Nuestra casa rodante - Our Airstream, travels and such…

We just got a Toyota Camry Hybrid to replace our 4Runner.  Roxie does a bit of driving for her job, not to mention the 20 miles each way to/from work.  We looked at the Prius but it didn’t have enough of the amenities we had become accustomed to.  Heated seats, dual climate control, power seats, etc.

So, on Saturday (24th), we decided to take a trip through Yosemite.  Remember that this was Memorial Day weekend so we realized that it might be a bit busy.  We weren’t expecting a sold day of rain and SNOW!  We ran into snow at Wawona and Crane Flat.  It was rain everywhere else.  Bridalveil falls was flowing very good and we decided to take the .8 mile walk to the base and back.  I got SOAKED.  No hat and a thin coat was not a good combination.  I felt sorry for the people in tents.  We couldn’t find a place to eat so we had a picnic in the car.

We came back down 120 through Groveland.  On 49 to Coulterville, then down toward Merced via Merced Falls and Snelling.

We went about 350 miles that day and averaged over 30 miles/gallon.

It is a weird thing to drive the hybrid.  When you are going slow you can be on electric only.  Just cruising along with no sound.  You also learn how to maximize the mileage.  There a realtime gauge on the dash that lets you see what your current usage is.

We have gone through two tanks and almost have 800 miles on it now.  Very fun.

One of the trips discussed at the AirForums was one to San Felipe, MX. We had been two other times with some other friends. It is a nice place to go and relax. This time we were going to go to a different place in San Felipe. As the plans were being formed it appeared that 5-7 Airstream units were showing up. As time got closer, people dropped out. It ended up being us and Ron and Debbie in their Airstream motorhome.

We left home on a Wednesday with reservations at an RV park in El Centro. We were to meet Ron and Debbie there to ‘caravan’ together down to San Felipe. The drive is a 400 mile trek for us and it seemed we would never get there. We left about 8:30am and go there about 12 hours later. We made SO MANY stops but we kept telling ourselves we are in no hurry. I also was trying was to slow down with the trailer for safety and MPG, more on that later. We got there and did not disconnect. I just connected the electric and put down the corner jacks. I took a shower and we went to bed, Roxie a bit sooner than I. It was weird to not disconnect but it sure made it easier in the AM.

We got going around 9am, made it through the border with no incidents. They asked if I brought any weapons (I didn’t). The drive took us about 2 1/2 hours. We stopped by to see Ron and Debbie’s house they are building down there and then went on to Playa Bonita. It was a little interesting to get into the RV ‘park’. I had to pull past the gate, back up a road to the left so I could align myself to go through the 10′ gate. We had the second spot from the water reserved (Ron and Debbie had the closest one), but when we got there we thought the third one looked better, it was much shadier. Her is a pic.

Here is the view from our trailer.

The beach was about 30 steps from our trailer. We went down there quite a few times. The RV ‘park’ also has condos there. It does have full hookups with 30amp service and good water pressure.

We went into town a few times to walk around, have some Mexican food and buy souvenirs. You can get 2 fish tacos, rice and beans for about $2.50 US. Everybody is very friendly and always trying to sell you something.

On Saturday we went to the 2nd Annual San Felipe Blues Festival. We started at 10:30 but it was pretty sunny later in the day so we bugged out back to the trailer (about 2 blocks) for a siesta. We went back about 6 and stayed to the end. It was fun, there were good bands and some not so good bands. It was fun to watch all the people which were primarily Americans that had moved down there. Very few local Mexicans there.

We finished up on Sunday by picking up some more things for people back home. I got my boss and one of my staff (we had a contest) 2 wrestler masks (like in the movie Nacho Libre). They all liked them. I also filled up the truck with diesel at a PEMEX station.  It was $2.10/gal!!!!   Wish I had a bigger tank with me.  Earlier that day Roxie got up early to take this shot of the sunrise (we are on the east coast of Baja).

Monday we made it back to the states. Ron and Debbie went via the east border checkpoint. We had always gone through the main one in downtown Mexicali. Once we got in line it took us about 15-20 minutes to get through. I guess it helped to have a unfriendly border guard. We said goodbye to Ron and Debbie in El Centro and we headed on to Anza Borrego State Park.

I had always remembered going here as a child in our Airstream so instead of heading home in one day we spent a couple of nights there. It is very quiet at night there and Roxie got a bit spooked when she heard coyotes in the distance yipping away.

On Tuesday it was very windy so we thought we would take a trip out of the desert. I remembered that the town of Julian was close by. Julian holds an interesting place in the Smith family history. Back in 1969, my parents tried to buy some land in Julian. The idea was to build a KOA kampground there. We were very close to purchasing the property when a bizarre thing happened. The lady that had the property also had a donkey, supposedly a world famous donkey. The donkey died, the lady buried it on the property and then she decided that she could not sell the property anymore. If that would have gone through, my life would have changed drastically. I am happy how it has turned out so far. I tried to find out some information about this lady and where the property was but the historical society was closed.

We headed back home on Wednesday. We were surprised to see someone towing a Bowlus on the freeway near Redlands. It had a few windows out and the front door was either open or gone. It had temporary tail lights and the axle did not look correct. But it sure was neat to see one. There was no reaction from the driver as we passed.

Since we came down through the LA basin we returned via I-15 through Victorville and the high desert. However this time, in a change of pace, we took State Route 18 (which becomes 138) to Palmdale. We normally go to State Route 58 then down through Bakersfield. We stayed on 138 which would take us to I-5 near Gorman. We were surprised to see a HUGE amount of California Golden Poppies in the fields and on the hills.

We find out further down the road that this is the location of the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve.  Very nice this time of year.  It was a nice way to end our trip.

I have other photos at my Flickr account if you would like to see them.

I mentioned previously about going slower in our trailer.  I thought I would run an experiment on this trip regarding safety and MPG.  This post by Rich Luhr got me thinking this way.  At 60mph, it is easier to handle the trailer, it is not too noticable since my truck outweighs the trailer by 50%.  I don’t have to worry about law enforcement at all.  I can cruise right on by a CHP with radar at 60mpg.  I don’t have to worry about passing anyone.  When is the last time you saw anyone doing 55 on the freeway?  The biggest plus is the MPG.  I have an option on the truck where one of the displays shows your MPG.  I don’t rely on it too heavily but on the trip down to Mexico, it never went below 15mpg.  I will take that ANY day while towing.  I did keep track of the entire fuel cost ($387), mileage (1290) and gallons (95.7).  My MPG for the whole trip was 13.48.  It could have been better but we had horrendous headwinds by Palm Springs and the high desert.

I am convinced about towing at 60MPH.  I normally would tow at 65 and if I had on this trip it would have saved us a total of less than 2 hours of time.   My MPG would have been down to around 11-12 so we also saved there.

As part of my job in the local education field there are meetings to go to. Oftentimes these meetings are in Sacramento. This was one such time. I had meetings on the Thursday and Friday before spring break was starting for our daughter so we thought it would be good to incorporate a mini-vacation into this.

I took the trailer up to the Sacramento KOA on Wednesday. This was the first time I have ever towed the trailer any distance by myself and I DID NOT hit anything (so there Rich)! I went to my meetings. I remember some of them comparing what they were paying (or rather their offices) per night for motels. I stated $160, then I added that was for 4 nights. All of their prices were for one night. I stayed two nights by myself (another first) and then Roxie and Hannah came up on the Amtrak and I picked them up. Coincidentally our niece had a birthday party that we attended on Saturday. We headed over the San Francisco on Sunday.

We stayed at the San Francisco RV Resort, south of SF in Pacifica. I investigated the other RV park, down by Candlestick park but it did not seem appealing. Kind of like the park at CAL Expo. The location of the SF RV Resort is great. Right on the ocean, we were backed up to the cliff. The showers are EXCELLENT and the restrooms are very nice also. The entire park is asphalt and there are many ‘permanents’. The spots can be short and they want you to keep all vehicles within the lines. This posed to be a problem since we didn’t get the spot that we reserved.

I emailed to change our reservation back one day and I stated this. However, I also gave them the wrong dates, I added one day AND one month. They followed the ‘new’ dates. When we checked in, there was no reservation. Since they were not busy we still had a spot but it was shorter than the one reserved. This meant we couldn’t actually get both vehicles in the space. So we parked next to our trailer. It turned out that no one bothered us about it.

The first day we drove to the South San Francisco BART station. I chose this one over the Colma station because the parking was free at SSF. We rode it downtown and were planning on riding the Cable Cars to Fisherman’s Wharf and do the ‘tourist’ thing. The Cable Car line was very long. I remembered that the SF Muni system had a line of streetcars that they have acquired from other cities and it ran between Market St and the Wharf. However, that line was too long also. We asked at the Muni desk and they told us to take the 30 route. It was fun to take a local route and see a different route that we would normally see.

The Wharf has become very much more shopping oriented, lots of stores on the streets. Roxie and I remember when it was still more of a true wharf where the catches were brought in and distributed immediately. We had lunch at a restaurant called Capurro’s. It was a very nice place, nice atmosphere and good food. The manager(/owner?) was very friendly. Recommended. The last stop was Pier 39. I had never been there. It was more food and shopping. Here is a photo from there.

The next day Hannah decided to stay at the trailer and live on the internet all day. Roxie and I went across the Golden Gate Bridge to Muir Woods National Monument. Muir Woods is a very nice and relaxing place. The road to get there is very exciting (no trailer this time). We took the walk, saw a banana slug and another grove of Redwoods that we have not seen before. After Muir Woods we went to Sausalito for lunch. We drove down the main street, past the GEORGEOUS view of SF but did not find anything that looked interesting. We turned around (on some pretty interesting streets for the truck) and back again. We settled at Saylor’s Restaurant. I was very pleasantly surprised. I had probably one of the best restaurant burgers that I ever had, also recommended. On the way back ‘home’ we went through part of the Strybing Arboretum in Golden Gate Park.

While we were gone, Hannah called and talked about a para-sailer that was flying around behind the trailer. In reading some of my blogs that Bobby, Danine and Elise saw the same thing shortly after we were there.

The third day we went to the Exploratorium. We got there just at the time that schools were leaving so it worked out real well. There were many different exhibits as usual but we unable to make it to the Tactile Dome.

One thing that I found interesting was driving over the hill in Pacifica. We were without the trailer and came over a hill. A sign stated that it was a 17% grade coming up. I was amazed that there was a street with that type of grade. There may be some in SF that are more but this was pretty interesting. We turned the corner and there was a sign about an 18% grade(!) coming next. It was fun!

We then had our usual drive home, the worst part of any trip.

It has been a while since I have posted and, therefore, it has been a while since we visited the San Clemente State Beach.  It was during the first weekend of February.  It was with the California group from AirForums, the rallies are discussed in this thread.

We got there on Thursday and stayed in the full hookup loop, others were in the no hookup sites.  The weather was not too bad during the day but it did get cold at night.  We did the tourist thing on Saturday and went to the San Juan Capistrano Mission.  It was one of the first times that we had been to a mission without a child’s project riding upon a visit.

The saturday night pot luck was fun.  The weather was managable with the bonfire.  We had it at a campsite that was on a plateau overlooking the ocean and sunset.

After leaving San Clemente we took an extra day and went to Bolsa Chica State Beach.  They have a policy of not allowing you into the spots until 2pm.  They do enforce this.  So, since we were there early, we ate some lunch until we would could go in.  Essentially it is a parking lot(s) with hookups.  We had a spot that backed up to the beach.  We could see the Catalinas and oil rigs from our back window

The primary reason to extend the stay was to visit with my birthfather who lives nearby.

All in all it was a fun trip but it is pretty exciting driving around the LA basin with the trailer.

We made it back from our week’s long excursion. We started on Thursday and, as I was hooking up, I noticed that one of the trailer tires was starting to split in the tread. Time to get another. Luckily a local tire store had a tire and said it would take 20 minutes to mount it. Sure enough, that is all it took. Removal and reinstallation on the trailer was speedy due to my TrailerAid. We got on the road, got some supplies and lunch in Oakhurst at Todd’s Cookhouse BBQ. The drive through Yosemite and down Tioga Pass took a bit of time due to the speed limits. Roxie did not like the downhill part of Tioga since she was right by the dropoff. Arrival at Obsidian Dome was about 5pm.

The Sierra Nevada Unit of WBCCI is a very likable group. We had a total of 8 trailers there. The evening turned out to be a bit too cold to sit around and talk much. The recent fire limitations did not allow a campfire which put a bit of a damper on things. The next day some of us helped out the Forest Service to remove some fire rings in the area and make the area look like they never existed. This is to try to deter people from camping in areas where they should not. We took a much needed nap that afternoon and then went into Mammoth Lakes for some supplies. On the second day we were welcomed with a waffle breakfast which filled everyone up. The planned potluck at lunch was pushed back until dinner. We decided to go to Devil’s Postpile National Monument. I hadn’t been there since 1974, Roxie never.

We were going to stay one more evening but decided to go visit my sister in Bishop, since we were over that way. After that we headed back through Yosemite to the Yosemite Pines RV Park, our stop for the next 3 nights. The park is OK. They say they are rated #8 from the Travel Channel but I don’t agree. It is not very lush, all dirt. Our sewer hookup was uphill from the trailer which made it hard to empty the tanks. What is does have going for it is that is close to many things.

The first day we decided to go through some Gold Country towns along Highway 49. We went down the CA-120 grade, past Lake Don Pedro and through Jamestown. We stopped for lunch in Sonora at a very good Chinese restaurant, the Hong Kong. We then decided to go to see a movie. We saw “Live Free or Die Hard”. I always liked the Die Hard series but a added benefit was how many Nokia cellphones were used in the film. I saw an N76, E61 (the one I have) and an E90. After the movie we went to Columbia and walked around a bit. Not much to see so we continued on. We ended up in Jackson and had dinner at a forgettable Mexican restaurant. We then returned home via a different route.

Day 2 was in Yosemite, we went into the valley and took the 2 hour open tram ride. We have only lived for 22 years about 90 miles from Yosemite and have been there a scant 4-5 times. I have seen the trams and thought it would be fun. It was. I usually do the driving and therefore don’t get to see all the scenery. This time I could just relax and enjoy things.

The next day we headed home. We went a bit of a circuitous route to get back. Groveland, down 120 to 49, south on 49 to Coulterville, west on 132 to the Merced Falls turnoff, then south to Merced Falls and on to Merced.

This just added. I forgot to show my favorite place to dump the holding tanks. Click on the photo for more information:

It was nice to get out with the trailer after such a long time.

It is about time!! We finally have plans to take the trailer out. We are going to join the Sierra Nevada WBCCI unit for their rally at Obsidian dome. It is between June Lake and Mammoth Lakes on the east side of the Sierras. We will be going through Tioga pass to get there then we will stay a few nights at the Yosemite Pine RV park and visit Yosemite and/or the Gold Country. I will put up a postmortem when it is over.

Not the kind of itchy that I can get medicine for, but itchy to take out the Airstream.  Due to holidays, work schedules, ilness, etc., we haven’t been able to get out since the Redondo Vista trip in October.  We have to do something about that pretty soon!

In the summer of ‘06, we went to Salem, OR for the Wally Byam Caravan Club, International (WBCCI) rally. Since the rally was a week long, we didn’t have too much time to sightsee on either side of it.

Our first night was in Redding, CA at the Premiere RV Resort campground. It was interesting to ‘return’ here. My parents owned this campground as a KOA from 1971 until 1980. A lot has changed in that time but it was fun to look around. Here is what you see when you come in:

What you don’t see is that it hit 122° on the day we got there. It was hot all the way up the valley. I was concerned about tire temperature so I did not go much over 60mph. The first thing we noticed was that the refrigerator was not working well. I was suprised since the refrigerator was about 2 years old and had not given us any trouble. That was a point of concern. We also noticed that the plastic tab that keeps the medicine cabinet above the bathroom sink had broken. It was now swinging free.

The next morning didn’t prove much cooler but I knew we were going to a higher altitude. We stopped at a few RV shops to look for the elusive part for the medicine cabinet. We used a bungee cord to keep the door closed. We didn’t find the part. So we headed north.

The next stop was the KOA at Sisters, OR. Sisters is a cute little town. It appears that many come up there from the Portland area for R&R. We saw a few Airstreams in some of the other RV parks. We noticed that some of them had dates and times stuck in their windows. We didn’t know what this was all about, yet.

Driving back from ‘downtown’ Sisters that evening, I noticed a weigh station that was showing zero on the display. Someone left it on! I had always wondered about the weight of our rig but never had the time to check it out. I had weighed the both the truck and trailer together in Bakersfield one time and the total weight was 15,000 lbs. I was surprised since I knew the GVWR of the trailer was 6300 lbs. This meant my truck was close to 9,000 lbs?!?!? I was able to weigh it that night and, yes, the truck weighed around 8,500+ lbs. WOW!

After that it was to the rally.  One of the reasons for going to Sisters the night before was to make sure that we were at the local fairgrounds BEFORE 4pm.  That was the latest of each day that they would park you on the grounds.  If you were there after that time, you had to spend the night there (or elsewhere) and get parked the next day.  You see, 4pm is the magical ‘happy hour’ time.  One afternoon I rode my bike over to the ‘bullpen’ at 4:15 and saw no WBCCI officials but a few trailers getting ready to spend the night.

We got there around 2pm and after a very brief interaction showing our registration, etc., we were parked.  We were in the blue section and the end of a row.  One side of our trailer was on dry grass and the other was on asphalt (I have a shot of this in the photos section).  We DID have power (30amp) provided by a very large generator down the row.  However, it would shut off sometimes which was not good for our DirecTivo unit.  We also had water in a daisy-chain fashion (trailer to trailer).  Sewage was pumped out once when we were there.  A truck came around and they attached to your drain and essentially sucked it out.

At the top of this page is a panorama shot from our trailer.  We had very nice people parked by us, one was Rich C. that very graciously had a wireless hotspot setup in his trailer and invited all to use it that wanted to.  So in the evenings I would go outside, sit down with my laptop and get on the ‘net.  We made it to most of the evening programs where they had a lot of ‘old people’ entertainment.  It was OK to sit there and watch because we got to sit.

Airstream had about half of their service department there running around on golf carts and fixing people’s trailers.  They also had a parts store going.  Great!  I can get my cabinet latch from them.  I went up to the parts manager and she said she knew exactly what that was but they don’t make them anymore.  No source for a replacement.  Alas, I am still looking for a replacement and we are still using the bungee cord.  George M. Sutton RV was there to sell new and used Airstreams.  We got to see a few models but did not get to see the Front Bedroom Classic since someone bought it the first day and removed it from the floor.

There were things to do at the rally but very few that attracted our interest.  There was one talk about wheel, axle and trailer loading that was very good and made me realize that I was running my tires at too low a PSI.  Since the activities were so slow, we took a few afternoons to go visit some other sites.

First up was the Spruce Goose at the Evergreen Aviation museum:

Next was Silver Falls State Park:

The last full day of the rally was the 4th of July (Wally Byam’s birthday).  All that we saw going on was the WBCCI parade and an Elvis impersonator at the evening show.  We decided that we would pass and leave a day early.  By doing this we changed a single day 400 mile drive to a 2 day, 200 mile each day drive.  Much better.  We also got to camp right on the Rogue river at the RiverPark RV resort.  We even talked with a few vintage owners there.

The next day we travelled to Humboldt Redwoods State Park (below) for a couple of nights.  Along the route we saw many other Airstreams, probably heading home also.

We made a stop at the Jelly Belly factory in Fairfield.  We were going to take the tour but the line was too long.  We made it to our last stop, the Stockton/Delta KOA for one night.

Headed home the next day.  Why does the last 100 miles seem to take the longest?

All in all, I am glad that we went.  We will NOT be going to this years rally in Perry, GA.  Summertime in Georgia does not sound like a good idea to me.  We will plan to go to the rally in 2008 in Bozeman, MT.  The last time the WBCCI, in 1989, was there, they had around 5000 trailers and LOTS of MUD!