Here's our home while we're in Palm Springs.


Morning coffee in Palm Springs. Very nice.


I was supposed to post this photo a few days ago. This is my Granddog Bubs modeling his Christmas sweater (I know my friend Troy won't like it, but I thought 'Bubba' looked pretty good in it).

Nelson

Hey everyone!! I think we're starting to feel "officially settled in" now. This morning, we sat in the sun on our new little "patio" while the dogs wandered around a little bit on their leashes. I've been focusing on work most of the afternoon and evening today, making up some nice brochures about my company for the presentation I'll be doing next week in La Pine, Oregon. I'm excited about the presentation, and hoping that it'll attract some additional consistent business. I've got one major iron in the fire, but it's too early to really talk about it at this time. Let's just say we're keeping our fingers crossed as it might turn in to something big for my little company. :) If any of you know anyone who needs graphic design or desktop publishing work, be sure to let me know. We're growing and things are going great, but there's still room for more growth.

Anyway, we walked around the mobile home country club community that's adjacent to the RV Park we're living in, and it's really nice. There's a great executive golf course in the middle of it and those of us who are residents of the RV Park are welcomed to play the course as if we lived in the country club community. So, I'm going to play tomorrow morning and Dawn will ride along with me. We're going to get her playing the game before long. She really wants to play, but we've got to get her to the driving range first. Sooner or later, we'll accomplish that . . . and then get Dawn on the golf course.

Well . . . I've still got plenty of work to do for a couple of clients, so I'll stop writing now, post a couple of photos and get back to work.

Thanks again for reading! :)

Great day. We love Palm Springs. We've talked about possibly staying here all winter. The days are perfect blue skies. Probably about 70 degrees. We are surrounded by mountains. Really nice. Judie and Jim, you should be here! Nelson was excited to get our awnings and lawn furniture out for the first time , since it's the first time we've actually settled somewhere for any amount of time. The people behind us with the citrus trees are really friendly and said we could pick the grapefruit and the tangerines whenever we want. That is so awesome.

We explored town a little today. We found the mall and lots of restaurants and the airport.

I talked to Brooke, and Luka is feeling lots better and he is home, so that is awesome.

All for now....
Dawn

This is the tangerine tree in our backyard. It is so awesome.

Another picture of our new yard. Look at Molly in the window. That is her and Lucy's favorite place to be. So cute.

I guess you can't see this very well, but this is a grapefruit tree in our backyard that is laden with grapefruit.

This is our new yard for the next 3 weeks in Palm Springs.

Molly, trying on Bella's holiday dress. So adorable.

Lucy, modeling Bella's new holiday dress.

Nelson

Wow…the holidays sure have a way of throwing one off schedule. It’s been a long time since I’ve posted to the blog, more than just a little bit.

Since Thanksgiving, we’ve been pretty busy. On Thanksgiving Day, Dawn and I had a great dinner with Brooke, Luka and his dad Cello at the kids’ place in L.A. Luka made three of his favorite dishes for us, a steak (my personal favorite), a chicken dish and ravioli. All of the grub was fantastic. It wasn’t exactly our traditional Thanksgiving meal, but it was really nice. On Friday, we all drove out to Dawn’s cousin Mike’s house where we enjoyed a traditional dinner with Mike and his family (wife Tannie and daughter Sophia), as well as Dawn’s Aunt Sandy and Uncle Ernie (Mike’s parents), and a couple of Mike and Tannie’s friends and their daughter. The whole thing was very nice. Their place, between Ventura and Ojai, was absolutely beautiful. I hadn’t seen that many stars in the night sky since Halloween in Battle Ground at our friends Wes and Melissa’s place. And never had I seen that many stars in Southern California.

On Saturday morning, Luka and I got up early and went to play golf at Van Nuys Golf Course, which was really neat. It was a fun executive course with six par threes and three par fours. I really didn’t play well, mainly because my short game truly is poor, but we both had a lot of fun. Luka beat me by one stroke. Then we went to Taco Bell for a little lunch and back to his house for some college football on TV. It truly was a pretty cool “guys’ morning.” It was cool for all of us, actually, because Brooke and Dawn went shopping that same morning, while us guys were playing golf and watching football. About 1:30 or so, Dawn and I got back on the road, continuing our adventure.

We had decided that we really wanted to stop in Palm Springs and check out the town, so we made plans to stay the night and spend our Sunday exploring in town. Well…it didn’t take us long at all to fall in love with the place, and we’ve decided to stay a little longer.

My work continues first thing tomorrow morning. I’ll be working on a major presentation that I’ll be giving on December 5, pitching my business and its services to a group of utility folks. I’m also working on a re-design of my company’s website, which we’ll gradually change as time goes by over the next few months. No major hurry, but I do want to get the new logo and colors on our site as soon as we can, so that part is underway. I have a newsletter for one client that needs to get finished up, too…and some invoicing that should get done and shipped out soon.

Hope you’re all doing well. We’d love to hear from you guys!

Dawn

Ok, sorry, I haven’t written for a long time. We have have had a wonderful 5 days with Brooke and Luka. Let’s see, I think I told you about Tuesday night. We went to the Grove Mall and to the Cheesecake Factory. Wednesday, we went to the Laundromat. Thursday Luka fixed us an awesome Thanksgiving dinner…BBQ steak, Chicken in wine sauce, an awesome pasta sauce. Brooke made a really awesome Pumpkin Cheesecake with walnut crust. Nelson made his famous bean dip. Luka’s dad Cello was over. He is thinking of moving to Portland soon and is looking for an older home in a nice neighborhood in the $350.00 range. If anyone knows of one??? Brooke and Luka and me and Nelson ended up playing “Catch Phrase” for about 3 hours that night and we laughed so hard. I’m not going to tell who won like 7 games out of like 12???

On Friday we went to my cousins house in Ventura, Mike and Tanny’s. My favorite Aunt & Uncle , Aunt Sandy and Uncle Ernie were there. We had a wonderful family Thanksgiving. Tanny had a wonderful dinner in a beautiful home. Thank you Tanny.

Saturday morning Brooke and I went Xmas shopping. Nelson and Luka went golfing. Nelson had a lot of fun but said he didn’t really play very well and Luka beat him by 1 point or stroke or whatever you call it.

When we got home we got on the road again and ended up in Palm Springs. It is such a cute little town. Our RV site has like 4 palm trees in it. I’m trying to talk Nelson into staying here for the next month rather than going on to Arizona quite yet. We’ll look into it a little more tomorrow. We went into town and had dinner and Margharita’s at a recommended restaurant from Brooke and Luka. We ordered Margharita’s and then found out they cost $15.00 each… ouch! But they were good!

Now I want everyone out there to tell me about their Thanksgiving. Did everyone have a wonderful, family time? I hope so. I don’t want to sound mushy, but I am, honestly so thankful to have so many people to love and to be loved by.

Sunday…
We’ve decided to stay in Palm Springs. We had to change sites, because the one with all of the palm trees was reserved for the month of December, but we found another really nice site and we have a grapefruit tree and a tangerine tree ( I think) right behind us. That is really cool. They’re full of fruit, too. We will stay here for 3 weeks until we leave to have Christmas with Brooke on Dec. 20th. We may never make it to Arizona at this rate. But we really only wanted Arizona because of the nice weather, and we have fallen in love with Palm Springs, and the weather is awesome. Since we are finally settled somewhere for awhile, Nelson was able to put the awnings out and the outdoor mat down. It’s really cozy.

Brooke called me this morning and her and Luka have had the worst past 24 hours. First of all their debit Visa kept getting denied, from the account that had all of their bill money and living money in . Brooke called her bank and they found out that their credit card number and pin # had been stolen and people had cleared out their account. The bank will reimburse, but not for awhile. Then she found out that the lady next door was held up last week at gun point, which is scaring the heck out of her. Then at about 9:00 last night Luka got really, really sick and after being unable to quit vomiting for hours, they took him to the emergency room. They are keeping him in the hospital at least through tonight to do some more tests, because his white blood cells were high. But the last time I talked to Brooke a couple of hours ago, Luka was feeling a little better, so that’s good. I’ll keep everyone posted.


My pictures of Thanksgiving at Brooke’s didn’t turn out, so Brooke if you have some will you will you email them to me? And Mike will you email me pics of Thanksgiving dinner at your house at dawnrh@peoplepc.com ? Thanks guys.

Until next time…

Dawn

Brooke at her office. This room is actually a guest house of the attorney's she works for. The house is unbelievable. It's behind a gated entry. The pool is surrounded by palm trees with a waterfall. The lemon trees are filled with lemons that you just reach up and pick. Really awesome

Nelson, trying to figure out how a wahing machine works. We actually thought it was kind of fun, roughing it.

I hadn't posted any pictures of my beautiful grandaughter, Bella (back), along with Bubs,(front).

Aren't they beautiful.

Dawn

It's Thanksgiving. I miss Steph alot today, but I just talked to her on the phone and she has plenty to do today. One of her friend's mom is having a Thanksgiving dinner for the kids that work at Who-songs that don't have relatives nearby. She's looking forward to being an Orphan...well a wannabe orphan, since her Uncle Todd is having a get together with Craig's side of the family and her dad is in town and Judie and Jim invited her there. But I think she's having fun with the whole orphan thing today. But thanks everyone for thinking about her.

We are having a non-traditinal Thanksgiving today. Brooke and Luka are cooking a couple of there specialties and Cello, Luka's dad will be here. Tomorrow we're getting together with my side of the family in Ventura for a family dinner.

Nelson and I went to our first laundromat yesterday. It was kind of fun. While we were trying to waste time we walked next door to Goodwill and Nelson got a couple of golf clubs that he didn't have for $1.99 ea. And I got an Eddie Bauer blouse. I love good deals!

Sitting in the laundromat gave me this huge urge to be reading a Star magazine, lol. Laundromats and Star magazine seem to go hand in hand. So we went to Walgren's and bought one.

Nelson dropped me off at Brooke's office. Then Brooke and I went grocery shopping for today and then we went to see "Pride and Prejudice", which was very good. The guys wanted to go golfing, but they couldn't make it there in time.

It is kind of wierd to see sunshine and people watering their lawns on Thanksgiving.

That's all for now. Hope everyone has a fantastic Thanksgiving.

Dawn

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!!

Nelson 11/23

Hey everyone, from LA...where traffic is terrible but the weather is nice. Speaking of that, this Thanksgiving is going to be different than others we've been used to in the past. It's supposed to be clear and probably around 70 tomorrow.

It's likely to be the first Thanksgiving that I've ever worn shorts during.

But since our arrival here at Brooke and Luka's cool little apartment in LA, we've really had a good time. Brooke baked me a birthday cake, which was really really sweet and thoughtful of her! Turns out it was her first cake, and she did an awesome job with it. So thanks goes out to her! (BTW: I had another piece tonight, and plan to have more another time very soon...maybe tomorrow for breakfast). She and Luka also gave me a very nice gift card for Olive Garden, which I'm sure we'll use before we even get to Arizona! I think this is the longest birthday celebration in history. We celebrated with my Mom & Jim as well as Nancy (my sister) and her family on Nov. 5, then again (just Dawn and I) on the 15th (my actual b-day), and last night when Brooke, Luka and Dawn all sang to me and I got to open presents! One of the presents Brooke had wrapped for me was a gift from my mom...so we all got a good laugh about that. :) (BTW Mom...I put the RAM in my computer tonight. Big improvement! Thank you!!)

I got to talk to my dad on the phone tonight, which was awesome. It's always nice to talk to him. He's doing great.

Well...it's just about officially Thanksgiving! So happy turkey day everyone. I'll be thinking of you Turkey Bowl guys tomorrow morning...wishing I was joining you. I'm sure you'll have a lot of fun! Bye for now everyone!

Dawn

OK, OK, everyone has been getting on my butt for not writing lately so I guess, to stop the nagging, I will write.

Actually everything has been pretty uneventful. No flat tires and no breakdowns. We stayed in a really nice RV park on Monday night in Paso Robles. In a really cute part of town. We had dinner on the balcony of a restaurant. That was really nice, especially knowing it was the middle of November.

We left the next day (yesterday) for LA .I finished a really good book called “The long road home” by Danielle Steele. I haven’t read anything by Danielle Steele for a long time and it was really good. The last hour and a half was spent sitting in traffic before we got to Brooke’s house. I then got to snuggle and kiss my grand-dogs. I missed them so much. It was great to see Brooke and Luka too. Brooke had made Nelson a cake for his birthday, (her first cake) so we sung Happy Birthday to Nelson and he blew out the candles. Nelson opened presents. It was funny because Brooke had wrapped a gift that Judie had sent To Brooke’s for him. So she pretended like it was from her, until he opened it and then he knew it was from his mom. And Brooke and Luka got him a gift certificate for Olive Garden. The whole thing was very sweet of Brooke.

We then proceeded to take Luka’s convertible to the “Grove”. It’s a really, really nice outdoor mall. It was supposedly “not far” from their house. But because of the traffic, at all hours of the day, it took us over an hour to get there. Luka drives like a maniac (sorry Luka) , and Brooke’s seatbelt didn’t work, so I was happy when we made it home safely. It seemed like we were having races in the parking garage, everyone drove up that thing like there was a prize at the end. I guess the prize was the best parking space. We had dinner at the Cheesecake Factory and that was fun.

When we got home we had a piece of the Birthday cake, and it was yummy! I think Brooke has found her new calling.

Brooke and Luka have to work today (Wednesday), so Nelson and I are going to take this time to get our laundry done. Nelson wants to get a haircut. And I need to get some bills paid. When Brooke gets home tonight, her and I are going to go and see “Pride and Prejudice”, which the guys refuse to see. There is a golf course near here that has big lights all over the course so that you can play at night, so the guys are going to try to get some golfing in at some point.

And to the ”Anonymous” commenter from Tuesday the 22nd, I know who you are, and next time I see you I’m going to kick your butt. And I may just sneak home at anytime to do that so you’d better be looking over your shoulder at all times. And if everything you said wasn’t totally opposite of the truth, (Steph’s totally looking forward to going to the house of misfits for Thanksgiving), then if you were any kind of a good friend or mother, you would make sure she was being well taken care of, so now it’s your fault, not mine! And if your kids ever are alone on Thanksgiving, I will try to find them a “house of misfits” that they can go to.

But besides all of the above, I hope everyone has a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving.

Talk to you soon, Dawn

Nelson 4/21

Well...we're so close to LA now, that we'll be there tomorrow.

Today we made it from San Francisco to Paso Robles, which is less than 30 miles from San Luis Obispo, and right around 240 miles from LA. We'll be in LA, with Brooke and Luka, for Thanksgiving on Thursday and on Friday, the four of us will head up to Ventura for another Thanksgiving celebration with Dawn's cousin Mike and his wife Tani, their daughter Sophia and Aunt Sandy. That'll be fun.

On Saturday, two weeks after we left home, Dawn and I will be off to Arizona, where we'll finally start looking for the place that we're going to live for the next six months.

Well...I've got work to do tonight, so I'm off now. Here's hopes from both Dawn and I that everyone has a very Happy Thanksgiving.

This is Mendocino. A really cute little coastal town in Northern California. It's a bit difficult to get to in an RV with a tow car hooked to the back, but it was fun to see it!

These are my family members that we visited on Sunday night in Petaluma, Calif. (From L-R) Aunt Lois (hiding behind Denise), Jack, Todd, and Uncle Steve.

Dawn and I with Jack...son of my cousin Denise and her husband Todd.

Dawn

Well, lets see. I haven’t written for a couple of days. We have been so busy. We did end up going to Mendocino yesterday. It was an adorable little town. I’m not sure if it was worth the windy scary roads to get there (Lois’ fault, lol) but now that it’s all behind us I’m glad that we did see it.

We went on to San Francisco later that day. We met Emmy for dinner last night and that was fun, but none of my pictures that I took turned out, so that sucks.

We went to Alcatraz today. Nelson had never been there before. It was really neat. Yes, I wore a hat. After we got off of the Ferry, we walked over to Hard Rock Café and had a beer. Absolutely beautiful weather. It couldn’t have been more perfect. We are now getting ready to meet Nelson’s relatives for dinner. His Aunt Lois and Uncle Steve and cousins Denise, Todd and Jack.

Next day…
We had a great time at dinner. Little Jack is so adorable. Nelson’s family have all welcomed me into their family with open arms. Very nice people.

We are about to head further South on 101 today. Probably try to make it half way to L.A. today and on to Brooke’s tomorrow.

This is Alcatraz. We got to walk around inside of this, It is really cool...and creepy.

Nelson is standing in one ot the cells. I think they said it was 6'x9'.

Nelson

Today was a really cool day.

As planned, we went over to Alcatraz this afternoon. Wow, was that interesting, creepy, and cool all rolled into one. The self-guided audio tour around the former federal penetentiary had more than just details of what was what, but also stories of things that happened within the walls of the cellblock and sound effects that made you feel a little bit like you were really "there". Since I'm such a trivia geek, I thought I'd share a few things with you that we learned today. Did you know that the main corridor of the cellblock is known as "Broadway", and another is known as "Michigan Ave."? How about this...Al Capone served four years on "The Rock" because of tax evasion. We also learned that many of the prisoners who did time at Alcatraz were guys who did bad things in other prisons and were sent to Alcatraz as punishment. Did you know that the Birdman of Alcatraz didn't actually take his birds along with him...but it was said that he did have a number of very annoying behaviors? How about that there was a riot in the cafeteria that was caused by the fact that the cooks served spaghetti AGAIN. There is, of course, mor to the story than that...but theoretically, that's what caused the riot, particularly as the quality of the spaghetti continually dropped off.

Tonight, we went out to dinner with my Aunt Lois, Uncle Steve, and my cousin Denise, her husband Todd and their son Jack. It was so fun to visit with them and catch up again. We saw them back in July at a family reunion, but it's always nice to see all of them. We had great conversation for a couple of hours, and enjoyed Jack's company. He's only 11 months (in a few days), but he's communicating pretty well...especially when he noticed the helium baloons.

Tomorrow, it's back on the road after our two-day stop in San Francisco. Molly will be bummed. She has really enjoyed the hours without travel. But we're expecting to make it to LA in time for Thanksgiving by Tuesday night.

By the way...I did think it was very cool, and very thoughtful, that my friend Mick called me from Husky Stadium on Saturday afternoon during the final seconds of the Apple Cup, he let me hear the crowd and the celebration. Thanks Mick...it did make me feel like a part of it all.

Nelson

Hey everyone! Sorry neither of us posted much yesterday (Saturday), but we got into the San Francisco area about 4:30, and by the time we were getting settled in, we'd made plans to have dinner with our friend Emmy Zack. She'd told us about this great restaurant just south of the San Francisco airport, called the Elephant Bar and said it was only about a 30 minute drive from where we're staying...in Marin City. It was...on the way home at 10:45 p.m. Long story short, it took us more than an hour to get to dinner. Fortunately, Emmy was also held up in traffic and didn't have to wait too long for us.

We had a great time at dinner, talking about everything from our trip, to jobs, to sports (which is "surprising" when Emmy and I get together. Poor Dawn. I think she was bored when Emmy and I talked sports...but she was awesome about it). We tried about a million times to get a picture of Emmy in the restaurant that we could post on the blog, but there wasn't enough light for the camera we had with us...and couldn't get a good picture. So...here's our picture of Emmy. We like her because she only has four fingers on one hand and three on the other. And look how skinny she is!
Today we're going to Alcatraz. Dawn has been there before, but I never have. I'm excited about it. Later...we're going to have dinner with my family in the area, which we're very much looking forward to. It's always nice to see these guys when I'm in the Bay Area.

Lastly, and I've already said it once, but for the next year, we Cougars get to bask in the glow of being Apple Cup champions, I have to say how excited I am that we've won the Apple Cup for the second straight year. I think Alex Brink (Cougs' QB) is the first starting QB in school history to beat them twice...unless Mark Rypien did it back in the early 80s. Thanks to XM Satellite Radio, we got to listen to the game during our drive yesterday. We were kinda stuck with the Husky broadcast, but that wasn't too bad. We found Bob Rondeau, the play-by-play guy, to be very fair, professional, and all-in-all, really good. I had expected him to be much more of a Husky "homer", but he wasn't. Chuck Nelson, his sidekick, on the other hand...was. I didn't like him much...but it was satisfying to remember back to an Apple Cup in the early 80s, when Chuck (then an All-American kicker for U-Duh), missed a game-winning field goal in the Apple Cup...and the Cougs won. :)

Time to get to making breakfast now. Take care. We hope you all are well!

WSU 26, U-DUH 22

COUGS WIN! COUGS WIN!!

(Don't worry Brian...you'll look great in Crimson and Gray all week!)

More later. :)

11/18 Nelson

We made it!

There was a time today when we just weren't sure we'd done the right thing by exiting off 101 to CA Highway 1 (also known as the Pacific Coast Highway, or the Shoreline Highway up here). The first 22 or so miles of the drive took an hour -- literally. It was switchbacks, uphills, downhills, hairpin turns at recommended speeds of 10 mph, which of course means 5 mph in a motor home. And if that wasn't enough, shortly after we finished that stretch, there was another 16 miles of the same thing! Poor Dawn...she hates cliffs, and the drive today was scary for her. But she came through it all like a champ! It was tiring and I'm sure my arms will be sore tomorrow from all of the steering, but we made it to Fort Bragg just fine, and found an RV Park. I thought maybe we were in for more trouble when we checked in and the lady at the desk gave me directions on how to make one turn in the park to make sure we got by a tree without the RV hitting it and causing damage. I don't rightly know if she was more concerned about the RV or the tree. Anyway, she said to me, "I've got an experienced driver who is a return camper here, and he hit the tree last week and took his awning off." She also said something about, "A good driver can make it. A bad driver, well..." Let's just say we made it. Getting in to our so called "pull through" campsite was a different story. The right turn into the site is so sharp, it's got to be more than a 90-degree angle. Ugh. Needless to say, I'm not that good of a driver, and I unhitched the car, and backed the RV in from the other side of the site...then moved the car. Dawn was a great help...directing me backwards in the dark. She used a flashlight in the same way that those guys at the airport use those orange thingies to direct airplanes in to the gate. That was a big help. I couldn't have done it without her.

After that, we decided we were just going to relax for the night...so we made a quick run to the closest Safeway -- it's cool that you can buy "spirits" in grocery stores here in California. We were out of margarita makins. Also picked up a couple of steaks, which we grilled up for a nice little dinner. Made for a nice ending to a stressful afternoon.

I'm sure Dawn mentioned the fun we had in Ferndale (btw: we try not to read one anothers posts on this blog before we post our own, so as not to influence what we both write...just so you guys know). Ferndale is a really neat little Victorian town south of Eureka. Impressive. Thanks Rick and Joan for the recommendation! It was well-worth the side trip.

Speaking of Rick and Joan's recommendation, this blog thing is so cool, because we can read the comments you guys send us, and if you've experienced something along the same route we're going and you pass it along to us, so far, we've been trying to the recommended stops. Tomorrow we're going to Mendocino, thanks to my Aunt Lois and my Cousin Denise. That was our original destination for tonight, but we were ready to stop for the day when we found this place. We're going to get up a little earlier than normal tomorrow and head into Mendocino for breakfast...driving the car.

After that, we'll be off to our next stop. Quite likely someplace in the Santa Rosa/Petaluma area, where we'll get to spend some time with Aunt Lois, Uncle Steve, Denise, Todd, Jack, and hopefully maybe Laura and Dave (if they're able to join us for dinner on Sunday). We're also making plans to see my friend Emmy in the San Francisco area, and to do the Alcatraz tour. Thanks to Ron's suggestion, we're definitely going to try and find a cheap hat for Dawn...in case the birds "target her" again. Maybe we'll try to find one that's purple and gold with a big "W" on the front of it. Just in case. :) Speaking of that...tomorrow is the Apple Cup. I'm excited to listen to the game on XM Radio. Thank goodness for satellite toys! GO COUGS! (Speaking of which, if you have a minute...go vote for Jerome Harrison for the Pontiac Game-Changing Performance, http://www.pac-10.org/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/pontiac-2005.html. Thanks for putting up with the shameless plug. :)

With that...I'm ready for bed. It's been a long day. Thanks again for reading, and commenting. It's just as fun for us to read the comments as it is to write these entries. :) Good night.

This was an exact replica of a Victorian home in Ferndale, but it was a playhouse.

Ferndale

This was so funny. When we got out of the car to go into town in Ferndale, Nelson insisted upon taking our garbage with us. He couldn't find a garbage can, so he walked all around town with this bag of garbage. He even set it on the chair next to him at lunch. Ok, well maybe he didn't do that, but we joked about how funny it would be if he did. In this picture, I told him that I was going to put this on the blog and he was trying to hide the bag so that I wouldn't tell anyone.

Dawn

Well, this started out being a great day. We decided that the RV park that we stayed at last night in Arcata was definitely the nicest one yet. The worst one was a KOA in Kent, WA. It was the most expensive too.

We went into Ferndale under Rick and Joan's recommendation. It was an absolutely adorable town. We had lunch at Curley's. Every business and every house was refurbished Victorian. I loved it. I want to live there someday. Along with many other towns, I'm finding out.

After we left Ferndale, it was downhill from there. We wanted to try to make it to Mendocino from a recommendation from Lois. We took a small road from Legget to Fort Bragg. Well, I must mention here that I am an absolute Phobia Freak. This was a two lane road with hairpin turns with enormous cliffs. I HATE CLIFFS!!! I've been doing pretty well so far. I realized that there would be cliffs on Hwy. 101. I was facing my fears and doing pretty well...until today. It started out with 27 miles of roads like this. Right when I thought it was over, the sign announced another 16 miles of it. I was a basket case by the time we made it to Fort Bragg. Nelson was so awesome the whole time. He kept telling me that everything was alright, that we were almost through it. He knows how I hate cliffs...and airplanes...and dentists...and spiders. I told you I was a phobia freak. It totally reminds me of a book that Brooke bought for me once. It was a pop-up phobia book. Every page was this huge pop up picture of different phobias. We laughed so hard because I was afraid of the phobia on every page. Well, we are staying in Fort Bragg tonight, because the map looked like the next few miles to Mendocino might be cliffs. We're going to drive the car in to Mendocino for breakfast tomorrow, without the motorhome.

I've chuckled to myself several times on this trip when I turn around and look at this big, long house that we are driving around with. It so reminds me of "the longest trailer" with Lucille Ball, lol.

We love it when you guys comment on our blog. So please keep doing it. I have to wonder though if some of the people I sent the blog address to are reading this. I'm thinking they probably didn't even know what a blog is...Aunt Sandy? Jeannette? You're the two that I think would want to be reading it that I haven't heard from. There are others too. If I don't hear from you I'm going to nag you until I know you're reading it.

Trenton, I hope you're feeling better.

Hi Gladys, lol. (personal joke).

Bye until next time.

Dawn

It’s almost 1:00 PM. The weather is perfect again. We are just leaving Bandon. We think we’ll try for ” Ferndale” today from Rick and Joan’s recommendation. Thanks guys. So far we’ve gone, I think, 3 full days with no mishaps with the motorhome (knock on wood).

Thanks Judie and Chet on the comments on the wood slats. We seem to be learning a little more about this RV life everyday. It’s been so fun so far, but we’re still sort of vacationing. The true test will come when we’ve settled into one place for awhile.

Judie, you should talk Jim into doing this for awhile. We could travel together. That would be so fun. You only live once!

Steph called and said we have a ton of mail (probably mostly catalogs). She is going to open up everything and read it to us piece by piece. That’s going to be a pain for her. We’ll have to figure out something else if we continue with this lifestyle for awhile. Thanks Steph.

Later…
Well, we didn’t quite make it to Ferndale. We’ve stopped at Arcata, Ca. Yeah! We finally made it to California, it only took us 6 days, lol. We’ll stop at Ferndale tomorrow.

Molly was no better during our traveling today. But she’s ok now. I am kind of worried about her.

Nelson locked the keys in the car again today, for the 2nd time in a month, dingbat!

When we get to the San Francisco area, I think we’ve decided to stay for a couple of days. We want to stop and see Nelson’s Aunt Lois and Uncle Steve and his cousins. And we want to see Nelson’s friend Emmy. And Nelson has never been to the Alcatraz tour, so we’d like to see if we can get in there. My most memorable moment of Alcatraz was when a seagull pooped on my head. Yes, it was disgusting. I’m wearing one of Nelson’s baseball caps this time. I don’t care if they do make me look like a pinhead.

All for now, bye.

I'll bet my grandson is cuter than yours. This is Bubba.

Nelson, blogging.

11/17 - Nelson

Well...here we are in Arcata, California. It only took us six days, but we finally crossed the border into California. The weird thing is, there's still like 600 miles or something to go before we get to Brooke and Luka's place, where we're going to stay from whenever we get there through Thanksgiving. Then we'll head over to Arizona sometime the following week. I'm not sure we've even covered 600 miles on this entire trip yet...but we're probably pretty close to that number.

Today's drive was kinda weird, in a sense. I spent a lot of time really looking forward to going through the Redwood forest. But, unfortunately, we're thinking that unless you get off of 101 in the park, there's really not a lot to see. Sure, there are some cool really old trees with the "different" redwood bark, but there are no tunnels through trees, or trees so big you could hardly even imagine that it's possible for a tree to get that big. I guess when you spend most of your life in the Pacific Northwest, you get pretty used to seeing evergreen trees that are as old and thick as the ones we saw today.

One part of the road today gave me memories of a trip Nancy and I took with our parents once. Siskyou Pass was closed (this was probably 30 years ago or more), and mom and dad decided to go over to the coast and take 101 down to my aunt and uncle's place. Well, when we got to 101, there was a huge mudslide that was backing up traffic for miles. That was the first time we'd tried Pringles potato chips. I think we drove that stretch of road today. It was pretty familiar looking to me.

Going through places like Gold Beach and Brookings today was pretty. Oddly enough, of all of the south coast towns we went through yesterday and today, it sure seems like (along 101 at least) we thought Gold Beach was the only one that was really some sort of beach resort town. It really reminded me of Lincoln City. In another sense, there's something about the stunning beauty of the south coast. It's a little different than the Oregon Coast from Astoria to Newport that most of us Vancouver/Portland area folk are used to, I guess in a sense that a huge portion of it is still largely untouched by resort development. But it's really, really nice. If you've never seen it before, it's worth the trip.

The other thing I've been thinking of for two days now is my basketball team: the Slashers. For those who don't know, it's a club team we put together about three years ago and they've really become a great little team. The girls have all made friends with one another, and the parents have too. All of them are friends of mine. When we made the decision to leave for Arizona, I spoke with Kevin Fox, my assistant coach about him taking over the program and carrying on the traditions of the team (the main tradition is DEFENSE, DEFENSE, DEFENSE). Anyway, last night was the first time I'd missed practice since Kevin took over as head coach. Tonight was the first time I'd missed a game. My thoughts seem to be focused on what happened tonight...and how practice went for Kevin last night. I'm confident he did fine in his first practice, and equally as confident that both the girls, and all the parents are just as supportive of Kevin as they always were for me. The good thing is, we'll be home in the spring, and we'll be able to see all the kids and their parents again before they all graduate in June. I'm still hoping Kevin, or someone from the team, will call or email me (or even comment on the blog) to let me know how things went tonight. Just because I'm gone doesn't mean that I don't care any more. I totally still care.

At some point in the next couple of days, we'll make it to the San Francisco area. Maybe as early as tomorrow. It's about 250 miles from here, still. But I've got family in the Bay Area, and Dawn and I have a friend there as well. We're going to try and see all of them. We're also even going to try and take the Alcatraz tour...which I've never done before, believe it or not. So we're planning to spend a couple of nights in that area. Should be fun!

More photos from 11/16

Molly, Mommy and Lucy enjoy their time on the beach in Lincoln City.

Lucy gets to go running on the beach. She hasn't done this for years. She loved every second of it...and tonight, she's sleeping pretty soundly on the couch.

11/16 - Nelson

Hey everyone! We're really making progress, and still having lots of fun at the same time. Tonight, we're in Bandon, Ore. Yes, we went past the world-famous Bandon Dunes Golf Course on the way into town. Tomorrow, I'm sure we'll go out and pay a visit to the golf course. I'd love to play it, but my budget won't allow me to do so...but that's not because I don't have the money...it's because Bandon Dunes looks like it would be EXPENSIVE to play. Then there's also the fact that I'm not half the golfer that it takes to play a premier course like that one. It'll be fun to at least see it, though. Just like it was fun to see Pebble Beach's famous 18th hole when we were in Monterey a couple of months ago.

Anyway, today was cool. I slept in until almost 9, which is late for me, then got up and farted around a little bit. Made breakfast for us, and then we went into town to make our stop at the outlet mall. We took Molly and Lucy with us, too, because we wanted to let them play on the beach. It was really cool, seeing the two little ankle-biters running around, looking so happy. I'll attach some pictures of us at the beach in a bit.

You know, this experience has been really cool. We've been on the road now for five days, and it's been really easy to learn why people like doing this as full timers. You get to see so many things that you never even maybe knew were there...Who knew North Bend, Oregon was such a quaint little town, bordered by much better known Coos Bay, which is very industrial? Never would've known that Waldport, Oregon is a really cool small town in its own right.

Tomorrow, we'll finally cross the border into California. I'm sure we'll at least make it to Eureka, but who knows? We're in no hurry, really. It's getting easier and easier for me to live that way. I've always been focused on the next destination, and in a hurry to get there. But this experience has been very educational to me...and taking time to see what's out there (out here) in these places we hear about but perhaps never think about is pretty awesome.

To be honest, I haven't looked at the map yet, to see what cities and towns we'll see tomorrow as we keep going south. But I do know we'll see Brookings, Oregon, which I've never been to (at least that I can remember). Brookings is the town in Western Oregon that always seems to be the state's warmest city, no matter what time of year it might be.

I gotta say this, too, there are no better places to watch the sunset than on the Oregon Coast. None that I've seen anyway.

Until tomorrow...

Dawn

We’re just leaving Lincon City, heading south on Hwy. 101. It’s 2:00 pm. If we keep getting late starts like this we won’t even make it to LA by Thanksgiving. After talking to Brooke about us being so far behind our original schedule, we’ve decided to go to Arizona after Thanksgiving. Since we are going to spend T-day in LA anyway, it would be silly of us to go through LA to Arizona and then back to LA next week for T-day.

We went to the Outlet Mall this morning. I always buy my wrapping paper at the” Paper Factory” (best deal in town). I don’t have any gifts to use the paper on yet since I haven’t even started my shopping (which will shock every one who knows me well, I’m usually done by now).

We took the dogs to the beach. That was fun. I’ve never seen Molly run so fast. It was really cute.

I talked to Steph. She says she is totally redecorating my house. Taking all of the “mom” things down and putting up her posters and paintings. She’s going to send me pictures. I told her she can do anything except paint the walls. Hope I’m not sorry about that call. No, I trust her, I’m sure she’ll take care of things.

The views from 101 on this beautiful day are absolutely fantastic. Gee, I hope I made the right decision about taking this trip…let’s see…sitting at my desk at work? …or looking at this view?...hhhmmm???

We went through some really cute little beach towns today. Waldport and North Bend. And we landed in Bandon. Tomorrow we’ll go explore “Old Town” and probably the historic lighthouse. We found an RV park that just opened with full hookups and we just checked in to settle down for the evening. Some good shows on tonight like ”One Tree Hill” and “Lost”. And I’ll probably work on a scrapbook page.

Molly isn’t doing so great with all of the traveling. She seems to be pretty nervous while we’re moving, but then seems to be fine when we’re stopped. Hopefully she’ll get used to it. I thought it would be Lucy that might not like it but she seems to be doing fine. She has picked her ”throne” on the dashboard as her preferred mode of travel. Both girls have offered to keep the dogs for us if it doesn’t work out, so that’s good. But I would really miss my “babies”. I’m looking very forward to seeing my “grandchildren” Bubs & Belly next week. I miss them a lot. Oh ya, and Brooke& Luka too, lol.

We’re trying to figure out why some motorhomes put blocks of wood under their tires and under their jacks and some seem to just use their jacks without any wood. Does anyone know?

I caught a picture of Nelson with Molly running and running as fast as she could on the beach. It was so adorable.

Dawn

Lucy, our 14 year old Chihuahua. She hadn't been to the beach for many years. She's always loved it. Nelson and I have talked many times about making sure we get Lucy to the beach again before she dies. And we did!

Photos - Dawn

The Tillamook Cheese Factory. this is where they slice huge blocks of cheese into smaller portions and package them.

Nelson in the casino at Lincoln City. We really didn't play any slots (blackjack only), but they wouldn't let us take pictures in the casino. We were sneaky to take this one.

Thank you all! - Nelson

Thanks to everyone who has sent along their best birthday wishes...everyone in my family, many friends. It has been very much appreciated. We were just talking about how neat it is that we're doing this blog and people are reading it...thank you to everyone for that. Keep the comments coming...we love reading them.

As Dawn said, we're in Lincoln City...granted it took us 4 days to get here. But we're taking our tim and having a great trip. We've commented several times today that while we realize we're only four days into the whole thing, we're really having a good time, and so far we're enjoying living in the motor home.

Tonight we're in the parking lot at the Chinook Winds Casino, with a handful of other RV'ers. It's the first time on this trip that we haven't had hookups for power, water or sewer. It seems as if we've been doing things right, though. The water tank isn't running low, the black water tank isn't overfilling, and the gray water tank is just fine, too. We're running the generator this evening, to watch a little television.

Tomorrow, we'll visit the outlet mall here in Lincoln City and we'll likely take some time to let the dogs play on the beach. The weather has been absolutely beautiful.

We're a couple of lucky people, really. Thanks for reading...and commenting.

Dawn

Day 4...we're in Lincoln City. We think that is so funny, it's like 2 hours from home, lol. Since today was Nelson's birthday, he got to choose what we would do all day. I took him to breakfast at Pig & Pancake in Seaside. We toured the Tillamook cheese factory. We played Blackjack at the Casino in Lincoln City. Perfect blue skies all day on the coast which is unheard of for the middle of November in Oregon. Free camping tonight in the Casino parking lot. I like free.

We have absolutely no plans or destination for tomorrow. Que sera, sera (oh my gosh that is so corny).

I'm going to try to figure out how to put pictures on here now. Bye.

November 14- Dawn

We've been traveling for 3 days and we finally made it to....SEASIDE, lol. Actually we had a very nice day though. The weather was beautiful. Nelson made us a nice pancake breakfast. We got our lighting problem fixed and then headed over to the coast. We went through the best little town. It was called South Bend. It was right on Willapa Bay. A couple of little cafe's, a bowling alley, it looked like the perfect little "small town". Just the kind I want to spend time in on this trip.

The first thing we did after we checked into the "Venice RV park" in Seaside, was go into town and have dinner at "Doogers", one of our very favorite restaurants.

I'm using Nelson's computer right now and it's the first time I've used his new little, cordless mouse that his mom got him for his birthday (which, by the way is tomorrow), it is awesome. If you're looking for a Christmas present for someone this is called Micro Innovations and it's really neat.

We're going into Lincoln City tomorrow. I know we're going to go to the outlet stores. We may just stay at the Casino and play a little blackjack, or we may move on. Whatever we feel like doing at the time. Pretty cool.

11/14 - Nelson

So, we've decided to make each of the headlines reflect who wrote the post in our blog, starting now. Hopefully that way you'll know who's writing while you're reading. Also, I'll write my posts in green and Dawn's will be in black. We'll try to stick to that as best we can.

Today is a new day, and first thing today, we're going to try and get our RV into a nearby repair place to have the light problem taken care of ASAP so we can get on the road. While it was a nice evening just being able to finally relax and enjoy each other's company rather than sit around in all the tension of the day's events, it will be nice to get on the road. We're both looking forward to moving toward a southerly direction. :)

So far, I guess we haven't said anything about our dogs, Lucy (a 15 year-old Chihuahua) and Molly (a nearly 4 year-old Yorkie). They've both been great! It's amazing how dogs just adjust to their environments and move on with life.

Well...I've got work to do, and I have to call the RV repair place now. We'll both check in more later today.

PHOTOS!!!

Here are the first photos of our trip.

1. How's this for a quality tire? Ugh. This was the inside right rear tire. It blew out just 50 miles into our trip. Now, it's garbage.

2. Welcome to the side of Chehalis, Washington that you just don't see from I-5. Marlino's Pizza is a good bet for a quick lunch in downtown. If you need tires, this is the Les Schwab place to go. They were super friendly and very fast. Did a good job.

3. The Les Schwab guys working on our RV.

Two more posts from Dawn

November 12, 2005


Oh my gosh, this is the weirdest feeling in the entire world. We just left our house…for 6 months. It is so scary with the unknown And so exciting at the same time.

Well, we’ve been traveling for about an hour and POP a tire blows out. We are at exit 46 just past Longview. We’re waiting for roadside service to come. We’re still smiling, so that’s good.

Well about one hour later and we’re rolling down the road again. The tire guy said the tires were looking old, so now we’re worried and we’re going to stop in Toledo and get all new tires. With a blow out like that it could have been pretty dangerous, so we’re not going to take any more chances.

The tire center was closed in Toledo, so we found a Les Schwab in Chehalis… $1,065.00 later and we have all 6 brand new tires. That is a very good feeling for our long trip ahead of us. We went into downtown Chehalis and ate pizza for lunch while we were waiting for the tires and now off to Seattle to Nelson’s RCU board meeting and banquet.



November 13, 2005

The banquet was successful last night. Nelson was one of the speakers since he was the outgoing chairman of the board. He misplaced his notes right before it started and had to wing it, (we later found out that Cheryl had been sitting on them, lol). He did a great job. He’s a good speaker in front of people. He also got rewarded with a “contribution award”, which is very cool because he does do a lot of “ behind the scenes” things for the club.

We got up on Sunday morning and were supposed to meet Nelson’s dad, Fred for breakfast. We got everything hooked up and then realized that the lights weren’t working properly on the tow car. Fred came to where we were and the guys tried everything they could think of to get the lights working. Nelson’s good friend Bob Hulliger was coaching him on the phone on things to try. Finally Nelson was sick and tired of standing in the rain and at about 2:30 we checked into a nearby KOA. We’ll just hang out here the rest of the day and watch TV (Gray’s Anatomy & Desperate Housewives) and read and nap and take hot showers and maybe I’ll scrapbook.

Poor Nelson was not smiling today. But we have no place we have to be at any time so all is cool.

Jeannette, if you’re reading this, I hope this is not “The Motor Home from hell the 2nd”, lol.

Photos to come

Never dispair...we're planning on posting photos to our blog before long. It just will take some time for us to figure out how to do it. ;)

New postings (11/13)

November 12

Here we are. We finally made it to Kent, Wash., site of the Hydroplane and Raceboat Museum. Tonight, we’re going to participate in the Awards Banquet for R/C Unlimiteds and Electric R/C Unlimiteds, two clubs that I belong to for my model boat racing hobby (or addiction, as some would say). It was a much longer trip up I-5 between home in Portland and here than we’d anticipated because — as Dawn has reported — we had a tire blow out just 50 miles into the trip. Thank goodness for Roadside Assistance! While the guy from Superior Tire in Kelso was helping fix things up and get us back on the road, he noticed that our tires were nearly 10 years old, and despite the fact that they had significant tread on them still, it was time to replace them because of other wear and tear. So, after a little more than an hour on the shoulder of the offramp at exit 46, we were back on the road to find a tire place. We found a Les Schwab in Chehalis, where a young man named Val was very friendly and more than happy to help us out. Lots of money and a little more than an hour later, we were again headed north on I-5. Long story short, after having left home at 9:40 a.m., we arrived at the Hydroplane and Raceboat Museum in Kent at just a few minutes before 4 p.m. Now it’s time to get ready for the banquet and the silent auction, which starts at 5:30 p.m.

November 13

Well, it’s the morning after the R/C Unlimiteds banquet, which was the final duty of my tumultuous term as chairman of the boat racing club’s board. The banquet went great, there were nearly 100 people in attendance and the silent auction raised more than $1,200 for our club, and our sister club (Electric R/C Unlimiteds) with which we shared the event. Both clubs did a great job of honoring their members who were successful both on the race courses, and in doing good things to help each other out, and to help out their respective club. I was surprised with a contribution award, which was very much appreciated. We had a fantastic time last night, spending time talking with all of our old boat racing friends from R/CU, and with some of our new friends from ERCU.

Today, though, is the big day when we’re beginning the drive south. We’ve decided to go down 101, just for something different. We’re really in no huge hurry. I can do work for my company in the evenings when we stop, and in the mornings before we leave, so there’s time for that. But we don’t want to be in too much of a hurry to make our trip. We’re going to have breakfast with my dad this morning, then head off on our way. Places we don’t typically see on a trip between Seattle and the Oregon Coast include, that we’ll see today, include the Washington towns of Elma, Cosmopolis, Raymond, and Ilwaco. We’re kind of thinking we’re going to try and get as far as Lincoln City tonight, but we’ll just play it by ear and the clock.

Things really didn’t go as planned today. We’re still in Kent. Only instead of sitting in the parking lot of the Hydroplane and Raceboat Museum, we’re at the KOA Kampground down the street. Today sucked – except for spending it with Dawn, and for spending several hours with my dad, too. When we started getting ready to leave this morning, I hooked the tow car up to the hitch, and checked the lights. It was weird…the headlights on the RV worked just fine. But the side markers didn’t work at all, and the taillights didn’t either. We had turn signals and brake lights on the RV, and no lights at all on the car. I tried several things, including checking fuses, calling my friend Bob Hulliger (an RV expert), and even tried calling a “mobile RV service” guy…who never returned the phone message I left for him. Oh well. Now that I’ve had a nap and relaxed some, my frustration is gone and I’ve decided to just enjoy the rest of the evening. First thing tomorrow morning, we’ll try to get into the closest RV service place and get things fixed up so we can really get on our way. It’s a good thing we’re not in any hurry to get somewhere.

Dawn's 1st posts...

November 4, 2005


It is pouring down rain. It sucks. I hate the rain. We leave on our adventure in 1 week. I’m excited and nervous at the same time. The best parts about going are that I’ll be closer to Brooke and hopefully, God forbid, it won’t be raining. The worst part is that I’ll miss Stephanie.

I’m very glad I’ve read so much about RV’ing. Especially the parts that talk about all of the things that go wrong. Today was our first episode…leaks around the air conditioner’s in the ceiling. I was very upset at first and yelled at Nelson for it. But then I took a deep breath, realized that it wasn’t Nelson’s fault, and remembered all of the stories I’ve read. It really did make me feel better. Thank goodness for reading about other people’s RV adventures.


November 5, 2005


Nelson went to “Camping World” today to get caulking for the leaks in the ceiling . The service man told him that 9 times out of 10 the air conditioning vents just need the 4 screws tightened. That is so awesome. Nelson came home and tightened all of the screws (which were all loose) and…so far so good. What a relief!

We have so many friends and family members that have wanted to get together before we leave. That really makes me feel good. We are truly blessed.

We went to Jake’s tonight for dinner. It was not only for Nelson’s birthday but for our last time at our favorite restaurant before we leave. At dinner we talked about how we really hope that we like the”RV” life. About how fun it will be to explore and get to know so many little towns in so many of the states . Hopefully all of the states eventually. That would be really awesome.


Later November 5…
All I know is that we HAVE to be somewhere next Sunday night where we will be able to watch “Gray’s Anatomy”!!!


November 11, 2005

We leave tomorrow. Today is absolutely frantic with all of the last minute things we need to get done, even with all of the preparation we have already done.

Yesterday was my last day at AllRisk. That was weird. I opened that place 21 years ago, and yesterday could very well have been my last day there. Actually I feel kind of sad about it. I will miss joking around with Bonnie and Lou.