednesday we ran some errands (read that as shopping) then went to Wal-Mart where Lorraine made up some Christmas cards for a picture we had. I’m not into sending/receiving cards, be it for birthday, anniversary, Christmas or whenever but Lorraine still sends out a bunch.

After dinner we drove over to Costco to check out a couple of items and to see about getting Lorraine a smart phone, they had “Black Friday” prices on phones. We had been looking at phones and pretty well decided on which one to get her, Samsung Galaxy Note 3. We filled out all the paperwork and the salesman gave us a very good, high-level explanation of some of the features of the phone. The phone has a “simple” feature that “dumbs down” the smart phone. I told him it may be a smart phone but it was our first and we needed it simple. So we left the store with the simple feature activated until we had a chance to review some of the help features.

Why is it all of these days the operator’s manual only how to turn the machine on and the information is online somewhere. I am one of those who actually read the manuals and would rather have a paper version but those days appear to be gone.

Two days later, we turned off the “simple” feature and have been trying some of the more advanced features. Lorraine has it set up for email, facebook and internet and knows how to use either wi-fi or cell towers to operate it. She’s getting the basics down pretty well and is working on the more advanced features. I doubt we will ever be an expert on it but at least she is using a smart phone, something we’ve avoided so far.

Thursday we went over to Susy’s place. They had decided to continue with our new ‘tradition” of going to Black Angus for Thanksgiving dinner so they weren’t tied up in the kitchen all day. In fact, Lorraine and Susy decided to go to K-Mart before we left for dinner. After they got back, they informed us that they had been interviewed by one of the local TV stations and might be on the 5:00 news.

Of course, we were at the restaurant at 5 but Mark was able to get the TV news on his cell phone. But just as they got to the part about folks out shopping, he lost the signal so we didn’t see it. Mark was the only one who ordered turkey, Lorraine had lobster, shrimp and steak while Susy, Katie and I order steak. Susy and I ordered a two for one that came with a dessert, Katie wanted the fresh, hot chocolate chip cookie so that’s what we ordered. We had a good dinner and a great time.

Mark and Susy were both wanting to go out on Thanksgiving evening for some of the “Black Friday” sales so Katie came home to spend the night with us. Her and Lorraine had a good “sleepover”; they watched movies and such until past Katie’s normal bedtime. Sure glad we didn’t go out for late night shopping, I don’t do late anymore.

Friday Lorraine and Susy wanted to get their traditional Santa Claus picture with Katie. Of course the best place to find Santa was at a mall, on Black Friday none-the-less. I don’t know what came over me but I agreed to go with them. I dropped them off and spent most of the next 1/2 hour trying to find a parking spot. Finally I parked in a restricted area for bank customers then walked over to the mall. I was checking out a different smart phone for me and they called to see if I would carry some packages they had. So I met them at a store, picked up their bags and returned to the cell phone place where they met me soon after.

They were going to a movie but I decided I had enough of the crowds and elected to go back to our place and wait for them, after all, there were a couple of football games on. After they got back we had BBQ for dinner, another great day.

Saturday was set aside for Lorraine and Susy to put up her Christmas tree. Lorraine really misses decorating our house and tree so she really enjoys help Susy with hers. I did what I do best, stayed out of their way! I did help Katie with some of her homework, at least we reviewed some the multiplication tables she is learning.

Lorraine had brought over pork roast and fixings for dinner so they put that in the slow cooker where it simmered all day. Boy was everyone hungry by the time they were done with the tree and it was time to eat. Once again, a very good, home cooked meal. We said our byes and left with a promise we would be back in a couple of weeks, staying over for Christmas on our next trip.

This morning we got ready for travel, moved over to the dump station to empty our holding tanks. Mark and Katie came by to see us off, very nice to see them and Katie/Lorraine has more time together too. We then drove over the mountain and about 4 miles before we got to I-5 we got into stop and go traffic. This lasted all the way to I-5 and about three miles on the freeway before it opened up and we started moving at almost the speed limit. It took us about an hour to travel those 6 or 7 miles with all the traffic. We figured it must have been because of all the folks returning home after Thanksgiving.

Just after we got off the freeway and headed East towards 99, we saw the freeway traffic was once again stop and go, don’t know why but we got off just in time. At that time we were about 150 miles North of Los Angles, could have been folks heading there but whatever, it looked like it would take them some time. There were even portable signs along the road warning of heavy traffic and to expect delays. Sure glad we only had to deal with the one bad stretch, that was stressful enough for me.

The rest of our trip was pretty uneventful, we stopped for the night at Bakersfield Orange Grove RV park. This place used to be an orange grove, they [it in RV sites and left lots of orange trees too. The oranges are just now getting ripe so after we got set up, I picked some oranges. In fact, I found a grove of tangerines and picked some of them too, hope they don’t turn before we get back to Susy because Katie really likes them.

The weather has been pretty nice this past week, we had high 60s/low 70s during the day but we needed a jacket at night, not cold, just cool enough for a jacket. The forecast is for possible freezing temps in the Bay area this week, glad we don’t have to deal with that. I haven’t checked the forecast for Palm Springs but it probably won’t be as cold there, at least I hope not.

Our travel plans are to continue to Palm Springs tomorrow, stay there for two weeks then head back to the Bay area. We stay at the Elks Lodge in Santa Clara, they have 9 sites with power and water and a dump station available. The rules at this Elks lodge are folks can stay there for two weeks. It’s first come, first serve for sites meaning we can’t reserve a site. The camp host told me some of the folks who are there stay for two weeks, check out, drive around the block then check back in for another two weeks. I talked to two of them and found they lost their homes and except for their RV, they would be homeless. I feel sorry for them but sure hope we can get a site when we return, it’s sure handy for us.

We are still trying to decide where we will spend the winter. We are pretty sure we will go to Quartzsite for the annual RV week the third week of Jan. After that, we aren’t sure. Our friends in Yuma gave us an offer to stay at their lot in the Foothills if we want, we may take them up on that kind offer. We are thinking where ever we go, we will stay there until April when we head back to see Katie for her birthday. So we are looking at sitting for a couple of months, just need to nail down where. Lorraine says she is looking forward to sitting for awhile, we drove lots of miles and had lots of travel days over the summer/fall.

Now to add some pictures.

Palm trees the Elks Lodge need trimming, left is before, middle is starting, notice the falling branch on the right.