Our RV Adventures

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After a really nice breakfast at the Sunday House Inn here in Fredericksburg, we were on our way to Kingsland a little before noon. With a few stops in between.

First up was to head back into town and drop Jan off at Rustlin’ Rob’s for a few treats to bring home.

Then it was on out to Wildseed Farms for our yearly pilgrimage.

Finishing up we finally headed to Kingsland, arriving at our hotel about 2:45.

Then it was over to Chris’ for the evening.

I’ll flesh all this out tomorrow.

Thought for the Day:

Yes, as a matter of fact, I do have an opinion on pretty much everything. Just ask me.

Your Retro-Preview Highlights –

2010 – Texas Blue Bonnets vs California Poppies

2014 – The Home Of Blue Bell Ice Cream

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™

April 25, 2010

Rested up and Ready to Travel…

Tomorrow morning we’ll head north about 230 miles to the Park of the Sierras Escapees RV park in Coarsegold, CA.

But today was a “get ready” day.

After going the Marie Callender’s restaurant in Lancaster for lunch, we stopped off for gas and then went by WalMart for supplies.

Back home, I fixed a loose panel on the coach, checked the engine oil, added coolant, added water to the coach batteries and checked the tire pressures. And it looks like we’re ready to go tomorrow.

Last week I showed y’all some great poppy pictures. Now I want to give equal time to some great Texas bluebonnet pics.

The red flowers are Indian Paintbrushes, another Texas favorite.

Take that, poppies!

More tomorrow from Park of the Sierras, at the edge of Yosemite National Park.

April 25, 2011

The King is Dead. Long Live the King.

First off, we have a new champion, the Trinidad Scorpion Butch T chili.

First, we had the Naga Jolokia chilies, also known as Bhut Jolokia, or Ghost chilies. Known at the time as the hottest chili in the world, it rated at a hair over 1 million Scoville units. I’ve had hot wings made with these at the Cypress Creek Café in Wimberley, TX. They call them Devil’s Breath Wings.

But after years on the throne, the Ghost Chili was overthrown by the Naga Viper, rated at about 1.38 million Scoville units.

And now, The King is Dead. Long Live the King. The Butch T comes in at almost 1.5 million units.

But I guess they’ve got a ways to go.

Pure capsaicin tops out at about 16,000,000 Scoville units. Apparently, exposure to that can stop your heart.

The weather here has been really great, with temps in the high 60’s and low 40’s with a lot of sun. But I’ll be glad to get somewhere with higher humidity soon.

Not 95% like in Houston, but not like the 20% here in Arizona, either.

I’m really tired of waking up with the inside of my mouth dry and cracked, and feeling like a place old spiders go to die.

About 10, while I was making coffee and Jan was heating up our muffins, our daughter Brandi called to say that Landon is crawling. Later she sent some video of him playing with the new toy that arrived in the mail today from the Easter Bunny.

Here’s a still shot from the video. He does seem pretty happy with it. I think we, uh, I mean the Easter Bunny done good.

Can hardly wait until we can Skype again next Sunday.

For lunch, we had leftover pizza and chips. Really good after Jan added her own special touch of spices.

Then after lunch, I went outside to do some rig maintenance before we hit the road on Wednesday.

First off, was to close the grey tank valve. Not really maintenance, but I want to have plenty of water built up when I dump.

Next, I checked the engine oil level and added a quart of Rotella 15W-40HD. That’s doing really good, since it’s the first oil I had to add since my last oil change about 12,000 miles ago. Plus when we’re parked on concrete, I also look underneath the coach after a few days, to check for leaks. None found so far,

Then I checked my coolant level and topped off the reservoir. This took the last of the gallon I bought in Elkhart, IN last September. Time to get another jug.

About 2 pm I drove over to Pinetop to get some extra keys made for the rig door, and then while I was out, I stopped off at an NAPA Auto Parts to pick up some more diesel antifreeze. NAPA is the only place besides truck stops where I’ve been about to find the stuff.

About 5pm we headed out to the Red Devil Pizza in Lakeside. We ate here last year and remembered it as being good, and it still was.

Jan had the Baked Penne and I had my old favorite Spaghetti and Meatballs. Very good, and much, much better than The Pizza Factory a few nights ago.

After a lot of good food, we headed back to the rig a little before 7.

That’s about it for today.

April 25, 2014

Needed: 60,000 cows . . . A Day!

Today was time for another day trip so we headed out a little before 10 am, but didn’t go far, only a few miles north on US71 to our first stop, the Industrial Country Market. We’ve passed this place a bunch of times, but never stopped. But blog reader Rob Nixon said we really needed to check the place out. And he was right.

Take a hardware store, a toy store, a gadget store, a solar power supply store, and an ammo store, then throw in water and hydroponic vegetable gardens, add a lot of garden art and solar panels, run the whole thing completely off the grid, and you’ve got the Industrial Country Market.

You could actually spend hours walking up and down the aisles of the ‘non-general, general store’.

Toys, clothing, jewelry. ammo.

Spices, electronics, tools, puppets, 1500 Watt Pure Sine Wave Inverters. and more.

And outside you find all sorts of gardens and plants.

As well as a forest of Bottle Trees.

Water gardens with fountains and waterfalls.

And ingenious art gardens made from a little bit of everything.

Even a number of hydroponic gardens growing vegetables and ornamental plants.

And it’s all run completely off the electrical grid.

These 24-volt batteries come from telephone company Central Offices, which is why your landline phone keeps working even when the power is out. It’s all powered from the phone office.

These and other solar panels provide an amazing 25KW of both 120VAC and 240VAC electrical power

Jan and I really enjoyed our visit and we’ll probably go back again the next time we’re in the area.

Our next stop was a few more miles up the road at Hruska’s.

We’ve been stopping here for a long time and have watched the place grow into what it is today, a major operation. The place started out as a general store/market in 1912 and has been in the family ever since. And they still have the best kolaches around.

Jan and I stopped for a couple of kolaches, but we noticed a lot of locals having their double-cheeseburgers, and it turns out that Texas Monthly Magazine says they have one of the best burgers in the state. Hopefully, we can check them out before we leave.

Then it was back on the road, heading up to Brenham and the Blue Bell Ice Cream Factory Tour. We’ve been trying to take this tour for almost 35 years and we finally made it.

The problem was that the tour is only given Monday through Friday, and it seems we were always up that way on the weekend.

Unfortunately, I can’t show you any pictures because they don’t allow photos on the tour, but they do give you free ice cream at the end, so no pictures for you, but free ice cream for us.

That sounds fair.

One of the most interesting facts given on the tour is that this one plant (they have two more. one in Sylacauga, AL, and one in Broken Arrow, OK) uses the milk from 60,000 cows . . .  a day. Now that’s squeezing a lot of cows.

After finishing up our ice cream (Jan had Rocky Mountain Road and I had Salt Caramel Vanilla) we headed back toward home, but in a roundabout way, via Giddings, rather than the most direct way.

But going this way let us stop off at the Buc-ee’s there for a bathroom break and some of their Cranberry Nut muffins to bring home.

But the day wasn’t over yet. We had timed things so that we would be back at Peter’s BBQ in Ellinger about 4:30. Just in time for our last shot at their great Friday Night BBQ and Seafood Buffet. As always, really, really good.

Tomorrow looks to be a work-around-the-rig day.

April 25, 2015

Back to Basics . . .

After coffee and taking care of some chores, I got back on my  PacBrake problem. I had gone online and found the lubrication instructions on the PacBrake website.

The first thing was to get access to the PacBrake under the bed, and that means removing a lot of our stored stuff out of the way.

So after lifting the bed, and then lifting the engine access cover, I could now get to the PacBrake itself.

The unit is just to the right of the engine and fairly accessible. Here it is from the side.

I started lubing all the points listed in the docs. There was a problem matching up the actual lube points on paper with the actual unit since I’m looking at it from the top, but the docs show it from the side.

There are two lube sites that I’m still unsure about that, which means I’ll have to put in a call to PacBrake on Monday.

I also need to figure out how to manually trigger the PacBrake, first, because I also need to lube the air cylinder’s shaft, and second, to be sure it’s actually working. I think I have a good idea how to trigger the air solenoid manually, or electrically, actually, but I want to be sure.

But however I do it, I know I’ll have to crank up the engine, since the valve itself is air operated. More later.

For dinner, Jan and I had been talking about a good hamburger, and after talking over the obvious, McD’s, Wendy’s, Five Guy’s, or Smashburger, we decided to give In N Out Burger a try. It also helped that there was one pretty close.

The last (and only) time we ate at one was in February 2008 when we were in San Diego during our first month of RV’ing. We remember liking the burgers, but it was Friday night and the place was full of screaming teenagers. Don’t know if that’s the only reason, but whatever the reason, we’ve never been back to one. Until now.

Originally they were only located in California, but in the last few years, they’ve been spreading east. They’re even in Houston now.

We got there a little after 4:30 and found the place pretty busy. Getting in line, the first thing we noticed was the simplified menu board, harking back to the old days of McDonald’s.

Just cheeseburgers, hamburgers, fries, and drinks. Just how McD’s started out.

Of course, you do apparently have a lot options, with their Secret Menu, and a Super Secret Menu. We both got the Double-Double (two patties, two slices of cheese) from the regular menu, but they also have a 3 x 3, and a 4 x 4 on the Secret Menu if you’re really hungry. We both got the #1 Combo which included fries and a drink.

But one bite told me why In N Out has the reputation it has. This has to be one of the best ‘inexpensive’ burgers I’ve ever tasted. And by ‘inexpensive’ I mean not one of those $7-9 or higher burgers. The Double-Double is only $3.50

And the fries were delicious too. A little research tells the story. They do pretty much everything in-house, or at least in-company.

They have their own meat companies that fresh grind the patties and deliver them fresh, not frozen, to every location. The same goes for their buns. And like Five Guy’s and others, they do their own fries in-house, starting with the raw potatoes

They also make every burger to order. They say they don’t have microwaves or heat lamps in their locations. And it shows.

The other thing I noticed was how clean the dining area was. They had 3 people running around, wiping things down and cleaning up. In fact, within seconds of someone leaving a table, it was cleaned off, wiped down, and ready to go again.

And their drive-thru shows how popular they are.

They have to rope off the area because it winds around through the parking lot of the shopping area.

We’ll definitely go back. Often.

Tomorrow we’re going to drive down to Henderson at the bottom of the Strip to visit the The Lion Habitat Ranch. Originally it was the off-duty home of the MGM Grand Lions. But when that exhibit was shut down a few years ago, it became their full-time home, along with giraffes and other animals. And they have a bunch of lion cubs just born earlier this month. Sounds like fun.

April 25, 2016

Kluging It . . .

Recapping yesterday’s trip, we were hooked up and on our way by 9:50am. We made our first stop at the Luling Buc-ee’s for diesel, $1.79, the cheapest we’ve seen in the area.

And we’ve never seen Buc-ee’s this busy. It took a while to thread our way through the cars to get around to the larger pumps in the back. But we were able to pull right up to an end pump and fill up. Then it was another obstacle course to get out, but we were in and out in about 25 minutes, so it wasn’t too bad.

Then it was another 120 miles, and about 2 and a half hours to Medina Lake, the time mostly due to the hilly, curvy road from Boerne to the park.

We got into the park about 4pm and headed in to find a spot. We knew our friends, Dave and Lynn Cross, were back in the ‘F’ section so we headed that way. And then as we were meandering around, looking for a site, who popped out to flag us down, but Dave,who directed us to a 50 amp site two away from he and Lynn.

And as I mentioned in yesterday’s blog, Lynn Cross had prepared us a delicious spaghetti dinner and we spent several hours talking, and having a great time.

When we got back to the rig, I tried to get the satellite system up and running, but without any luck. Our site is pretty heavily treed so I knew it was going to take some fiddling. But the first problem I had was getting power to the dome. I have about 75 feet of coax that lets me move the dome out into the open, but I only have 50 feet of 12-volt power cable.

The 12 volts is only needed to power the motors that aim the dome. Once that’s done, the 12 volts can be disconnected. But now I needed to get power to the dome, so since I didn’t have a 12-volt extension cable, I decided to take the power supply to the dome.

So I used my 12-volt power supply on an extension cord to power the dome

I’d modified it to add a 12-volt socket just for needs like this.

But it still didn’t work. Although my voltmeter showed the power supply was putting out 12 volts, it wasn’t getting to the dome for some reason. But by this time it was dark, so I called it a night, and we just watched stuff we’d recorded earlier.

Then this morning, I went down to the guard shack to let them know what site we were in and pay for our 50 amp electric. Or at least I tried.

When I tried to start the truck, I found the battery dead. I had left an accessory switch on, and had run it down. So I dug out my battery charger to fix the problem. But then I ran into another problem.

The charger I have does auto 6 volt/12 volt selection, and since the battery was down to about 5 volts, the charger kept treating it as a 6 volt battery. Not good.

So now what to do? I have 2 sets of battery cables that I can chain together to let me charge the truck from the rig batteries when it’s hitched up, but that’s still not long enough. I could take the battery out of the truck and take it back to the rig batteries, or take out a rig battery and use that to start the truck.

But that seemed like too much work. There’s got to be a simpler kludge.

And then I realized I already had the solution at hand – the 12 volt power supply that I had tried to use for the satellite. It puts out a current-limited 6 amps steady, 8 amps surge. So I used it to charge the battery up to about 9 volts, and then let the big charger take over. It’s 3/5/20/75 amp model, so at 20 amps, it didn’t take long to top off the battery. So about 30 minutes later I was on my way to the gate.

And while I was there, I also wanted to get my driver’s license back. They recently started holding your Thousand Trails membership card until you come back and settle up.

But I no longer have a TT membership card, since the last place that held my card, the Bend/Sunriver TT in Bend, OR, lost my card and couldn’t give it back to me. And since I know my membership number by heart, I never needed it again.

Until today. So instead, they held my driver’s license.

I guess this will finally get me to call TT and get another one.

This morning our friends Brett and Frankie got in touch to tell us that they were also here at Medina Lake and wanted to get together. But it had to be today, since they’re leaving for Conroe tomorrow.

So, about 3:30, Brett showed up at our rig in his golf cart to Uber us back over to their rig. Frankie had coffee and cake waiting for us, and we had a great time talking over their recent travels all the way down to Key West and back to Texas.

Too bad they’re leaving tomorrow, since we would have liked to spend more time with them. But I’m sure we’ll catch up with them down the road.

Getting back to the rig, I got back on my satellite problem. And when I hooked up the power this afternoon, suddenly the dome was getting power and scanning for the satellites. Not sure why it suddenly started working, but gift horses, and all that.

But it took trying 3 different locations to find one that worked. And unfortunately, the one that works is on the picnic table of the site next to ours, about 60 feet away.

But this is a 30 amp site, and since the temps are edging in the 90’s now, and there are a lot of empty sites, hopefully we won’t have a problem.

Hopefully.

April 25, 2019

Almost . . .

But Not Quite Yet.

I spent the morning trying to cram 4 suitcases of stuff into only 2. Or at least that’s what it seems like.

But really we’re doing OK, I guess. There’s a 50# weight limit on our checked bags and 17# on our larger carry-on bags, and so far we’re under those limits, but just barely.

In some cases it’s a game of ‘do I want to take this or do I want to take that’, or ‘which weighs more, this or that’. But whatever, we’ll be ready to go tomorrow morning when our car service guy gets here at 10:30.

Jan and I headed out this afternoon about 1pm, with our first stop at King Food for some of their great Hot & Sour Soup, and then it was on for a quick stop at my client’s to double-check a couple of things before our trip.

Then heading home, Jan picked up a few things at Palais Royal, a local department store chain, finally getting back to the rig about 3:45.

But after getting the kid’s will copies ready to be mailed off, I headed back out, first to the PO, and then over to Dickinson to return our Impala a little early, so we won’t have to deal with it tomorrow morning.

Our Lufthansa A380-800 leaves Houston Intercontinental at 3:55 with a 9 hour 45 minute flight to Frankfort, Germany, a 3 hour 30 minute layover, and then a 90 minute flight on to Budapest. This means that we will be getting into Budapest at 5:45am Saturday morning for us, but 1:45pm Budapest time, since they’re 7 hours ahead of us.

Then I imagine we’ll spend some time in our room napping and getting ourselves turned around to local time. The next day, Sunday, we have free to get acclimated before starting our cruise on Monday the 29th.

April 25, 2021

Family Values . . .

After a quiet morning, I put in a call to my cousin (first cousin, once removed) Marjorie back in Athens to see how she was doing, and to thank her for the nice Easter card she sent us, including a lot of my mother’s old letters to family members, as well as an old photograph of my grandmother, Clara Calvin (my mother’s mother).

Marjorie’s husband, Dr. Walter Walker, died suddenly this past January. Ironically, after both he and Marjorie survived CoVid last October with no real problems, he collapsed and couldn’t get up.

Taken to the hospital, he was diagnosed with advanced bone cancer and died a few days later. He was 91.

I was really surprised to see this old photo of my grandmother, obviously a reprint.

The photo doesn’t have a date of any kind on it, but I’m thinking maybe late 40’s/early 50’s, since this was her in the early 70’s.

We’re really looking forward to seeing Marjorie this June when we come back through Alabama from our reunion up in Illinois.

About 1pm Jan and I headed over to Dickinson to have lunch again at Gator’s Bar & Grill, and it was good to see them even busier than last weekend.

Margie, the owner, said they’ve been super busy ever since they opened last Saturday.

Jan got their Blackened Chicken Breast with Roasted Broccoli and Sweet Potato Waffle Fries.

I got a Blackened Chicken Breast Sandwich, adding Bacon and Texas ToothPicks, along with the Sweet Potato Waffle Fries.

Both really, really good. And we’re really glad to see them doing so good.

Next up was a quick HEB stop before getting home a little after 3pm. And after everything was put away, we retired to the patio to enjoy a couple of cold, refreshing adult beverages.

A very nice way to end the day.

April 25, 2022

Google It . . .

A pretty quiet day at work today, especially for a Monday.

The only thing interesting was that I saw one of Google Street View cars driving in the parking lot next to the feeder near FM517 and I-45.

But that’s about all.

April 25, 2023

I Couldn’t Taste The Duck . . .

Our first destination this afternoon was a return visit to our GP, who’s now called our PCP (Primary Care Physician for some reason). We were just there for our annual checkups two weeks ago, but I’m back to get some tests rerun, and Jan wants to have a consult with our doctor about some possible medication changes.

I mentioned in yesterday’s blog about our new ‘Smart’ watches, and one of the functions it has is to take your Blood Pressure. So I was curious as to how accurate it really was, considering there is no cuff squeezing your arm.

So I set it to check my BP while the nurse was taking mine the conventional way. And I was disappointed to see my watch said my BP was 148/87 while the official one said it was 117/71.

Bummer!

But then I realized that the fact that the cuff was squeezing my arm really tight might have affected the reading my watch was getting downstream on my wrist. So after waiting about 5 minutes, I tried it again. And this time it read 119/74.

Now that’s pretty accurate.

Finished up at the doctor’s we headed back over to Webster to have lunch at Walk-On’s Sports Bistreaux. They just opened yesterday so we wanted to give them a try. And we both agreed it was really, really good.

And like other sports bars (Texas Huddle, Twin Peaks, etc.) we visit, there are TV screens everywhere you look,

Jan started out with a really good Side Salad,

while I got a cup of their Duck and Andouille Sausage Gumbo.

Really good, though I couldn’t taste the duck. Though I’m not really sure I know what duck tastes like.

For her entrée, Jan got the Tuscan Chicken, with a Blackened Chicken Breast covered in Warm Tomato Salsa, along with the Grilled Green Beans.

For my meal, I got the Avery Island Salad.

With Blackened Shrimp, Mixed Greens, Bacon, Granny Smith Apples, Candied Pecans, bleu cheese crumbles, and pepper jelly vinaigrette, it was one of the best salads I’ve had in a long time. The tang of the bleu cheese contrasted with the sweetness of the apples and pecans was really good.

And of course, we had to split an order of their Krispy Kreme Bread Pudding.

We both agreed that it’s a worthy match to Lulu’s version over in Gulf Shores.

When we’re over in Gulf Shores in a few weeks, we’ll have to do another comparison.

Remember, we do these things so you don’t have to.

Next up was a Costco stop for a few Costco things, and then heading home, we made a Post Office and a park Mailbox stop.

When I got the PO mail, I was surprised to find a package addressed to Jan, that when we opened it, contained 4 boxes of CoVid-19 Home Test, 2 tests to a box.

She didn’t order these, so we weren’t sure where they were coming from until I read the insert.

It seems as Medicare recipients, we are each entitled to 8 tests a month! And unless I contract them, we’ll receive another 8 tests next month . . .  and the next month . . . and the next . . .

I’ll be in touch tomorrow.

And I still don’t know why I didn’t receive my 8 tests.

Yet.

April 25, 2024

Longer Than I Expected . . .

Today was my first chance to replace the window regulator on Jan’s side of the Jeep. I had pulled the door panel off Tuesday a week ago to be sure it was a regulator problem, so today was the day.

I started off with this.

After popping off the door panel, I had just the water barrier to remove.

The panel came off much easier this time since it had been off before. And once the water barrier was removed, I next had to pop the window mounting loose.

It’s just a matter of pulling the clips, and popping the glass off the mounts.

Rather than using tape to hold the window glass up out of the way, I always use suction cups to hold things in place.

Works much better.

Then it was just a matter of loosening 6 bolts and removing the old regulator. Which turned out to be the proverbial ‘easier said than done.’

The problem turned out to be that the window glass has to be all the way up to the tippy-top. But once that was done it came right out.

But then getting the new one in was another problem. Turns out that the mounting bolts have to be screwed all the way in, rather than left loose as the directions and YouTube videos say. Once I figured that out, the new one went right in pretty easily.

At this time I made sure the window actually worked, and it did. And as I put everything back together, I tested door locks, door opener, remote mirror, etc. It’s a real bummer to get it all back together and find something doesn’t work.

Finally, about two hours later, I was done, with a job that should have only taken me about 45 minutes sans complications. But according to the local Jeep dealer, having them do this would have run me about $400.

So it cost me $60 and a couple of hours of my time, making me about $170/hr.

Wrapping up, I want to thank everyone for all their tips about excursions on our upcoming cruise.

I saw something about Royal Caribbean having over 1200 possible excursions parsed out over the 5 stops on our cruise. Though the fact that we’re pretty much only looking at Mayan Ruins-related tours.

Hopefully, that will narrow it down a bit.

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Right-Click on The Link and Select ‘Open in New Tab’

Wanting to leave at 8am, we were on our way by 8:02, but only because we had to drop off a bag of garbage at the dumpster and then pull the Jeep back into our site.

About an hour later, we stopped off at the Katy Buc-ee’s to pick up coffee and breakfast kolaches. And then 90 minutes later we stopped off at the Luling Buc-ee’s to drop off some coffee.

Our last stop was at the Love’s at Comfort TX where we dropped off some more coffee and turned north on US87 for the last 20 minute run into Fredericksburg.

And our first stop – Der Lindenbaum.

Our absolute favorite Germain restaurant.

Jan, of course, got her usual Jägerschnitzel, a pork schnitzel covered in a mushroom sauce. Accompanied by German potato salad (warm) and Red Cabbage.

And my regular order is the Bürgermeister Plate, with German potato salad, Sauerkraut, and I added a Red Cabbage.

This is pretty much the same plate I get at King’s Bierhaus in League City. And this is so MUCH better.

We also got a slice of their house-made Carrot Cake to take to the motel with us. Said motel being right down the street from Der Lindenbaum

Sunday House Inn, where we’ve stayed 4 or 5 times, is a very nice large family motel, not a chain.

Tomorrow, we’re going to check out another German restaurant that’s been highly recommended. Then we’ll do some downtown shopping, make the obligatory Wal-Mart stop, and then finishing up with our yearly visit to Wildseed Farms.

Then it’s on over to Kingsland, about an hour away, for our big family get-together.

YAY!

Thought for the Day:

Some people claim to be willing to listen to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views.

Your Retro-Preview Highlights –

2010 – Driving The Pacific Coast Highway

2014 – The Wayback Machine

2019 – The A380 SuperJumbo

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™

April 24, 2010

Pacific Coast Highway…

Today was our Pacific Coast Highway road trip.

Two years ago this past March we drove the first part of the PCH where it starts at San Juan Capistrano and Dana Point, up through Newport Beach, Laguna Beach, Huntington Beach, and ending up in Long Beach. I sense a trend here.

We stayed at an RV Park in Long Beach right on the Pacific Ocean. That’s us on the far left.

And here was our view out the other way. The Queen Mary.

Anyway, today we drove into LA and got on the PCH near Playa del Rey, and headed north.

Coming through Venice Beach we encountered this strange sight.  I’m not exactly sure why a CVS pharmacy has a transgendered clown on its marquee, but it is Venice Beach, after all. But this, Venice Beach Clown, explains it further.

Coming into Malibu we decided to stop for brunch at Marmalade Café right off the PCH. The place was really good, really yuppie, and really expensive. Jan had a short stack of blueberry pancakes with bacon and I had a tortilla scramble. And it was $33!

Leaving the café, we headed north again. About 3 miles down the road we came across the Malibu RV Park high on a cliff overlooking the PCH and the Pacific Ocean.

What a view!  We may have to think about staying here a few nights when we come back this way next year.

Moving on along the PCH we started encountering some of the really scenic areas.

This shot I think I’ve seen in a lot of movies and TV shows. It’s Point Mugu.

Reaching Santa Barbara, we turned around and headed back, this time taking a different, more scenic route. Rather than go all the way back down to LA and back up, we cut across through the Los Padres National Forest, to Ojai.

This is Lake Casitas, a 420 sq. mile lake that’s over 1000 ft. up in the mountains, and it’s really a great view.

Along the route we passed through Ojai (pronounced ‘O HIGH”),  I had heard of the Ojai Valley before, and it’s easy to see why. It’s just one big garden. Tree farms, nurseries, fruit orchards with lemons, limes, and strawberries, sod farms, you name it.

Leaving Ojai, we passed through Santa Paula, Fillmore, and on to Santa Clarita on I-5 Then it was a straight shot back to Lancaster and home, a total trip of about 300 miles.

Tomorrow will be a ‘rest up” and “get ready to travel” day, since we plan on leaving here Monday morning, and moving north about 230 miles closer to San Francisco.

April 24, 2011

Happy Easter ! . . .

Happy Easter!

I was sleeping so good this morning I didn’t get up until about 10:30 and made coffee while Jan heated up muffins.

I worked on web stuff for a while and then went out and mounted a new rack on the side of my electrical bay to hang my dogbone power adapters so they don’t just have to lay on the bottom of the bay.

About 1 pm our son Chris called to say Hi and see how things were going.

About 1:30 I made a run to Home Depot for some 4-40 screws and then on to Wal-Mart for cake flour, strawberries, and whipped cream.

She wanted to bake her world-famous pound cake for dessert tonight.

And boy, was it good.

After that great dinner, we sat around for a while trying to make room for pound cake with strawberries and whipped cream, and trying to nail down our plans for the next few weeks.

We know we’re leaving here on the 27th, and heading over to Williams, AZ to take the Grand Canyon Railway day-long trip to the southern rim of the Canyon. While we’re there we also want to check out Bearizona, a drive-thru wildlife park in the area.

After that, the plans start to get kind of hazy. We’re trying to get tickets to The Talk day-time talk show. If so, we’ll probably try to stay at the Soledad Canyon Thousand Trails near Acton, and then head up to Park of the Sierras Escapees park in Coarsegold, CA near Yosemite where we stayed last year.

If our tickets don’t come through, we’ll probably head straight up to Coarsegold. But who knows?

It could all change tomorrow.

After all, that’s part of the fun, isn’t it?

April 24, 2013

I’ll have the Da Vinci, Over Easy . . .

Brandi sent over some more pics of the progress on the new house. She said they’ve put another coat of paint on the walls, and started painting the trim.

Looking good. I think they hope to be in the house in about 6 weeks.

I know they’re really excited.

I took it kind of easy today, didn’t do much, because I’ve had a sore back the last few days, one of those things where everything’s fine, and then you move just the wrong way and it feels like someone put a knife in your ribs.

Hopefully, it’ll be better tomorrow.

I did head out about 1:30 to make a Home Depot run, along with Radio Shack, and an Office Max for Jan. Then about 6:45 we took off on our walk to finish up our mile-and a-quarter walk, getting back just as it got dark.

Tomorrow morning Jan and I are going to visit the Arizona Science Center to see the Da Vinci – The Genius Exhibition. This is a traveling exhibition that’s here in Phoenix from February to June, so we’re lucky our timing is good.

The last time we visited the Arizona Science Center was in March 2007 when we had rented a CruiseAmerica Class C to check out RV’ing, and after attending the Life on Wheels training in Tucson, drove the RV up here to Phoenix for the afternoon to see the Body Worlds exhibit, the one with the real plasticized bodies in various poses.

On our way to the exhibit, we plan on stopping for breakfast again at Over Easy, the breakfast/lunch place we ate at a couple of weeks ago.

April 24, 2014

The WayBack Machine . . .

I came across this website that has almost 200 photos taken between 1887 and 1892, mostly in the Black Hills of South Dakota that I thought you might like to see.

Ever wonder what Sturgis looked like before motorcycles clogged the streets? Well, back then it was teams of oxen, the 1880’s equivalent of today’s semi’s, moving freight across the plains.

This is not a wagon train of settlers, but a line of ‘freighters’ moving between Sturgis and Deadwood. It turns out that there were long lines of these teams moving goods back and forth across the country.

And here’s the Devil’s Tower taken in 1888. Note the bulge on the left side of the base.

And here’s our photo taken 120 years later in 2008. I took this from the RV park where we spent the night before visiting the Tower the next day. Looks like we were kind of close to the same position.

You can view all these photos here. South Dakota 1888

On another note, some of you might be interested in checking out this book.

The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Our World from Scratch

It’s a survivor’s guidebook, not covering actual survival skills, but it’s a discussion on ‘how to orchestrate the rebuilding of a technologically advanced civilization’ after a worldwide catastrophe, I.e., asteroid impact, global plague, nuclear war, etc. I just started it today, but I like it so far. Very interesting.

I don’t know where our niece Christina keeps digging up these old photos, but they bring back a lot of memories.

These are our kids, Chris and Brandi, in the back, and Jan’s sister Debbie’s kids, Tana and Christina sitting on their laps, and Jason in the foreground. Jan thinks this was taken here in Houston when they visited us in July 1983. We think.

I came across this article talking about a 2 year technical school education being worth a lot more money than a 4 year liberal arts college degree, especially in the oil fields.

A company working in the Ohio Marcellus Shale area has 60 pipeline welders making over $150,000 a year, and 2 making over $200,000. And they don’t have enough welders to cover all the work they have. And that’s just one company.

I’ve always thought it was a mistake for high schools to drop the many technical classes they used to give. Most people have no idea how much money a good mechanic, plumber, electrician, or an HVAC guy can make. And in many cases, if you show an aptitude, the company will train you.

Tomorrow Jan and I are going to do a day trip up through the Brenham-Hempstead area to check out the Bluebonnets, and of course, the Blue Bell Ice Cream factory.

April 24, 2015

Braking It Down . . .

Mister got himself a new box yesterday, and from one of his favorite places, Amazon. He apparently likes the way their boxes taste.

Of course, he’s got his big one right next to this one, but new is always better, right?

As to what came in Mister’s new box, it was a bottle of PacBrake lubricant. Well, not their brand, but it’s the same stuff, and cheaper.

Super Lube Synthetic Oil with PTFE

Coming up from Verde Valley to Vegas, I noticed that my PacBrake didn’t seem to be working. It’s always kind of difficult to be sure that the PacBrake has actually engaged when it’s combined with the normal downshift to 4th. But my PRXB PacBrake (the upgraded model) should be felt working whenever your foot is off the gas and your PacBrake is turned on, even before the downshift to 4th

Our trip up here to Vegas is the first time I’ve really used it this year due to a lack of hills, and I didn’t use it much last year either. I also realized that I didn’t do the lubrication maintenance on it this winter, mostly due to my bottle of PacBrake lubricant having leaked out. So that’s probably why it’s not working.

Needing another bottle, I called the Camping World down in Henderson to see if they had some in stock, since CW is where I bought my last bottle. And when I asked the Parts Department guy if he had any PacBrake lube, he said,” What’s a PacBrake?”

HUH?

Camping World doesn’t know what a PacBrake is? That certainly explains a lot. And after I told him what it was, I got, “We don’t have anything like that here.”

Right.

But Amazon had the same stuff in a generic form, but it looks like it’s made by the same company.

So tomorrow I’ll lift the bed up and do a lube job on the valve.

We’ve really been enjoying our really mild weather here. The last several days it’s never gotten above the mid-70’s, and it’s been down in the high 50’s at night. Very nice.

Tomorrow, besides the PacBrake lube job, I’ve got some other stuff I want to work on around the rig. But on Sunday we’ve got some fun stuff planned.

More about that later.

April 24, 2016

Toddlin’ Along . . .

Our morning started out way too early this morning, since we have a 290 mile trip today, instead of our usual 120.

But we couldn’t start our trip without our usual Cracker Barrel breakfast. We just had to get there earlier. We both got our usual, mine being the Sunrise Sampler, with two eggs, a sampling of bacon, patty sausage, and ham, grits, fried apples, and hash browns.

And this leads to my question of the day.

What happened to hash browns, and when did they change?

When I was growing up in Alabama in the 50’s and 60’s, we would often stop at a Toddle House when we traveled. If you’ve seen a Waffle House, you know what a Toddle House looked like. In fact Waffle House was indirectly spun off Toddle House, when a TH regional manager left to start his own chain of restaurants.

And like Waffle House today, you could watch the cook prepare your food behind the counter. And they made Hash Browns by squirting a little oil in a hot skillet, dumping in a serving of diced potatoes and frying them up. The cook would sprinkle a little paprika on them, and as they cooked on one side, he would flip the whole loose mass up in the air, catching them back in the pan just as it ended up back on the stove burner. And although the cook never seemed to lose any potatoes, some of the oil would splash out into the burner flame and flare up with a big sizzle.

By ‘diced’ potatoes, I mean potatoes cut up into roughly 1/2” cubes, and not the shredded ‘riced’ potatoes we get now. In fact if you Google ‘Riced potato hash browns’, they will show you recipes for making the hash browns you get at most restaurants today.

And just to clarify, I’m also not talking about Cottage Fries. Those are usually much larger, and not really cubes, but have rounded edges.

But this is what the hash browns of my youth looked like.

Maybe it’s a regional thing. Friends said that to them, hash browns have always been the shredded ones.

So, you out in the audience, what’s your kind of hash browns?

Since I got on a hash brown rant and it’s late and I’m tired, I’ll flesh out the rest of today’s journey in tomorrow’s blog and skip right to the good stuff.

As in a really, really good spaghetti dinner, serviced up by long-time friends Lynn and Dave Cross. They’re parked two spaces over from us, and Lynn told us a couple of days ago she’d have dinner ready for us when we got here.

And boy, did she. Lynn really knows her way around a spaghetti recipe.

Thanks, Lynn and Dave for the great welcome.

Fun Facts about Toddle House.

• It was started in the early 30’s by James Smith, father of Fred Smith. Fred went on to start his own company in 1971. It’s called FedEx.
• During the segregation era, the company had a parallel chain for African-Americans called Harlem House.

• ---

  April 24, 2017

  Lady Marmalade . . .

  I was getting ready to order a micro SD card for my new phone, but then I realized I already had one.

  Readers will remember when I got the new dashcam for the truck when we were gate guarding down in south Texas, and had trouble with it. That trouble turned out to be caused by my use of a particular brand of SD card. So I retired the first one and ordered another one of a different brand and it’s worked fine ever since.

  So yesterday I ‘unretired’ that card and plugged it into the slot on the S8+ and it works fine. And I saved some money.

  One reader asked what that sauce was that came with my Outback pork chops.

  

  It’s called Creole Marmalade and it really goes well with pork, or anything actually. In fact Jan always orders a side of it for her Alice Springs Chicken.

  As far as what it is, it’s just Orange Marmalade with some horseradish mixed in to give it some kick.  Not really hot, just spicy good. Try it next time.

  ---

  We left the rig a little before 4:30 heading up to Palmdale to meet Maurice and Judy Kunkel at the Antelope Valley Mall’s Chili’s.  We had met at a couple of past rallies, but this was our first time to get to spend any time together.

  

  Jan went with her favorite, the Margarita Chicken, which Judy also got.

  

  Maurice got the new Chili’s Fiery Pepper Chicken Crispers,

  

  while I got my favorite, the Grilled Chicken Caribbean Salad.

  

  Maurice spent time in Thailand as an Air Force weatherman (like our good friend Al Cox), and likes spicy food. But he was kind of disappointed with the heat of these ‘Fiery Pepper Crispers’. He gave me a bite, and I agreed. ‘Fiery’ is in no way an apt description. More ‘Medium-Hot’, or maybe ‘Lukewarm’.

  Everyone seemed to really hit it off, with Maurice and I both at the same Air Force Base at the same time, him in the AF and me with the DOD. We had a great time and a lot of laughs trading stories of our adventures.

  And as is usual when RV’ers get together, we spent the obligatory 3 hours over dinner,  actually about 3-1/2 hours. Really I think the only reason we called it a night is that our butts were getting numb.

  Hopefully, we’ll cross paths again soon.

  Tomorrow we’re heading down to LA, and in particular, Yorba Linda, to have lunch at Esther’s Taco House. We were told about this place years ago by a late good friend and we checked it when we were first in the area in 2008. And we’ve gone back a number of times, and always enjoyed it.

  Loving the cool weather. It went down to 44° last night and only up to 71 today, but still sunny and nice.

  ---

  April 24, 2019

  We Got The SuperJumbo Size . . .

  Now that we’re getting down to nitty-gritty time I thought I’d check out the planes that we’ll be flying on.

  Turns out that our flight over, from Houston to Frankfurt, will be on an Airbus A380-800 SuperJumbo, the largest passenger plane now flying.

  

  So now I’ll have the complete set since I’ve also flown on the previous ‘largest’, the Boeing 747, starting back in the ‘spiral staircase piano bar- lounge’ days.

  

  Then from Frankfurt to Budapest, we’ll be on an Airbus A321 for the short 90-minute flight.

  

  Finishing up coming home, we’ll be on a United 787 Dreamliner flying from London back to Houston.

  Flying back and forth from South America in the early 60’s, I flew on both the Douglas DC-7, a turboprop, and the DC-8, the first jet I ever flew on.

  And flying between Colombia, S.A. cities, I flew on Ford Tri-Motors like this.

  

  Mostly though, they were Ford Bi-Motors, I guess, because the centerline engine had been removed for more cargo space, and the wing-mounted engines were replaced with DC-3 engines to make up the power loss, and also allow them to fly over the high mountain passes in the Andes.

  It gets a little scary when you’re flying ‘through’ Andean mountain passes with rock faces off both wings, and not ‘over’, because they just can’t fly that high.

  Checking SeatGuru.com, I located the seating chart for our plane and flight, and found where our seats are located.

  

  Note that by reserving seats on opposite sides of the aisle, we both get an aisle seat, yet we can still talk. And we did this on all our flights on this trip.

  And also note that we’re seated in Standard Economy, I.e. the Cheap Seats. I thought it was kind of funny that the next level up is called Premium Economy.

  Isn’t that kind of like Jumbo Shrimp or Non-Dairy Creamer,

  Tomorrow we’ve got a few wrap-up things to do and then we’ll be ready to head out on Friday morning when our car service arrives.

  ---

  April 24, 2020

  When The Mask Comes Off . . .

  As I’ve been doing these Retro-Blogs™, I’ve pretty much been leaving out/editing out all of the Wu-Flu stuff. But I wrote this blog to make people think about what’s really going on with all the rules and decrees, so I decided to leave it in.

  ---

  Now you can get your WuFlu straight from the source, with none of those weak second or third-hand infections passed on from some random person in WalMart.

  Get your order in before they run out.

  Or you could always go with the ‘fruit-based’ version like they want you to wear here in Houston.

  

  You won’t believe some of the memes that are showing up online.

  Or if you’re Vegan, you can do it like this.

  

  Lettuce come together. Romaine calm. This may just be the tip of the iceberg.

  Jan and I did a WalMart run yesterday afternoon to pick up my prescription as well as a few groceries. And the mask situation was pretty much the same as the other day, with maybe a few more people wearing them, but many more people not wearing them correctly.

  A lot of people, including WM employees, had them pulled down off their noses so they could either breathe, or so their glasses wouldn’t fog up.

  And at the Pharmacy, the pharmacist and the techs were having to pull their masks up to talk to each other, or on the phone. And the tech at the checkout kept having to pull his mask aside so people could understand him behind his mask and the Plexiglass.

  And of course, the tech just put my prescription package, which had probably been touched by 3 or 4 people, in a WM plastic bag, and handed it to me, with his bare hands.

  Oh, the horror!

  And apparently this guy had mask problems too.
  New Jersey driver crashes car after passing out from wearing N95 mask

  I have received some push-back over my mask views so a little explanation may be in order.

  If you want to wear a mask, then go for it.

  But don’t rag on me when you’ve got it down below your nose so you can breathe, or pulling it up or out of the way so you can talk to your companions, or on your phone.

  Don’t pull it to the side so you can slurp your coffee or even that double-decaf soy latte with non-fat foam and mocha sprinkles.

  Don’t wear that paper mask for a week until it looks like you could read through it. But, hey, it does make easier to breathe, right?

  And if not, you are disposing of the paper one after every use, aren’t you? And you’re not just throwing it in the trash, are you? But treating it as hazardous waste, since it might be infected with the WuFlu, right?

  Or maybe it’s that cute Hello Kitty mask your Auntie made for you. You are washing it and sterilizing it after every use like the authorities recommend, right? Not every day. Every use! At least according to the CDC guidelines.

  And of course, there are all those people sorting through the bananas and tomatoes or squeezing the heads of lettuce in the produce department. Or opening each carton of eggs to be sure none are broken, and picking up that can of veggies off the shelf to check out the ingredients and then putting it back and checking another brand.

  Think all those are being sanitized/disinfected after you, or the previous dozen people, have finished pawing through them?

  Or the person in front of you at the checkout who used the credit card machine. They handled their credit card, stuck it in the slot, then you put your credit card in the same slot, and then back in your billfold or purse.

  Or maybe you paid cash, which we already know was pretty disease-ridden, pre-WuFlu. Did you disinfect all those bills/coins before you put them away?

  So I just think there are so many vectors of possible infection that, at some point, you just have to throw up your hands and hope for the best. And I think this is the same reason there are more and more anti-shutdown protests every day. People just don’t want to fool with it anymore.

  And as I mentioned yesterday, a Houston, Harris County Texas judge has ordered everyone over the age of 10 must wear a mask when out of their home, unless they’re eating, drinking, or exercising. That whole breathing thing again, right?

  Now Harris County Deputy’s’ Association and the Houston Police Officer’s Union have both said they will not enforce this questionable decree, and a number of lawsuits have already been filed, but the timing of it is kind of suspect.

  Judge Hidalgo issued her order this past Wednesday, the 22nd, but it doesn’t go into effect until next Monday, the 27th, Now if this is such an emergency, and so necessary, why wait 5 days to start it?

  ---

  April 24, 2021

  It’s Penciled In . . .

  With yesterday’s and last night’s rain gone, it was nice enough for us to sit outside with our morning coffee, trying to decide what we wanted to do this weekend.

  We finally decided to stay home today, and have the rest of hotdogs/sausages left over from last weekend,

  

  and then have lunch at Gator’s Bar & Grill once again tomorrow.

  

  Jan combined the hotdogs and sausages in a casserole dish and covered them with Wolf Brand Chili and Shiner Beer Cheese, and along with Bush’s Grilling Beans, and chips and dip, it was a really good simple meal.

  In a blog from a couple of days ago, I mentioned a new burger place up in the Friendswood area, Pop Top Burgers. Well, some friends of ours ate their last night, and it turns out that the owners had previously been part of Tookie’s and Stomp’s, two of our long-time favorite burger joints in this area.

  So we have a visit there penciled in for next weekend.

  ---

  April 24, 2022

  Hartz . . .

  We just hung around the rig all afternoon, finally leaving for lunch (linner?) about 3:30. And we decided to have lunch (linner?) at a place we haven’t been for probably about 40 years, Hartz Chicken Buffet. We used to go to the one in League City when our kids were still at home, but that was long ago.

  Then back in December, a new one opened over in Dickinson, so we thought we’d give it a try again. And it was really good.

  For $12 (senior) we got about a dozen veggies, fried chicken, chicken tenders, fried fish, hot yeast rolls, desserts, and a drink.

  A good deal, and good food too.

  ---

  April 24, 2023

  They’re Smart . . .

  A couple of weeks ago Jan and I got new watches – Smart Watches, and we’re really happy with them.

  Jan’s looks like this, but with a different face.

  

  You can select from 100’s of different faces, and even use your own photos.

  This is the one Jan likes.

  

  Jan’s Smart Watch

  Besides the time, it shows the battery level, the temperature, your heart rate, and the number of steps and miles you’ve done since midnight.

  Nice.

  Mine looks like this.

  The gears behind the skull actually turn, but after a while it’s kind of distracting and not easy to read.

  

  Greg’s Smart Watch

  So I switched to this one.

  

  Two things have impressed me so far. One is how long the battery lasts. So far I’ve only had to recharge it every two weeks.

  The other is how accurate the Blood Pressure reading app is. I checked it last week while the nurse was taking my blood pressure and was surprised that it was within a few points of the official reading.

  Nice!

  Tomorrow we’re going to check out a new place that just opened up in Webster. Called Walk-On’s, it calls itself a ‘Sports Bistreaux’, with the menu showing a Cajun flair. Looks really good, but we’ll see.

  But first, we’ve got our last two Doctor’s appointments. Another blood draw for me, and a consult for Jan. Then we’ll be done for this year.

• ---

• April 24, 2024All Set To Go . . .

  Well, we’re all set to go on our Royal Caribbean cruise. starting December 7th. Our first port will be Progresso in the Yucatan, then Cozumel, Roatan, Honduras, and Belize City, Belize, finishing up in Costa Maya, Yucatan.

  That’s 9 nights, 7 days in port, and 3 days cruising.

  

  Built in 2004, the Jewel was totally remodeled in 2016, and being an older ship, it’s also smaller, holding only a little over 2000 passengers.

  Fine with us.

  Jewel’s big sister, Icon Of The Seas, holds almost 8,000 passengers.

  As Jan says, “Oh No. No, No, No!”

  I agree wholeheartedly.

  Though both passenger totals made us long for our Viking Cruise in 2019, where we had only 179 passengers out of a possible 190.

  Since tomorrow is our stay-at-home day, I’m going to replace the passenger-side window regulator in the Jeep. I’ve done it before in our Dakota truck, and it looks to be pretty much the same.

  Shouldn’t take too long.

  Don’t know if we’ve seen Winter’s Last Gasp yet, but maybe.

  We are talking about Houston weather, right?

  We had temps in the low 50’s last week, but we’re back in the low 70’s at night again.

  So we’ll see.