Saving the oldest for last.....

 8:00 am - Monday - October 17th - Fontana, CA - 59° F, 77% humidity, wind 1 mph out of the south....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 83° F, which we will not see as we roll our wheels in about an hour.  On this date in 2015 my daughter Kate married Nick....hard to believe it has been 7 years already......↴

Sunday was to be our last day at the Elks Lodge in Fontana, and we had just one child left to visit.....our oldest son Chris, who just turned 50 six weeks ago.....just writing that gives me pause.  How is it I have a 50 year old son?  I remember my 50th birthday, and it wasn't that long ago, but only if you count 23 years as not being long ago....lol.  He, and his wife Rochelle have been married over 21 years now, and have two children.....Cynthia, and Christopher.  We set a time with Chris of 2 pm on Sunday to arrive at their home in Rancho Cucamonga, CA for a BBQ.

We didn't deploy much stuff for our 4 day stay, so there was not much to do Sunday morning except for me to finish a couple of projects, whilst TLE did another load of laundry in the Splendide, which is working splendidly again, by the way.  To finish the two projects I headed to the local Home Depot, which is just a long block away from the Elks Lodge.....how handy, right?  I needed a couple of air compressor quick connects, and two new water filters for our two stage city water filter we've been using for a couple of years now.  I found everything I needed quickly and was back home within 20 minutes.  To visit the local hardware store when we are in Likely is a 40 minute round trip, plus whatever time you spend within the doors of Ace Hardware.  

By 1:30 pm we were on the road driving to Chris and Rochelle's.  Rochelle is an avid, and very loyal reader of my blog, and I was not surprised to receive a text from her that the home was ready for blog pictures to be taken....lol.  The first thing we did when we arrived was walk into the backyard to take an 'usie'......

....any time we get Chris and Rochelle to ourselves for even an hour is precious.  Rochelle makes my son very happy, and for that I will love her as if she were m own daughter for the rest of my days.

Within an hour of our arrival Chris and Rochelle's son, Christopher, and daughter, Cynthia, arrived with her husband Daniel, and our two great grand children Daniel, and Jameson, so another 'usie' was in order.....

TLE holding Jamison...for the first time he ran up to us and wanted to give each of us a hug......it just melted our hearts

-t

Left to right - back row: Moi, TLE, Chris, Rochelle and Christopher

Left to right - front row: Daniel, Jameson, Cynthia and Daniel

.....we had a great time visiting with everyone, and the BBQ tri-tip sandwiches were scrumptious Chris!

By 4 pm TLE and I were feeling the effects of three consecutive days of socializing, plus we needed to make a quick stop at COSTCO to pick up some things before we got home, and then we needed to stow the patio, and window awnings in preparation for lift off Monday morning.  We've been getting heavy dews the few days we've been here, and I didn't want to stow them wet Monday morning.

I was in bed by 9:30 pm.....very tired, but with a large smile upon my face.  What a great time we've had catching up with our kids, grandkids, and great grandkids!  My youngest son, Tim, his wife, Laila, and their two children (Crosby and Bowie) moved to Woodstock, GA about 6, or 7 months ago, so we will need to fly out to see them before we return to LPG&RVR in April.

Thank you for stopping by!

Time to reacclimate......

7:27 am - Sunday - October 16th - Fontana, CA - 61° F, 93% humidity (OMG, will the madness never end?), wind 3 mph out of the southwest.....heavy overcast this morning with a forecast high of 74° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I attended the wedding rehearsal in Riverside, CA for our daughter Kate, and now son-in-law, Nick.....↴ 

Whenever we come into SoCal for a short period of time, such as this time (just 4 days) the days we are here are a whirlwind of visiting with family, and friends.....mostly family as we have 5 children, 9 grandchildren, and two great grandchildren.....that is a lot of catching up to do in a short period of time.

Saturday we had a date with our oldest daughter, Meredith, who was born in 1978 on my birthday. I am always so impressed with her breadth of knowledge about most anything one might want to talk about, and when TLE and I are with her the time just seems to melt away.  We met her at Simple Simon's Bakery and Bistro in the walking mall in downtown Riverside (next to the world famous Mission Inn) around 10 am for breakfast.  Whenever we are in town breakfast at Simple Simon's is a must.  They make all their bread, bagels, croissants, and pastries, and many people visit their establishment just to purchase one of the aforementioned.  We had to park about 4 blocks away as parking is always an issue on Saturdays as there is a weekly farmers market.....

.....which draws thousands of visitors.  Simple Simon's is located about 1 block south of the farmers market.  Their sign says they serve Lunch & Breakfast & Lunch.....I've always wondered why lunch is mentioned twice.....maybe I should ask one time, right?  LOL!.....

....Meredith beat us there as she found parking spot right on Mission Inn Blvd......

....whilst Meredith snagged an indoor table (it was quite cold, and stormy looking outside so we forewent the alfresco option), TLE and I got in line to order 3 breakfasts.....

.....they have a one page menu at Simple Simon's, and their omelettes are for which to die....

.....TLE had their Breakfast Croissant Club, I their Fresh Spinach & Bacon Omelette, and Meredith their Chicken Apple Sausage Omelette.....all of our breakfast entrees were splendid.....

.....as always, the conversation flowed non-stop, and soon the restaurant got much busier, so we decided it was only right to abandon our table so someone else might enjoy it.  From there we walked across Mission Inn Blvd. to visit one of our all time favorite thrift shops, Mission Galleria, which is 4 stories in all, counting the basement, and they have a lot of stuff to see.....

....a little after 12 pm we bid Meredith adieu, and headed back to our car.  From there we stopped off at Walmart to buy a few things, and were home sometime after 1:30 pm.

Sunday will be our final day here at the Elks Lodge in Fontana, CA, and by Monday afternoon we will be at our winter job site, Glamis North Hot Springs.  I was looking at the weather forecast for Likely, and for Niland, where Glamis North is located.....quite a different forecast for the two places....

......a 31° F differential for the morning lows at each location.  I think we've got some adjusting, and reacclimating to do...lol.

Around 3 pm it began to rain, and continued on and off well into the evening. At times the rain came down so hard one could not hear the TV audio at any volume level.  Additionally, we had quite a bit of lightning and thunder....something we only briefly experienced at LPG&RVR.

Thanks for stopping by!

When the Splendide is not so splendid......

 7:35 am - Saturday - October 15th - Fontana, CA - 62° F, 92% humidity, wind 5 mph out of the southwest.....heavy marine layer this morning with a chance of rain later today, and a forecast high of 71° F.  On this date in 2021 we stopped in a Rest Area off I-90 eastbound in Washington State to find a billboard advertising Elks Lodges, and saw they had used a picture of our Newell and American Trailer while we were staying at the Elks Lodge in Lompoc, CA back in April of 2017......very cool!.....↴

We refused to get out of bed until the sun had come up, but by 7:30 am it was obvious there was a heavy marine layer blocking out any hint of the sun, but at least it was light outside.  According to everyone with whom we have talked since we arrived it has been quite humid the past 10 days here in SoCal.  We've been used to humidity in the 15-25% range the past 6 months, so returning to SoCal where it is normally pretty dry to find humidity in the 90's is kind of a shock to our collective systems.....lol!

Besides seeing our kids and grandkids, our other main reason for spending 4-5 days at the Elks Lodge in Fontana before continuing on to Glamis North Hot Springs (to be referred to as GNHS from now on) was to pull our Splendide washer/dryer combo unit out of its cubbyhole once again to address a recurring problem with the dryer cycle.  The washer portion of the Splendide would work fine going through the wash, rinse and spin cycles without a hitch, but 10 minutes into the dryer cycle it would shut down.  I think I wrote about dealing with this issue when we were at LPG&RVR.  At the time we had vacuumed out the dryer vent hose, and using the crevice tool for our ShopVac we vacuumed out, as best we could, the rubber tunnel running from the back of the washer/dryer down into the drum area.  It was obvious to us at the time that the air flow coming out of the vent was not what it should be, but after doing the vacuuming it seemed to improve a bit, so we put her away, and she worked fine for another week, or two, but then the dryer started shutting down 10 minutes into the drying cycle again.  LPG&RVR has a nice laundry with pretty new equipment, and it was only a short distance from site #55, so TLE decided she would utilize those facilities to wash our clothes for the final few weeks we were there, and then we would deal with the Splendide when we returned to SoCal and would be nearer to the service folks who would come and and diagnose our problem.

Anyway, I decided to pull the Splendide out once more to see if I could find something obvious, like a big lint blockage deeper into the machine.  Around 9:30 am after finishing my latest post, TLE emptied the pantry, and then I removed the shelving, and doors so I could pull the machine out.  Once it was out I removed the top, then a panel on the back so I could access the rubber snorkel connecting the vent hose with the dryer.  Most of the time the problem is not very obvious, but this time I was blessed with the obvious.....

You are looking at the bottom end of the rubber 'snorkel', an obvious place where lint might gather....not a good design

That is a LOT of lint

......I was initially aghast at how bad the clog was....there was no way you could see it without removing the entire snorkel from the machine, but in the end I was so relieved to find the problem was easy to fix, and would not involve the services of a costly mobile service guy.  I spent about 10 minutes thoroughly cleaning out the snorkel, then as I began to reinstall it our daughter Kate, and her oldest son Elijah arrived for lunch, so I took a break and joined TLE, Kate and Elijah out on the patio behind the RV section here at the Fontana Elks Lodge.  I failed to take a single picture to memorialize the occasion, but needless to say, we had a great time talking, and eating sandwiches prepared by the hands of The Lovely Elaine (I type out TLE once and while as there are some folks who wonder what TLE means).

After our lunch I returned to the task of putting the Splendide back together, and then pushing it back into its cubbyhole where it is my prayer that it will remain for a long time to come.  By the time I finished my job, and TLE was able to put all our stuff back into the pantry it was after 2 pm, and I was sweaty (high humidity) and tired.

We had also arranged for our daughter Sharon, Rod (husband) and Brayden (6 year old son) to join us for dinner at the Elks Lodge.  They host a dinner every Friday night at 5 pm, and we eat there at least once, or twice each time we are here.  We had a great dinner filled with a lot more conversation, then it was time to bid everyone adieu.....

......we had barely said goodbye to Sharon, Rod and Brayden when our oldest daughter, Meredith showed up to welcome us home.....we had plans to see her for breakfast Saturday morning, which is still on, but being able to spend a little extra time with her is quite a bonus!

By the time Meredith left it was going on 9 pm, and I was tired after a few hours of socializing with our three daughters, and was in bed a little after 10.  We'll see our oldest son Chris on Sunday at his home along with Rochelle, his wife, and hopefully their kids (Cynthia and Chris).

Thanks for stopping by!

Uh oh!

 8:22 am - Friday - October 14th - Fontana, CA - 64° F, 78% humidity, wind 2 mph out of the south......heavily overcast this morning with a forecast high today of 81° F.  Notice that humidity?  It's about 50 points higher here in SoCal than it was at LPG&RVR!  On this date in 2017 we were at Ririe Reservoir near Idaho Falls, ID for one night....we went to bed with green grass next to our Newell, and woke up the next morning to a foot of snow.......↴

As has been the case for a month, or so now we turned on our heaters first thing Thursday morning to chase away the cold night air one would rightly expect at over 4,000' elevation, just as we did the last few weeks at LPG&RVR.  In the Eastern Sierra town of Bishop, CA it feels like Fall, as it should.  Within 5 hours we would transition from Fall weather to late Summer weather in Fontana, CA.

Once I had posted my latest daily missive it did not take us long to be ready to haul anchor, and begin next leg of our journey to Glamis North Hot Springs.  Thursday would be our biggest driving day since we left LPG&RVR at 256 miles.  I'm glad we gook the first 450 miles in small bites, and I now felt ready to tackle a big driving day.  As we turned right off Sierra Street in Bishop, CA onto US-395 southbound I noticed the time was 8:50 am....by 2 pm we would be arriving at the Elks Lodge in Fontana, CA, and a completely different world than that in which we have lived the last 6 months....heavy traffic, dense population, smog, and significantly warmer overnight temps.  But, as oft I do, I get ahead of myself.

It was a windless day as I set the cruise control to 60 mph, and then just held onto the wheel for the next 210 miles......

South of Lone Pine

Little Lake

Nearing Coso Junction and now under 3,000' elevation for the first time in 6 months

......with about 46 miles to go the traffic began to increase dramatically, and I could feel my grip on the large Newell steering wheel tightening more with each mile we drove further south.  We took a short break just below Kramer Junction with about 40 miles to go, and since we were just off the road I turned on my emergency flashers, but left the big Detroit Diesel 6v92 running.  I usually turn off the engine, but for some reason I left the engine running, but turned the key to the far left position, or accessories position....why, I have no idea.  When I returned to the driver seat a few minutes later I turned off the flashers, and puled back into traffic to begin the 2 mile climb out of the Kramer Junction area.  When the key is in the accessories position none of the gauges work, so, not remembering the key was in the accessories position I glanced at the coolant temperature reading as I often do and saw it was over 215° F....far too high.....UH OH!  I kept glancing at it in confusion as the engine had been idling for 5-10 minutes, and usually the temp reading is around 185° F, or less at idle.  Suddenly I imagine I smell coolant, and begin to think the worst.....either a coolant hose has burst, or my fan belts have broken....I quickly pull onto the shoulder again, put the Newell in neutral, then rev the engine to cool it down, but the temperature does not drop at all.  Suddenly I glance at the key, and see it is in the accessory position.....doh!  Once I turn it to the 'ON' position, the temp reads 184° F....double doh, and a BIG 'WHEW!' escape my mouth.....lol.  All is back to normal, and we once again merge back into traffic heaving heavy sighs of relief intermixed with nervous, but relieved laughter.

The rest of the trip was just slogging through mind numbing traffic as we neared the merging point of US-395 with I-15 southbound, and then the real fun began in earnest.  As you crest over the hill and see the Pomona Valley you begin an 8 mile, 6% grade downhill run.  I put the Newell into 2nd gear, and let the Jacobs Brake take over.  The Jacobs Brake keeps us at around 35-40 mph.  The traffic is very heavy as we make the descent, and here are a  few videos TLE shot to relate how heavy the traffic was, and how smoggy the air was/is here in SoCal......

......we arrived safely, and without further incident at the Fontana Elks Lodge around 2:05 pm....

Safely ensconced in site #9 for five nights

.....we're only going to be here for 5 nights so we did not pull out the artificial turf, and just did a minimal setup, which did, of course, include deploying our Starlink 'dishy'.  As has been the case all four times we have deployed it we had internet within 10 minutes, and MBPS speeds of over 120.....what a deal!

Thanks for stopping by!

Deep Impact......

7:29 am - Thursday - January 31st - Winslow, AZ - 26º F, 73% humidity, wind 4 mph out of the east......partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 61º F.

I had a 10 am doctors appointment Wednesday morning......originally I had both appointments scheduled for Tuesday, but about 2 weeks ago one of them had to be changed to Wednesday, so we had to make the 110 mile round trip into Flagstaff once again.  We left home at 8:30 am so we would be sure to arrive 30 minutes before my appointment, and we succeeded.  In all my appointment took about an hour, and  then we were free to roam the streets of Flagstaff to our hearts content.

First up was a visit to Findlay VW on the east side of Flagstaff where we ordered some parts, and scheduled an appointment for February 1st to have them installed, so we will make another round trip into Flagstaff then.  We had work done on our Beetle at Findlay about 5 years ago, and were very happy with the work, the price and the service.  From there we drove a couple of blocks over to 'Savers' Thrift Store to see if they had anything without which we could not live, and they did.  I don't think we have ever been there when we did not come out with something.

At last it was time to revisit one of our favorite local breweries.....Beaver Street Brewery for lunch........

....about 10 minutes later we were walking in the door and ordering some brews.....Yelp gives them a solid 4 stars on 1,152 reviews, and we would agree.   I ordered their seasonal Shandy, and TLE an Oatmeal Stout......both were very good.  For our entrees I had their Chicken Caesar, and TLE their 'Personal 3 Smoked Meat Pizza' and a salad....

.....soon it was time to head back to Winslow, but we had one stop to make on our way home.....'Meteor Crater National Landmark'.  Like the Petrified Forest, we have driven by this site numerous times on our way east and west on I-40.  It is located about 1/2 way between Flagstaff and Winslow, and is about 6 miles south of the Interstate.  Meteor Crater is the best preserved meteor crater in the world, and is where scientists learned how to identify other meteor craters around the world, of which there are estimated to be over 200.  The iron/nickel meteor traveling at some 26,000 mph impacted here 50,000 years ago, and is estimated to have been about 150 feet in diameter, weighing in at several hundred thousand tons.  In seconds a crater almost 1 mile in diameter, and 700 feet deep was created.  The explosive force created by the meteor impacting earth, which formed the crater is estimated to be equal to 20 million tons of TNT.  The rim of the crater stands over 150 above the desert floor.  Over 50,000 years erosion has reduced the depth from 700' to just over 550' today.  In another 300,000 years it will be completely filled.....

 The largest fragment found to date of the meteor

 Pano of Meteor Crater

Pano of the surrounding area

......the crater is privately owned by the Barringer Family, and all of the facilities on site were built by them under the auspices of Meteor Crater Enterprises, Inc.  In 1967 Meteor Crater was designated a National Landmark.  With the senior discount our combined admission cost was $30.....a little steep by our standards, but we are happy we decided to pay the fee, and thoroughly enjoyed our time there.  The fact it was a windless, clear blue skies kind of day only served to enhance our experience.  There is an extensive museum providing a lot of very interesting information....we recommend Meteor Crater very highly.

We were home just before 5 pm and settling in for the evening....what a beautiful day Wednesday was!

Thanks for stopping by!

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The appointment.....

6:26 am - Wednesday - January 30th - Winslow, AZ - 27º F, 71% humidity, wind 6 mph out of the southwest......partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 56º F.

Tuesday I had my first doctor appointment in Flagstaff at 3:15 pm, but what to do until it was time to make the drive?  When in doubt, take a walk, and that is what we did around 11 am.  We just set out with no particular goal in mind just walking west down Route 66 about 1.9 miles then turning around......here is some of what we saw that was interesting.....

     

   
.....we continued walking east on Route 66 until we came to the La Posada Hotel, then returned to 'The Corner' to the Sipp Shoppe (4.5 stars on Yelp, and the same on Tripadvisor) for some coffee, and people watching time.....

An Americano for moi

Watching the tourists take the obligatory pictures by the 'Standing on the Corner' statues

.....we returned home from our walk around 12:30 pm having covered 2.9 miles.  Essentially the most prosperous part of Route 66 through Winslow is contained in a 4 block stretch (two blocks either side of 'The Corner'), and if that is where you spent your entire time in Winslow you would come away thinking Winslow was doing alright, but it is not.  Once you get beyond that 4 block stretch you find about 70% of the storefronts are shuttered, and about 40% of the homes.....and the homes being lived in appear neglected.

We were in the VW heading to Flagstaff by 1:50 pm for my 3:15 appointment.  It's about 55 miles to Flagstaff from the Elks Lodge in Winslow, and we arrived at the surgical center around 2:45 pm....perfect!  The drive was beautiful......

......I met with my doctor (ENT specialist) who will perform the parotidectomy (removal of the saliva gland cyst).  My surgical appointment was set for February 25th, so now we know the 'when'....now we have to figure out where we will stay until that date....we have some great ideas, and I will talk about that soon!

We were back in Winslow by 5:30 pm, and decided to head directly for the Turquoise Room at the La Posada Hotel, and specifically to their Martini Bar......

The elegantly intimate setting

.....I am not a Martini kind of guy.....in fact I do not believe I have ever had a Martini, but who doesn't want to say just one time to a bartender....."....shaken, not stirred...", right?  TLE ordered the Sea Salt Caramel Martini, and I the Desert Orchard Martini.  Both were spectacular, and a great way to end our day.....

....we enjoyed our Martinis and then headed for home, arriving just in time to catch this wonderful sunset.....

.....thanks for stopping by!

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