Abbey's Road

OK, now what?

Last year I really enjoyed Lake Tahoe, especially the town of S. Lake Tahoe. It was also the scene of my infamous dog bowl accident so I wanted to go back this year and try to do some of the hikes I missed out on last year. And, of course, I wanted to visit my favorite coffee shop, the Alpina Café. I managed to go there everyday, though most days I drank tea. I actually go there for the free wifi and for the atmosphere. It’s mostly a local crowd and there’s usually at least one good conversation to eavesdrop on. This year an added bonus was the cute, friendly blonde working behind the counter most days I went. What more could you ask for? The coffee is good too, I’m sure.

This year I stayed the whole time on the south shore at Fallen Leaf Lake. Most mornings Abbey and I would get up and take a walk by the lake. Sometimes Abbey would even go in which would really wake her up. I prefer tea for my morning wakeup. This year we parked closer to the lake and it was great except for the last night. I came back to my site before going out to dinner and someone had taken it. They thought I had left since I didn’t leave anything at the site. I was pretty ticked but they weren’t around so the rangers couldn’t ask them to move so I just found another site. Next time I’ll leave a chair out just to make sure. I went out and enjoyed a nice dinner anyways at a place that the cute blonde had recommended. Funny thing was that when I showed up, she was there at the bar. Imagine that. Too bad she was with a guy friend. She was a bit young anyways.

I took a chance and took Abbey on hikes two days in a row. Both days we did between 5 and 6 miles so I was a little worried, but they were both fairly level hikes. Each one had plenty of water and even a little bit of snow on the trail, both of which helped keep Abbey going. The second day she was playing in the lake by a dock and a couple hiking came down to take a break. We started talking while Abbey was entertaining them and I found out that they grew up in Kingston, NY, where I first started working for IBM. The guy had worked for IBM, though not in Kingston. Of course, they were RVers too, though not fulltimers. Below are Round Lake, Echo Lake, and Echo and Upper Echo Lakes.

I didn’t take many pictures there this year, and none of Lake Tahoe itself, because I took a lot last year. If you didn’t see them last year, you can still check them out in the archive by clicking here. On Friday morning we headed north out of town and saw the more touristy, not-so-nice side of S. Lake Tahoe. What was really funny was that as soon as you crossed the Nevada border there were casinos waiting for you. And I mean literally as soon as you crossed the border. The sign indicating the border was on the street corner and on the other side of the sidewalk was the casino. Welcome to Nevada! I drove through Reno on my way north with the benefit of being able to stop in and stock up once again at Trader Joe’s. I can’t help myself when I go in there, but I did manage somehow to get out for less than 100 bucks this time. We passed back into California and I was hoping to get fairly close to Lake Shasta before stopping. On the way, I pulled off down a dirt road that had a glorified puddle running alongside of it that couldn’t have been more than 50x20. But that was all it took for Abbey to entertain herself for close to an hour. I figured she needed it after being in the RV so long. After looking for nearly an hour trudging down one dirt road after another I found a place to pull over and park for the night on the edge of the national forest. It wasn’t great but it was free.

Saturday we drove to Lake Shasta to meet up with 2 fulltimers who are actually younger than I am. I met Brian and Leigh back in New Mexico in March when we were all freezing our butts off. I had a nice dinner with them then, so this time it was my turn to reciprocate. They ended up showing up pretty late, but it was a good thing. When I asked about the campground Leigh had picked out at the visitor center the woman smiled and said, “Well, let’s just say your neighbors will be a little unusual.” I checked it out anyways. It was supposed to be shoreline camping, but it was more on a hillside because the lake levels were so high and the people there definitely seemed to be the “Coors Light crowd”, as Leigh called it, with the beer flowing and the music blaring. I pulled over on the side to figure out what to do next and when I started up again, I heard this “Thump, thump, thump” followed by a loud hissing noise. It turned out to be my first flat. I had run over a rock just the right size in just the right spot for it to get wedged between the two rear tires on my right side (I have dual rear wheels on each side in back.) I tried to pump it back up with my handy little compressor and it held for a while until I hit 70 psi which apparently was its breaking point. When I crawled underneath I could see a big gash in the sidewall. So I slowly drove up to a marina and when I couldn’t budge the lug nuts with the cheap wrench they give you, I called my emergency roadside service. A big, young guy named Lurch came to my rescue in only 45 minutes. Even he had trouble getting the lug nuts off so I didn’t feel so bad. Another hour later and I was back on the road, but still with no campground and no Leigh and Brian. Suffice it to say that I found a decent spot for the night for all of us and made a nice dinner of chicken with pasta and pesto. We had a great time catching up and swapping stories of flat tires and other disasters.

Sunday morning it was on to Cottage Grove, OR where I agreed at the last minute to do an RV Care-A-Vanner build with Habitat for Humanity. I’ll be there for about 2 weeks working with a group of RVers working with the local affiliate on one of their houses. I was on the waiting list and someone cancelled at the last minute. So those of you who were worried that I was getting to used to being a bum can feel better that I will at least be doing something constructive for at least 2 weeks.

Posted by Ed at 8:30 PM | Permalink

In the campground just west of Sonora Pass I saw 2 forms of “camping” I had never seen before. There was a Swiss couple next to me who had shipped their Toyota Landcruiser over to the States and they had this expandable sleeping compartment that sat on top of the roof rack of the car. It looked kind of like the extendable roofs that VW campers have, but you can’t access it from the car. They had a little ladder on the side they used to climb up into it. They also had something on the side called a Safari Snorkel but don’t even ask me what that’s for. I have no idea. The other funny thing I saw was a group of 3 pickups that all had regular mattresses in the bed of the truck. One had a tarp rigged up over the truck bed, another had something that looked like a tent over the bed, and the 3rd just opted for sleeping under the stars in their sleeping bag on top of the mattress. Quite bizarre.

Anyways, in the morning we made the daunting climb (26% grade in spots!) up to the top of Sonora pass. It was real slow going but other than that and using a ton of gas it was fine. We stopped at the top to do a little exploring and playing in the snow.

There were some people who put climbing skins on their skis and were hiking up the mountain so they could ski down. I wasn’t quite as technically prepared so I grabbed a garbage bag, Abbey and I climbed up the slope and I used the time-tested method of sliding down on my butt with the garbage bag helping to keep me from getting completely soaked. It was a little bumpy, but it was a fun ride.

After eating lunch while checking out the view from the pass, we made our way down the other side unscathed. I found a spot to do a moderate hike to Secret Lake, a nice little sub-alpine lake on the eastern slope of the Sierras. Going up the trail I quickly overtook another guy who was going quite slowly. I was just going to say hello and pass on by, but he started talking to me right away so I didn’t want to be rude. He was an interesting guy, but boy did he like to talk. I didn’t mind so much, but I had planned to leave Abbey for only an hour or two. We stopped at the lake and had a long, leisurely lunch and it turned into a 5 hour hike. Abbey turned out to be fine as usual and it’s not like I had anywhere important to go.

I decided I wanted to do some boondocking so I took a dirt forest service road towards a couple of campgrounds in hopes of finding something along the way. About a mile before the first campground we found a nice wide open spot by a stream and stayed there for the night. It turns out there is a hot spring right down the stream from where we camped. I only found out because some people came by asking if it was nearby, and in the morning when I was walking Abbey by the stream I saw it on the other side. So after breakfast I treated myself to a soak in the spring. It was great lying in the hot water watching the cold water in the stream rush by only a few feet away. Not a bad way to start the day. Later we drove over to a place called Twin Lakes and after having lunch I let Abbey play in the stream for a while. Then I took a hike up to another sub-alpine lake, though this one didn’t turn out to be that nice of a lake. At least the views were nice. There were a whole bunch of campgrounds near there, but I decided to save a few bucks and go back to our boondocking spot. I figured another soak in the hot spring in the morning would make the bumpy, washboard road worthwhile. Then it’s on to Lake Tahoe.

Posted by Ed at 8:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I’ve been to the mountain. I can die now. Well…maybe not yet. But I finally made it to Yosemite. Mary Beth and I had always wanted to come here, but we never made it. At least now I can say I have. Believe it or not, I wasn’t overwhelmed at first. Maybe it’s because I’ve been to so many beautiful places lately, or maybe it’s because the Kupecs treated me so well, not to mention fed me pretty well, too. Maybe it was the gray, cloudy weather the first day. Or, maybe it’s just because I’m slow. But it didn’t take too long for the sense of awe to settle in. Everywhere you look there are granite walls (and crazy people climbing them) and waterfalls. Being spring still, the waterfalls were spectacular – raging torrents and mist as heavy as rainstorms.

I know it’s hard to believe, but some of them were so loud that Abbey was scared of the noise. Yosemite Falls is the 5th highest waterfall in the world, and what’s amazing is that you can see it from almost everywhere in the valley and many points above.

And it is just one of the many waterfalls (during spring and early summer) in the park. Half Dome dominates the view from most places. The funny thing is that geologists were so upset about the name that they refused to accept it for over 50 years. They said that only about 1/8 of it broke off. I guess 7/8’s Dome just didn’t have the same ring. El Capitan is said to be the largest slab of granite in the world, but that doesn’t make me want to go out and climb it. About 2000 people a year feel otherwise, even though it takes most of them 3-5 days to do it. I can’t imagine them getting a good night’s sleep. Enough of the accolades. Yosemite is just a really cool place. And I didn’t even get to go into the backcountry at all. Tioga Rd. was still not open for the season. It’s projected to open June 16th, so I missed it by about a week. The good and bad thing about Yosemite is that it is different in every season. Good because you can see a different place in each season and no matter when you go there is something beautiful to see. Bad because you have to be able to go back many times to enjoy it all.

I actually didn’t do a lot of hiking while I was there. Partly because of Abbey, partly because you don’t have to hike much to see many of the sites, and partly because I’m out of shape and was worried about my knee. But on my second full day there I decided to do the Panorama Trail from Glacier Point, high above the valley, down to the valley floor. It’s an 8.5 mile trail that goes past 2 of the year-round falls and has views of many of the main sites. Glacier Point is about 2000 ft. above the valley floor. There are 2 ways to get to the start – hike up the 2000 ft. in 4 miles (on the aptly named 4 Mile Trail), or take a tour bus. I thought $20 for the one-way “tour” (glorified hiker’s shuttle) was a bit steep, but not as steep as the 4 Mile Trail so I opted to fork over the cash and save my legs. After my experience with my knee on my last couple of hikes I was a bit worried so I brought my hiking sticks along (sorry Tommy). I was still debating on using them (OK, so I’m vain), until I saw an attractive blonde woman in her 30s or 40s using them. So I decided if they were good enough for her, they were good enough for me. The sticks must have done the trick as my knees held out pretty good. I only felt a slight twinge now and then. The trail was incredible with great views of 3 different waterfalls that you can’t see from the valley floor. Plus, it was nearly all downhill. I felt bad, though, ‘cause I left Abbey for nearly 7 hours. So to make it up to her I took her on a walk on the bike path through the valley. Part of it was still flooded so she had a ball playing in the water for most of the time. She entertained many park visitors with her “fishing” routine and her normal antics in the water.

I am now sitting in a campground at the beginning of the steep climb to Sonora Pass. Since Tioga Pass is closed, and I wanted to go to the east side of Yosemite, I had to go countless miles and hours out of the way. Luckily, I stopped at a ranger station before starting up the road to the pass where I found out that the road up is a 26% grade (to put it in perspective, the most I’ve ever done in my RV is about 12%) and it goes for about 20 miles. Seeing that it was almost 5PM I decided to stop in the last campground before the pass. I had had enough (and I’m sure Abbey did too) of steep winding roads for one day. Besides this area is beautiful so I don’t mind spending the night here. Tomorrow I’m headed to Highway 395 and the eastern slope of the Sierras. I’m not sure where I’ll stay, but I’m sure it will be pretty nice. Next time I come back to Yosemite, though, I want to come in summer so I can backpack up in the high country. I can’t imagine anything much better. (Can you guess that I drank a little wine while I was writing this? I guess it got my creative juices flowing a bit!)

Posted by Ed at 7:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I arrived on Saturday a few hours after Steve and Mimi and the kids left for the weekend. It’s kind of become an annual event – I come into town Memorial Day weekend and they go away. Luckily, a mutual friend of ours, Dennis, was going to take his sailboat out for a spin on San Francisco Bay and invited me along. The first day the wind was quite light in the morning and we weren’t making a lot of headway until we decided to take the reef out of the main sail. (Sorry for all the sailing lingo, but suffice it to say that we were hoping to get more speed because of the light wind.) As you would expect, the wind picked up considerably within minutes so we had to re-reef the main. It turned out to be a good sail after all and lunch in the cockpit back at the marina was just as good. Not only can Dennis sail, he can cook too. I brought Abbey to the marina in the RV so Dennis and I took her for a walk along the bay where she managed to find a few dead fish. After feeding Abbey Dennis and I headed into San Francisco to a blues club. We got the last seats in the place, but unfortunately they were right under the speakers. It was so loud that the sound vibrations blew out our candle twice. The band put on a great show, though. They were really smokin’.

On Monday we headed out again, this time, Tim, a friend of Dennis who works with him, and an old friend of Tim’s came along. Tim grew up sailing so he was having a ball trimming the sails trying to catch more wind and improve our speed. The wind was pretty constant and pretty much ideal all day. It was another great day and another great lunch back at the dock.

Steve, Mimi, Katie and Sean came home on Tuesday, but the kids had school so things were pretty mild ‘til the weekend. Friday night we hit a Greek Festival and the partying continued on Saturday at one of their neighbors who was turning 50. They had the perfect party backyard.- a kidney-shaped pool with fountains, a bar with a built-in grill, 2 refrigerators and a keg tap, an outdoor fireplace, a smoker and the piece de resistance – a wood-fired pizza oven that they had just installed that week. The food was unbelievable and they had Rolling Rock on top. I’m sure my friends from the University of Delaware have fond memories of drinking some Rocks back in their college days. Steve and I certainly had our share, but the only problem was we were supposed to make scalloped potatoes that night for a cookout the next day. Mimi was too nervous watching us using a razor-sharp mandolin to slice the potatoes that she went to bed. It actually didn’t turn out too bad, which is more than I can say for Steve. We were supposed to go sailing with Dennis again early Sunday morning, but someone (I won’t mention who) was a bit under the weather. He claims it must’ve been the food.

I haven’t been out sailing in a long time so going for the 3rd time in a week was a real treat. And the last day was definitely the best. Mary, Dennis’ partner in the boat, Dennis’ brother, Dave, and I picked the perfect day for a sail on the bay. We made such good time that we made it almost all the way to San Francisco. It was too bad that I didn’t bring my camera along that day. We got some great views of the city. To make things more exciting the wind picked up right at the end and we hit a new speed record for the boat at a whopping 5.38 knots. I know that doesn’t sound real impressive, but it sure felt like we were flying. After sailing I met Mimi and the recovered Steve and the kids at yet another cookout with some more great food and drinks. After this weekend I felt like I needed a rest. Tomorrow we’re saying goodbye to the Kupecs and heading for Yosemite for 3 nights. It’s always a great time when I visit here, and if you know the Kupecs you know there’s always plenty of good food around. They are like family to me. As Sean said, it’s like a pitstop for Abbey and me. Abbey didn’t get a lot of exercise this week but she did get a lot of attention and she had lots of great grass to roll in.

The Skipper The Crack Crew
The Kupecs (I finally remembered)

Posted by Ed at 2:54 AM | Permalink