Sunday ; Hallowe’en
Boy, I’m really looking forward to getting back on the road tomorrow ! We’ve all got “hitch itch”. Well, maybe not Sully ! HA HA HA !
Monday ; Keremeos, BC to rest area near Quincy, Washington
Today was cool with intermittent light rain. This morning we prepared for departure … in the rain … I hate that … and left home / Riverside RV Park Resort. We stopped in Keremeos to adjust the air pressure in the trailer tires before heading east on Hwy. 3 to Osoyoos. At Osoyoos we stopped at the Bank of Montreal to deposit Joanne’s paycheque.
The line up at the border crossing from Osoyoos, BC to Oroville, Washington was longer than usual, but moved reasonably well. We got
< sigh > a female Customs & Border Patrol agent. As always, after clearing Customs, we had to be inspected by an Agriculture Inspector, as are all RV’s. We got < sigh > a female Agriculture Inspector. She confiscated an unopened package of Whiskas Temptations Cat Treats worth about four dollars. The package said “Made in Canada by Mars Canada” and one of the ingredients was “dried meat by-product”. She said that wasn’t specific enough to be certain that it did not contain any prohibited types of meat, such as lamb or other hooved animals. The same as last year, I felt it wasn’t worth arguing with her. Although, any … < ahem > … Agricultural Inspection professional with half an eye and an a**hole should realize that there would be no lamb … or other hooved animals … in a seafood flavoured cat treat !
A few minutes later we were grocery shopping at Prince’s in Oroville. I went down the pet food aisle. There was Whiskas Temptations, apparently the same as what had just been confiscated from us. I checked the label. “Made in Canada, imported by Mars U.S.” “dried meat by-product”. That really pissed me off ! ! ! She confiscated and discarded a $4 package of cat treats ignorantly and unnecessarily ! The American border agents seem obsessed with stopping the flow of Canadian made pet foods … even when they’re wrong ! ! ! … as they were last year as well … into the United States, while Yemeni terrorists are sending bombs by UPS ! ! ! Check your perspective, people ! ! !
We had a late lunch in Prince’s parking lot then headed south on Hwy. 97. It was our plan to make it to Omak by late afternoon, do some shopping at Wal-Mart and Home Depot, have supper at KFC … I had been promising Joanne for weeks that we could have supper at KFC our first day on the road … boondock overnight in the Wal-Mart parking lot, then pick up a piece of mail at the Omak Post Office in the morning. I had ordered our Passport America renewal package to Omak to avoid the additional $10 charge for shipping to Canada. We arrived in Omak quite a bit earlier than I had expected. So … we picked up the package at the Post Office, refilled with diesel, decided to defer our Wal-Mart and Home Depot shopping for a day or two until we are in Oregon … no sales tax … and we continued on.
I wanted to take a different route than we usually do, just to see some new sights. Instead of continuing south on Hwy. 97, we went east on Hwy. 155 over the mountains. Up, over, and back down the mountains to the Columbia River Valley, then Hwy. 155 turned south following the Columbia River. I wanted to see the Grand Coulee Dam. When we drove alongside of it, it seemed to us to be as impressive as the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River near Las Vegas. This route was a bit longer than our usual Hwy. 97 route following the Okanagan River, but the scenery was nicer along the Columbia River. Eventually the Okanagan River flows into the Columbia River.
The roadside rest area on Hwy. 155 that we thought we could spend the night at was closed. We continued south on Hwy. 155 to Soap Lake, then southeast on Hwy. 28 through Ephrata and Quincy to a roadside rest area a bit west of Quincy. It was dark even before we got to the town of Quincy. We have stayed at this road side rest area before. And we’re now back on the same route as if we had stayed on Hwy. 97.
Tuesday ; Quincy, Washington to rest area near Terrebonne, Oregon
Today was a beautiful day, sunny and mild, temperature well up into the 60’s. And it was another day where “the plan” got discarded. Which I think is great ! I like travel days better without plans.
We left the rest area this morning and drove east a few miles on Hwy. 28 into the town of Quincy to refill with diesel before heading south on Hwy. 281 to Interstate 90. West on I-90 to I-82, then south on I-82 to Toppenish. Toppenish is the most northerly town that we know of that has a panaderia
( Mexican bakery ). Dos ( two ) panaderias actually. WOO-HOO … we bought some pan dulce ( Mexican pastries ). We parked in the Safeway parking lot and walked to KFC for lunch. Toppenish is a small city with a significant population of Mexicans and American Natives / Indians. The Mexicans are particularly noticeable because they’re very visible as hard working employees in the lower paying jobs. And the Indians are particularly noticeable because they’re drunk and panhandling. What a sad commentary that is !
From Toppenish we rejoined Hwy. 97 and continued south. We reached the Columbia River … again … crossed it, and were in Oregon. Yippee … no sales tax ! Our original plan for today was to visit a friend in Grass River, Oregon. Perhaps boondock in her yard or driveway tonight. In the village of Grass River we found our way to the summer address of Eilene, our 87 year old Escapee friend from Kofa Ko-op in Yuma, Arizona. We were supposed to visit her last spring on our drive back north, but we phoned her repeatedly for a couple of days before we were to visit, and she never answered her phone, so we did not go by her place. In the summer we tried to reach her and her phone was disconnected. Today there was no one home at her address. And we know that she doesn’t usually leave for Arizona this early. So … we’ re thinking the news can’t be good ! ! !
We continued south on Hwy. 97, stopping in Madras to refill Lanoire with diesel ( for the second time today ! ) and refill a propane tank. It was almost dark by that time. By the time we reached Redmond it was dark. We found our way to the Wal-Mart and … DARN ! No overnight parking permitted ! HMPH … one of those Wal-Marts ! We backtracked about ten miles or so on Hwy. 97 to a rest area near the village of Terrebonne where we boondocked overnight.
Wednesday ; Terrebonne to rest area near Klamath Falls, Oregon
Third day of travel, and third day that “the plan” got tossed out the window ! Our plan for today was to go to LaPine State Park.
This morning as I was checking the air pressure in the trailer tires I discovered … HUH ? … a nail embedded in the sidewall of one of the trailer tires. How odd ! It went in the sidewall and back out again without puncturing all the way through. I took a picture of it, then yanked it out with pliers.
We left the rest area this morning and continued south on Hwy. 97 about ten miles to Redmond. In Redmond we shopped at Wal-Mart ( that took a long time ! ), Home Depot, and Walgreens. We continued south to Bend where we shopped at PetsMart … WOO-HOO, Bo loooooves shopping at PetsMart … and an RV parts dealer. We had spent essentially the entire morning shopping !
Since we had such nice pan dulce for breakfast we decided to skip lunch and get some driving done. We made plans for an early supper at LaPine State Park. Shortly before arriving at LaPine State Park, it got cloudy, the temperature dropped 20 degrees, and it began to drizzle ! Cold, wet weather defeated the purpose of going to the lovely State Park, I thought, so we kept driving. Half an hour later, the sky cleared, and the temperature rose 20 degrees again. We stopped at a Native Casino and Travel Service Center at Crater Lake Junction to refill with diesel.
Joanne found an RV park listing in our new Passport America directory that appealed to me. A golf course and RV park near Klamath Falls, with Wi-Fi and cable TV. Oh boy, I could get our U.S. cell phone reactivated and watch Survivor tonight. An RV park attached to a golf course was likely to be fairly upscale, I thought. WRONG ! ! ! What a dump ! On an Indian Reservation ! I told Joanne when she went into the RV park office to register us, that I didn’t want to stay if ( 1 ) they wouldn’t honour the Passport America rate or ( 2 ) they didn’t have Wi-Fi or ( 3 ) they didn’t have cable TV. Well, they honoured the Passport America rate, but no Wi-Fi or cable TV. Goodbye !
We drove to a rest area south of Klamath Falls, just about at the California border for our third night of boondocking.
This morning I phoned Virgin Mobile in an attempt to reactivate our U.S. cell phone. I started the process online, at home last weekend. I had an assigned phone number, and simply needed to complete the activation process using the cell phone. For three days of travel I was unable to complete the activation process. The rest area that we stayed at overnight had Wi-Fi, so this morning I was able to use our “home” phone ( VoIP on the computer ) to phone Virgin Mobile. FORTY-FIVE ****ING MINUTES ON THE PHONE WITH TECH. SUPPORT ! ! ! And the problem is a technical one that requires three working days to fix, so … I have to phone them back next Tuesday to try again to reactivate the cell phone ! ! ! I don’t have the patience to be on the phone for 45 minutes while Tech. Support tries to solve a problem ! ! ! I am sorely tempted to simply discard the 2 year old Virgin Mobile phone and switch to a Tracfone, but I’ve already invested in a non-refundable Virgin Mobile top up card ! Tracfone next year for sure ! ! !
WOW … what a neat scam ! We just returned a product that we had purchased in Redmond, Oregon to a Wal-Mart near Redding, California . We paid no sales tax on the item in Oregon. The refund in California included sales tax. HA HA HA ! I’ve been sitting in the trailer after lunch working on the computer while Joanne went into Wal-Mart.
We left the rest area this morning and after a few minutes of continuing south on Hwy. 97 we were in California. We had to stop at an Agricultural Inspection Station at the border. California is “fussy” about fruits and vegetables coming into the state. Hwy. 97 ends at Weed, California when it reaches Interstate 5. While driving through Weed I noticed that a Chevron station had an “air and water” kiosk, and decided it would be a good idea to refill our fresh water holding tank. It would provide us another opportunity to boondock tonight if we could refill the fresh water and dump the shower waste holding tank. We refilled with fresh water at the Chevron, got onto Interstate 5, I pulled over onto the shoulder, and < ahem > opened the shower grey tank valve. I rarely do what is known as a “jungle dump”, and I have never done it on an Interstate highway before, but … it‘s only shower water ! So, now we were boondock capable again.
I-5 passed though, and over, the Shasta Mountains. When we came down on the south side of the Shasta Mountains, the temperature soared to the upper 70’s near Redding, California. We know from previous journeys that the good weather always starts at about Redding. When we stopped at Wal-Mart we were severely overdressed. At the rest area this morning the temperature was in the mid-40’s. Now it was in the high 70’s ! I was wearing a long sleeved, heavy sweatshirt and a fleece vest !
I put on a t-shirt, we had lunch, Joanne did a tiny bit of Wal-Martin’, and we continued south on I-5. At Corning we stopped to refill with diesel at a station that used to be a Flying J but was now a Love’s. HMPH … it was better as a Flying J. Use of the trailer dumping station was free when it was a Flying J. Love’s charges $5 to use the trailer dump station. Good thing I had refilled the fresh water and done that jungle dump earlier. HA HA HA !
In mid-afternoon we stopped briefly at a road side rest area. HEY … it had a trailer dump station, so … we decided to dump the kitchen waste holding tank. Now everything except the toilet waste holding tank was empty. Guess that jungle dump on the Interstate was a bit premature ! Late in the afternoon, just before dark, we stopped at a road side rest area about half an hour north of Sacramento to boondock overnight. We will likely make it all the way to SKP Park of the Sierras in the Sierra Nevada Mountains near Yosemite National Park tomorrow. We don’t normally drive from home to there in 5 days but … !
Friday ; Dunnigan to SKP Park of the Sierras near Coarsegold, California
Whew … I’m tired ! I had forgotten how stressful and tiring an entire day of driving a large rig on really congested California freeways can be, especially when it‘s the fifth day in a row of driving. And I had forgotten that from Sacramento south a couple of things happen ; ( 1 ) smog ! and ( 2 ) the drivers all become ***holes ! ! ! And by the time we reached Madera, our most southerly point today before turning east towards the Sierra Nevada Mountains, the temperature was 90 degrees ! Hellooooo, California !
We left the rest area this morning and continued south on I-5. Almost immediately we were enveloped in Sacramento’s smog … and very congested, very fast moving traffic. We drove through Sacramento on the freeway looking for a PetsMart and a Walgreens. Didn’t find either. Driving through Stockton later we found a PetsMart. WOO-HOO … more fun shopping for Bo. I got directions to a Walgreens in Stockton, halfway across the city. That was okay, because at some point today we were going to have to cross from I-5 to Hwy. 99. And driving through / across Stockton would take us from I-5 to Hwy. 99. So … some shopping at Walgreens, late lunch in the parking lot, then onto Hwy. 99 headed south.
We refilled with diesel at Love’s in Ripon. At Madera we turned east on Hwy. 145 heading towards the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Near the mountains we turned north onto Hwy. 41, and up into the Sierra Nevada Mountains to SKP Park of the Sierras near the village of Coarsegold, the town of Oakhurst, and Yosemite National Park. AHHHHH … this is one of our favourite places. We’ll likely stay here for three weeks, until after American Thanksgiving. We arrived today after the office was closed, so will spend the night in their boondock area and get assigned a site tomorrow morning. But … WOO-HOO, WOO-HOO, WOO-HOO … we did arrive in time to catch the tail end of the daily dog party in the dog park. HA HA HA HA HA … relax, Bo ! Bo actually recognized where we were just before we arrived and started going berserk in the truck.
Saturday ; Well, we drove 2000 km. / 1250 miles in five days to get here. We don’t usually drive that far that fast !
AHHHHH … what a nice place ! This morning we moved from the park’s boondocking area to our assigned site. What a lovely spot ! We spent much of the day getting caught up on miscellaneous cleaning and maintenance chores. A few days ago I bought a drain auger / plumbing “snake” to clean out the shower drain which has been draining very slowly lately. Today we “snaked” the shower drain. YIKES … what a lot of crap down there ! And what an improvement in draining ! ! ! Guess I’ll make that an annual chore.
Around 3 PM Bo started acting “antsy”, pacing and whining. Relax, Bo … the daily dog party doesn’t start for at least another hour. Does he have an internal clock ? ? ? Shortly after 4 PM we took him to the dog park for the daily dog party. Afterwards I went to the clubhouse to use Wi-Fi to get some online work done. Hmmm … a fairly decent rally in the stock market this week !
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