Tag Archives: camping

Prairie City

Posted on by

We left John Day at the stroke of noonish and made the “grueling” drive to Paradise City where we will spend just one night. The drive was 13 miles, but it was on our list, so we stopped. It’s a really nice facility but right off hand I cannot remember much about it. My mind doesn’t seem to retain anything for a useful amount of time. It’s there, then it’s gone.

So, I’m just going to share what’s in my head right now.

First, we mad it to Farewell Bend State Recreation camp ground located a few miles from where Cliff’s Grandpa used to live. It’s a small town of 450 residents and has no gas stations. While he and Susie toured the town, Diane drove us to Nampa for a visit with Jim, Donna, Steffani, and Bob. Diane was excited about the drive because once you cross the border into Idaho, the speed limit rises to 80 MPH. It gave her an opportunity to burn out the carbon she’s been accumulating in the engine.

It was a nice visit. Short, but nice, and we got lunch!

Before leaving Nampa for our return trip “home”, we stopped at Costco to fuel up. The last time we didn’t do that and ran over 125 miles on an empty tank in the motor home. True story. We drove all the way to La Grande. The next morning was our checkout day so I had the pleasure of emptying our holding tanks on that way out of the park. It took a while and I’m happy to report that I didn’t spill even one little drop, then we went up the side road to Huntington to visit a museum.

There was a lot of interesting things inside, most interesting the curator who grew up in Huntington and knew where Cliff’s Grandpa lived (2 blocks from the museum). I think she remembered the color of the house, too. She knows the history of Huntington.

The railroad was something that touched everyone’s lives in some way, as did river traffic on the Snake River. There’s information about the time a steamboat captain sails his way through Hell’s Canyon.

The rest of the items are typical for a small town, except for this guy.

It’s not often that you run across a gun-toting preacher.

The next stop was at the “A Frame RV Park” in Baker City. It was a fairly easy drive. Actually, it was very easy for me because Diane is doing all of the driving. The only thing I do is park the truck and trailer on arrival, and hook it all back up when it’s time to leave. Easy peasy, right?

We checked in for a 2-day stay so relaxed after getting things connected then the next morning we took a trip to the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center that resides on a hill just outside of Baker City. Actually, it was just 4-5 miles from our current residence.

This was an excellent stop. The displays and stories are awesome. We stayed long enough to be the last wagon remaining in the parking lot. If you’re ever in Baker City, this is a must to visit.

On the way back to the ‘ranch’, we were assaulted with a rock hitting the windshield thrown by a little car going the other way, The glass chipped and cracked and will require replacement. We decided to celebrate this assault by eating dinner out at the Latitude Forty Five restaurant. Great people, excellent food.

Bsck at the A Frame Park, I took Max for a walk in the 9-acre dog park they have. He really liked the freedom and he met many congenial dogs.

I got the TV working by searching local channels. It’s almost as good as Dish TV but there are only 66 channels. We did, however, get to watch AGT for the first time on this trip.

This day, our last one here in BC, we spent looking around town for thrift stores and cheap places to shop.

Tomorrow we leave for Elgin hoping they can accommodate the two of us for a couple of days. From there we’ll be going to Hell’s Canyon.

Seaside and a Broken Truck

Posted on by

Yup. I’m still sucking air, as my friend Junior used to say. That may surprise some of you since I have a history of harming myself in various ways. Thankfully, that hasn’t happened lately.

Except for my left shoulder. It’s kind of wonky and I’m scheduled for physical therapy to address that malady. That starts on May 8th. If I can still use my keyboard then, I’ll tell you all about it.

Before I go too far into this, I’ll admit that there may be some repetition about previous posts. You have permission to skip the repeated info.

Let’s talk about our truck. As you know, it sat idle in our driveway while we were off sampling the weather in Arizona for the last part of 2024 and a bit of 2025. I may have mentioned the issues we encountered previously, but things have progressed. For the last few weeks it’s been unreliable about starting. The first episode was during a trip to Portland for something I don’t remember, maybe a Costco visit, then lunch at Chang’s Mongolian BBQ. After lunch it wouldn’t start.

It would lock and unlock with the FOBs but the big START button did not function. Therefore, the engine didn’t start. I decided to try the remote start feature which worked fine, but I could not get it out of that mode. That means I couldn’t put it in gear. It’s supposed to shift modes when you press the unlock button after the remote start, but that didn’t work. That meant the truck wouldn’t let me put it in gear no matter how hard I tried.

So, I called AAA for a tow back to St. Helens so they could figure it out. While waiting for the tow truck I kept trying stuff and finally wound up slapping and pounding on the dash in the vicinity of the START button. That apparently caused something to wake up because it actually started the next time I tried.

Feeling lucky, I called the tow truck driver and cancelled the tow and away we went, directly to Emmert where I handed them all the keys and walked home. I was losing faith in that rig.

A couple days later, they reported that there didn’t seem to be a problem because it started every time they tried. Feeling brave, I drove Max to Wiggle Buttz, a dog store, to have his nails trimmed. He was. begging for a trim. When the toe nails were trimmed we jumped in the truck to go home but it wouldn’t start. I only tried once. Then we walked back to Emmert and I gave them the keys again and told them where the truck was parked and we went home.

It was during this period of being truckless that we went to Seaside for the weekend. Diane wanted to see the super low tide in person. So, we went and had a good time. Max got to spend time on the beach running just as hard as he could and, though it rained a bunch, we enjoyed the stay like we always do.

Diane took her Mom’s fancy walker to the beach and discovred that it glides suprisingly easy over the sand.

So, while Max and I played, she sat peacefully watching the surf up close.

Max was perfectly content laying on the table watching the surf from a distancd.

Can’t say I blame him because the beach was very busy with folks carrying clam guns that apparently are very popular during low tide. I’ve never seen Seaside Beach like this before.

Looking north there were a few TeePees people had built and we chose this one for our next home.

We took one long walk, about 2 miles to Norma’s and back just to get this required photo of us at the Seaside Turnaround.

Emmert called and told me they had analyzed about 40 error codes that all pointed to low voltage and deemed that we needed to replace the battery. I said sure, so they did. That was Friday, a week ago but we were at the beach in Seaside so couldn’t get it until Monday.

I went back to the dealer, paid the $580.00 that wanted for the new battery, and they gave me the keys. I happily went to the truck planning for a leisurely drive home, but it wouldn’t unlock with the remote.

I didn’t try anything else before taking the keys back to the service desk to report this failure. We went back to the truck and the service writer couldn’t get it opened with the remote, either. He pulled the manual key out and opened the door but there was a disturbing absence of dome and dash light when the door opened. This was an indication that the $580 was not well spent even though their specific testing of the old battery revealed it was bad.

After scratching our heads in unison for a bit, they said they would like to keep it for another few days to see what more they could find. I said, “sure, if you can give me something else to drive because Diane and I both have places to be at the same time. They wound up giving me one of their rentals, a 2024 Blazer EV which is pretty nice. I drove it home and tried to get the truck out of my head for a bit.

Today is Saturday and the truck will be there until Monday at least. I checked yesterday and it was in the shop, which is good, but they still had no clue what the problem is. That wasn’t encouraging.

So, I think we’ll just go out and burn up all that electricity stored in the EV’s batteries. It tells me we can go 216 miles before it requires a charge. Perhaps we’ll find out if that’s true.

In the mean time, Max is glad to be home and that the crick has dropped low enough to go wading like normal. One of his favorite things to do after a walks is to take a dip in the crick.

Day 135 – Monday – Quartzsite, AZ

Posted on by

Getting ready to vacate Luke AFB was a snap because I disconnected everything except electricity. That allowed us to get on the road in record time. We even stopped to fill the bus with fuel before leaving the base. We were going to pull the car once we find a place to do so after leaving the base.

Diane took off using the GPS and I followed with the Garmin. I think we made it almost two miles before we got separated due to a misleading interpretation of one of our GPS setups. It took us about an hour to reunite at exit 121 on I-10 West. That’s where I finally tried to connect the car to the bus and discovered a problem that will require us to drive both rigs all day tomorrow. That’s unfortunate but fixable. Just need time and patience and a stop for longer than one night like we’re doing at Quartzsite. So, the fix will happen at Twenty-Nine Palms.

So, after over an hour of driving aimlessly around Phoenix, we finally got aimed west on I-10. The drive was just fine until we got within 11 miles of Quartzsite where road crews were busy putting a new layer of paving on the west bound lanes of I-10. For about 20 miles the traffic, which included about 1700 semi-trucks, were slowed to two lanes of traffic going between 2-5 mph. Many times, we had to stop for random periods of time. Making it worse, at the end where the equipment was working, the lanes were trimmed to 1 right at a very long entrance filled with more trucks. So, we went from 3 lanes to 1 lane. It wasn’t difficult since it was all done in slow motion.

Once past the heavy equipment, the lanes opened up and we were off like bullets all the way to Exit 19 where Quartzsite lives. It was only 3-4 miles from where we got to speed up after the slow down.

But, we made it safely and got checked in and parked.

At this point in time, we’ve had dinner and we’re winding down watching all the horrendous fire reports knowing that we’re driving right toward it. We have a plan, however. If we encounter smoke, we’re going up through Nevada. If the smoke reaches that far, we’ll head for Utah. One way or another, we’ll get home safely.

To recap, the trip today should have taken us between 2-3 hours. Instead, it took us 6 hours.

Hi. It’s me again. Max

Posted on by

It’s been a hectic time since I’ve had a chance to share ‘stuff’ with all of you. Until yesterday, things were pretty normal. Except for the cat. I don’t know why, but Louie seems to be growing on me a little and that’s disturbing. I’m a professional Cat Chaser and Louie just lays there. He won’t run anywhere except to get under the bed. That’s just no fun at all because I bump my head a lot when I run under there. I’m not as short as some people might think.

Then, the day before yesterday, my humans started packing things into the trailer they parked next to the garage. I’ve seen them do that before and it winds up with me stuck in this little basket they put on the center console between the buckets. They call it my throne. It’s not so bad, really, and it gives me an opportunity to get a lot of sleep unless we pass a herd of cows and one of them says “Look at the cows!” real loud. Of course, it scares me a little, jerks me awake and I can’t help but look out the window to find the cows. No matter how hard I try to ignore things like that, I always fall for it because I like finding cows on our trips. Squirrels are more fun, though.

Seeing what was going on, I figured I might as well get myself in the mood for another trip. Now, don’t get me wrong. I love trips. The alternative is to be left home. Alone. With Louie. The cat. I’ll take the trip every time.

The packing went well past noon so they decided to delay the departure until the next day. I overheard them say that they had originally planned to make it to Memaloose State Park off I-84 on the Columbia River. Instead, they decided to drive straight to Boardman RV Park which was supposed to be the second leg.

After digesting all of that, it makes me wonder why they plan things at all. Doing things when the mood strikes is more fun. There’s more mystery that way.

So, yesterday we got the trailer hooked up and I insisted that I be allowed to wait in the truck where I happily climbed into my Throne.

The trip was OK. They stopped in Scappoose, all of 8 miles away, for a dead chicken sandwich, then we headed east. All I got out of that was a couple of french fries.

The trip through the Columbia River Gorge was very interesting. There were lots of waterfalls that normally aren’t there. Seeing all that water cascading off the cliffs made me want to pee. A lot. Finally, they stopped at the Walmart in Hood River so I could unload. It was very gratifying.

We arrived around 4 pm. I didn’t get to go for a walk until everything was hooked up. Then I got a long one. My human is good about walking with me but he doesn’t keep up very well.

After the walk we ate, they watched TV, then we all went to bed. It was the 1st day and it was good.

Today I got another walk in the morning then they both left me alone for a few hours while they went somewhere else. I have no idea where. So, I curled up in my Serta Perfect Sleeper and stayed there all day. When they got back I was served dinner on the lawn next to the Columbia River. It was very romantic. Then I got another walk around the park. This time, however, I got to go play in the river! Then I ran a bunch of Zoomies at the end of my leash until I got dried off. It was a lot of fun. Not like Milton Creek, but fun anyway. When my toenails get ground off a little more I’ll be able to download some photos Dad (Jerrie) took of my swimming prowess. Right now they are just too pointy and would probably scratch his computer. A dead giveaway that I’ve been messing with his stuff.

I’m going to stop this now because it’s taken me 4 days to get this far and we’ve only covered 1 or 2 days.

Snowbird Wannabes

Posted on by

After many years of sticking around town we’re planning trips south for next fall. We’ve discussed doing this for years, but events and family ‘things’ prohibited such a trip. Now we actually have reservations to get it going.

First stop will be Fiddlers Cove on Naval Base Coronado, CA. Our plan is to be there for a month then we’ll move on to the Boneyard Vista Park on Davis-Monthan AFB in Tuscon, AZ. We’ve stayed on many bases during our various trips around the country but rarely with our RV. The exception is NAS Fallon, NV that was a topic of discussion not long ago.

One of the decisions we had to make was whether or not to use the motorhome or the travel trailer. When we bought the trailer, our intention was to sell the motorhome. Our pickup is rigged to be dingy towed, but the truck is more useful while towing the trailer. I think we’ve agreed to take the trailer so in case any of you are interested, the motorhome is for sale.

No, it doesn’t come with the tow car. Since this picture was taken the car was totaled when it got rear-ended at a crosswalk. If the Neptune piques your interest, let me know at Jerrie.cate@gmail.com and I send you particulars.

Today, March 1st, 2024, I took Max for a leisurely walk around the neighborhood like normal and we wound up walking in snow the entire way. Sadly, I didn’t take pictures, but everyone knows what snow looks like. It was just a surprise. We’ve had lots of rain all up and down the Left Coast and the remnants continue on across the country making life miserable for pretty much everyone in different ways. In general, everyone got wet everywhere. Some got more wet than others. For us it means the little crick in our backyard, that normally makes its way in a leisurely manner to the Columbia River turns into a muddy torrent. There’s no danger of water getting to our house, but sometimes it makes us wonder.

Max would like the creek a little lower and slower so he can go wading, one of his favorite things to do.

Now I must go do something productive.

Farewell 2023

Posted on by

Since today is the last day of the year, and it’s been a while since I’ve shared anything with you, I thought it might be OK if I ended it with a recap of what we’ve been doing all year long. It will only take a couple of minutes.

January – Went to Hawaii for a couple of weeks.

February – Winnebago Friends visited and parked in our front yard for a few days. Then we visited Beverly Beach State Park.

March – Had all the carpet removed from our new home so LVP could be installed everywhere. We also invested in new counter tops in kitchen and both bathrooms.

April – Flew to Fort Lauderdale to spend some time acclimating ourselves before cruising through the Panama Canal. Visited Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, San Diego, Vancouver BC, and Seattle.

May – Stayed in Salem for a few days for Jeran’s graduation. Adopted Max after a trip to Albany after Church on Mother’s Day. Mid-month we camped out at the Cornelius Eagles Lodge visiting with our Winnebago friends.

June – Visited Nehalem Bay State Park for a few days. Diane got a pedicure, and I got a haircut. Ended the month visiting in a Chehalis Eagles’ parking lot with our Winnie Friends.

July – Stayed close to home.

August – Packed the motorhome preparing for September trip to Utah. Yes, it took most of the month because Diane planned a looong trip.

September – Started the RV trip with 4 of our Winnebago Friends, and their 2 RVs. It lasted the entire month. Really, it did. It actually had to because it was on our schedule and reservations had been made. Halfway thru the month our friends had to leave and head back north for home. We continued on spending a few extra days in St. George, UT. During that time, we left the RV sitting and drove to Surprise, AZ to visit big brother Jack for a couple of days.

October – Finished the Utah trip on the 10th, after spending ten days on the Oregon Coast. Gilligan turned 16 on the 5th.

November – Spent a few days for Friendsgiving in Gresham parked in front of our friend’s home.

December – Visited friends in Keizer and parked in their driveway with another RV. Also took a trip to Seaside for a few days for Diane’s Birthday.

After going through all of that I can see that we were pretty busy all year. When I started this, I wasn’t convinced that we were so busy, but Diane’s Calendar Entries don’t lie. Plus, during all that time, everyone in our entire family, and yours too, probably, had a birthday in there somewhere. We went a lot of places and saw a lot of stuff.

I’ve kinda lost my touch for getting info out regularly and I’m sorry about that. This recap will have to do for now and I’ll just make a revelation to do better in 2024. Or is it that other “R” word, resolution. Yes, that’s it! Resolution! I’m going to make one of those. I shared with Diane that it’s been at least 15 years since I didn’t honor my resolution because I didn’t fail even one time. Nope. I resolved to NOT gain 125 pounds during the new year and worked really hard to make it work. So far so good. But now I’m going to have to be more regular next year.

It’s 9:45 pm right now and past my bedtime so I’m going to wrap this up. Diane and I wish you all a Happy and Prosperous New Year. Be kind to one another and stay safe.

Ciao

Camping

Posted on by

Two days ago we loaded up the RV with everything we own, including all the food we had, and headed for the wilderness a little East of Vernonia. We went there because it was out understanding that it was the only place in the world that wouldn’t be inundated with political rhetoric and the never-ending barrage of unsavory news stories. That was true, until Diane told me she had to have internet access in order to submit her Avon order for this week.

Doing that, of course, violated about 12 rules of camping … there shouldn’t be internet access in any campground. You should have to go to the nearest village for that. I already knew there wasn’t any TV reception because that’s the first thing I checked. There was, however, excellent cell phone service, another violation.

Since there was excellent cell service, there was no problem getting my new iPad hooked up to the internet after a couple of conversations with some very nice AT&T people who answer phones at 611 in order to help people like me.

Once Diane had access she did her order and all was good, but knowing I could take it that one step further was just more than I could bear, so I downloaded some apps from the app store. Just the free ones. I rarely pay for apps. Just Angry Birds. And Angry Bird sequels. Nothing else. The apps I downloaded violated more camping rules because they related to News. There is no current news allowed in camp grounds unless it comes from someone newly arrived who is eager to share what they know.

20120815-225413.jpg

That’s us camping, by the way … about 28 hours ago when we got here. After everything was set up. We had Papa Murphy’s Pizza for supper, another violation. It was really good, and I ate too much of it. But, what the heck, we’re camping. We brought the pizza with us and Diane baked it in the RV’s tiny little oven. Worked pretty good.

We brought Cedric and Jeran with us yesterday, along with the two dogs. Jeran rode with me, and Cedric rode with Diane, in the chase car. Actually, it was the lead car, and I followed in the RV so I guess we now have a “chase RV”, instead of a chase car. We brought the Buick because I have physical therapy at VA tomorrow morning that I dare not miss.

This afternoon Daniel and Jennifer arrived and the level of activity increased. Yesterday I was pretty much cripple because my back seized up while eating pizza (so I’m never doing that again) making it necessary for me to eat with my elbow propped on the table. After eating, and working my way slowly from my place at the picnic table, I limped all over the place until Diane suggested that I give it up and go to bed, which I did. This morning my back still hurt, but it was much better and I didn’t have to limp as much, which pleased Diane. She doesn’t like it when I limp. Sometimes, however, I just can’t help it. The physical therapy I’m getting tomorrow is my 4th session to deal with the back issue. Oddly, the back issue causes my right hip and leg to hurt, a lot, but not my back. I suspect I’ve mentioned this before so will not bore you with those details.

Because of all the limping, and whatnot, I was allowed to take a nap this afternoon. It was good because it helped relieve the pain a great deal. While I dozed, Diane and Jennifer went about the business of making dinner for everyone, except for Lydia who isn’t here. She’s at another camp with her friend, Brianna. It’s a church thing.

Diane cooked a large pan of frozen lasagna in our tiny oven and during the end of that evolution I became more alert and asked Diane a few questions. She failed to respond to any of them so I mentally investigated the possibility that I had died while laying there. Finally, however, she came a little closer so I asked another question and she immediately responded and wasn’t at all surprised that by answering a simple, innocuous question, she had just resurrected me from dead. Actually, she didn’t know it because I was so relieved that I was alive that I didn’t mention it. Until now.

Now it’s late, and our day is done. It’s going to be an early day tomorrow because we have to be back in civilized country by 0930 for my appointment. It’s going to take about 45 minutes to get there and, as I said previously, we cannot be late. Anyone who is late for a VA appointment is punished by the appointment people who ensure that your next appointment, for any reason, is not any time soon.

Good night.