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All about writing, traveling, genealogy, and whatever else comes to mind

Revised Route for my USA Swing

Posted on August 4, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, one of my goals for purchasing Ramsey was/is to see all the National Parks within the contiguous United States before I turn 76. I reached the goal of visiting all the California NPs within the first year – not counting the Channel Islands, which I had already visited. Nine years to go. I added the locations of the National Parks to my initial draft of the route for my upcoming swing around the country and made a few alterations. I only have nine days to get from Pasadena to St. Paul, Minnesota. There are a lot of National Parks on the way. Doubt I’ll make it to all of them.

Getting Ready for a Swing around the US

Posted on August 3, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

2018-AugSep-US-Roadtrip

Hi. I am getting Ramsey ready to take a six-week road trip around the US. First I’ll drive from San Francisco to Pasadena to deliver my daughter’s dog, Basil. He’s been staying with Annie and me while his family was on their summer vacation. From Pasadena, Annie and I will drive to Vermont for my niece’s wedding, passing through Minnesota. There is someone very important I want to see in St. Paul. After the wedding in Vermont, I will take the Henry Knox Trail from Westfield, Mass, where I left off in June, to Cambridge. I have a box full of my book, Henry’s Big Kaboom, so I can hand them out to all the libraries along the trail. From Massachusetts, I’ll travel through Virginia to Memphis, then west and home again. I picked up a stack of maps from AAA yesterday.

As part of my preparations, I dedicated this WordPress blog to just my travels in Ramsey. I’ve renamed the blog and given it a new banner. I also made this little video. What do you think?

I will create a different blog about my book writing later.

The Dodge mechanic gave Ramsey a thumbs up after his 16,000-mile check-up. I’ve washed the rugs and taken everything out of the drawers and lockers I don’t use. I emptied the gray and black tanks and washed them out with a power hose. Now all I have to do is fill up with water and propane and pack.

One hitch is that I realized too late that my passport has expired. Crossing my fingers, I have an appointment with the office in downtown San Francisco to see if I can get an update before my departure in two weeks. Otherwise, I won’t be able to swing through Canada on my way from Minneapolis to Vermont as I want to.

If anyone has suggestions about what to see along my proposed route, let me know in the comments section. That’s it for now.

Lighthouse Road Trip – Epilogue

Posted on May 21, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

Ann Delfin sent me the group photo that our PleasureWay RV group took of ourselves on the last night of our nine-day rolling rally. Here it is.

PleasureWay RV Club Lighthouse Rolling Rally – Group Shot

Here is a map showing the lighthouses and RV Campgrounds we visited.

And here is the whole trip starting in Anacortes compiled into a 25-minute YouTube video.

Thanks again Tim O’Malley for organizing everything.

Death Valley, not a great place for an old dog.

Posted on April 13, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

A trip I intended to last five days turned into a three-day dash to, through, and from Death Valley. Annie, my fourteen-year-old corgi, did not do well in the heat, which is why I cut the trip short. It was still an amazing get-out-to-see-my-country experience. Here’s the vlog.

And here’s the route.

RouteToDeathValley

A Tour of Ramsey

Posted on April 8, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

Every time I tell people about traveling in my 20′ campervan, Ramsey, they ask me what the interior is like. Here is a tour.

Boondocking at Viaggio Winery in Lodi – My First Harvest Hosts Experience

Posted on March 14, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

I just took a four-day trip to Yosemite and the California Gold Country. I needed a place to stay on the way to Mariposa, where I wanted to see the California State Mining and Mineral Museum. There are a lot of wineries in the Central Valley between San Rafael and Mariposa. Having heard about Harvest Hosts, I signed up and was able to boondock for free in the parking lot of the Viaggio Estate Winery in Lodi. There are six wineries around Lodi that participate in the Harvest Hosts Program. I describe it all in this YouTube video. Enjoy.

Little Ol’ Lady in Pasadena

Posted on February 8, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

Pasadena is famous for the tiny cottages ‘grandfathered’ into the back of properties in neighborhoods reserved for single-family dwellings. My daughter and son-in-law do not have one of those cottages, which is why I visit in Ramsey. This time I upgraded from parking him on the street to shimmying my way up the driveway to park in the backyard. It was a tight squeeze, but worth it — quieter and a safer walk to my front door for my tiny grandsons.

Camping near the Russian River

Posted on January 29, 2018 by Mary Ames Mitchell

I just posted this video on YouTube about a loop I took from my home in San Rafael to the Russian River. After a night near Guerneville, I drove about 15 minutes to Jenner on the coast at the mouth of the river. Then I headed south along the cliffs to Bodega Bay, then home. I’ve included a 24¢ tour of my rig. The good news about traveling in January is that there is room in the campgrounds. The bad news is the mud, as you shall see.

Quarantined on South Lake Avenue

Posted on November 15, 2017 by Mary Ames Mitchell

For eight straight days, my family and friends banned me from their presence. The day after I drove to Southern California to spend the weekend with my fellow RVers in Indio, then a week with my grandsons in Pasadena, I came down with a very bad cold. Kaiser claimed it was not the flu or strep because of the low-grade fever.

I lay in Ramsey. Thank goodness dogs don’t catch very bad colds. Annie curled up at my feet. Indio was quiet. The air was beautiful, and birds chirped constantly. My biggest disappointment was missing the pickleball. I had been taking lessons for weeks in preparation. I had even purchased my own paddle and balls.

On Sunday I felt well enough to drive through Joshua Tree National Park on my way to Pasadena (see separate blog). Joshua Trees can’t catch very bad colds. I wasn’t as strong as I thought and on Monday I couldn’t move. For the next six days, with my daughter’s resident parking pass stuck to my front window, I lay in cozy Ramsey and felt sorry for myself.

[Image source: http://www.thedepartmentstoremuseum.org/2010/05/bullocks.html]

My daughter lives on South Lake Avenue two blocks away from the commercial district. When I was a little girl in the early 50s, South Lake was a fashionable shopping center dominated by the architecturally gorgeous and elegant Bullocks Department Store and her sister, I.Magnin. When my grandmother took me shopping there, we wore gloves. When I was a young adult, I envied women who could afford to shop at Gene Burton’s just south of I.Magnin. Shoppers took a rest sipping a peppermint soda or eating lunch at Blum’s. The fashionable purchased gifts, such as French Quimper Ware and hand-hemmed handkerchiefs, at Port O’Call across the street.

Today, Macy’s occupies the Bullock’s building. The modern Macy’s typography does not sit well like the handwritten script for Bullock’s did. Paint peels from the building. A huge chunk of white concrete packed with stores and markets dominates the street corner and blocks the view of what was once a gracious entrance to the Bullock’s building. I.Magnin is a Barnes & Noble. A Ross for Less dominates everything else. What happened to city planning?

Pinnacles National Park

Posted on September 7, 2017 by Mary Ames Mitchell

I intend to visit all the National Parks in the contiguous US within the next ten years. The US has fifty-eight National Parks. Hawaii has two and Alaska has eight, which leaves forty-eight parks in the contiguous US. Until last week, I had seen only two of them: Yosemite and the Channel Islands. Last week I visited my third, Pinnacles National Park, leaving me forty-five to go. Pinnacles is about 3.5 hours south of my home in San Rafael, small, and uncrowded.

Pinnacles is the nation’s newest National Park. In 2013, Congress upgraded it from National Monument. It is known for it’s rock formations (duh!), the place where the California condor was released, and for the largest amount of species of bees in the world. It is supposedly a rock climber’s paradise, but a rock climber I am not. With my National Parks Senior Pass, I got 50% off the campground site and free entry to the park. I paid $18/night for the campsite.

California was still having a heat wave. Daytime weather fluctuated between 102 and 108 degrees during my two-day trip. The air was also hazy from all the wildfires in California and Oregon. Not so great for taking photos.

I left civilization after driving through Gilroy, known for its garlic. I passed this industrial area with a line-up of trucks full of the pungent bulbs …

… followed by a block of market stands selling garlic braids and other local produce. I bought a basket of Bing cherries thinking I was supporting the local farmers. Turned out they came from the state of Washington. Oh well.

The road from Gilroy to San Benito County, where the park is, consisted of farms and golden fields of grassland.

I passed the San Benito County fairgrounds, where, interesting to me, there was a sign saying that RV parking was available.

A sign as I entered the tiny town of Tres Pinos (population 500) let me know it was the last place I could purchase gas. I had already tanked up at the Costco in Gilroy.

After more grassy hills, I came to the RV campground, which is not within the pinnacles, but about a mile east. I pulled into the parking lot of the visitor center and parked right next to a Roadtrek version of Ramsey. Roadtrek is the major competitor to PleasureWay, the company that built Ramsey on a Dodge Promaster 3500 truck chassis. The Roadtrek was also built on that chassis. You can see they are cousins!

I checked in at the visitor center with my Senior Pass in hand. It was blissfully air-conditioned in there.

It was about 1:00. The park let me in earlier than their formal check-in time. Annie and set up camp at spot number 106, which was the far eastern end of the loop.

Then we returned to the Visitor Center, this time with my National Parks Passport in hand. One ranger held Annie’s leash while another ranger took this video of me stamping my first National Parks stamp in my passport.

After that, we returned to the rig. It was so hot, there was nothing more we could do than crank the air-conditioner to full speed, read, and eat the cherries, which had been cooling in my fridge.

Around 4:00 we took a tour of the campground. I looked through the telescopes that aim at the hills where the condors live. Placards explain that the difference between the condors and the turkey vultures is a white patch under their wings. I saw a lot of dark blobs in the trees, but nothing I could clearly identify as a condor.

The ranger said wild turkeys often roam the camp but I saw none. I did spot this deer and a wild hare. Quails scurried everywhere.

It being too hot to take a hike, I purchased an ice cream sandwich at the visitor center and sat on the porch to people watch. The dog friendly visitors kept Annie well petted.

From the east end of the campground, it is possible to hike to the pinnacles area. There are two major places people hike. One is a shortish walk through Bear Gulch that takes about 45 minutes. The other is to the highest pinnacles known as the Balconies. That takes much more time. There is very little parking, maybe ten spaces, at the beginning of the trails. Most people take a shuttle from the Visitors Center to the trail head and hike from there. The shuttle leaves every 20 minutes, starting at 9:00 in the morning.

Pets are not allowed on the trails. Since I didn’t want to leave Annie in the rig and take the shuttle, I decided to take my chances and drive Ramsey to the parking lot by the Bear Gulch trail head early in the morning and leave her there. We left at about 8:00 am.

The parking lot was mostly shady, and the temperature cool and overcast. I felt secure Annie would be comfortable.

My destination was the small Bear Gulch Reservoir, which one reaches through a trail encrusted with boulders and caves. My three-year old grandson, who loves to climb steps and rocks, would have been in Paradise. Bats live in many of the caves, but the areas where they breed are closed off at this time of year.