On the way home

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Around Lake Isabella

The cave-mobiles at Pebbles cave

While enjoying a visit with Pebbles on Friday the 13th, the weather was sort of dismal. It rained and it snowed, it sunned and it blowed. And it was not warm!
 

Rock-O

Fred, Pebbles, Wilma

               It had not changed much this morning, but there was no snow mixed in the rain. The pass was clear as we left the Lake Isabella valley behind, and we knew there was a high wind warning for 395. We were kind of pushed along with a tail wind for the 45 mile drive to 395, and then we changed direction. It blew and it blew and was either coming at us head on or smacking us from the side. Oh what fun it is to ride in a wind slapped cavemobile.

Mountains with fresh snow

               We stopped at the Eastern Sierra VC and found a stamp for Mt. Whitney. It is not an official stamp for our books, but we collect what we can. We could not see Mt. Whitney because of clouds, but the mountains along there were pretty with the fresh snow.

Fire truck in front of VC in one of the remaining buildings

You can see beyond the fire truck how barren it was and is

Soon we came to Manzanar. It is a Japanese relocation center from World War II. We had thought it would be kind of depressing, and it was. But the VC museum and video were very nicely done. There was a huge display with the names of those who had lived there. On Tuesday of this week there will be a special program there with at least 9 of the surviving people who had been brought there from Bainbridge Island, WA. That would have been real interesting, but we were a few days early. We also got our books stamped in the VC. The VC is in one of the few remaining buildings on the grounds. You can take a guided driving tour, and it is three and a half miles long, so the place was pretty big. The constant wind would not have been pleasant, and extremely cold winters and hot summers.

On the way home

As we approached Bishop the road condition board told us to carry chains if going up 395, but 6 was clear. So we again changed plans and are headed directly home rather than take an extra day or two to go the 395 route.
We checked a couple of "rest areas" that were more than slightly undesirable for parking overnight, then tried for a recreation area around Walker Lake, but backtracked to an empty lot in the town of Hawthorne. We will continue on home from here on Sunday.
We have had a great trip so far, and know the travels on Sunday are kind of boring, but should get us home early enough to get the cavemobiles emptied.
We will be looking forward to our next adventure, and will post again then.
Thanks for joining us on our journeys!

Visit with Pebbles

Thursday, April 12, 2012

We awoke this morning to the music of big-rigs coming and going from the Flying J in Barstow, CA. Since it was so convenient, at the Flying J, we dashed into Denny’s for a quick breakfast before we fueled up the cave-mobiles and hit the road.

Today is a short travel day. We are only going to Kernville, CA to visit Pebbles for a day or so. We do have an ulterior motive. It is called shower and a down day.

We did make a pit stop in Inyokern, CA where we ran into a local fellow who gave us a fishing update on the Western USA. He was a very nice, interesting gent who would have given us a complete rundown on the entire USA if we had not had a destination and a commitment to be at Pebble’s house today.

So here we are at Pebble’s; clean, refreshed and unwinding.

We’ll be back on the road in the next day or so.

So long for now from the Bedrock Bunch.

Welcome Home to Bedrock

Wednesday, 11 April 2012
We awoke this morning in the Mather Campground in Grand Canyon National Park, on the south rim of the Grand Canyon. The plan for today is travel in the general direction of Barstow, California. We ate a quick breakfast of eggs, turkey sausage, biscuits and hash browns. (you wonder why we don’t just waste away while we are traveling) After the dishes were cleaned up we headed south on route 64 toward Williams, AZ.

It was blowing really hard here at our home in Bedrock

We had to make a stop at Bedrock to take a few photos of the old home place. Once photos were taken we went on in to Williams. It was time for some fuel in the cave-mobiles so we stopped there and paid $4.59.9 for fuel, the most expensive on the trip thus far.

We hit heavy rain showers on some of the hills

Another heavy squall

We continued west on I-40 to Kingman where we stopped at Taco Bell for a quick lunch then on to Route 98 and 68 to Bullhead City, AZ. The side trip was to Katherine Landing on Lake Mohave for a Lake Mead National Recreation Area stamp for the Passport Books.
Somewhere along the way, about 30 seconds out of the Grand Canyon National Park, we picked up a little head wind. It stayed with us all day and, as if by magic, it continued as a head wind regardless of which direction we were going. At one point Betty and Barney ran through a small whirlwind which caused a short, white knuckle moment. Things were rocking pretty good. Through all this rocking around Fred and Wilma had a gallon of water on the counter of their cave-mobile that stayed in place like it was glued there. 

No, we couldn't go there! Would have knocked the top 3 feet off!

From Bullhead City we went south on route 98 to Needles, CA. In Needles we found what could be the only 8 foot clearance overpass along the Colorado River. After a little maneuvering around the obstruction we found ourselves back on I-40 headed for Barstow, CA.

Freezing wind blowing us

Grandson and his girlfriend in front of his new Charger

In Barstow we had dinner with Fred and Wilma’s grandson and his girlfriend at a Mexican restaurant called Los Domingos. It was a very enjoyable meal and was nice to see the kids again. After dinner we went down I-15 a couple of miles where we wandered into a Flying J and settled in for the night. It has been a pretty long travel day wrestling with the wind so we are glad to be off the road for the night.
Good night from the Bedrock Bunch.

Doing the Canyon

April 10, 2012

Hard to see, but the petroglyph is there

Up and at it a little earlier than usual for us, we chowed down and went to find a parking spot so we could hop on the shuttle bus. We had several different shuttle bus trips planned for the day. We started with the Hermit’s Rest trip. But first we took the village shuttle and stopped at the Bright Angel Trailhead. We all started down the trail, but when it rounded a bend that was on a drop off, Betty and Wilma stopped and Fred and Barney went on alone. We had been told just after the first tunnel were some petroglyphs, so they went down to see them.
Then we transferred to the Hermit’s Rest shuttle. We thought we would go to the end and do our stopping on the way back, but they do more stops on the way out, and only three on the way back. So we got off at several stops, looked around and then hopped another bus. Two of the stops were fairly close together, so we walked between the two. If you get on and ride the whole trip without getting off, it takes over an hour, so with stops you can spend quite a bit of the day on just one trip. Our stamps were at the end of the trip out, the Hermit’s Rest stop, and we enjoyed looking around there. They had a huge fireplace that was very interesting to see. There is a little snack bar there and they had freshly baked cookies that were smelling up the whole place. Of course we had to buy some, and they were really good.
As we were at the railing looking over the edge, an older man started talking to us. He was there with his son who was about our age, and the son was getting real embarrassed with his dad. The dad was telling us that the WPA built the Grand Canyon during the depression and if the depression had lasted longer the canyon would have been bigger. That evolved into what was dug out formed the Rocky Mountains. We really had some laughs with him.
After our trip out there, we went back for some lunch, showers and laundry, and then decided that was enough for the day.
We really enjoyed our trip to the Grand Canyon, much more than we had expected to. It was crowded, but like one of the drivers told us, later it will be wall to wall. Even now, the late afternoon shuttle buses were just packed. We did it right by going early in the day.

On the way to the Grand!

Monday, April 9, 2012
Monday morning we left Lees Ferry campground headed for the Grand Canyon. Just before the highway turn off to the Canyon, we stopped at a Trading Post where we found a penny smasher.
We didn’t stop at the overlooks until we got into the National Park because most of them were just used for sales booths and we weren’t in the buying mode.
     Not too far into the park we found the Desert View area. There we found a stonework viewing tower, a general store, and a bookstore where we got our stamps. We went to the observation patio at the tower, but did not climb to the top. We purchased a couple of items at the general store, then rearranged our parking and fixed something to eat.
Heading on into the park, we stopped at the Tusayan Ruins Museum to get more stamps. We decided to go on into the main hub for visitors and try to find a camping site, then we could backtrack and see the viewpoints we were passing by. That never did happen! We found enough to keep us busy while in the park.
We had a little bit of problem relating the map to the street signs, but finally found the campground, and were blessed to get two sites next to each other. After getting settled in our site, we loaded up in the Rubble mobile and went to do some exploring.
     We found several bookstores with stamps, and also got stamps at the VC. Also while in the VC we enjoyed the movie. We also did a little walking around and took in some of the viewpoints around the VC. After checking off most of the stamps we knew were available, we went looking for one that was kind of elusive. Like I said, we were having trouble relating the map to the signs. We drove up into an area restricted to vehicles under 20 feet, and just drove around the loop and back out. Then we drove around the one way loop and couldn’t see the store where the stamp was supposed to be, so we went around the loop again, and still couldn’t find the store that was marked on the map. We looked at another map on a different brochure, and it looked like the store was in the restricted area, so around we went again! Sure enough there was a side street where the store was located. The parking lot was full, so we went around that again and still nothing. So Barney orbited three times while we hurried in to get our stamps. We didn’t even look around to see what else was there. It turned out to be very funny. We just were not getting the connection with the map!
It was quite warm and we were wiped out, so we went back to camp and made our plans for tomorrow.
 

Happy Easter

Sunday, April 8, 2012

Sunday morning we began the day in Sunset View campground in Navajo National Monument. We had a very nice campsite, and restrooms with running water and flush toilets, and shared the campground with one other couple. There were also a couple of motorcycles parked in a spot, but we never saw people there. They had probably gone on some back country hike. The price was within our range since it was free. That was keeping our average cost per night down!

As the VC opened we went over and watched the film. We enjoyed it very much. We did not plan on other activities there since we had done the one walk the night before, so we headed toward Page, Arizona. It is on the northern Arizona/southern Utah border.

Our first stop in Page was the Carl Hayden VC at the Glen Canyon dam. We got our stamps there, took in the view and watched the movie. We also walked out on the bridge over the Colorado River a little way.

We needed to fuel up, and started to pull into a Shell station, but it was quite a bit more expensive than the Maverick we had just passed. So we turned around and went to the Maverick. We had to wait in line for our turn, so I turned on the mifi to find an RV dump station in the area. It was back at the Shell station, or at the car wash beside the Shell. And it was a free one.

We got that chore done, and thankfully it is a “blue” job, so that means Fred and Barney. The other office in Page that had stamps isn’t open on weekends, so we headed down the road to Alternate 89 and turned back north a little bit, stopping at the Navajo Bridge VC for more stamps and a short walk out on the old bridge. We thought the green color of the river was pretty until we went on up the road to Lees Ferry and saw how clean and clear it was until the Pariah River ran into it. The Pariah was really muddy and sure changed the color. It was interesting to see the two colors side by side for a short distance before the mud fully merged.

We got sites selected in the Lees Ferry campground and then went in search of the stamps. The ranger station where there was supposed to be one was closed, but we talked to someone there who directed us to the law enforcement station. The building was locked, but there was a bell, and soon the law enforcement officer let us in and found the stamps. He chatted for a little while, and told us that this is the launch point for trips going through the Grand Canyon. The trip is over 200 miles, and 14  days.

We looked around at the old buildings there, then went back to camp and turned in.

        Twas a good day, and we hope you had one too.