desert – Page 6 – The MoHo and Other Traveling Tales

Rick is King!

IT King Rick to the Rescue! (link to Rick’s help)

A great photo of Laurie and Odel at dinner at the Fishermans Market

Rick came to the rescue this morning with his comment on my last post with his great CNET download and instructions (linked above). What a great guy. I have to say this wouldn’t have been possible without my small purchase yesterday after Brian, the IT dude here at Catalina, hooked me up with a Wi-Fi booster. At first I was skeptical, but seeing my signal go from 1 to 11 with the simple addition of this little baby was great. I was able to download the software in a flash and with Rick’s clear instructions, in no time I had my photos back. Yes! So, maybe they aren’t the most fabulous photos in the world, but they are mine, and the Oasis is about 40 miles down the road in a direction we certainly didn’t want to do again in all the rain and flooded roads around here right now. THANK YOU RICK!!

Desert Rain

Jumping cholla at Desert Hot Springs 2007

Rain in the desert is a good thing. After months of drought, brilliant sunshine to a fault, temperatures that can reach 120 degrees, I would imagine that local folks in the Coachella Valley are drinking in this storm and loving it. I used to love the rain those long decades ago when I lived in Southern California. I played in the washes as a kid, filled with wild rushing chocolate brown water, leaping among the boulders and pretending I was Davy Crockett in a storm. I lived through all that somehow, and my daughter would gasp in horror if her kids tried the same thing.

I’m not so sure I will live through this storm, however, without some serious self talk. It is raining just about everywhere in the west, or at least anywhere we could manage to get to in our eleven days of MoHo time. It is snowing hard in Klamath, the power probably is out often enough to be a pain, and the satellite will no doubt need a bit of brushing to keep the channels up and running. Here in the desert, we don’t have to shovel the rain. We are somewhere new, seeing new sights, (through the rain of course) but new sights.

Miracle Hot Springs Pools Desert Hot Springs December 2008

Yesterday we drove east through Indio, (in the rain) to visit the Oasis Date Farm. We read a couple of reviews on the internet that made us laugh out loud. If you find those reviews, read them for entertainment, but don’t let them stop you from going to the original. The place was small, charming if not fancy, and I tasted at least a dozen kinds of dates and had a classic date shake. I’m not sure just what I think of the date shake, but the date palms are beautiful, stately and graceful, with a history that goes back 5,000 years and a sex life that seems to need the constant intervention of dedicated date farmers to function. I took a ton of photos, including a really cute one of Mo and Abby, and lots of graceful fronds against the dark skies. We drove back west to the larger, more fancy Shields Date Farm and as nice as it was, we were glad to have experienced the Oasis, even though it was many more miles east.

Blazing sun and cloudless skies Desert Hot Springs 2008 December

Our evening was filled with fun and friends and truly good food, sharing dinner with Laurie and Odel at the Fisherman’s Market in La Quinta. I was surprised at the reasonable prices and the truly fresh seafood. The menu was huge, with almost limitless choices, and I settled on a plate of Mahi Mahi, Salmon, and Shrimp, all grilled and teriyakeed to perfection. Not quite Key West, but close. I took more photos. including a really great shot of Laurie and Odel.

The rain pounded all night long, and the thick dark clouds made viewing the full eclipse of the moon impossible, even though I was awake at midnight, at the time of the most shadow. Yes, there are internet photos, my daughter took some great ones, other bloggers are posting as well about the beautiful night sky show. That’s great. Glad I didn’t take a photo.

This morning I went for another great long swim in the steaming pool, with rain falling on my face. It was wonderful. Thought about taking a photo of that as well, and almost ran back to the MoHo for the camera, fantasizing water level shots with the cloudy sky above the steam. Sure glad I didn’t. Later this morning, we drove over to the Sands RV Resort to play some great table shuffleboard with our friends and forgot to take some photos. Good thing.

Clear blue skies in Joshua Tree NP December 2007

This evening, settling in to the twilight, I carefully took the SD card out of the camera, selected all the photos to move, and somehow hit a key, an unknown key on the LEFT side, NOT the delete key, and BLIP! Gone. Every single photo, just gone. How the heck does that happen? Of course, they are nowhere, into the ethers. External stuff doesn’t delete to the recycle bin, we all know that. I have no idea where they went, but they are truly gone.

Ah well, I have entirely too many photos anyway, something like 43,000 just here on this computer since 2001 or so. Who knows what I will find hiding there someday, but it won’t be photos of the Oasis Date Farm or Laurie and Odel at dinner.

Traveling south to Desert Hot Springs

Rain in the desert is often lovely, except when I have dreamed of blue skies and warm sun and planned a major MoHo run south to find it. We have had snow and dark skies in Klamath for several weeks now, and my week in Florida was challenged by 20 degree weather. A long trek to the Coachella Valley should be the remedy. I think the weather forecasts show a bit of a break next Thursday. Last night, however, the skies were beautiful, with soft shades of pink and rose among the gray, cream, and yellow lit clouds.

A quick run south, leaving behind the cold and snow of Rocky Point, is only possible because we decided to store the MoHo in Redding this winter. Enclosed, insulated storage isn’t cheap, and we tried for the smallest unit possible. We also decided to forego winterizing thinking that the temperatures in Redding rarely drop below freezing. The water tanks were all empty and the lines emptied out, but we didn’t do anything else before parking in mid November. It was with a bit of trepidation that we opened up the big sliding door. Everything turned out just fine, with the trickle charger keeping the battery charged up and the house batteries were still even on 12.6. We brought along a couple of gallons of water to fill the tank and everything worked just fine. Although next time when we pull into the storage spot we will have some pink stuff in the drains, at least.

See that gorgeous sun in the photo above? The trip over Mt Shasta on I-5 to Redding was gorgeous once we left the icy freezing fog behind in the Klamath Basin and Highway 97. Little did we know that was the last time we would see brilliant sunshine for a long time. I am still waiting. By the time we got to our stop over point in Lodi, the rain was coming down hard. We hoped to get to the desert with only one overnight stop, requiring 400 mile driving days. By the time we reached the Flag City RV Resort in Lodi we were worn out. We shared the driving duties, but it still is a very long haul. Flag City is really nothing more than a reasonably comfortable stopover, with perfectly level cement pull through sites, and full hookups including fast Wi-Fi and cable. I have no idea what else the park offers because we didn’t care in the least. The MoHo was stopped, and everything we needed was right inside our cozy home.

On Friday we thought our trip to the desert would be about 8 hours of driving so thought leaving at 9 would be just fine for a 5 pm arrival. We didn’t factor in the hard, driving rain, or the plan to take HWY 58 through Tehachapi rather than brave LA traffic. As dark fell on the desert we still had 90 minutes to go before reaching our camp. We took 247 south from Barstow rather than drive through Victorville and all the traffic there as well. It’s a narrow road with lots off ups and downs, but oh soooo beautiful. It looked like a lot of BLM land, open and free, and in the coming desert twilight it was all I could do to keep from begging Mo to just head out into the desert and boondock.

When we finally arrived at the Desert Pools RV Park, I remembered again why we try to never, never, never land after dark. Everything was strange, the night person didn’t have our reservation, and offered to let us stay for one night only “off the road”. Somehow I had messed up the reservation (they don’t take them) and instead I opted for the “just come in and talk to the hosts and you can stay for two days”. Dumb. Of course, the fact that the park had recently disconnected their cable service wasn’t exactly a good thing either. After a long day on the road we at least wanted Wi-Fi and TV. Otherwise I would be back boondocking in that gorgeous desert! Mo is a little bit easier about these kinds of things than I am, and I wasn’t much fun to be around that night I am sure.

In the light off day, the park was every bit as ugly as it appeared the night before. The pool was small and brown as were the three spas. We took the dog for a walk and everyone was just so dang friendly! The night host came up to us and urged us to stay, saying the park was “so much fun with a lot going on”. I guess we aren’t very social, because that actually sounded just awful to me. Although the hot cinnamon rolls in the dining room were pretty good.

Our original plan was to spend six days at the Catalina RV Park and Spa, so we called them hoping for a chance to come in a day early. Success! With great relief, we packed up and didn’t even bother to hook up to drive the half mile back to the Catalina. Through the gate and immediately we could see the difference. Even though this is a very large park, with spaces fairly close together, there are trees and shrubs between sites, and while our site is on packed sandy dirt, it isn’t so bad that we couldn’t level the rig without blocks. The cloudy, threatening skies were breaking here and there with a bit of lightness, so that helped my mood a lot as well. Thank goodness! Our plan now is to spend the day adjusting to the local area, do some driving around, and just try to catch up a bit. Wi-Fi is still an issue, but hopefully I can find a spot somewhere around to actually get on the internet.

October 1 Boondocking on 447

Yesterday, as we left Ely, we both thought that our last night out would be a great time to actually boondock. Looking at the map, there were many miles of open range, what looked to be a lot of BLM land, and we imagined that finding a wide place to pull out would be simple.

What we didn’t count on was the temperatures in late afternoon along our route. Nevada is hot. Most of the time, Nevada is hot. I know this, but after all, it IS the last day of September. After turning north on 447 from the Sparks area we started looking for a boondock site. What wasn’t at first noticeable on the map that I was using was that many miles of the route were included in the Pyramid Lake Indian Reservation, not a place to try to camp without specific permission.

The other problem was the temperature. It was five o’clock in the evening and the gauge read 100 degrees. Stopping for just a few minutes to take a break and let the dog walk around a bit gave us a pretty good indication that we couldn’t really settle in until the sun went down, or we found a shady side of the hill. We continued past Gerlock, and after several miles found a wide place in the road that would suffice, but I had a vague memory of a small lake and camping spot where Mo and I had stopped on a day trip in 2003. There was nothing on my map, but the phone, when it worked sporadically, showed some green areas a bit distant, so we kept going.

The best moment of the day was rounding a steep curve and dropping down to the small reservoir, then realizing that the closed gate wasn’t locked. The signs indicated private property but allowed recreational use if the rules were followed. After some maneuvering, we settled the MoHo into a wide spot on a bumpy road, managed to get level, and opened up the fans and doors to the cooling evening breezes.

We camped with the slide closed, but still had plenty of room to cook a good supper and relax with a movie. I have to thank Laurie Brown once more for helping us to finally understand our inverter! We have traveled in the MoHo for two years without understanding that the tv and dvd would work if the inverter was on.

The night was starlit and perfectly still, and even though we were fairly close to the road, the closed gate and complete absence of traffic made it feel perfectly safe. I watched the sun rise this morning over the basalt hills and felt incredibly grateful for this perfect last night. Our trip home today through Alturas is on familiar roads and landscapes. Mt Shasta will rise up in the distance to mark the passage and tell us we are close to home.

I will call my daughter, we will stop at Fred Meyer for gas and groceries for home, we will dump the tanks at our local city park on the way out to Rocky Point. This trip of 7,714 miles will end, and it will be time to start thinking about the next one.

There are a few more photos for this last day of travel linked here>

HOME, BOTH OF THEM

September 30 The Loneliest Road in America

In July of 1986, Life Magazine described Nevada’s Highway 50 from Ely to Fernley as the “Loneliest Road in America”. Life said that there were no attractions or points of interest along the 287 mile stretch of road and recommended that drivers have “survival skills” to travel the route.

Things have changed a bit, but not much. The biggest change is in the vehicles we drive along these roads rather than the roads themselves. I remember desert driving and the days of vapor lock, overheated engines, flat tires, and no air conditioning. Cars seem to be made better these days, and we cruise along at 70 miles per hour without a thought about our survival. There really is quite a lot to see in Ely, and we plan to return, especially to visit the Great Basin National Park on the eastern edge of Nevada. We also want to come back to check out Ely’s treasure: The Nevada Northern Railway Museum, touted by the Smithsonian as the most complete authentic railroad complex in the country.

That is what we are doing today, cruising along, covering the distance on US 50 instead of I-80, enjoying the eyeball stretching vistas of the high Nevada desert. There are a couple of towns between Ely and Fernley where we will turn north toward the Black Rock Desert. Eureka and Austin are both historic mining towns from the heyday of Nevada history in the late 19th century. We will stop and take photos, enjoy the stories, and the time travel provided at these outposts before moving on down the road. At Gerlach, we will pass the sandy roads leading to the Black Rock Desert where the wild ones have their Burning Man festival every year.

Somewhere in the middle of nowhere, we saw a large group of road bikers pedaling up the long grades, supported by a couple of vans in pursuit. At the same time, we saw a lonely man walking in the opposite direction up another grade with some sort of walk.com sign on his back. Then nothing again but low sage and rabbitbrush and the distant hills. The air again is smoky, not in the concentrated way that it was yesterday in Utah, but high hazy widespread smoke that extends as far west and north as we can see, even from the summits. We are traveling west again through basin and range, so the MoHo is climbing the ranges and dropping into the basins repeatedly shifting gears as we go up, then down, then up, then more down. Glad I am not on a bike!

This morning in our full hookup park, I took the time to cook a good breakfast and clean the house a bit. In the process of cleaning the toilet, adding extra water to help with the black water flush to come, I suddenly dropped the large cleaning washcloth right down into the holding tank. Ugh! I freaked out, but Mo patiently bent a hanger, fished around in there, and got the thing out of the tank before anything got terribly clogged up. Kind of amazing that we actually had one simple wire hangar in the closet among all the fancy lightweight things I have for our clothes. I got all teary and realized that the stress of dropping a washcloth into the sewage holding tank shouldn’t be THAT bad, and thought, gee, maybe I am sad about the trip coming to a close.

Today and tomorrow we will continue our trek across the deserts and over the Warners into the Klamath Basin, to the base of the Cascade Mountains. Home. I am sure it will take a bit of settling in to really appreciate being there and not here, traveling along some highway with ever changing views out the windows.

There are a some more photos for this day linked here>