On the road again!

Woo hoo! We are back on the road. We left Graeagle Thursday morning to return to Sparks, NV to pick up Suni and head up to Mt Shasta. We haven't had internet since the last time I blogged and our cell phone service was very spotty. After a three day battle with the insurance company over the definition of "awning" we finally were able to get all of the repairs completed. Thanks again to Tom at A1 RV repair our latest man angel; we couldn't have done it without him. It is great to be home!

We had several adventures during our stay in Graeagle I am not sure where to start...

We took Sedona and Tahoe on what was supposed to be an 18 mile "easy, flat" mountain bike route around Lake Davis. We followed the directions as best we could and after two and half hours of tuscany style up-hills we ended up literally in the middle of nowhere in a valley with no cell service without a lake to be seen. We were so lost Peg tried to call the National Forest Service to find out where the hell we were and how to get home.  I was starting to wonder what would happen to the animals when we didn't return.  We finally decided to turn around and climb out of the canyon the way we came in. After another hour and half we reached a road. Peg flagged down a truck to be sure we were on the road that would get us back to the truck which he confirmed was about four miles up-hill! He was kind enough to give us a cold bottle of water - a life saver.

A couple of days later after recovering from the never-ending bike ride we took one of the most memorable hikes. It was gorgeous! Climbed up to a ridge overlooking the enter Plumas National Forest, through beautiful pine trees with foot-long pine cones, along a creek up to a lake. Again it was supposed to be a 2 mile hike that we managed to turn into a four hour 6 mile hike which felt like it was up-hill both ways! When we reached the trailhead and it was not the one where we had parked the truck - Peg was beside herself! "We did it again! How do we manage to follow a map so closely and still end up in the wrong place!" I finally found the connecting trail that would take us back to the correct trailhead, but I almost lost Peg in the process.

Bear Lakes Loop - Big Bear Lake - Hard to capture the true beauty.

Eureka Mine Millhouse

Hwy 89 through Plumas National Forest

When we reached Sparks, Tom had to do some finagling with the insurance company since the check had not arrived as promised,, but we were able to get on the road.  We had planned to drive to Mt Shasta, but Tom informed us it was a 10 hour drive and it was already 1 pm!  Aaaaahhh.  We decided just to head that way and see how far we could get.  We got stopped at the California border and we had to be "inspected".  The inspector asked us to open up Suni and went through our fridge to see if we had any pecans, sweet potatoes, citrus, or "diet" broccoli (which he thought was very funny).  It turned out to be a great stop because in the process of being questioned he told us that Shasta was only 196 miles away.  Yeah we can make it!  And make it we did.  What a beautiful mountain, can't wait to see what adventures it holds for us.

Love to all.... please email when you can, we love to hear from everyone.

Missing the internet!

Since I have been without decent internet for a while, I thought I would post a few of the pictures I have been taking.  Just a small sampling...

Beautiful Aunt Carol at the family BBQ

Rummy & Beth Ann in Sausalito!

Lake Tahoe

 

Our camp-site in Lake Tahoe - note Victor on the table.

Graeagle Wonderland

Suni is safely at the RV repair shop getting a new roof and two new slide-out topper assemblies.  Tom Kidd at A1 RV repair is awesome and taking great care of us.  Graeagle (prounced Gray Eagle) is named after an Indian Chief and is the cutest little town I have ever seen.  There is one market called the Graeagle Grocery that was established in 1918 and looks like it!  They have very fresh produce and meat, but a very small selection.  We had to go in today because it is chicken day to get a whole chicken to roast.  And we had to be there between 12 and 1 because everyone knows about chicken delivery day and they sell out fast!

We are really enjoying our little cabin that backs up to a forest and creek.  Really private and Calcite is having the time of her life.  We are having the time of our life, taking long hot showers without regard to water usage; washing dishes like there is no tomorrow, doing laundry and watching tv past 10 pm!!  Woo hoo.  I don't think I mentioned that our first night in Lake Tahoe we were sitting inside finishing up a movie at 10:05 pm after our harrowing experience getting settled and the park host came to our door saying "Ladies, it is after 10 pm quiet time" so we had to run outside and turn off the generator which of course turns off the tv etc.  Every night after that we would say.... 10 minutes until "Ladies".  Oh the freedoms of a cabin!  We have really learned to appreciate full hook ups.

Today we took our first true Mountain Bike ride right off the back of our cabin.  Sedona and Tahoe (our new bike names - mine is Sedona since she is a red mountain bike and Peg's is Tahoe because it is grey and the rocks, and squirrels in Tahoe are grey) were great and we had a lot of fun.  Right now we are relaxing on our screened in porch listening to the squirrels and birds and watching the wild-life all around us. 

Zoe update!  She is finally eating again.  Thank you God.  I have to hand feed her special food meant for dogs that aren't eating (think ensure for dogs), but she has eaten at least two meals two days in a row.  She even went for a pretty long walk in the woods this morning.  She is still pretty weak and incredibly thin, but we have high hopes.

We will be here until Monday if all goes well with the repairs.

The Adventure Continues

We have had some beautiful days here in Lake Tahoe.  We went on two great hikes and finally used our new mountain bikes!  This area is filled with great bike trails everywhere.  We rode from Suni out to the Truckee river and followed the river for about 4 miles.  It was fabulous.  Of course Peg could have rode forever and was the happiest I have seen her.  Our new bikes were great. We are going to go on a true Mountain Bike trail today.  That should be interesting!

Our fresh water tank was registering empty and we didn't want to have to drive Suni over to the dump station again, through the horrific turns and trees so Peg asked the property manager of the cottages next to us if we could buy some water from her.  How could she say no?  We connected our 75 feet of hoses to her hose and were successfully able to fill our tank.  These are the times when I love - "crazy gets shit done".

The insurance adjuster finally came yesterday to assess the damage from the "tree incident" and of course it is way worse than expected.  Two slide-out cover awnings have to be replaced and the entire roof covering has to be replaced to the tune of $12,000 - thank God for insurance.  He is very concerned that if we wait to do the repairs water will seep in under the roof and into the walls so we are going to have it repaired in Reno next week.  We had hopes that we could stay in the RV while it was being repaired, but no such luck.  We found a cabin to rent for a week in a place called Graeagle. It is about an hour outside of Reno and will take all of the buttholes.  We have extended our stay here in Tahoe City until Monday when we will take Suni into the shop and check into our cabin.

We have definitely come to the conclusion that this nomad lifestyle isn't as easy as we thought it was going to be.  We are in beautiful places and enjoying each other as always, but boy every day brings a new adventure and challenge!

Our little Zoe is still very under the weather.  Her fever has come down some, but she is not reacting to the antibiotics as well as we had hoped.  Her blood work wasn't good and we fear she will never be completely back to her old self.  We have been able to get her outside a few times a day where she perks up for a few minutes, but that is about it.  As all of you know, it is very difficult to watch a beloved butthole slip away.  We still hope for the best.

We miss and love you all.

Lake Tahoe

We are really enjoying our time here in Lake Tahoe.  We drove the 77 mile loop around the lake and it is so beautiful.  The water is crystal clear and the same shade of blue as the Adriatic Sea on the Dalmation coast of Croatia.  The temperature has been in the 80's during the day, cooling at night.  We are completely sefl-contained here and have been successfully using our generator.  We have already used one propane tank and were able to get it filled yesterday without incident woo hoo!  We keep getting surprised by the loud thud the pine cones make when they fall on the roof of Suni, but it has been really fun watching all of the squirrels collecting them for winter.  The sugar pine cones are bigger than the squirrels!  Peg is in the kitchen whipping up chicken parm for tonight's dinner - sorry Karen. :)

We did take Zoe to a vet in Truckee yesterday.  She has a fever so he put her on two different antibiotics so hopefully she will be back to her old self soon.  We hope to take a couple of small hikes today, but I don't think she will be up to it.  I have taken a few pictures, but I still cannot get them to upload. There is a cute one of Victor (our road runner) enjoying his time in the Sugar Pines.

Love to all.

Beware of Tall Trees

It seems that our new life is just one learning experience after another!  We had what we thought was a successful visit to Manteca RV and Trailer to get some needed repair work done on Suni.  We said good-bye to our family in beautiful Discovery Bay, CA and headed north to Lake Tahoe.  We had decided on the William Kent state campground on the North Shore and it is beautiful.  We pulled in with our monster rig to find that the roads through the campground are 8 ft wide lined by tall pine trees and big rocks.  While making the first turn I was carefully watching the wheels on Suni to be sure she was going to clear the tree, not realizing that she was leaning and her top was hitting the tree!  Ahhhhh.  I was able to maneuver back and around, but not before the damage was done.  The drive around to our campsite way in the back of the campground was harrowing and when we reached it we both agreed quickly that there was not enough room to back Suni into it.  So we made our way back to the front through several turns where I literally had to drive over boulders.  Have we said enough how much we love our truck!  We were both practically in tears by the time we made it back to the front.  The ladies there were very supportive and drove us in a golf cart to a couple of other sites that are closer to the front.  We found an open site that was an easy back in and managed to get set up to asses the damage.  Well it wasn't good.  Two of the slide-outs wouldn't open due to awning damage.  I was able to go on the roof and fix one of them, but the other was toast.  We called a mobile repair guy who came to our rescue at 6:30 on a Saturday night and he removed the damaged awning so we can now open all of the slide-outs.  He also noticed that we damaged the side of the rubber roof, so he repaired that as well.  A very expensive learning lesson.  Peg and I are now even!

On another note... our little Zoe isn't doing so well.  As some of you know, she has been suffering from seizures for about four months and has been taking medication to control them.  She has recently lost her appetite and her breathing is very labored.  We are hoping she is just having a bad few days, but if you could add our little girl to your prayer list we would really appreciate it.

I am still having trouble uploading pictures, I think it might be the internet speed.  But I was able to get these two.  I will try again later.  Love to all.

Bev and Jay at Sausalito Festival

 

Us at Sausalito in a pink tent

 

 

We have to be smarter than this

These are the famous words from my Uncle Rick when he came to our rescue to jump start our generator because we left the lights on and killed our battery.  We didn't know that the battery couldn't handle anything, not even lights for a short period of time.  Well this quote has been more true than we would like to admit.  We have had a beautiful few days here in Discovery Bay, CA visiting April's Aunt Carol and Almost Uncle Bobby.  They have an RV pad inside their back gate which we backed Suni into.  Quite an amazing job by April, because she barely fits (Suni, not April).  This is just a parking spot with no electricity which is how we learned our battery is a woos!

Once the battery died, we couldn't start the generator and we have also discovered a glitch with our propane.  The refrigerator turned off and we had to move all of our food to a cooler.  Thank goodness we found all of this out, before we were "self-contained" in Yosemite which we have now cancelled due to a Huntavirus outbreak we were completely unaware of.  Our new best friend Bev Dalton (Cherie's sister-in-law) who works for the Good Sam Club called us off.  She has been an amazing resource for all of our camping needs.

Our dear friend Cherie and her daughter Beth Ann met us here in Discovery Bay to attend the Sausalito Art and Wine festival with us!  We had a beautiful day, traveling to and thru San Francisco and to the festival.  Bev and her husband Jay also met us there!  Great art and music.  Tons of fun!  I think Beth Ann was a little embarrased by the Zumba performance on BART, but she was a trooper and I don't know how we got around before her and her navigation app.  She is a walking GPS and fabulous trip organizer.

Aunt Carol threw us a family BBQ on Monday and it was great to see everyone.  It had been a really long time; we are all a little older and slower, but there are a bunch of new babies running around to keep us smiling.  So many generations!  Jenny is a beautiful mom of the cutest little boys and cousin Kim is the livliest grandma I've ever seen.  And I can't say enough about Ashly's daughter Ryann's cheeks. Auntie Carol was a great synchronized swimming student... too bad there are no pictures of that :).  The only thing that would have made the day a little better was a little more of Aunt Georgie's potato salad!

We spent today looking for a RV Service Center that we can take Suni to and hopefully get our first little glitches worked out.... I can't believe I have to take her there and then bring her back here - hopefully my backing up skills were not beginner's luck.

I will post some pics tomorrow!
XO