On The Road Again, August 24-26

We spent the morning finishing up the final touches on the Beaver.  There are a few things Joel need to "clean up" and they can be accomplished on the road, so by noon we hit the road.  We had made arrangements to catch up with Joel's son and daughter on Saturday, so we stopped at the Salem Elks Club for the night.

Saturday morning we headed into Portland with the car,  picked up Jenny and went shopping.  Jenny's baby is due the end of September and Joel had promised her he would buy her a stroller and a few other baby items.  Wow, how things have changed since I had babies.  There are so many styles to choose from:  all terrain strollers; baby joggers; city street strollers; and there is even a Jeep type stroller...and the good ones are all expensive $$$.  Yikes.  It's almost like buying a car.

Well, with Joel's lighter wallet we met up with Bradley and we all had a nice lunch; said our good-byes; and headed back to Salem.  We hitched up the Beaver and headed over to the Spirit Mountain casino for the night.  Joel really was on a mission to get to the coast so we could begin our travels up the Oregon coast.

Sunday we arrived at the Pacific City TT for the week.  After last week's marathon, I am looking forward to "staying put" for a few days and we have a perfect view from our galley area:

I'm looking forward to some serious  beach walking.!

Busy Family Time- August 17

  

A fawn is enjoying the McKenzie Rive across from the Reim house.  

It's been a very busy few weeks.  As promised Joel finally finished most of the projects he started and amazingly, the Beaver fired up for a shake down run in Eugene for some transmission service.  On Friday we headed out with just the car, back to Portola. Since August 17, I think we have put 1600 miles on the Honda as follows.

 First,we made a mad dash to Portola, California to my son's Jeremy's house to drop off  Rio (Jeremy's dog)..more on that later. Then onto the Reno airport on Saturday to pick up my son Justin and his wife Liz who were arriving from Virginia for a weeks visit in the west.  We took them back to Portola for a family Bar-B-Q and nice visit, but not before visiting the Undercover Ale Brewery just a few miles up the road.

Sunday, Liz took Jeremy's car in to Reno to meet up with her friends and we visited with Justin a little longer before  taking him back to Reno to catch up with Liz.

Justin and Liz at the Undercover Brewery :

 Then, we swung by my house in Verdi to check out the minor roof damage my property manager had told me about.  The damage wasn't bad and Joel determined we could fix it while in town.  On the way to picking up some roofing shingles, Justin called and Jeremy's car had "died"..the one Liz had borrowed.  Well, Joel and I checked it out and determined it was the battery.  The car is ten years old and a typical "little old lady car" (it was  my mom's) and it had the original battery.  Fortunately, there was an auto supply place nearby and Justin was able to purchase a new battery and Joel helped him install it.  "Mr. Fix It" to the rescue again! We purchased the roofing shingles and returned back to the house and fixed the roof. What a long day.  I think we didn't get back to Portola until 8:00 that night.

Monday morning, Joel said goodbye to Rio.  I really think he is going to miss her.

Rio:" Hmm that bacon smells really good.  Will he give me some if I sit here patiently?"

 Joel: "if you are really nice I'll give you a treat".

 Rio: "Eh..I wasn't expecting an Eskimo kiss".

Before leaving, Leaburg, Joel found out his nephew was in the hospital in San Francisco and had had brain surgery the previous Friday.  Joel's brother was there and so we decided to make a detour to San Francisco before heading down to Pacific Grove to see my Mom. Monday morning we headed to SF only to find out that Joel's brother had to leave before we would arrive.

We went to the hospital anyway, and saw Paul (Joel's nephew) who was still in ICU. We didn't stay long as Paul was pretty sleepy. Then we  headed towards the downtown area looking for a place to crash and found  a "cheap" motel in the "Little Saigon" section of San Francisco which was pretty close to SF Medical Center.  The area wasn't too bad, except for "dodging" the homeless staking out their sleeping area for the night.

Tuesday, morning we heading back to the hospital and caught up with Joel's sister-in-law, Jane, (Paul's mother).  Joel had a brief reunion with Jane who lives in Arkansas and then we headed down to Pacific Grove to see Mom.

Wednesday, Justin and Liz arrived at Mom's and we all went out to dinner.  Joel and I left for our return trip to Leaburg, after dinner so we could get ahead start and not deal with the bay area traffic  in the morning.  We accomplished our mission and spent the night in Fairfield and continued onto Leaburg in the morning.

Thursday, we readied the motor home for travel.  Its been sitting since May and Joel really has hitch itch and Friday was departure day as planned! Whew I am ready for a vacation!
Stay tuned.  We are on the road again!!

This and that around Leaburg, August 3

On the way back from Portola last week, we stopped at Salt Creek Falls, which is on Highway 58 just before the tunnel.  The falls were pretty spectacular.  I think the plaque indicated that at 286 feet  they were the second tallest falls in Oregon.  These pictures are taken with Joel's IPhone.

 The Salt Creek Canyon is pretty steep.  I sure wouldn't want to fall. The canyon was cut by glacial action.

 

(My little Canon PowerShot G9 was stolen/lost several weeks ago.  Of course it is not made anymore and I have all the accessories to it, so  after hours and hours of research and debate over whether or not to buy a new G12 or Nikon P7100 I've decided ordered a refurbished G9 which should arrive soon.  Sheesh, the new ones have all that recording video stuff I don't think I'll ever use and the price just keeps going up. Suggestions are welcome. )

One of the reasons Joel wanted to get back to Leaburg quickly and not stay in Portola  and visit was his sister-in-law, Joanne, and her husband Chuck were  arriving at the Reims place for a few days.  They live in Southern California and would like to eventually move to Oregon. 

Walter cooked a wonderful Tri-Tip roast on the smoker. It's on the plate at the end of the table between Walt and Joel.   Ymmmm.  Do you think there was any leftovers? Not!

Joel had a nice visit  with Joanne and Chuck.  Joanne also went through some of Christine's things (Joel's deceased wife) that  had been stored at the Reim household.  These were items Joel didn't know what to do with, so it was really nice for Joel, that Joanne could take several boxes of stuff back home with her.

The other evening we were treated to a unbelievable spectacle while sitting on the deck overlooking the McKenzie River.

The herd of Elk had come down out of the mountains and were playing in the water just a little ways up river from the Reims deck.  There were several bulls and lots of cows as well as some babies.  They frolicked in the water (the river has really gone down the last few days) splashing each other.  Pam said this was only the second time in all the years they have lived at their home that the herd had come down to the river.  Its been warm, so I guess they needed to cool off.

Joel is still working on projects on the motor home.  So far he has refurbished and reinstalled the radiator; fabricated a new box for the shore power receptacle where it had fried and welded itself to the motor home; beefed up the bedroom floor where one of the leveling jacks kept bowing the floor; disassembled the bedroom window to check for water damage and found none around the window but found water damage between the fiberglass and luan panel and had to take off the moldings, dry everything out and glue it back together; and reworked the hitch so the bikes would not interfere with opening the engine compartment door; fixed the awning over the window that never wanted to retract.  There's more, but that is just one side of the motor home. . It makes me tired just thinking about it all.  Now he is reworking the battery compartment for the coach batteries and inverter located on the other side of the coach which the solar panels charge. Big, big job. He has earned his  "Mr. Fix It" name.

In addition to working on the motor home, Joel has also been helping Walt remodel the shop.  He removed a large overhead garage door added a stem wall and framed in the wall, adding a man door and window in its place. He and Walt still need to finish drywalling the interior.  This is retirement????

The PLAN (always in jello) is to depart the Reim "Complex" two weeks from today to travel back to California by car for a few days (to see my son and maybe my  mom) and return  to Leaburg and pickup the motor home and tour the Northwest until late September.

Stay tuned.  Remember jello! :)