Monthly Archives: January 2019

Between the holidays

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We were at our house during Thanksgiving but the day after we headed to the SF bay area to visit our family there. As usual, the issue was finding a place to stay with the trailer. Our go-to location is transitioning and only have 2 spots now that would fit our trailer. We opted to stay in Pacifica at the SF RV Resort. The last time we were here, RV’s could back up to the cliff and hear the waves crashing. Things have now changed. There has been such erosion that area has been closed off due to safety concerns. We were only there for 3 nights.

We headed south from there to Paso Robles. This is another location that we have stayed at many times and there used to be only one major RV park there, Wine Country RV. This time we tried a different one, Vines RV Resort. It is a very nice park and, as a bonus, a Passport America participant. We were able to visit some of our usual locations in that area while we were there. Here is a sunset from there:

After 4 nights there we headed to our next stop, a favorite, Catalina Spa and RV, in Desert Hot Springs. This leg was over 300 miles, which we try to avoid, so we decided to break it up. We did an overnight stop outside of Bakersfield at the Orange Grove RV Park. It was a nice place for an overnight but a bit pricey and, alas, the oranges were not ready to pick!

We stayed at Catalina for 8 nights and took advantage of Passport America with them also. We always have a good time in the Palm Springs area and we were biding our time for an upcoming event. The mountains got some snow on them while we were there:

Our next stop was Van Nuys. We were heading to the Hollywood RV park, we knew it as Balboa RV park. We have stayed here also and like its’ proximity to many things to do.

We primarily came here because we had tickets to a filming of Jeopardy. I love Jeopardy and have always wanted to see it taped so I decided to get tickets. Roxie thinks I should go on it sometime but I KNOW that would be the episode where the questions were about Opera or English monarchs!

Unfortunately we got a phone call that the Jeopardy taping had been cancelled but they offered us seating at a Wheel of Fortune taping. We accepted. They put us on the production guest list for a different date. It was OK with us even though I would have rather seen Jeopardy.

Prior to the day of the taping, we met up with our friends the Chens. We met them at the Sriracha factory in Irwindale CA for the factory tour. They have wanted to go to this tour for a while and we are always willing to on one. The story of the founder of Sriracha is really great, you should read it here. Here are some shots from the tour:

We then drove to their house but stopped off at the California Yuan Yung Buddhism Center. It was nice and serene with good views from the hills:

One night while we were down there, we went to eat at Lawry’s Prime Rib. I remember going there once as a child and seeing them carve the prime rib from a hunk of beef in a cart. They do this right at your table. Not much has changed. The food was very good, the ambiance was great and the service was fantastic!

The next day was the Wheel of Fortune taping. We first went into the wrong gate at Sony studios but since we were early it didn’t matter too much. When we went in the right gate, we couldn’t fit the truck in the parking structure and had to park on the street (meters). The assistants started lining people up and we were taken first (remember we are on the production guest list) and this was a good thing! I forgot that my pocket knife was in my pocket. This is a no-no. I had to walk/run back to the truck, then back.

I made it back with plenty of time. They brought all of us into the studio and seated us. They gave us instructions on when to clap, when to be quiet, when we can go the bathroom, etc. They taped 3 episodes that day. There was a LOT of clapping that you were supposed to do and follow the assistants. I figured out that we were cheap labor for the show. There is a possibility that we will be seen on one of the shows. Our shows are being shown on Feb 7, Feb 8 and Mar 13.

After our 7 nights in SoCal, and 24 nights total, it was time to get back to Visalia for Christmas time.

A week away from things

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In light of the recent events in our lives, we thought we should just get away from it all for a week. We didn’t want to go far as we had to be back for Thanksgiving and then some stuff in SoCal. We headed up CA41 to Oakhurst (about 90 miles).

We have passed through Oakhurst numerous times and stayed there about 6 years ago and we really like this small little town. We were there to relax a bit but not just sit around the trailer all the time. It was starting to get a bit cold in the mountains.

Since we were so close, we had to take a drive through Yosemite. We stopped at the Mariposa Grove of Sequoia trees at the southern entrance to the park. Another location that we had driven through so many times but had never taken the time to stop. This time was different, we got out of the truck and took a hike.

It was not a very long hike, we weren’t up to that. We walked up to see the Grizzly Giant Sequoia tree. Along the way we did a selfie by a downed Sequoia:

I tried out the portrait mode on my iPhone during a break in the hike:

We finally got to the Grizzly Giant:

It was interesting to hear visitors commenting on how amazing and huge these trees were. Coming from living near, and visiting often the trees of Sequoia/Kings Canyon National Parks, we have seen more and bigger Sequoias but many visitors only hit Yosemite.

We continued down to the valley floor and saw the devastation of the southern part of the park due to the forest fires from the summer. It was surreal.

We got a couple of pictures from Tunnel View:

We concluded the day with a nice dinner in Mariposa and completed the loop back to the RV park.

Oakhurst has one movie theatre, which is OK with us. We always like to go see the movies. This one does it a bit differently. They did not sell, per se, an individual movie ticket. They sold you a ticket that was valid ALL day. You would watch any of the 4 movies for this one price. However, they also offered a monthly movie pass for one or a reduced monthly pass for two. We took the monthly for two. So we ended up seeing 3 movies for $35. About $6/movie/person. Not bad.

One movie we saw was “Dawn Wall”, a story about a pair of climbers that were the first to scale a specific wall on El Capitan. Seeing the movie made us stop during our Yosemite loop to see if anyone was climbing El Cap. There were a few and it was fun to see.

On another day I decided we should drive the Sierra Vista Scenic Byway. I had heard about this scenic route and thought it would be fun. It was a good way to kill a day but would have been better in the spring. It amazed me how many roads are built throughout backcountries everywhere, this is no exception. There were very nice paved sections, rough paved sections, partially paved sections, and complete dirt. There were some very beautiful portions and vistas. Some odd rock structures, and a few lakes:

We also ran into some ‘issues’ on the road:

Near the end of the loop, we came across the Geographic Center of California. This is always the kind of thing that I love. So I walked up and became ‘centric’ for a bit:

Since the holidays were coming we headed back to Visalia bidding Oakhurst a fine adieu!