California – Page 2 – RV Travels in Europe and North America

February 9, 2018 China Lake CA

Today was a travel day. We got up early and tried to clean some of the sand from Scout. Parking directly on the beach is really great, but it comes with a ton of sand which managed to get everywhere. Ton did a great job chasing most of it out, but will probably take another shot at it this afternoon.

The downside of being on the beach is sand everywhere inside. Not much of a downside.

We were up early and had another visit from the local Marines. This time a company of Marines were using the beach in front of us for physical training. All of the women in the campground were fascinated to watch the women Marines in the unit doing the training alongside their male counterparts, and I think the mother in all of them came out a little bit. I know the women Marines would not want to be treated any other way.

Physical training on the beach. Just like the recruiter told them!

We reluctantly departed our ocean front property, and headed out into southern California traffic. Ron was a bit under the weather so we were focused on getting down the road.

One of the weird things about driving around in the Mojave is that fairly frequently you come across these large airports with hundreds of mothballed airplanes parked there. This one was near Adelanto.

February 8, 2018 Camp Pendleton CA

We had a slow start to the day. One of the things about staying on a military base is that sometimes you share your campground with Marines training. This morning a platoon of amtracks (a floating armored personnel carrier) went thru the camp.

Two LVTP7 Amphibious Tractors, known as AMTRACKS.

They then took off down the beach.

They are going to enter the water a little further down by the safety boat you see in the water.

We headed over to Oceanside for the afternoon we shared a fish and chips lunch at a nice restaurant. We then had a nice walk thru town and down to the pier. A lot of California coastal towns have piers, and Oceanside’s is nice, and not quite as commercial as some of the others.

We watched the surfers for a while from the pier. Ton pointed out one older gentlemen mixed in with all of the younger surfers. After a while though it was clear the old guy was by far the best surfer.

February 7, 2018 Camp Pendleton CA

The first job for today was to try to sort out our camera. It suddenly stopped working. We are not sure if the battery has given up the ghost or it is something bigger. It is 6 or 7 years old so it may be just at the end of its’ life despite Ton’s meticulous maintenance. For now we are in possession of a new camera we bought at Costco. While Ton was sorting out the camera and doing some grocery shopping, Ron took Scout for an oil change.

After that we headed out to check out the north part of San Diego county. Once again Ron is shocked that an area he remembers so well from 20 years ago has changed substantially. Oceanside has gentrified tremendously, and Carlsbad is positively upscale now. We really enjoyed checking out the town including the Belching Beaver Brewery, a Pizza place that also brewed beer, and the farmers market. In fact we had such a good time that we decided to spend another night here.

Last night most of the sites around us were empty, when we returned tonight we were surrounded by a bunch of large RV’s. It turns out it is a group of Elks from around Moreno Valley California who are here for the weekend. They seem like a bunch of nice people and invited us to join them tomorrow for a card tournament. We will see.

February 6, 2018 Camp Pendleton CA

Ton brought up the idea of heading over to the coast. Our original hope was to stay at the Navy park on Coronado Island in San Diego, but as with every other time we could not get a reservation. We instead are at the Marine Base with an ocean front spot. We are not disappointed with not getting into Coronado.

We started out trying to get up for sunset but did not succeed. Ron ran out to try to get some just past sunset pictures but they did not turn out. On our way out of the park we stopped at one of Tons favorite spots the Cholla garden. The Cholla Cactus has one of the nastiest thorns of any cactus, but it has really nice flowers.

We took a back road from Palm Springs to Temecula which kept us off the freeways from Palm Springs to Temecula. The highway was called the Pine to Palms Highway and takes you thru the Santa Rosa Mountains. The climb out of Palm Springs is quite steep as you quickly go from Sea Level to 3000 feet. You go from desert to alpine and pass thru at least three different plant types. While the road is windy and narrow for Ron it is less nerve racking than dealing with Southern California Freeways.

We arrived at the beach and as we were setting up a nice couple came up and struck up a conversation about our drive down and the Tiger. Ron was hooking up things and Ton was outside speaking with the wife. A few minutes later Ron noticed water coming out of the truck. Sometime along the way one of us had bumped the water in the kitchen sink on. While we are driving we store some stuff in the sink so that was blocking the drain, and we had a flood. So tonight we are drying out the floor, and some of our dish towels and things are hanging up to dry.

We ended the day by doing something we have never done in seven or eight years of camping. We built a campfire and sat on the beach eating our dinner and enjoying the sound of the surf.

February 5, 2018 Joshua Tree NP

Today we visited one of our favorite national parks. Ton really loves cactuses and Joshua Trees. It was originally in our plans for the trip with our friends last fall, but we cut it out due to time constraints, so we decided to head over on our way to the coast.

The drive took a little longer than we thought, and we ended up driving around for over an hour looking for a place to spend the night. At that point Ron realized that we probably needed fuel, so we ended up driving back out into town to the Marine Base to get fuel. The fuel there was 50 cents a gallon cheaper than in town.

Part of the trip was along an old section of Route 66.

We got back to our campsite just in time for sunset, and had a nice walk shooting pictures of the sunset, rocks and Joshua tree’s. It was also fantastic weather, clear and 79 degrees, so for the first time on the trip we will not need the heater.

November 5, 2017 Pacific Coast Highway CA

Ron was very excited as we were going to take one of his favorite drives, the Big Sur. The plan was to drive down to the point were the road is closed. Last winter a giant land slide took out a large part of the road so at this point you drive down about 60 miles along the coast until the road is closed. It is a wonderful road with incredible views. We also intended to visit San Simeon to look at the Elephant Seal colony that has taken up residence there.

The weather was perfect, and probably because of the closure traffic was light. Big Sur lived up to Ron’s expectations though he was worried that Noi and Dang were not impressed. Ton assured him that Dang thought it was great, Noi slept a lot of the way. The detour was a one and a half lane road over the mountains and thru Fort Hunter-Ligget. It was a tough drive, but fortunately we had abandoned Elephant in Monterey and took a rental car for the day. Ron enjoyed the challenge of the road, and everyone else endured.

On our way into San Simeon we passed thru Paso Robles. We decided to stop for lunch at Doce Robles winery. Ton, Dang, and Ron split a bottle of wine with lunch which perked everyone up. We headed to San Simeon where the juvenile elephant seals were in residence, both the adult males and females are off in Alaska. They are still an amazing site and worth a visit if you are in the area.

We ended the night with a great dinner at Monterey Fish House. This was our farewell dinner as tomorrow we are splitting up, with Ron and Ton heading to Oregon, and Dang and Noi heading home to Thailand. We all enjoyed ourselves tremendously as the food was outstanding, and even Noi enjoyed a little wine. If you are in Monterey I highly recommend the Monterey Fish House.

November 4, 2017 Monterey CA

The day started out with a quest for a longer sewer hose for Elephant. The sewer hose for Elephant is about 8 ft long and we need one about 20ft long in our spot. We started out going to the PX at the old Fort Ord Army Base, but unlike most PX’s this one did not have any RV stuff, but Ton, Noi, and Dang enjoyed shopping. We next went to the Target, no hose there, but Noi, Dang, and Ton enjoyed shopping. Next door to Target was a REI, Ron knew they would not have a hose, but Noi, Dang and Ton enjoyed shopping. We next went to Wal-mart and they had a hose, and Noi, Dang and Ton enjoyed shopping. After the quest for the hose was complete it was now 1pm and while everyone had enjoyed shopping it was time to do some touristy stuff.

We headed over to Carmel to visit another spot we enjoyed on our Pacific Coast Highway trip a couple of years ago. Point Lobos State Nature Reserve is a great place to look at both sea animals and some really beautiful Cypress Trees.

We returned in time to whip up something and get a good nights sleep under the flight path for the main runway at Monterey airport. Fortunately it is a small airport.

November 3, 2017 Monterey CA

Originally we planned to spend two nights in Yosemite NP, but due to very cold temperatures there and concerns about road closures we had to adjust our plans. So instead we are heading for Monterey California for the next several days and we will have to come up with some new plans.

Today was mostly taken up with driving from Bakersfield to Monterey, and some more shopping at Costco. Ton has shared her love of all things Costco with Noi and Dang and they are embracing it enthusiastically.

A field of nursery flowers in the central valley.

We arrived in time to visit a couple of wineries in the Salinas area. Noi was interested in shooting some of the vineyards as the leaves were turning colors. Ton, Dang, and Ron were much more interested in drinking wine. On an earlier trip we had visited Passagno Winery and really enjoyed ourselves so we returned to see if it was still good. We really enjoyed ourselves and have three bottles to take back with us to California.

“Display” grapes near the entrance to the winery.

Tonight we are settled in at Monterey Pines RV Park next to the Navy Golf Course in Monterey and working on plans for the next two days. Stay tuned to see what we come up with.

November 2, 2017 Death Valley NP

We had planned to head to Zabriske point for sunrise, but everyone overslept. In the end we got there about an 90 minutes after sunrise. Zabriske point was the highlight of our first trip to Death Valley, and Ron in particular has fond memories of the place. We were happy to see that Dang and Noi were more up about Zabriske, so Death Valley had a happy ending.

We had originally intended to target Tehachapee for the day, but when Ton realized we would be there around noon, she extended the drive to Bakersfield. After arriving about 1pm we checked into Orange Grove RV park, which is a great commercial camp ground including you own orange trees in each site. If you are in the area I highly recommend you check it out. As it was still quite early we headed to Costco to fuel up, and see if there were any secret things in Bakersfield that we had not seen in other Costco’s. Yesterday California raised their gas tax by 12 cents per gallon, so even with the Costco discount we had our most expensive gas on the trip at $2.80 per gallon.

November 1, 2017 Death Valley NP

We were pleasantly surprised this morning, it turns out we both slept well. We’re not sure if it was because we were really tired, or if the freeway noise acted as a kind of white noise, anyway it was one of the best nights sleep of the trip.

We let the traffic die down for a bit before heading out. It was easy to know when traffic had lightened up as all we had to do was look out the window of Scout to get an up to the minute traffic status.

As we were heading to Death Valley the GPS was routing us thru Pahrump Nevada. Ron finds the name fun to say, and by the time we got there, everyone was coming up with different reasons to include Pahrump in the conversation including at one point a chorus of Little Drummer Boy.

Death Valley is one of Ron and Ton’s favorite parks. It has a stark beauty that really appeals to us, and we were looking forward to introducing Dang and Noi to it. I don’t know if we oversold the park or they hit a wall, but they did not seem as impressed as we hoped. They did enjoy sunset at the dunes, before we headed back to the campground for the night.

January 26, 2017 Death Valley NP

Ron had always wanted to visit the Racetrack Playa. Ton was a little nervous as the park service puts out very severe warnings about the road and particularly mentions long stretches of sharp rocks. Ron had done some research and several other Tigers had made it out there, though all of the owners had complained about the washboard condition of the road.

We started the day by visiting Ubehebe Crater. The crater is about a half mile across and 700 feet deep and is a result of a recent magma explosion in the park. The crater is quite impressive and a reminder of how suddenly things can change on the planet.

We set out for the playa and Ron thought it could not be much worst than yesterdays drive thru Titus Canyon. In some ways he was right and in some ways he was wrong. The road itself was pretty straight forward with no particular narrow places or washed out sections of road. Looking at it it was a typical gravel road you find in the west. But the washboard was the worst Ron had ever experienced and really beat up the truck and the people inside. We creeped along at 10 miles per hour along most of the way and still felt like we were inside a blender.

The valley approaching the race track is really beautiful and you feel like you are really on your own. For the day I think only about 5 vehicles including us went out to the Playa. About 6 miles from the Playa you come to Tea Kettle Junction where there is a tradition of hanging a tea kettle with your name on it. We were not aware of the tradition and did not have a tea kettle to leave.

We did not have a tea kettle to contribute.

Finally we arrived at the playa. How the rocks moved used to be a mystery, but apparently in November a group from the Scripps Institute were out there and saw the rocks actually moving. To make a short story of a long story it apparently takes a combination of a wet Playa, freezing temperatures that causes ice to build up on the rocks and high winds, and suddenly a 60 pound rock will move on its own.

One of the mystery rocks at the Racetrack Playa.

January 25, 2017 Death Valley NP

it was quite warm last night and we enjoyed a good nights sleep without a heater. After we got going we started the day by touring the Golden Canyon. It was a short walk but quite nice. Even at 8:30 it was starting to warm up a bit.

Next we went to the Devils Golf Course. It is on the valley floor and consists of thousands of small humps with salt deposits on the top. It was interesting but a little disappointing for Ron as he was expecting something with more of a golf theme.

The Devils Golf Course, not quite sure what inspired the name.

We had visited Artists Point on our first visit about 10 years ago. We had enjoyed the drive so were looking forward to visiting again. This time Ron was a little disappointed with the drive. Ton pointed out that the light was much better in the evening and the last time we had been there in the evening.

The last thing we planned was to take the Titus Canyon road. This is about a 25 mile drive thru the Grapevine Mountains on an unimproved road. The last time we did it in a car so we thought it would be a relatively simple drive. It turned out to be much rougher than it must of been last time, because I do not think we could have gotten a car thru the road as it was today. Still it was great fun and Ton wore out the battery on her camera taking pictures, and Scout handled the road very well.

January 24, 2017 Joshua Tree NP

We are getting used to the drive from Joshua Tree to Death Valley as this is the fourth time we have done it in the last couple of months.

On the way out of Joshua Tree we stopped at Skull Rock. The Skull Rock Trail is a short trail that highlights the non-cactus plants in the desert. Skull Rock really does bear an amazing resemblance to a skull.

We drove from Joshua Tree to Death Valley on a back road that passes thru Mojave National Preserve and Baker California. We were planning to fuel up in Baker as it had the cheapest diesel in the area last trip. Despite fuel prices dropping everywhere else on this trip, the fuel in Baker had actually risen to over $4 per gallon so we passed and drove on towards Death Valley, if we were going to pay an exorbitant amount for fuel we decided we would rather do it in a small desert community, then a large community right on the interstate.

Today we visited Dantes Peak in Death Valley which is an overlook above the main valley. From 5000 feet you are looking the length of Death Valley and can also see for miles back towards Las Vegas. We stayed up for sunset and Ton got some nice shots.

January 22, 2017 San Diego CA

Today we started out at Torrey Pines State Nature Area. The Torrey Pine tree is only found in two places in the world, one grove near San Diego and the other on one of the channel islands near Santa Barbara. The Preserve has an interesting mix of plants in a small area. In addition to the Torrey Pines in the same area there are ferns and cactus. The micro-climate in the area allow this diversity in plant types.

The Torrey Pines are the trees behind the cactus.

From Torrey Pines we headed to La Jolla to see how the other half lives. It is a pretty community. Along the waterfront there were a flock of Pelicans sitting on shore, and a few Sea Lions sunning on the beach.

We went to small dive restaurant in Pacific Beach that was reputed to be the best in San Diego. The food was excellent and Ton pronounced the Ceviche as the best Mexican Ceviche she has had.

As I said yesterday we were spending the afternoons in Breweries so today we went to Ballast Point Brewery. This was by far the poshest brewery we have ever seen. The trend we noticed in San Diego was that the breweries seemed larger and more commercially developed then their counterparts at home. We sent our friends a picture from Ballast Point, and one texted back that we needed to visit Karl Strauss brewery. We figured it was our last day so why not. It was in what was clearly an old Japanese restaurant complete with a Koi Farm. Turns out this was not the original brewery. We did a taster tray and it was very good and the waiter was quite knowledgeable.

Ended the day doing our laundry and having a nice conversation about Scout with a Marine who was getting ready to retire. Ron got another reminded that he was an old Marine as the Navy newspaper was talking about the decomissioning of a 35 year old amphibious ship that was launched when he was a Lieutenant.

January 21, 2017 San Diego CA

The theme of the trip to San Diego is mornings doing touristy things and the afternoons visiting breweries. San Diego is a great town to look around and despite living only 80 miles away for 5 years we had not seen a lot of the city.

The morning we visited Balboa Park which is one of the best parks in the US. We were particularly impressed with the Prado and the Museum of Man. The buildings were built for an exposition in the 30’s and have been used for many purposes since, including a garrison and hospital during WWII. There are also many different types of gardens and fountains that are quite beautiful. Ton really loved the cactus garden though she would have like to seem some name plaques on some of the cactus that we were unable to identify.

Balboa Park in San Diego is home to some great gardens and museums.

After finishing with Balboa Park we headed out to Escondido to visit Stone Brewery. The facility was really large and impressive. The beer was ok, and the food very fancy. The tour was really good and the “beer indoctrinator” was really knowledgeable about beer and the industry. Stone brewery is quite large for a craft brewery and is in the process of opening a brewery in Berlin. I am curious how it will be received, there was a German couple on the tour and they thought it might go over ok, as there are actually not that many breweries in Berlin compared to the rest of Germany.

At the end of the day we decided that we wanted to see La Jolla and check out another brewery, luckily we were able to get the last spot available for tomorrow in the Navy RV park so we are extending in San Diego.

January 20, 2017 San Diego CA

ell last night we had a talk about where to go next. Ton said there was a great road from where we were camped into San Diego. She had fond memories of a trip to Coronado Island we took about 20 years ago and wanted to see how it has changed.

We took California Highway 78/79 over the San Jacinto mountains and it was nice. A continuation of the high desert environment, with a few California Oaks occasionally. Not too hard of a drive and worth the effort if you need to go east to west versus I-8.

We were hoping to get into the Navy RV park on Coronado as it has a great view of San Diego Bay and all of the ships. Unfortunately it was full so we ended up staying at a RV park near the Junction of I-8 and I-15.

We headed over to Coronado to do some shopping at the Navy Exchange and Commissary. That taken care, of we went downtown where to Ron’s amazement things had change since he was last there in the Marines 20 years ago. We had a nice beer sampler at Coronado Brewing Company. It is worth a stop. Final stop for the day was a drive down the silver strand between San Diego Harbor and the Pacific. Great beaches some of them public and some belonging to the Navy.

January 19, 2017 Anza-Borrego SP

We woke up at dawn after sleeping at Fonts Point to catch the sunrise. It was not quite the party that sunset was as, there was only one other couple there. They drove out from San Diego just for the sunrise. The woman in the couple asked where Ton was from and when she told her Thailand, the girl laughed and said I thought so, you have the exact same accent as my mother.

After cooking up breakfast we headed over to Palm Canyon. We walked up a wash for about a mile and a half to the classic oasis you would see in a movie. Water and a cluster of Palms. It was very impressive

The oasis at Palm Canyon, just like a movie set for an oasis.

After returning to Scout we headed over to the town. On the two main entrances into town an artist has set out various sculptures in the desert. Not quite to our taste, but interesting none the less.

A giant dragon sculpture near Anza-Borrega, one of a series of similar sculptures.

We then headed over to a feature in the badlands called the slot. Another interesting walk. Including a very steep descent that looks like it used by motorcycles and possibly even some off road vehicles. It would be very tricky to try and a mistake would be quite painful.

On our way to camping up for the night Ton mentioned a cactus trail. She said it was only a mile walk, Ron had a vision of a nice stroll along a manicured trail. Instead it was a rocky trail through a wash and up over the side of a ridge. Probably a two hundred foot climb. Ton enjoyed it tremendously as the cactus were magnificent.

January 18, 2017 Anza-Borrego State Park CA

Today we reached our target to begin exploring instead of driving. We arrived at Anza-Borrego about 1:30 after driving about 250 miles. Enroute we stopped at a California Visitors Center in Yucca Valley to arm ourselves with some information about the park and other things in this part of California. While there we ran into a Canadian couple in a truck camper who had just come from Anza-Borrego. They told us to stop at the visitors center as the building was incredible.

When we arrived we made a bee line for the visitors center. Ton was not as impressed with the building as the Canadians, but she did enjoy the cactus garden. At the visitors center we asked for the best place for sunsets and they sent us to Fonts Point. The location was incredible overlooking the mountains, some serious badlands and a valley that stretched all the way to Mexico.

Part of the cactus gardens at the visitors center of Anza-Borrego.

The sunset was indeed incredible, though initially spoiled by a group that decided to hold a cocktail party at the overlook. After the sun set behind the mountains the cocktail party broke up, and Ton and I were the last ones left at the viewpoint. Ton mentioned that it would be a nice place for sunrise too, so we are now camped in the parking area for Fonts Point to be ready for sunset.

The sunset at Fonts Point looking out at the Badlands.

On a whim we checked the TV reception not expecting much, but were surprised that it found 17 channels over the air. When we started cycling thru the channels they are all from Mexico. As I write this we are watching the Patriots v Colts championship game in High Definition with Spanish commentaries.

January 17, 2017 China Lake CA

Our plans have changed. After spending last night in Reno we decided to head straight to Anza-Borrego, and then begin working our way North.

Today we headed down US 395 following the east side of the Sierra-Nevada Mountains. Unfortunately for California this winter has again been mostly dry and warm. This road would normally have a lot of snow along it and today it was completely dry and the temperatures were in the high 50’s all of the way.

River along US-395 in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Since we covered al lot of this area in our October trip we only made one stop to take pictures. Tomorrow we should arrive at the southern end of the trip and begin the real exploring, after watching the NFL championship games.

Tonight we are staying at China Lake Naval Weapons Station. I was surprised that they had a campground since this place is the Navy’s equivalent of Area 51. They had a weapons museum that included a bunch of aircraft that were in service when I first went into the Marines. As Ton likes to point out when I am surprised by these things, I am getting old.

The aircraft display that made me feel old.

December 18, 2016 Death Valley NP

Started heading home as we have a date on Sunday for a Christmas Party and our sons are coming home next week so we have some preparation to do. Had to make an emergency run onto the Marine Base to buy a replacement power cord for Ton’s Mac as hers died the night before.

We basically doubled back the way we came thru Mojave NP and heading north towards Reno, but instead of heading straight to US 95 we decided to run thru Death Valley NP as the main road thru the park parallels US 95.

We made a couple of stops including the lowest point in North America. Near there we ran across a couple of Coyotes who decided to pose for Ton, the first one even responded to her command to heal as she had not finished taking his picture! They both seemed pretty healthy and not at all skittish about people.

This coyote came trotting up to the truck looking for a hand out.

We had never seen Scotty’s Castle in the North end of the park so we made that our target for the day. We arrived just a little too late to take the last tour of the day, but got to walk the grounds. The grounds are pretty impressive and the back story is interesting as Scotty was basically a con man who got the money to build the castle by duping people into investing in gold mining operations when there was no gold.

Tonight we spent the night in Mesquite Springs campground which is nice and by a dry creek, that apparently was not dry last week. A flash flood came down the creek and flooded about a quarter of the campground,, but everything seemed back to normal.

Tomorrow will be a long boring driving day heading home.