Desert Hot Springs to Home, and the Summer

 At 8:30 AM on the 23rd we said goodbye to Peter and Celine and headed west on the I-10.  We set the GPS to take us to Santa Clarita, the first city on the I-5 north of Los Angeles. We thought it would direct us along the 210 but it sent us along the 60 for quite a distance. We skirted LA via Riverside, Ontario, Pomona, Pasadena, and Glendale to the I-5.

From there we just followed the I-5  north to the Santa Nella RV Park (off  I-5 near San Jose California) for the night, arriving there at 6:30 more than ready for a relaxing drink and a nice dinner which we enjoyed in the motorhome.


24 March      Not exactly at the crack of dawn, we left the RV Park and 10:15 and then almost immediately stopped for fuel, rolling again at 10:45.

When we reached I-580 we turned west towards San Francisco and followed the 580 through San Rafael where it essentially became the 101. Weather wasn't too bad though it was cool and cloudy there wasn't much in the way of rain. And not like last year, the dash heater kept working!

6:30 again we stopped for the night, at Riverwalk RV Park  in Fortuna CA, on the Redwood Highway.

25 March     We left at about 9:45 continuing on up the 101 through not particularly great weather--overcast and rainy periods. Getting us in the mood for home I guess. We took a short lunch stop at Port Orford Oregon  then on to Florence where we turned inlane to pick up the I-5 at Eugene.

By 6:40 we had arrived at McKay Truck in Albany where we had an appointment for vehicle service. This would take a couple of days at least as the battery trays we had ordered had not yet arrived. They were supposed to have been shipped three weeks ago but Kwikee (the maker) had decide not to ship that week. Apparently they only ship on Fridays!
 
For years we had planned on upgrading the house batteries to the true Deep Cycle 6 volt "golf cart" type of battery but weren't sure of they would fit. After a lot of searching on the internet and a lot of careful measuring Art decided that they would, just. The service manager at McKay had, in e-mails including photos, and the odd Skype call, assured us that given the dimensions he had to work with he could make it work one way or another.  So we told him to order the trays (the old ones were pretty much worn out anyway) which we charged to our credit card.


We also had a problem with the soft top on the Jeep; it was making a whistling wind noise where it met the windshield so we dropped in off at the local Jeep dealer. They changed the front seal and said all was now fine.

We still had lots of time to spare so we set off for the coast once again to Depot Bay to visit our friend Steve, who's wife was away for a while. We had a good visit, Trekker and Tia enjoyed Mo's (Chocolate Lab) company, but we missed Nancy. Look forward to seeing her on our way south perhaps, or at least in Mexico where we first met some years ago.

While returning to Albany we heard from our friends from Desert Hot Spring: They were on the I-5 already passed Eugene and reported that they had indeed run into snow on the way up. Glad we had taken the coast road.

By noon on the 29th the battery trays had not yet arrived. On checking with Kwikee, the parts manager discovered that they had only been shipped the previous Friday!!!!!  Even if they arrived tomorrow, they would not have time to do the installation before we had to leave for home, so at 12:20 we left for Knox Butte RV Park for the rest of the day and night, leaving for home in the morning.

9:00 AM on the 30th we were northbound once again. The last long run for this trip. We made one quick pit stop at a rest area at noon then at 1:20 stopped for lunch at our favourite cafe on the 101, The Tides Restaurant just north of Hoodsport, and just under 2 hours from Port Angeles.

On the road again (somebody should write a song!) at 2:10 we enjoyed a pleasant drive, the last leg to Port Angeles. We ducked into Safeway for fuel and by 4:30 we were parked on the street infront of the Tourist Office, waiting for the morning ferry.

The weather was quite reasonable, at least no rain. Early in the evening we checked out a restaurant bar by the tourist office and had a before dinner drink. The menu here looked tempting but we can never pass up  Bella Italia, our favourite PA restaurant. Excellent Italian food with a magic wine list, just two blocks away. Again we didn't regret the decision.

31 March

Up, walk and feed the dogs and ourselves, into the ferry terminal with lots of time to spare. The Coho left on time (8:20) and after an uneventful crossing we were home by noon.

Nice to be back. Wish someone would do something about the weather though!

15,764 kilometers since 16 Oct 2011






This summer on the Island we made 5 shorter trips in the rig attending 4 FMCA Vancouver Islander Chapter Rallies plus a visit up Island for a Family get together near Cassidy.

We also actually took a trip without either motorhome or dogs: 5 weeks in Europe; 4 days in Madrid, Spain, and a month in England with a side trip up to Scotland.

Before I actually got around to writing even this little bit,I made sure that the rig is basically ready to head south again in less than 4 weeks. Fuel, propane and fresh water tanks are full, black and gray waste tanks are empty and the house sitter has been confirmed.

20 March Ajo to Desert Hot Springs

20 March Ajo to Yuma and Desert Hot Springs. 

No rush setting off this morning; destination? Where ever we get to. Yuma? Desert Hot Springs? We have some FMCA Vancouver Islander Chapter friends who may be still in Yuma. If not we'll press on to Desert Hot Springs.

After breakfast and walking the dogs Art began to tidy up a little—make the bed, dishes etc, and getting ready to pullout while Gillian walked across the road to the grocery store. She soon returned struggling with a shopping cart on the gravel drive so Art fired up the rig and went to meet her near the entrance to the park.

 

By 10:00 AM (pretty good since we weren't in a rush!) we were rolling north on 85 again towards Gila Bend where we would turn west on I-8 for Yuma. The road climbed through a few hills but we made good time over all.

We needed an AT&T store in Yuma where we could buy a phone card to reactivate our US cell phone. We found the address somewhere and when we approached in Yuma we set off following the GPS directions.

Things started off well enough but soon we seemed to be driving through a residential area, turning left or right every other block. We finally came to a large stone wall built across the now dead end street! A resident told us that the road had been closed for ages—the wall had been there at least 15 years! Thanks Garmin!

So back to a familiar routine: Disconnect the jeep, turn the rig (not easy in this residential cul-de-sac but we have doen it in worse places. We made free use of someone's driveway and now facing the right way set off for the nearest Shopping Centre (sorry, Shopping Center in the US!) We managed to finally get the phone sorted out. Also on the urgent list was dog food as we had run out of Trekker's grain free food and had been mixing food for him using chicken, potato etc. Poor Trekker! Back to the kibble!

Needless to say by now it was now time for lunch. A nearby restaurant did fine. We had arrived in Yuma at 12:30 and three hours later were back on the road for Desert Hot Springs to spend a few days with yet more friends that we had first met in Zihuatanejo! Peter and Celine now winter here in the Sands RV Park and had arranged a space next to theirs.

Scenery along the way was different than we had encountered previously, particularly the spectacular sand dunes followed by dead straight flat roads.

We arrived at about 7:30 and were greeted by Peter. The site is beautiful with a nice golf course (too bad we don't golf) and spectacular mountain views.

Next day we were taken on a great tour of the area, the best being to San Jacinto State Park and San Bernadino National Forest, wonderful scenery, excellent lunch in the village of Idylwild, even to seeing snow on the ground--Tia was not impressed!

Here, after a few days of watching weather reports for the various routes home we finally decided to take the coast route home to avoid the forecasts of snow and ice on every other route! Once more it seemed that we would be cruising Los Angeles freeways in the motorhome.  Having done that last year we were much more confident this time round.