Category: National Park

San Francisco Part Two

San Francisco Part Two

Hey Guys!! We stayed in the Vacaville area for two weeks while we explored the San Francisco area.

Vacaville was about forty-five minutes away from San Francisco so it really suited us well. Far enough away to avoid the crush of so many people on a daily basis, but close enough that we were able to spend two days explore San Francisco.

We passed by this field every time we went toward the Bay area. Do you see the little outhouse? It’s quite the outhouse! Complete with modern plumbing…but no door…and facing a highway. Oh the things we see…

Y’all know that big cities aren’t really our thing. In fact, we usually skip them, but I wanted to see the big red bridge. Our first day in San Francisco was on a weekend and boy let me tell you…the crowds were insane! It took us quite a bit of time to find a parking space anywhere near the bridge, but we eventually did. It was cold and super windy. Apparently, that’s a typical summer day for San Francisco. By the time we walked to the bridge that famous San Francisco Bay fog had started rolling in.

We waded through the crowds to snap some pictures of the view then hightailed it back to the warmth of our car. This was as close as we got to Alcatraz. Timing and tickets weren’t on our side this trip. I’m hoping to revisit the area someday, but like I said before…big cities aren’t really our thing…so, we’ll see. We made our way down to Fisherman’s Wharf to do some more sight seeing, but the crowds were just too thick for us so we decided to leave.

We headed out in search of food and found ourselves at a place called Roam. Do you see that burger in the picture? I somehow got my mouth around it (no comments please) and promptly realized that this burger was definitely on my list of top five burgers…near the top. We got the Fry-Fecta to go along with our burgers. My favorite of the three choices was the fried zucchini/onion spirals. We left reminiscing about all of the other burgers we’ve had while trying to decide which burger is on the top of our list of favorites. We all agreed it was a green chili cheeseburger, but we’re divided as to exactly which one.

By the time we were crossing back over the bridge to head home the fog had rolled fully in. It was a little eerie crossing over the water without being able to see it.

Our second excursion into the city was during the week. We made the trip first thing in the morning to avoid as much of the crowd as we could. We found Fisherman’s Wharf much less crowded. And Guys, check out the famous San Francisco hills. It’s hard to really see how steep it is in pictures…you can see the slope of it better in the bottom picture. Driving up one of the steeper hills felt kind of like the beginning of a roller-coaster. You know…the very beginning when you’re click, click, clicking slowly to the top of the hill so you can plummet down the other side. I feel like it would definitely be more terrifying to go plummeting down one of these steep San Francisco hills.

Our first stop was the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park where we learned about the city’s seafaring past. There’s a nice little museum at the Visitor’s Center where the boys got their Junior Ranger booklets, but the best part is right across the street, over at the Hyde St. Pier where you can walk around and explore some older ships.

We walked around an old passenger ferry named Eureka. Eureka started out as a ship named Ukiah that used to transport munition filled railroad cars. We loved walking through all of the old cars and the upper level where the passengers would ride.

Years ago…I don’t remember where I first got some…I had my first taste of See’s Candies. It’s been my favorite boxed chocolate since then. So, when we saw a See’s Candies store on Fisherman’s Wharf…I had to go in. And…come out with a few…souvenirs.

We ended up at a fish-n-chips place called The Codmother Fish & Chips. There’s something about having fish just feet from the water it was caught in…so good!

Our last stop in San Francisco was the Sutro Baths. At one time, the Sutro Baths were once the world’s largest indoor swimming complex. The building itself is all but gone, but there are still remnants of what once was. This picture of what the Sutro Baths used to look like was in the Visitor Center. Adolph Sutro, a German immigrant, used the money he made as an engineer of a ventilation tunnel for the silver mines of Nevada’s Comstock Lode to purchase the real estate called Lands End and build the Sutro Baths. The swimming and bathing complex was covered in three acres of stained glass and steel and seemed to be built right into the seaside cliffs.

Confession…I’m a little bit of a sugarholic. Just a little. Well, if I’m being completely honest, I might as well tell you…I’m a huge sugarholic. Huge! Some of my friends and family have told me that sugar runs through my veins instead of blood. While I’ve made an effort to cut back on the amount of sugar I have a day…er…I mean a week. We couldn’t pass up touring through the factory of one of my favorite sugary treats. Jelly Belly!

The Goelitz family has been in the candy business since 1869. That’s a lot of candy making! At the Fairfield factory, you can take a free self-guided tour of their candy making process and see the factory in action. In the picture above you can see what Jelly Belly bean centers look like. When the centers get their shells, they’ll be 40% bigger! The center bean of a Jelly Belly is made from a slurry made of sugar, water, corn syrup, and corn starch. Every Jelly Belly bean starts with the same basic slurry and then the flavor and color is added. The Fairfield Jelly Belly factory can make around 800 Jelly Belly bean centers per second. Once the bean centers have been made they have to cure, rest and dry.

Have you ever wondered how they mix the Jelly Belly beans for the bags of mixed flavors? They pour boxes of each bean in the mix on this long conveyor belt. The belt moves and the beans work their way up to a big barrel where the beans are all mixed up together. The beans are then moved by another conveyor belt to those big white containers in the picture (top left a bit) above where they wait to go to the packaging area.

There’s a bean artist who gets to spend all of their time making these Jelly Belly bean works of art. How fun would that be?! Some fun facts:  each work of art is typically 4’x5′, each picture weighs about 100 pounds with the frame, it takes around 100 hours from start to finish, and it takes somewhere around 12,000 beans to make one masterpiece.  

One of the best things about the Jelly Belly factory…they’ve got all of the flavors! And I do mean all of them. We, of course, had to take home some samples. Just a few. **wink, wink**

We really enjoyed exploring the San Francisco area! There was so much to see and do that we didn’t even scratch the surface with two very full weeks of adventuring. Maybe someday we’ll travel through the area again so we can hit some of the things we missed…when we’re ready to face the huge crowds again.

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

San Francisco Area Part One

San Francisco Area Part One

Hey Guys! We spent two weeks in the San Francisco area. We crammed so much into those two weeks that I’ve decided to break up this area into two separate posts. I could easily do four posts…we saw that much…but I’ll cram it all into two to save some time. The RV park we were staying in was in the town of Vacaville and it was in a great location for exploring the area without being right in middle of the San Francisco crowds all the time.

We went to five National Park Units while we were in the San Francisco area. Five! We missed a few…they either weren’t open or we didn’t plan far enough ahead and we missed out on tickets. Y’all know how far out we plan our travels so the fact that we missed out on tickets…sigh…should tell you how fast tickets are snatched up at popular parks.

 John Muir is known as the “Father of the National Parks” and the “Patron Saint of the American Wilderness”. He devoted most of his life to preserving the wild places that he loved so much. We’re big fans of John Muir and what his perseverance to save the wild spaces did for future generations. All over our Country, in the many National Park Units we’ve visited we’ve heard his name spoken with a kind of reverence. It is because of him, that we have National Parks. We visited Muir National Historic Site in Martinz, CA one afternoon. It was just as thrilling to us to walk in John Muir’s home as it was for us to walk through the home of Abraham Lincoln or Lyndon B. Johnson or well, any of the other great homes we’ve visited during our travels across the US.

Muir spent quite a bit of his time in solitude as he explored and studied nature. Around the time John was turning forty, some of his friends started to urge him to return to society. Upon his return, a friend of his introduced him to his future wife, Louisa Strentzel. Louisa was the daughter of Dr. Strenzel who owned a 2,600 acre fruit orchard. Muir and Dr. Strentzel went into business together and within five years, Muir had earned enough money to keep his family living well for the rest of their lives. Muir spent the next ten years working on the orchard. He was a devoted husband and father to his two daughters, but his heart was still yearning for the wild places. Louisa encouraged him to go back to the mountains for some respite. He went. Sometimes he would go alone and other times he would take his daughters.

Muir called it his “scribble den”. This is the room where John Muir wrote most of his books and published articles. He would worry about the wording of his books and articles in his determination to make others see how important the preservation of wilderness is. Many of his journals helped in the preservation of National Parks even after his death in 1914.

Muir Woods National Monument was established in 1908. When John Muir found out that they’d named this park after him he said, “This is the best tree lover’s monument that could possibly be found in all the forests of the world.”

Muir Woods National Monument was our first glimpse of the coastal redwoods. The coastal redwoods are in the same family as the giant sequoia trees we fell in love with while we were exploring Sequoia National Park. Coastal redwoods are known as the tallest living things on Earth. In Muir Woods, there’s a tree that reaches up to 258 feet above the forest floor. To give you some perspective…that is about the height of a 23 story building. These giant trees need the moderate temperatures and fog that the northern California coast provides them with in order to survive.

Muir Woods National Monument is a little tricky to get to. You have to make prior arrangements to either claim one of the few parking spots at the park or to get a ticket with a shuttle bus. We chose to take the first shuttle bus of the day in hopes of avoiding the mass of people. This park gets over a million visitors a year. Our plan worked. We were leaving when the park started to feel crowded. We had a great morning walking through the giants…listening to their stories…and marveling at their height. And freezing. We weren’t prepared for how cold it was!

In December of 1941 everything changed for America. Men were sent to fight in the war which left a gaping hole in the American workforce. To fill that hole, the government turned to the women left behind. Around six million women joined the workforce during the war. Rosie the Riveter/ World War II Home Front National Historic Park tells the story of the American workforce during World War II. Women and other minority groups answered the call to help their Country by joining the workforce. It wasn’t easy for them. Many of these women had never worked outside of their home before. They weren’t accepted or welcomed by the men left in the factories.

I didn’t really know what to expect at this NPS Unit. We arrived late in the day and was rushed to get through it all. I could have easily spent hours here reading all of the memories. I hope to revisit this one again someday.

We finally made it to the California State Capitol Building in Sacramento! I’m going to be totally honest with you. I’m behind on writing posts…it’s been almost two months since we were at the California SCB and while I do love this dome…it’s really all I remember about the building itself…other than an awful lot of pink. Don’t get me wrong…it’s a lovely building. We took a guided tour and our docent was very enthusiastic about how big and powerful California has always been. This was pointed out numerous times. It was also admitted that the reason this SCB looks so much like the National Capital Building is because the plans for the NCB somehow fell into the hands of the California SCB planners…so yeah, there’s that too. It was for sure, the oddest docent led tour we’ve ever had of a SCB.

The day we went there was a parade and several protests. We didn’t’ stick around for any of it. Crowds aren’t really our thing. At all.

There was a really nice rose garden! So many different colors of roses! There were also some other really pretty flowers on the SCB’s grounds. It really was a very pretty campus.

We found a really good old fashioned diner in Martinez, CA while we were visiting the John Muir National Historic Site. Great burgers and milk shakes!

Stay tuned for part two of our San Francisco area adventures!

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Yosemite National Park Part Two

Yosemite National Park Part Two

Hey Guys! Yosemite Part Two! We spent a day and a half in Yosemite Valley and well…I was kind of disappointed. The views were stellar. The hikes were available. But, it was so incredibly crowded that it really felt more like a day at an amusement park. We couldn’t get away from the crowd no matter what time we got to the park or where in the valley we went.

If you look at a map of Yosemite National Park, you’ll see it’s actually separated into different regions. You’ve got Yosemite Valley where most people go…but then you’ve also got Wawona, Glacier Road, Hetch Hetchy, and Tioga Road areas. We tried to go to Mariposa Grove in the Wawona area but it was closed for restoration. Hetch Hetchy was a three hour drive from where we were staying which means six hours of just travel time…that’s half the day gone. We had already planned on driving Tioga Road…but we met a great family at Park Sierra (where we were staying) and they gave us tips on not only Tioga Road but also Glacier Road.

We drove a lot during all of our Yosemite NP explorations. One of my biggest tips for you if you’re heading to Yosemite is to get gas before heading into the park. Check out those gas prices. We saw two different gas stations that were close-ish to the park and both of them were super pricey.

The first time we tried to explore Glacier Road was during a weekend. It was a Sunday afternoon and we thought maybe the weekend crowds would’ve started thinning out. We were wrong. So very wrong. We got there and there was an hour wait just to go up the road. So, we skipped it for later. We were able to take an afternoon mid-week to explore Glacier Road and it was so much better. Not nearly the amount of people and no waiting. There are several pull outs for trails but we passed them to head to the very end of the road and Glacier Point.

Glacier Point is an overlook that sits 3,000 feet above the Yosemite Valley floor. You get unobstructed views of Yosemite Valley, upper and lower Yosemite Falls, Vernal and Nevada Falls, Half Dome, and some High Sierra snow capped peaks in the distance. Talk about eye candy. It was my favorite view of the entire valley. We were told that sunset from Glacier Point is phenomenal. We didn’t get to stay for it, but I would love to go back one day and see it.

One of my favorite hikes in Yosemite National Park is on Glacier Road. The Taft Point trial is only one mile (one way). You start out in a lovely forest setting and the trail meanders through a meadow before dropping down and spitting you out on this canyon rim. Now, one of the interesting things about this steep sided canyon is that it has these really cool fissures! Guys! Check out this fissure! There are several of them all along Taft Point. These fissures plunge 2,000 feet straight down. Some are wide and some of the fissures are narrow.

Taft Point gives you an amazing view of El Capitan. We spent some time out on the point wandering around. We pretty much had the place to ourselves. A couple of groups of people were getting there right about the time we were heading back. I have four books on National Parks and what to see and do in each park. The Taft Point hike was only in one of them and it was by far my favorite hike we did in the park. It was only two miles round trip, the hike was easy enough for any physical level, and the views were pretty darn amazing. Plus, we had the place to ourselves. We didn’t have to wait in line to get a glimpse.

It took us an entire day to explore Tioga Road. It might only be a 39 mile scenic drive, but there is so much to see and do. Tioga Road is closed during the winter months. We lucked out and it opened a couple of weeks before we got there. At Olmstead Point you can see granite exposed by years of weathering and erosion. Olmstead Point is also a great place to get a birds-eye-view of Tenaya Lake. At 8,149 feet, Tenaya Lake is one of Yosemite’s biggest natural lakes. The Native Americans called it Py-we-ack which means shining rocks. Thousands of years ago the rocks around the lake were polished smooth by glacier movement and they still reflect and “shine” in the golden glow of the setting sun.

Toulumne Meadows started out millions of years ago under a sea of ice that was more than 2,000 feet deep. This is the view…right here in this spot back in 1889, where John Muir and Robert Underwood Johnson sat around a campfire discussing ways to protect this area of the Sierra Nevadas. One year later, in 1890, Yosemite National Park was born.

Toulumne Meadows has panoramic vistas of snow capped mountains and domes. It’s one of the largest sub-alpine meadows in the Sierra Nevadas…and it’s where you’ll find Soda Springs. The biggest part of the spring is protected within the enclosure in the pic above. Soda Springs has carbonated water bubbling and percolating up right out of the ground. The minerals in the soda water has turned the area around it a rusty red color. It was fun to stand there and watch it. It would bubble for a bit and then stop…then start back up. We found fresh tracks around it so we’re pretty sure the animals in the area are drinking it. People used to drink it too, but the Park Service now discourages people from drinking it due to possible ground contamination.

Tioga Road is Yosemite’s only road through the High Sierra country. From 6,200 feet all the way up to almost 10,000 feet at Tioga Pass is California’s highest automobile pass. Once you cross Tioga Pass, you exit Yosemite NP and start to descend down to the small town of Lee Vining.

We got a tip about a place to eat in Lee Vining. Whoa Nellie Deli shares its space with a gas station and a gift store. You might expect their food to be “fast food”, but it’s not even close to fast food. I had the lobster and crab Tioga Taquitos and they were the bomb!! Is that saying even still used? We have to thank our new friends, the Buoy family, for letting us know about this place.

Right down the road from Whoa Nellie Deli is Mono Lake Tufa State National Reserve. We didn’t have much time, but we drove down and took a quick peak at the lake. What the heck is tuffa? See those structures out in the water? That, is tuffa. Basically, it’s a limestone tower that forms over a freshwater spring within the lake. If we could figure out a way that didn’t require taking our home-on-wheels over huge scary mountain passes we could totally spend some time in the Lee Vining area. Between the lake and a few state parks…I was bummed our RV park was so far away from the area.

We ended up enjoying Yosemite National Park way more than we thought we would after our first experience in Yosemite Valley. There are places that still feel wild and while you might have to work a little harder to get to them, your efforts are completely worth it.

I wish we’d had this book from the start of our Yosemite National Park exploring. All of the park roads have little numbered signs at different points along the roads. This book tells you what all of those signs and areas are. Plus there’s a ton on Yosemite history and geology. We bought ours at the Toulumne Meadows Visitor Center but, it’s also available on Amazon and would be a great planning tool.

There were a few pretties in the area. I love these bright pink ones! These light lilac colored blooms were sprinkled throughout the park. I’m a sucker for purple…

We enjoyed our time in Yosemite. It’s easy to see why it has inspired so many people throughout it’s history. Between the sheer size of the park and the number of people who visit, planning is essential to seeing everything you want to see in this park.

“It is by far the grandest of all the special temples of Nature I was ever permitted to enter.” ~John Muir

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Yosemite National Park

Yosemite National Park

Hey Guys! We spent two weeks in Coarsegold, California so we could explore Yosemite National Park. Originally we’d planned on staying in a park in Groveland, but when we took a closer look at the road to get there…we changed our mind. We like to avoid narrow, winding, mountain roads in our home-on-wheels. When I called Park Sierra in Coarsegold a couple of weeks before we needed a spot, I didn’t really expect them to have a spot for us. But, we totally lucked out and they had a spot for us!

We arrived Memorial Day weekend and had no desire to go up into Yosemite National Park over a holiday weekend. I took a morning before the heat of the day set in to get some of the grime off of our roof. You can see the line between clean and dirty in the top picture above. I really only took off the top layer of grime, but it looks so much better. It’s amazing how much dirt can accumulate in a short amount of time. I never thought I would have to mop the roof of my home…that’s RV life though! The only spot available to us was in direct sunlight all day and unfortunately, the temps were high 90s and even into the low 100s while we were there. Our front air conditioning unit decided to have issues. Luckily, Jerl was able to get it fixed one morning and we stayed…well, not really cool, but semi-comfortable.

Other than the no shade issue, we really enjoyed our time at Park Sierra. One of the coolest things about the park was all of the walking we could do. One afternoon we found ourselves down by a little creek. The boys made some friends and they all spent some time wading in the creek on the hot days.

Nicholas celebrated his birthday while we were there. He’s obsessed with pizza. His goal in life is to have pizza in all fifty states. A pizza game board is perfect for this pizza loving kid!

There are a few different ways to get into Yosemite National Park, but only one that’s open year round. The year round road had a little rock slide at some point so now there’s a detour that takes you over this one lane bridge that also takes you over the river. It looks like they’ve been working to clean up the rock slide, but it might be awhile before the road is opened back up. If you’re heading to Yosemite any time soon, be prepared for some delays getting into the park.

Welcome to Yosemite National Park! We spent three and a half days exploring the park and while we got to see most of the highlights, we missed quite a bit.

This is the famous Tunnel View that you come to right out of the Wawona Tunnel. There are two different parking areas so you can pull over and spend some time soaking in the view. From here you can see Yosemite Valley…it’s been called the most photographed vista on Earth. I don’t know if that’s true, but there were certainly tons of people there when we were.

Yosemite is one of the most popular National Parks to visit. More than four million people from all over the world come to soak in the beauty of Yosemite National Park every year. That’s a massive amount of people and more than a few cars. In order to help preserve the park, Yosemite has a free shuttle service. And Guys, it’s totally the way to go. The shuttles can take you all over the valley. We went at the very beginning of the busy season (the week after Memorial Day weekend) and it was already pretty insane with the amount of people everywhere. There were several times on the shuttles that we were crammed in like sardines in a can. On an average summer day there is usually around 14,000 people in Yosemite Village. 14,000!!! I can’t even imagine! I don’t think we’ll ever want to visit during the busy season.

Did you know that Yosemite Valley is only 3% of the parks total land area? The valley is a one mile wide and seven mile long canyon that was started by a river and then widened by a glacier a long long time ago. El Capitan can be seen from the park valley road. I snapped the pic above from the shuttle. El Capitan is 3,593 feet from base to summit making it one of the world’s largest granite monoliths.

Half Dome, one of Yosemite’s iconic granite formations, rises 4,800 feet above the valley floor.  The first visitors to Yosemite National Park…way back before it was officially Yosemite National Park…would take four to five days to get from San Francisco to the valley by carriage or by horse.

Upper, Middle, and lower Yosemite Falls combine to form the highest waterfall in North America and the second highest in the world. Yosemite Falls is fed mostly by snow melt and is often dry by August. There’s a short trail to the base of Yosemite’s lower fall. It’s worth a side trip.

We did two hikes in the valley. The first one was the Mist Trail. This was a hard trail due to it’s 14% grade. The trail it’s self was a great trail! It’s about a mile to the 317 foot Vernal Fall and then you start up the 600 granite steps. Right about the time you reach the steps you also realize where the trail got it’s name.

The mist off of the Vernal and Nevada Falls pretty much soaks you. On a hot day, it’s refreshing! We didn’t make it all the way up those 600 steps to the Nevada Fall. We could see what we wanted to see from where we were and we were trying to make it to a Ranger program. The Mist Trail was our favorite hike in the park. It’s the most popular trail in the park so go early or it’ll feel more like a day at a crowded amusement park than a hike in nature. Remember that 14% grade? Yeah, I was really feeling that the next day, but it was the walk back down that got me.

The second hike we did was to Mirror Lake. The trail there was enjoyable and well maintained. We were on the first shuttle of the day, so we were among some of the first ones there that day. I should probably tell you that Mirror Lake isn’t actually a lake. Nope, it’s a small part of the Tenaya Creek. Honestly, I was a little disappointed with it. Just a teeny bit.

It’s hard to be too disappointed when you’re standing in a place like this. I mean…come on…look how gorgeous it is! We were standing there taking it all in when one of us realized they really needed to find a restroom. We’d been told there was a restroom on the way there, but we didn’t see it. Which meant we were on the wrong side of the river. Three of us made it all the way across the icy cold river. Two of us chickened out after making it only about a foot from the banks edge and immediately turned around. Yup, Nicholas and I (Jennie) couldn’t handle the cold. It was so cold!!! So, we split up. Three went off to find the restrooms on the other side of the river while two of us moseyed back down the trail we’d come in on.

The crowds were showing up and getting thick by the time we made it back to the shuttle stop. Can you believe there were people stripping down to their tidy whiteys and swimming in that frigid water?! I couldn’t even walk in it and they were swimming!! No. Thank. You!

We made it to the Ranger program. The boys needed to go to one to complete the Junior Ranger booklet. Nicholas volunteered to help the Ranger during the program. In over 100 National Park Units, we’ve only had to pay for the Junior Ranger booklets twice. Yosemite was one of those we had to pay for. The boys got both a cool wooden badge and a patch. And…with the sheer number of people that go though the park per year…it is understandable that the NPS would need a little help paying for the Junior Ranger stuff.

There were so many squirrels in Yosemite Valley. I can’t tell you how many people were trying to feed them by hand and pet them. Guys, the fleas that live on these squirrels can carry the plague and those little fleas can jump like 15 feet! Not to mention, squirrels will bite. But, we saw countless numbers of people treating the squirrels like they were pets. Human food is actually bad for squirrels. Did you know that squirrels can develop diabetes from eating human food? It’s true. Keep wild animals wild by not feeding them or touching them.

Every NP unit has it’s own feel to it and it’s own way of doing things. Like signs. I love the sheet metal signs in Yosemite. They’ve got torched letters giving them a rustic feel. Back in the mid 1950s there was some concern regarding the potential for the paint smell on the classic trail signs might attract bears. Bears…they’ll eat anything! Can you imagine coming up on a bear trying to eat a trail sign?

Well, this post is getting kind of long…and we’ve only covered Yosemite Valley…remember, that’s only 3% of the park…and it’s not even our favorite part. I’ll show you our favorite parts in next weeks post! So stay tuned!! For now, I’m going to leave you with this picture of the pretty that was right out side our home-on-wheels in Park Sierra.

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Gilroy, CA

Gilroy, CA

We spent two weeks in the Gilroy area of California. We wanted to explore some of the coast and hit a National Park there. When I pick places to stay, one of the things I look at is cell service strength. We have to have decent Verizon service so work can be done. In three years, we’ve only had to move once due to lack of cell single. We almost had to move from this area. We weren’t that far from a big city, but there were so many people the bandwidth was completely bogged down. It was bad. The area it’s self was pretty good! We enjoyed it!

Welcome to the Garlic Capital of the World! Gilroy is all about the garlic. You can get garlic flavored…everything. And I do mean…everything. We tried the garlic ice cream. The garlic flavor was so light that we couldn’t really taste the garlic much.

This entire part of California is a heavy agricultural area. If a house or business isn’t sitting on some land…it’s being used to grow something. One of our favorite things to do was try and guess what was growing in the different fields. Have you ever seen artichoke plants? They look pretty crazy!

All those fields of veggies and fruits meant tons of little farm stands…and some not so little stands. Casa de Fruta is one of those touristy places we usually try to avoid, but a friend of ours told us we had to see it. She was right! We stopped on our way out of the area and it was pretty cool! So many different local fruits, veggies, nuts, and candies! I’d never seen so many different flavors and styles of garlic. There were honey, jams, jellies, dates and nuts…I could have spent several hours looking at everything.

We had to stock up on a few things. We could have easily spent way too much on all of the yummy looking treats here!

We found a fish-n-chips truck called Ketch It outside one of those fruit and veggie places. Guys…it was the best fried fish we’ve ever had. Ever. And the garlic fries…top notch! We went back twice…we would have gone one more time, but the timing was off. We will forever compare all other fish-n-chips to these. We also found a burger place. The Habit. It’s fast food, but better. We like them better than In & Out and Five Guys and so far in California we’ve seen Habit stores in most areas we’re staying in. We try not to eat out too often, but it does happen.

We spent a day driving highway one. The road is as snaky as you’ve heard and the views…are even better than you think they’re going to be. Luckily, there were tons of pull-offs so we could safely gawk. And we did. We gawked and ogled and said wow more times than we thought we would.

To be honest, it was better than I thought it would be. I’d seen pictures, but you know we compare everything to Alaska and Maine. I thought…how could it be anywhere near as great as Alaska or Maine…but Guys, it is. It’s gorgeous! And the color of the water even on a cloudy day was so pretty. We started near the Monterrey Bay area and made it down to the Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park to see the little waterfall. We had to stand in line to get a glimpse of it. The crowd was not the best but it was pretty though! It was worth wading through the crowd and standing in line to get a glimpse.

Garrapata State Park was probably my favorite stop of the day. I love love love all of the flowers right next to the beach! I mean…look at those colors!! When we started out that morning we were pretty much on our own. Not that many people out and about. But, by mid-morning the people found us and we decided to call it quits on the exploring.

Pinnacles National Park was a surprise. I actually found it after I’d made our reservations. It was a happy coincidence that we were close enough to go check out Pinnacles NP. We only got to visit once, but there’s enough to do for several visits. Pinnacles NP is part of an old volcanic field that sits near the San Andreas Fault Zone. There’s not a lot of parking at this NP. You have to park at the visitor center then ride a shuttle bus back to the hiking. So be prepared for that.

We were about a mile into a five mile hike when Nicholas started not feeling well. He pushed on a little more, but just wasn’t feeling it. Nicholas, Alex, and I ended up turning around while Jerl and Charles finished out the hike. We were so bummed to miss the hike, but it was a really hot day and the heat was making Nicholas feel even worse. Luckily, we’d packed a lunch so the three of us made our way back down to the visitor center where we sat in the shade and had our lunch while we waited. The food and the cooler temps in the shade helped.

The main reason we wanted to visit Pinnacles was to see the California condors. Pinnacles National Park is a nesting area for them and is one of very few release sites in the US for the big birds. Weighing in at around twenty pounds with a wingspan of nine and a half feet, the California condor is one of the largest birds in North America. They’re certainly not the prettiest bird…but they are awe inspiring.

While the little boys and I were relaxing in the shade, Jerl and Charles were working hard on the trail. Check out those foot holds in the pic above! I’m a little jealous I didn’t get to finish this trail. It looks totally awesome! Jerl and Charles came back with tales of how difficult it was all while raving about the views!

It’s a thistle…but it’s pink. I’d never seen a pink thistle before. They’re usually purple…but the ones at Pinnacles were all this vibrant pink color. Love! The other beauties pictured above were also at Pinnacles!

These pretties were all down highway one. I love them so much! I mean…Guys…it’s purple with a pink glow!!!

While this area presented a challenge with cell service, we really enjoyed our time in Gilroy, CA. So much so that we would consider going back one day even though it was extremely congested with people.

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Sequoia National Park

Sequoia National Park

Hey Guys!! We spent two weeks in Three Rivers, CA so we could explore Sequoia National Park and Kings Canyon National Park. We only made it to Kings Canyon NP once, but we were in Sequoia as much as we could be. It took us over an hour to actually get up into Sequoia National Park.

The road to get into Sequoia NP winds it’s way up a mountain with hairpin turns. Our first time into the park we were waiting in line to cross the construction area when some fog started to waft in. Well, it wasn’t so much wafting in as it was pouring in. It came in really fast and really thick. We thought it might just go on through so we headed on into the park anyway.

We made it to the Giant Forest Museum and went in to kill some time hoping the fog would roll out while we were in there. You can see the fog in the windows of the pic above. Did you know it takes 91,000 sequoia seeds to make one pound? Each seed is the size of an oat flake.

The fog was still rolling in, but we decided to try and push forward…until we couldn’t see the road in front of our car. It was slightly terrifying. We were stuck on a two lane, very narrow, mountain road going up the mountain into thicker fog. We finally found a place to turn around and start our slow, nerve wracking decent down the mountain. It was crazy how fast other people were driving…without their fog lights on. We made it down the mountain and went to get pizza. After all of that we were ready for some comfort food!

If you’re heading into Sequoia National Park this summer, be prepared for construction and lane closures. Depending on when we went up the mountain we would have anywhere between a 15 min to an hour delay.

Established in 1890, Sequoia National Park is the second oldest National Park. We had to hunt for this park sign. The one at the Three River’s entrance with the Indian Head that you’ve probably seen…it was taken down for restoration. We were super bummed, but at least we found this other sign.

Every year the General Sherman tree grows enough new wood to make a brand new sixty foot regular sized tree. You are looking at the largest living (by volume) tree on earth. The estimated volume is more than 52,000 cubic feet…which is about the same volume as sixteen blue whales.

This little marmot was out enjoying the sun at one of the less popular pull-offs. We try to check out a variety of pull-offs…sometimes the views are just as spectacular as the more popular super crowded pull-offs. And, sometimes you come face to face with some of the park residents. ;-}

One of the hardest things to portray in pictures (for me) is size. I snapped this picture of the Giant Tree Museum in the middle of some sequoias to try and show you how massive these trees are. The museum is a decent sized building and look how much taller those amazing trees are!

These giant sequoias only grow on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada range and can grow to almost 275 feet tall with a trunk circumference of around 100 feet. It’s hard to believe the little seedling in the pic above might one day reach 275 feet high.

We went to Sequoia NP before the official start of the summer season, so not all of the roads were open. One of the places we really wanted to visit was Moro Rock. You could park down by the Giant Forest Museum and walk up. It made the hike a few miles longer…one way. And we were totally going to do that…if we had to. We kept checking to see if the Moro Rock road was open every time we went into the park. On our last day in the park it was…open!! Sweet Chickens! When you can park in the parking lot by the trail head…Moro Rock is a short quarter mile hike up 400 steps along with several ramps. The trail was built by the CCC back in 1931 and takes you up to 6,725 feet. Before this nice trail was built, early visitors had to use ropes to scale Moro Rock. I’m not sure we would have attempted that particular hike. I like to think we’re adventurous and daring…but there’s a limit to what I’ll do with kids in tow.

When you reach the top and after you catch your breath… you can walk out to the end of the trail and enjoy unobstructed views of the Great Western Divide. We stood up there for awhile. The views were…well, they were pretty darn amazing in every direction! We finally moved on when other people started nudging us out of the way. I get it. We all want to take in the view and get pictures with that vista. We moved out of the way and started back to the car excited that we could check Moro Rock off of our list.

Buttress Tree fell without warning on June 3, 1959. Most sequoia trees die from toppling over. The roots are shallow and they don’t have a taproot to help anchor them. We found Buttress Tree after we left Moro Rock and found a wide spot in the road so we could pull over to get a closer look. I had to snap a picture of the boys with the root system to show how big the roots get.

Hale Tharp was the first settler of European descent to move into the Sequoia NP area. He built a cabin out of an old hollowed-out sequoia. Tharp’s Log has been pretty much left alone. You can step inside the door and see how Hale Tharp had it set up. Did you know that Sequoia bark is up to 2 feet thick and is a poor conductor of heat? Sequoia bark also has some natural immunity to bugs and fungi which means a fallen sequoia can stick around for a very very long time under natural circumstances. How cool would it be to have a house built from fallen Sequoia logs?!

Sequoias rarely die of old age. Many of the oldest sequoias are close to 3,000 years old. Sequoias live so long that we’re only just now seeing the second generation of these gigantic trees. Think about that… We still don’t really know how these amazing trees will evolve over time. They’re really just getting started.

Sequoia NP is in bear country so all of that stuff you carry around when you hike that has any kind of smell at all… lotions, lip balms, repellents, snacks, cans and bottles (even unopened)…bears can smell them up to a mile away. The park has provided tons of these bear boxes to store all of your stuff in. Oh, and bears have been known to claw their way into cars…in the middle of a crowded parking lot…so, do yourself a favor and use the bear boxes.

Did you know that sequoia trees actually need fire to regenerate? A sequoia pine cone needs fire in order to release all of those tiny, oat flake sized seeds. The NPS now conducts prescribed burns in order to keep the forest healthy. They’ve sectioned off the park and rotate burn sections.

We weren’t sure we were going to get to drive through Tunnel Log. This is up the same road as Moro Rock. We actually got to drive through it twice. Everyone we saw driving though it stopped for a picture or two or three. We even saw some tourists having a full on photo shoot in front of it. Seriously, how many pics do you need of yourself in front of the same tree? Ha!  But really…move it along. Tunnel Log fell naturally and instead of reworking the roads, the NPS tunneled through the tree so cars could get through. Oh! We also made it to an old fallen tree that you used to be able to actually pull your car up on and then get a pic of it…while it was on the log! So cool! It’s blocked off now. You can’t get your car up on it anymore, but you can walk and climb all over it. So fun!

Springtime in the mountains means pretties everywhere! I loved all of the flowers in bloom! These yuccas were amazingly huge and dotted all over the foothills of the park. We also spotted quite a few dogwood trees! I love dogwoods with their delicate white and pink blooms!

We loved Sequoia National Park so much more than we could have imagined. There was something very humbling about standing next to a living thing that’s been around for thousands of years. There’s a sense of being so small in the grand scheme of things.

It’s hard to grasp the sheer size and feel of a giant sequoia until you’re standing next to one.

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Kings Canyon National Park

Kings Canyon National Park

Hey Guys!!  Kings Canyon National Park is usually lumped together with Sequoia National Park but, Kings Canyon is so amazing…it really deserves a post all of it’s own.

 We found all of those California happy cows we hear so much about on television. Seriously though, we love this topography! The big rolling hills with little groves of trees here and there…This area of California is gorgeous!

It took us two hours to get to Kings Canyon from where we were staying. The road started out fine…narrow and windy, but paved. And then, the GPS Lady in all of her infinite wisdom decided we needed to be more adventurous and took us down an old forest service road to get into Kings Canyon NP. Truthfully… we loved it! We ended up driving though a section of the park not very many people get to see. Redwood Canyon is home to one of the largest sequoia groves and is one of the largest areas of old growth sequoias.

We had this area all to ourselves as we bumped and bounced our way up the old dirt forest service road filled with deep ruts. We feel like we should have seen a bear. Or mountain lion. Or any wildlife…but, we didn’t.  We loved that we didn’t see another car until we were almost into the park. Sometimes the GPS Lady totally messes up and sometimes…she’s spot on. We loved driving through the largest remaining grove of sequoia trees (over 15,000)!

Kings Canyon National Park was originally established in 1890 as General Grant National Park. It was expanded and renamed Kings Canyon National Park in 1940.

General Grant Grove is home to the General Grant Tree (in the picture above). At a whopping twenty-seven stories in height, the General Grant Tree is the world’s second largest living tree. Not tallest…but second largest…based on trunk volume. Want the numbers? The General Grant Tree stands at 267.4 feet in height and has a circumference of 107.6 feet. The General Grant Tree is a memorial to US soldiers killed in war and is also known as “the Nation’s Christmas Tree”.

It takes hundreds of years for one of these fallen giants to completely deteriorate. If you get to visit Grant’s Grove take your time and explore some. We found this fallen tree near the trail. As impressive as these giant trees are from the outside…they’re just as impressive on the inside. That’s Jerl’s silhouette at the end of the sequoia.

There’s a little general store and a pretty descent restaurant in Grants Grove. We ate at the restaurant, but I would suggest grabbing something to go at the general store and heading down into the canyon for a picnic lunch. Alex was so hungry he had a big burger and a potpie. Teenagers…

Kings Canyon Scenic Byway takes you to the bottom of the canyon via a road with hairpin turns, steep drop offs, and sheer granite cliff faces. This road isn’t for the faint of heart, but the payoff is huge. At the bottom of the canyon you can stand and look up at the canyon walls that rise thousands of feet up.

We only did a couple of hikes in Kings Canyon. One of them took us on a bridge over the Kings River. The water was amazingly clear and pretty darn cold.

Grizzly Falls is a must stop while you’re exploring Kings Canyon. It’s just feet away from the parking area and it’s a great spot for a picnic! I was standing at our car when I snapped the left shot of Grizzly Falls. If you’re not into hiking, this stop is good place to see one of the many waterfalls in the canyon.

The Kings River flows through the canyon. The road follows it most of the time so you have ample opportunity to gawk at the swiftly moving river. There are some pull-offs where you can get out and take a closer look. Just don’t fall in. Can you spot our red 4Runner in the picture above? It gives you a size comparison as to just how massive this canyon is.

On the way back up and out of the canyon we stopped at several of the vista pull-offs…and there are several! You can see the Kings River snaking it’s way through the canyon in the pics above. See how all of the mountain tops are rounded? That’s evidence that Kings Canyon is a glacier carved valley. With extreme elevation ranging between 1,500 feet to 14,500 feet, Kings Canyon National Park has a wide variety of habitats. Keep your eyes open and you never know what you might find…and always hike bear aware.

We saw some evidence of fires. This one happened back in 1955 when over 17,000 acres was burned. Now, Rangers know more about preserving these wild forests and do a prescribed burn to help prevent wildfires that rage out of control.

It was spring time while we were in Kings Canyon NP so all of the flowers were waking up from their winter nap. I love these bright orange pretties! They remind me of a wildflower called Indian Paintbrush. I don’t know if that’s what these are, but they’re very similar. The purple pretties are gorgeous!  It’s hard to tell, but these bushes were huge…and everywhere!

John Muir once said that Kings Canyon National Park is “a rival to Yosemite”. He was right. With it’s multiple 14,000 foot peaks and some of the worlds largest strands of giant sequoia trees…the Kings River and the canyon that is more than a mile deep…Kings Canyon National Park is definitely a rival to Yosemite.

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Desert Hot Springs

Desert Hot Springs

Hey Guys! We spent one very hot, very windy week in the Desert Hot Springs area of California. We were there at the end of April and the daily temps reached a scorching 90* by 10 every morning.

We spent a day exploring Joshua Tree National Park. If you’re going to visit this National Park come in the winter. Winter daytime temps are in the 60s vs. summer when the day time temps exceed 100*. Everyone says the best time to visit is March and April. We were there at the end of April and it was already too hot.

We didn’t do very much hiking here. It was just too dang hot and windy. We wanted to see all of the gigantic boulders so we hiked the Hidden Valley loop. This area is very popular with rock climbers so it can be a bit crowded.

We made it out to Keys View. Guys…check out that view! If you look hard enough you can see the Salton Sea and the San Andreas Fault in the pic above. Keys View is a quarter mile loop…so it’s pretty short, but we found some of the best views in the park here.

Did you know…a Joshua Tree isn’t actually a tree? Its actually the largest species of yucca! What?!? Crazy, right? For the first ten years, the Joshua tree grows about three inches a year. They can live for hundreds of years but unlike the saguaro I told y’all about…Joshua trees only grow to about forty feet tall. Driving through this National Park felt a little like driving through a Dr. Seuss book. Ha!

Yup, we found a dirt road to explore while we were in Joshua Tree NP. Are you surprised? ;-p We drove the 18 mile Geology Tour Road. It was a pretty narrow dirt road, but it wasn’t bad at all. We never had to kick it up into four-wheel drive and the views were all pretty stellar!

Scattered throughout Joshua Tree NP are the remnants of old mines. The one above is what’s left of the Silver Bell Mine. Gold in the 30s, lead in the 40s, and copper in the 50s. There are several old mines you can hike to, but most of them are unsafe. So, this is as close as we got.

It’s not technically a sea any more, but a long, long time ago it was part of what is now the Gulf of California. The Salton Sea is California’s largest lake at around 35 miles long and 15 miles wide. It sits 235 feet below sea level. Most lakes have a natural outlet flowing to the ocean, but the Salton Sea doesn’t. The only water it gets is through rain and agricultural runoff.

The lake you see today is only the current form of the many different lakes that have filled this area over millions of years. Because of all of the agricultural runoff there is a peanut butter type sludge that sits at the bottom of the lake. Fishing for tilapia is a popular recreation at Salton Sea, but I don’t think I would eat anything that came out of this lake. You think it’s sand until you get closer. It’s the skeletons of thousands and thousands of barnacles and fish. Neat but gross at the same time. There are old motels and and boarded up yacht clubs all over the shores. If you go exploring here, do it in a safe spot. We’ve read horror stories of people sinking to their ankles and then having to throw their shoes away due to some residue on them that eats the shoe. We didn’t encounter that at all, but we didn’t stray from the state park head quarters.

Those…are date palms. The first date palms in the US were planted by missionaries in California in 1769. There are a few different date farms in the Desert Hot Springs area. We went to Oasis Date Gardens.

Oasis Date Gardens was established in 1912 and is a whopping 175 acres full of date producing palm trees. YUM! The Oasis Date Gardens doesn’t give tours but they have a video you can watch and there are dates set out for sampling! We had no idea there were so many different kinds of dates. And that they tasted so differently!

I had to try the prickly pear date shake. Had to. There just wasn’t any way around it. It was soooo good. If we’d found this place our first day in the Desert Hot Springs area…I would have gone back to Oasis Date Gardens at least four…maybe five times just for this shake.

We walked out with some goodies. The boys didn’t waste any time getting into the date bread. It didn’t last long.

Over in Palm Springs there’s plenty of green. Big palm trees…lots of lush bushes…but the rest of this area looks…well, brown. Along with some very nice shades of tan. We drove about 15 miles down this road and found a natural oasis. A spot of green in the middle of the desert.

There were several hiking trails here. We stuck to a short boardwalk hike because we were warned that the rattlesnakes were waking up and were very active. And…they like to hide in the trees. Um…nope. Nope. Nope. That’s a great big nope from me. It was bad enough to worry about danger noodles in bushes and near big rocks…but to have to worry about them falling out of the trees onto us…I’m gonna pass on that every time. We saw everything we wanted to see. It was really cool to walk among the huge fan palms. This particular oasis sits on top of the San Andreas Fault. The boys are standing on it in the pic above. You really can’t tell. If the sign didn’t tell you, you’d never know.

We were told of a different place to see the San Andreas Fault in it’s more natural state. It was out in the middle of nowhere and the whole area was in upheaval. It was something else to see it.

We stayed at the KOA. There was zero shade and temps of over 100* every day. It was a very very hot week. They KOA had its own hot springs spa. We didn’t use it because…we were hot enough as it was. The thought of getting into hot water was not at all appealing. We did, however, utilize the pool! Most of the time we were the only ones there.

I can’t leave out the pretties. Even in the desert there is color. Spring in the desert is so full of color and life. Not all of it from cacti! This palo verde tree (top picture) is lovely with it’s green bark and yellow blooms!

There was a surprising amount of things to see and do in the Desert Hot Springs area and if we ever go back… it’ll be in the winter. It was just too hot and too windy for us. While we thought what we saw was neat, it was kind of a looong miserable week.

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Seen in San Diego

Seen in San Diego

Hey Guys! We spent two very full weeks in the San Diego, CA area and we still didn’t see it all, but we got in as much as we could.

But first, let’s talk about the drive from Tucson to San Diego. It’s not one that I will want to do again any time soon. Not too far after Yuma…just past the CA border you get to this area of well…wind and heat and hills. There wasn’t anything at all for miles and miles. Except the intense heat (we crossed in April and the temp got up to 95) and the wind that tried to blow us off the road every so often with a mighty gust.

The conditions are bad enough that California put in pullovers every few miles for radiator water and call boxes. Because, yeah…there’s no cell service here either. Along with the radiator water, call box, and hill percent grade warnings there was a sign that urged motorist to turn off their air conditioning…you know…so maybe your vehicle will actually make it through this little slice of the H word. I was a nervous wreck by the time we got though all 20 to 30 miles of it and if we ever decide to go back to San Diego, we are definitely going to need a different route.

When I was planning this area I had a hard time finding an RV Park that fit us. I don’t want something right downtown in the middle of all the traffic. It needs to be a safe area, kid friendly, and not cost $90 a night. I stumbled onto the Sweetwater Summit Regional Park in Bonita, CA right as I was about to give up on seeing the San Diego area. Guys, this is a great park! Look how big our yard was! And…fullhookups for right around $30 a night! Score! We were only half an hour from the coast…so not too far away from the touristy stuff we had planned, but far enough away that we weren’t stuck in the middle of the rat race everyday.

We had some pretty cute neighbors here too. We had ground squirrels as neighbors at Catalina State Park back in Tucson as well, but these guys were twice the size! Just as fun to watch though. We also had tons of rabbits as neighbors here. The little jerks liked to get up on our steps at night and do their…potty business. So, there were rabbit pellets all over the steps and our mat for the first few nights. We stopped it by putting our steps in every night. Take that rabbits. We heard rumors of rattlesnakes, but we never saw one. And ants…we heard rumors that there are legions of ants just waiting to invade your RV, but we didn’t see any of those either. We got lucky.

All National Park units tell a story. Some, like Cabrillo National Monument, has more than one story to tell. Cabrillo National Monument tells three different stories. The stories of exploration, guidance, and protection. One of the stories told at Cabrillo NM is about it’s namesake, Juan Radriguez Cabrillo who set sail in New Spain in 1542 to explore and claim new lands for the King of Spain. Cabrillo was the first European to set foot on the west coast of what is now the United States.

Another story here is the story of the Old Point Loma Lighthouse which operated from 1855 to 1891. The lighthouse was in the perfect spot as long as the weather was good, but if there was any fog…the lighthouse couldn’t be seen. So, a new lighthouse was built closer to sea level in 1891. The old lighthouse has been preserved and is set up in the fashion it would have been during the time when the longest serving keeper and his family lived there. Robert Israel worked as the lightkeeper for 20 years. He was on duty 24 hours a day 7 days a week so he had very little time to spend with his family.

The last story we learned about was of Fort Rosecrans. Point Loma is a natural protective barrier located at the entrance of the San Diego Bay. Due to its strategic location Point Loma has had an important part in coastal defense since 1797 when the Spanish built Fort Guijarros at Ballast Point. Today, at Cabrillo NM, you can explore a bunker from WWII where many soldiers spent countless hours watching for enemy ships, planes, and submarines.

The boys really enjoyed this Junior Ranger book. It had them exploring different sections of the NM in order to answer questions. They like the interactive booklets that make them get up and explore more than the ones that just have them find answers in the visitor center museum.

We spent over four hours exploring the USS Midway. We’ve been to a few different battleships, but this was our first aircraft carrier. The USS Midway was built in 1945 during WWII in 18 months by women. Most of the women had never even picked up a tool before they were drafted to work in factories and plants to help with the war effort. You are looking at the first ship that was too big to go through the Panama Canal. At the time, it was the largest ship in the world. Our favorite thing about touring the Midway was hearing all of the personal stories from the Veterans who were volunteering as guides. Hearing someone recount their time and experience as a crew member made it more personal…more real…for us. It was different than just reading a sign about what this room was used for or what that lever does.

Let’s talk foodies! It is San Diego…they are kind of a foodie town. We took Alex out to lunch one day and he got a surf and turf burger (bottom left picture). He ate it all! We found a little taco shop that served Tijuana style street tacos (bottom right picture). It was originally started in Tijuana. You know you’re in the right spot to try ethnic food when there’s a language barrier. We got the family pack and it ended up being more than we could eat for only $40! Thanks to a cousin (waves at Dev) we found Hodad’s. I think the picture (top middle picture) tells you everything you need to know. The only one who finished their burger here was Charles. Those burgers were huge!

I think I’m going to have to break this area up into two posts. We did more touristy things here than we usually do. There were sooo many pretties in San Diego! I’ll share some with you now and some with you in the next post too! If I’m being totally honest here…I have enough pictures of pretties to do an entire post on just flowers. Ha!

Ok Guys! That’s it for this post…stay tuned for San Diego part two and watch out for Nicholas’ Pizza Street post and a new Zoo Review!

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018

Las Cruces

Las Cruces

Hey Guys! We spent a week in Las Cruces.

We had to tandem drive from our overnight stop in Junction, TX. If you know me, you know I’m not a driver…so I was pretty nervous about an entire day (it took us right around seven hours) of driving. It was actually ok until we got to El Paso. El Paso is huge with tons of lanes and tons of cars and I was a nervous wreck driving through it. Luckily, all I had to do was follow Jerl who was driving the RV. Nicholas rode with me and we listened to music the whole time.

After a drive day like that we needed a breather…and a burger. The next day we found our way to Hatch, NM and a place called Sparky’s where we had some of the best (and hottest) green chili cheeseburgers we’ve ever had. But, what do you expect from a town known for its chilies? We got there right before 11am and had to wait in a little line. As we sat there eating, the line kept growing and before we left it was out the door and down the block. It was that good. Aaannddd…when you’re in a town known for it’s green chilies…you have to try a chocolate green chili shake. Right? Alex said it was a good thing all of those green chilies were covered in sugar because they were super spicy!

We stopped by a little curio shop in Hatch to look around. Check out the hand painted pitcher and glasses! It’s a good thing we don’t have room for any big souvenirs…I would have walked away with a set of these. We did pick up some green chili powder. We’ve been adding it to our taco seasoning. It has a great taste!

We celebrated Alex’s 15th birthday with a pie. We now officially have a 17 year old, 15 year old, and a 13 year old… how is that possible? I swear I’m not old enough to have three teenagers!

Quite a bit of our time in Las Cruces was spent doing car work. Jerl ordered and replaced the broken headlight. We also spent a fair amount of time replacing the tow bar. You might remember our old tow bar ended up under our car. It was bent beyond repair. We upgraded and went with the next best model plus we added locking pins anywhere and everywhere someone could tamper with them. We would really like for out toad to stay behind the RV where it’s supposed to be…not racing us down the highway. No more joy riding please!

Jerl and I actually had a date night. We don’t have them often, but…we do have three teenagers who are capable of cooking for themselves…so, we out. We ended up at the High Desert Brewing Company and Guys…Oh. My. Goodness….we had the absolute spiciest green chilies EVER!! Wowzers!! Jerl had the green chili burger in the picture above with green chili queso fries. (right picture) I had a green chili quesadilla. We walked out of there with burning bellies! The food was so good, but sooo spicy!! We will totally go back the next time we’re in Las Cruces!! It’s a good thing we didn’t take the boys with us because there’s no way any of them could have handled the amount of spice those green chilies were packing. We did take the boys to a place called Andele’s Dog House for some very tasty and not too spicy food! These are the nachos I got. (left picture) They were really good! I asked for beef expecting to get ground beef…like taco meat…but got steak! The boys like it mainly because you could go get your own chips and salsa at the salsa bar. Kids. Ha!

Right down the road from where we stayed was Old Mesilla which was a stop on the Butterfield Overland Trail. The Butterfield Overland Trail is the predecessor to the Pony Express and ran from St. Louis to San Francisco. We had a good time walking around the little downtown square with all of it’s curio shops.

The Courthouse that Billy The Kid was tried in is now a gift shop. It was kind of fun to stick our heads in and see some of the old architecture.

We drove over the San Agustin Pass. There’s a little pull off at the top where there are some info signs and a pretty darn good view. The San Agustin Pass goes through three mountain ranges…the Organ Mountains, the San Andres Mountains, and the San Agustin Mountains.

We spent a little time hiking around the Dripping Springs area of the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument. Before I tell you about the hike…let me just say that we almost didn’t do this hike. We were talking to one of the volunteers and she told us a couple times about all of the diamondback rattlesnakes down on this one trail that were super aggressive and had actually chased her down the trail. Guys…I do not want to be chased by a snake. Ever. I have a healthy fear of anything that can kill me and venomous snakes are pretty high on that list. I plucked up my courage and was bolstered by the fact that it was a pretty cool morning (and snakes don’t like cool weather) and we went for a hike up to Van Patten’s Mountain Camp. It was a pretty nice hike…it was a constant gradual up so we were breathing a little hard. It warmed us up and gave me a reason to stop every so often to take some pictures. You know, because I need a reason to take pictures. *wink wink*

Part way up the hike we found a set of old buildings that had been used as a livery for the Mountain Camp. (right picture) In the late 1800s the guests could ride a stage line from Las Cruces up to the hotel (mountain camp). By the early 1900s guests were showing up in automobiles too. About a quarter of a mile on up the trail we found the remnants of Van Patten’s Mountain Camp. (left picture) Major Eugene Van Patten built the resort hotel in the late 1800s. In 1915 Van Patten had some financial troubles and sold the resort to Dr. Nathan Boyd.

Dr. Boyd turned part of the resort into a tuberculosis sanatorium. Sometime in the 1920s Dr. Boyd sold the resort and sanatorium to a Dr. T.C. Sexton and by the 1940s the resort hotel was in ruins.

The Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument is run by the BLM. When a NPS unit isn’t run by the NPS we never know if there will be a Junior Ranger program or not. This one had a small one and even had a little badge that the boys earned. We were also warned about the Oryxx that roam the area. Apparently, they can run fast and they’re pretty muscly. They’re causing havoc with the ecosystem in the park because they don’t have a natural predator in this area. We spotted one resting under a tree. With the magic of a zoom lens we got a good look at it. Those are some serious horns!

The Dripping Springs area of the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks NM is about 6000 feet in elevation. We enjoyed some pretty nice views through the whole hike.

There weren’t too many pretties around since it was still technically winter at this point, but these amazing little yellow pretties were in our yard for the week.

It was a stressful and busy week in Las Cruces with all of the car/tow bar work, but we thoroughly enjoyed the area!

See y’all down the road!

#westernloop2018