A wonderful Friday......

 7:33 am - Saturday - July 26th - LPG&RVR - 57° F, humidity 45%, wind 1 mph out of the southeast.....partially cloudy today with a forecast high of 82° F.  On this date in 2017 TLE and I were taking a hike on the 'Beaver Ponds Trail'.....

One of three beaver ponds on the 6.5 mile loop trail

....the trail begins and ends at the Mammoth Hot Springs General Store in Yellowstone NP.

We meant to go shopping Thursday, but somehow that never happened, so we really needed to go on Friday as the markets in Alturas are very crowded on the weekends.  Once I finished posting my latest missive we got dressed, and were in the VW by 9:30 am heading to Alturas. We weren't due for a big shopping, so we just stopped briefly at Dollar General to pick up a few things, then onto Holiday Market for the rest.  We were finished shopping just before 11 am, so decided to make a stop at 'Wild Mustard', a boutique coffee shop in Alturas, which we have NEVER visited in our four summers at LPG&RVR.  TLE had been talking it up for the last couple of days, so who am I to dash her dreams....lol!  Besides, I haven't had a Mocha Frappuccino in a while.

We had no idea how funky, and cool this place was, and were immediately wondering why on earth we had never stopped....

32 ounce Mocha Frappuccino!

.....I ordered their 32 ounce Mocha Frappuccino....I think that is the largest one I've ever ordered.  We hung out there drinking our iced beverages for about 30 minutes before heading for home.

Within 20 minutes of arriving home I was lounging on the 'lido deck' watching the 19th Stage of Le Tour, with a nice nap thrown in for good measure.....

......all afternoon clouds were moving into the Pitt River Valley, and a little after 4 pm it began to rain just as I was heating up the Sea-B-Que to grill three chicken breasts.  Along with the rain we got lightning and thunder....a lot of thunder.....

.....at times the rain was torrential, but I managed to stay mostly dry inside the dining canopy.  It took me about 30 minutes to bring the chicken breasts to a perfect 165° F.  TLE provided sides of broccolini, and cilantro lime rice.  I wish I had taken a picture!  The entire dinner was amazing.  I'm not married to a 'cook'....I'm married to a Chef!

It continued to rain on and off for a couple of hours after dinner, which was really needed.  It's been getting very dusty here, so the rain will tamp that down for a few days.  We never had to run the A/C Friday, and frankly, we didn't run it Thursday either.  The high temp was around 85° F, but by 4 pm, when it began to rain, it had dropped to 70° F.

Thanks for stopping by!

Worldwide outage....

 7:55 am - Friday - July 25th - LPG&RVR - 61° F, humidity 40%, wind 2 mph out of the north by northeast....mostly sunny today with a forecast high of 85° F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were touring Glacier National Park....

....this picture is of Wild Goose Island in Lake Mary.  The views were spectacular....

....we hiked the High Line Trail.

As is most often the case on day one of our four day weekend TLE and I slept in until almost 7:30 am.  There is something delicious about awakening at a time much later than 5:30 am, our usual workday awakening time.  Once we are out of bed we ever so slowly ease into our day.  Each of us always has a few things we want to accomplish, and Thursday was no exception for me.  There were three things I wanted to accomplish Thursday, not necessarily in this order: 1) fix the rear flat tire on my Haibike pedal assist mountain bike, 2) fix the oscillating  sprinkler so it would oscillate again, and 3) run our Predator 5000 dual fuel generator for 30 minutes.

I had to completely disassemble the sprinkler, to see what was wrong, but could not see anything wrong, so I lubed the oscillating mechanism, and put it back together.  Once hooked up to our hose again it worked as it should.  Sometimes just taking things apart, and reassembling them does the trick.....

....next up TLE helped me lift the very heavy Predator out of the trailer, and onto the ground where I then started it, and wiped away 3 months worth of dust off its exterior.  It started right up, and ran quietly, and smoothly for 30 minutes.

While the Predator was being exercised I pulled out my Park bike stand, which I have not used for a long, long time, and then clamped my mountain bike into place raising the rear wheel off the floor so I could remove it.  The last time I had a flat tire on the Haibike was back in 2022, our first summer here, and had a very difficult time detaching the tire from the rim.  The rim is set up for tubeless tires, but I've been using an innertube.  Nevertheless, because it is a tubeless rim it has a special lip on it that locks in the bead of the tire pretty tightly.  I had to buy a special tool three years ago just to detach the tire from the rim, but it's been three years since I used that tool, so it took me at least 30 minutes to figure out how it worked.  Once the light bulb clicked on in my brain I had the tire off in 30 seconds, and the tube repaired in five minutes.  Now I can ride my bike again.....

....it was only 11:30 am when I finished repairing the flat tire on my bike, and I had already accomplished everything on my to do list for the day.  Friday I'll run the generator again to heat it up before changing the oil.  It only takes one quart so that shouldn't take too long.  Amazingly. I have never had to add oil since we've owned it.

During the afternoon, while I was watching a YouTube video, Starlink had a worldwide outage that lasted a good two hours.....

.....the 2nd screenshot was taken just as the system was coming back online.  Within another 5 minutes service was restored.  That is the first outage we have experienced in the 3+ years we've had Starlink.  When Starlink first went down I tried rebooting the modem, then the dish, but determined it was not my equipment as everything was functioning as it should, it just could not connect to the internet.  I then went to the Starlink website on my cell phone, and found out it was a Starlink issue.

The rest of the day was spent watching Stage 18 of Le Tour in which Tadej Pogacar managed to add another 10, or 11 seconds to his already substantial lead, and now has a 4 minute and 25 second lead.  Of course, there were a few naps thrown in for good measure.  I didn't spend much time outside in the afternoon as the mosquitoes are really pesky right now.

Thanks for stopping by!

The nature of things.....

 7:07 am - Thursday - July 24th - LPG&RVR - 60° F, humidity 33%, wind 2 mph out of the north....partly cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 87° F.  On this date in 2017 TLE and I were relaxing in our RV site at Yellowstone National Park.....

.....the RV park at which we were staying was right on the Yellowstone River in Gardiner, MT.

We have a 'Nature Trail' here at LPG&RVR, and it is actually quite a nice trail which is hiked by many people every summer.  There are 9 'points of interest' along the trail, and every couple of years the number on posts at each of the sites must be refreshed.  I did it back in 2023, and it was time to do it again.  The trail is a little over a mile long, and has a number of places with benches where you can sit and enjoy nature....

One of the numerous ponds on the property.  This one is near the 12th hole

Jose's Point (#7) with a view of the 9th and 18th fairways

.....after staging 10 carts I drove over to the beginning of the 'Nature Trail', parked and began the 1+ mile loop hike to replace the numbers (9 in all).  I had forgotten how scenic the trail is, and really enjoyed spending the better part of an hour walking from one point of interest to the next.

Bob, our cart mechanic, has been working for the past three days to revive Club Car Villager #15, which has been in pieces for about a year.  It is a four seater that is normally used by workampers.  A little over a year ago the primary clutch failed, and Bob spent the rest of the summer trying to remove it as it was stuck fast to the drive shaft.  Whoever installed the original clutch did not employ 'anti-seize', which made its removal very challenging.  At any rate, Bob finally had to remove the engine from the cart to more easily access the clutch, and was finally able to remove the faulty clutch shortly after we left last October.  The new parts finally arrived a few weeks ago, so Bob was able to reassemble it.  When I returned from my 'Nature Trail' hike he had just put the wheels back on the cart to take a test drive.  The test drive was successful, and after 14 months it is now back in service....

......and with that repair there are only 2, or 3 golf carts left to get back into service.

After finishing the 'Nature Trail' work I hopped on the 2 bag Husqvarna and headed down to mow the very large grass area which surrounds the 'Night Office'.  I had done all the string trimming a few days ago in preparation for mowing it Wednesday.  From there I headed to the 10 back-in sites, which I had previously trimmed, to mow them, then over to the grass area next to the restrooms, and then finished off by mowing 5 pull through sites.  By the time I finished it was time for TLE's lunch break.

The afternoon went quickly, and soon it was 3:30 pm, and time to begin another 'four day weekend'.  I picked up TLE shortly after 5 pm, and another 8 day cycle was in the books.  Our next 8 day cycle will take us to August 4th.

Thanks for stopping by!

3 down, one to go....

 5:37 am - Wednesday - July 23rd - LPG&RVR - 49° F, humidity 35%, wind 1 mph out of the south by southeast....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 87° F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were overnighting in the parking lot of the Visitors Center.....

....parking lot at the St. Mary's entrance to Glacier National Park, which was another 'bucket list' place to visit.

We actually rented 12 golf carts Tuesday, most of them before lunch time.  It was, compared to 10 days ago, a coolish kind of day, and really a great day for golfing, but with the park about 50% occupied right now, that is about the best for which we could hope.  Once I had enough golf carts staged to handle the expected demand I began washing the three 5 gallon buckets of balls I had gleaned from the driving range Monday finishing that task within an hour.

As you recall I began string trimming around the back-in sites (11-20) Monday, so I headed back there to finish the final 6 sites, then up the hill to the residential area to trim around those sites before mowing them.  Once that was done I retrieved the 2 bag Husqvarna to mow them.  By the time I was done mowing it was time for TLE's lunch break.  Once she returns from lunch each day I have just 2.5 hours left in my work day, which always goes by quickly.

I haven't been out on the golf course since the last time I mowed around my tee boxes, and that was almost 8 days ago, so what better way to wind down the last 2.5 hours than spending 90 minutes doing just that.  As I was returning to the Clubhouse on the cart path from hole 18 I decided to mow site #20, which I had just trimmed hours earlier, then up the hill to mow the employee sites, and then for good measure I mowed around the large gazebo, which had just been vacated.  By the time I was back at the Clubhouse it was 3 pm, and I had 9 golf carts needing their daily spa treatment.  By the time I finished washing and stowing them it was 3:30 pm, and time to head for home with just one more day left in our four day  work cycle.

I spent the balance of the afternoon watching the end of Stage 16 of Le Tour, which I had begun watching that morning before heading to work.  Once again Tadej Pogacar staved off the multiple attempts by Jonas Vinegaard, and his cycling team (Jumbo Visma), to dispossess him of the yellow jersey, but in the end Tadej added two more seconds to his already substantial lead ending the Stage with a 4 minute 15 second overall lead.

Summer time is quickly slipping into the rearview mirror, and within a week we will be entering the month of August with just 60 days remaining before we head back south to Northern Arizona and 'The Wilson Wilderness'.

Thanks for stopping by!

Local weather 1, and weather guessers zero....

 5:35 am - Tuesday - July 22nd - LPG&RVR - 49° F, humidity 44%, wind 1 mph out of the south by southeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 82° F.  On this date in 2021 TLE and I were enjoying another Seal Rock, OR sunset....

.....all of these sunset pictures I have posted over the last few years were taken from our site at Seal Rocks RV Cove (10 miles south of Newport).  One of the most amazing 'IT FACTOR' places at which we have worked!

Monday was almost as unbusy as Sunday was, mostly because there was a forecast of rain for a few hours (56%) that morning.  I initially staged 5 Yamaha gassers, but by noon time when it became apparent it wasn't going to rain, we rented another 4, or 5.  Nevertheless, it was a slow day golf wise, but not work wise.  I spent a good portion of the morning using a Stihl string trimmer down at the 'Night Office', along the back-in site row (RV sites 11-20, and tent sites 1-3), around the restroom, around a few of the pull through sites 1-10, and around the small gazebo before hanging it up to begin clearing balls from the driving range.

There were more balls than I was expecting on the driving range, but not the most I have ever seen.  In all I collected 15 gallons of balls (3 five gallon buckets).  I was only able to clear the far side of the driving range (on the far side of the creek which divides it) before lunch, so I had to finish quickly after TLE's lunch break as Dewayne was ready to mow around 1:30 pm.  I finished just before 1:30 pm, and DeWayne followed shortly thereafter.

After lunch I did a lot mowing with the 2 bag Husqvarna which included the small gazebo, the parking lot grass, the grass area by site #30, the group fire pit grass, and numerous pull through sites before it was time to clean the first 5 Yamaha gassers we rented early in the morning.  The ones we rented after 12 pm did not return until after 5 pm.  I was off work by 3:30 pm.  

For the first time in a few weeks no air conditioning was necessary inside the Newell, and it looks as if Tuesday will be more of the same.  In fact, it will not get back into the 90's until Thursday, but it will drop back into the low 80's within a couple of days, so that is a nice development weatherwise.  TLE was home by 5:20 pm, and another LPG&RVR work day was in the books.

Thanks for stopping by!

Almost predictable.....

 5:37 am - Monday - July 21st - LPG&RVR - 57° F, humidity 44%, wind 3 mph out of the south by southeast......cloudy today with a chance of rain this morning, and a forecast high of 80° F....YAY for my team!  On this date in 2020 TLE and I were having lunch at Tamarack Brewing Company in Lakeside, MT.....

.....on the shores of Flathead Lake about half way between Kalispell and Poulson, MT.  Still, to this day, the best micro brewery in our almost 14 years of travels.....amazing brews, and food, and this was during the Wuhan Flu scare.

Sunday we were back at work, but it was also the 4th and final round of 'The Open', so I didn't stray too far from the Clubhouse TV during the morning.  Scottie Scheffler began the day with a four stroke lead, which he increased to 7 strokes at one point on the front 9.  By the 72nd hole he still had that original 4 stroke lead.  That's his fourth Major, and 20th win in the past three years.  Almost Tigeresque, no?  It's almost becoming predictable that if he is in contention, the winner, more often than not, will be Scottie Scheffler.

While Sunday seemed kind of slow, we actually rented 20 golf carts, and hosted over 50 golfers.  Most of the golfers were finished by 2:30 pm, and by 5 pm all the carts had been returned.  I'll have two carts to clean first thing Monday, so not too bad.

I spent the better part of the day setting and moving sprinklers at the Clubhouse between the deck and the putting green, the large grass area in the parking lot, and down at the 'Night Office'.  In between runs to the 'Night Office' I cleaned and stowed golf carts as they returned.  The temp only got to 88, or 89° F, to which I am now acclimated.  I really don't do too bad when it gets a little over 90, but I will never get used to those triple digit days....NEVER!

I was home by 3:30 pm, took a shower, then settled in to watch the 15th Stage of Le Tour. At the end of the day Tadej was still in first place by four minutes and 13 seconds, and still wears the yellow jersey, so nothing changed in that regard. What has changed is that including Stage 15, there are only 7 of the 21 Stages left in Le Tour this year, and by this coming Sunday it will in the history books, and we will be less than a week from August 1st.  Where has the summer gone?  

Thanks for stopping by!

Putt, putt....

 5:43 am - Sunday - July 20th - LPG&RVR - 55° F, humidity 32%, wind 1 mph out of the south by southeast....partially cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 89° F.  On this date in 2014 I was mountain biking at Mammoth Mountain in California....

.....with good friends from my workaday life.  Hadn't seen them for over two years.

Saturday we watched 'The Open' live as all the players we wished to watch were teeing off around the time we got up at 7 am.  Saturday is often called 'moving day' in the golf world, and that was what it was for Scottie Scheffler.  He moved from a one stroke lead at the end of the second round to a 4 stroke lead at the end of the 3rd round, and is now 14 under par.  I spent part of the morning on the 'lido deck' watching.....

....the 3rd round ended around 11:45 am so TLE ad I drove over to the Clubhouse to do a little putting in advance of the weekly putting contest at 4 pm.  We practiced for about 45 minutes before heading back to the cool confines of the Newell where I began to watch the 14th Stage of Le Tour.  By the time 4 pm rolled around the 14th Stage was only about 1/2 over so we paused it, and headed to the putting contest.

Saturday was one of those days when my putting was as good as it has been.  I actually made it 7 rounds, and was 2 rounds from being 'in the money'.  I made one mistake on the first hole of the 7th round, and lost to my opponent 1-0.  Overall, I made just two mistakes in 7 rounds and the last one cost me a chance to putt for first place.  I ended up in fourth place out of 21 putters.  I had three hole in ones, and just missed three others by inches, so I was really in the zone; oh well.

We watched the balance of the 14th Stage of Le Tour which was another mountain stage in the Pyrenees.  At the end of the day Tadej Pogacar finished second in Stage 14, but extended his lead over overall second place, Jonas Vinegaard, another 6 seconds for a total deficit of 4 minutes and 13 seconds now.

Thanks for stopping by!