Our kids make us so proud!

There they are! All three of them completed their first 1/2 marathon. Logan, Maureen and Brian have been training hard for weeks for this and, on Saturday, September 26th, they ran the "Wicked 1/2 Marathon" in Boston, MA. It was a fantastic achievement and Ellyn and I are both very proud of them. Our boys have not looked better since they were just little tykes. Maureen has been Logan's inspiration for more then 7 years now for his slim-down and Brian has been playing Ultimate Frizbee for several years but recently started on Weight Watchers and training for this run and has lost most of another person. They are all inspirations to Ellyn and I, we love them very much, and I hope I have not embrassed them too badly.

Cut-up, Wine, and Exit South

(Note: Ellyn and I did not confer and both wrote on the same subject. Hers is below. There is some duplication, but mine has pictures)

After Yosemite, we were back to Pacifica for 6 more days to Rosh Hashanah and to look after Ellyn’s sister Laura, who is recovering from surgery. Ellyn made us all a New Year’s meal which could not be beat and her Father and Liz also joined us. First, they stopped by the RV for a look see and to enjoy some hors d'oeuvres, and then to their house for the main course. Ellyn and attended services on Shabbat Evening (Erev Rosh Hashanah) at B’nai Israel Judea in San Francisco. We were attracted there because Ellyn found out that a friend of hers from her camp days is the Cantor there. The Friday evening service was really nice and we enjoyed it a lot. We also went to the Saturday morning Rosh Hashanah service there and, although it was also nice, it was very long (3 1/2+ hours!). We had to tear out of there and get some food right after it was over. Too bad but we were glad we hung around Friday night to schmooze a bit. One surprise was that when we arrived Friday evening, a gentleman at the door overheard us say we were from Alabama and he said “Not Dothan, Alabama?” and we said “Yes!”. It turns out he knows one of the most prominent families in that congregation. We only caught his first name, “Zef”. 

After Pacifica, we headed up to wine country, Napa Valley. We had reservations for two days at the Napa Valley Expo Fairgrounds at the RV Park on the grounds. It was very nice, not at all like other fairgrounds we have stayed at, but paved slabs to park on and nice grass and other landscaping touches. We were supposed to meet our friends Brian and Nina, who were going to show us around and be able to talk “wine” lingo with our friends up there who are in the wine business. However, the day we traveled up there, Nina had an accident at her workplace and had broken her nose and dislocated her shoulder. Ouch! Travel the next day was out of the question, but we still had a nice time visiting Joel and Jenlea, who own property with grape vines on it, which they hire someone to tend to and harvest, and Tom and Beverly Porter, who own the  Porter Family Vineyards, which was featured on an episode of “Dirty Jobs” when they had a wine cave dug on their property. We got a nice tour of the winery and cave and got to sample some of their wines. We also toured around the area and saw some very beautiful grape-growing country. It was a fun day!

Now we are on our way Southward. Yesterday we were in Capitola, CA north of Monterey at the New Brighton Beach State Park and then today we drove into Monterey to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium. They had some nice displays featuring Sea Horses, Jellyfish, and Kelp. We also enjoyed watching them feed their Sea Otters. We even saw some wild ones frolicking and feeding in the bay as we ate our lunch. Afterward, we went to the end of a pier near where we parked the RV and saw about 1000 seal (sea lions?) sunning themselves on the rocks of the breakwater.

Then we took a leisurely 3 hour drive down California Route 1 to Morro Bay where we are parked for the night. Tomorrow we head into L.A. to visit with friends there and attend Yom Kippur services.

Lotsa California

Yikes! We've fallen behind on the blog, again. Here's a quick summary of the weeks since Yosemite.

We returned to Pacifica - just South of San Francisco, where Ellyn's sister and husband live. Ellyn had lots of fun hanging out with Laura while Laura recovered from surgery. We went to Rosh Hashona services at B'nai Israel - Judea in San Francisco where Ellyn's Camp Swig friend, David Morgenstern, is now the cantorial soloist. The services were great and David's voice was a joy. It was also great to see David's sister, brother and father. We had Rosh Hashonah dinner at Laura's and Jay's with Ellyn's father and his wife also joining us.

While in the Bay Area - we had fun seeing: Lorna, Brian & Nina, Wendy as well as Ellyn's family.

Our next destination was Napa where we visited the incredible "dream home" of Joel and Jenlea as well as the Porter Family Vineyard owned by Geoff's former IBM boss, Tom and his wife, Beverly. Their son gave us the winery tour and we had a delightful wine tasting in their wine cave that had been featured on "Dirty Jobs." It was a nice reunion with old IBM friends and a beautiful day in the Napa Valley.

Yesterday, we headed toward Monterey and were pleasantly surprised by the beautiful New Brighton Beach State Park. The beach was great to walk on and we were suprised to see dolphins just offshore. We had a great campfire using our newpurchased enviro-logs. Ellyn found these at Home Depot and they solved several of the drawbacks we had with using regular wood - smoke getting in our eyes, restrictions on carrying a supply of wood due to insect risks, and concern about the "carbon footprint" of smokey fires. The enviro-logs burned very wood-like and are the same cost as a bundle of wood. Now we have a box of them in the car ready to use whenever we get the urge to have a campfire.

It's time for bed now - I'll finish about Monterey and the thrilling ride down the coast of CA in my next post sometime soon.

Yosemite National Park

Ellyn and I have arrived back where it all started. We spent our honeymoon here in a Curry Village cabin. We took a look today and it may be #220. Sadly, due to some rockslides, it is now roped off and all of the cabins may be demolished.

We got here on Thursday afternoon and pulled into what we thought was our parking site because of the way I read the list at the gate. However, we found out the next morning we had to move. Fortunately, we did not have to pull up many stakes because there are no services here. Just keep stuff from falling all over and pull in the slides. In addition to no services, we have very tenuous cell phone voice coverage and no data. Plus too many trees to get a satellite signal. So, a lot of hobby work and reading.

Today we did finally find one of the free internet signals in the valley and I was able to upload some pictures to Flickr. We also saw some climbers on El Capitan and water coming over Bridal Veil Falls. We have done some bike riding around the valley and toured by car a bit today. We are trying to decide if we will go to the high country tomorrow or not. It is getting late here and we should get back to the RV. More later…

Well, we confirmed, based on a picture that I took of Ellyn from a window, and trees and a rock, that this is the cabin we stayed in on our honeymoon in 1978. It looks like they eliminated the problem we had with the kerosene heater by installing natural gas.

This was one of our longest times with no electrical power other than our generator and batteries. Unlike in Charlotte earlier, we were more reluctant to run the generator here. However, the 6V golf cart batteries worked wonderfully and kept their power very well, even when running the inverter for our laptops. When we did run the generator, the new charger performed flawlessly and the exhaust up-stack we bought before we went to Charlotte helped keep the noise and exhaust out of our neighbor’s campsite. As I was pulling out of the campsite, one of our neighbors stopped me and asked about the stack and where he could get one. He said it really made the generator quieter, although I think it really just helps with the exhaust, as the generator is pretty well sound insulated under the coach.

I loved taking pictures in the valley. There is not a bad picture you can take. I was able to concentrate on working on composition and lighting because the subjects are perfect. I have also had a little fun in post-processing, using the IBM Perfect Photo program, and doing some experimenting with dodging and contrast.

Summer 2009 Trip Map

Here is a map of our trip across the US from Bethel , CT to Pacifica, CA in the summer of 2009. I have tried to get pictures at each place we camp but sometimes that does not happen. So I have included other pictures taken in the area of friends or scenery.

Place the mouse pointer over any picture on the map to see the name of the location, and click to see a larger version of the picture or a link to information about the location.

From Sea to Shining Sea

Yay! We made it to the campground just south of San Francisco in Pacifica, CA and our site overlooks the Pacific Ocean. We've now made it across the whole country from sea-to-sea having left Danbury at the end of July. California has a special place in our hearts. Ellyn lived here from '57 to '60, '65 to '69 and '73 to '78. Geoff was stationed in California while he was in the Navy and then sent by IBM to here for one year in '77 to '78 when the two of us met and married. We'll be seeing lots of family and friends, here, as well as lots of beautiful places.

Despite Pacifica being known for its fog and overcast, it's a beautiful sunny day, today. We're resting a bit this afternoon before we meet Ellyn's sister, Laura and husband, Jay, for dinner.

We'll post photos of Pacifica and our visit to the Bay Area in a later post. First, here's some from ofur first stop in CA which was Truckee where we stayed in Granite Flat Campground right on the Truckee River which was only about 10miles from incredibly beautiful Lake Tahoe. We spent two days there and had fun biking in a couple locations and taking short hikes. We had our first sighting of the huge California trees.

Here's some photos:

This is a huge tree...you have to look very closely to see markings on the photo pointing to 5ft 3in. ellyn standing next to it....not sure how many times larger the tree is but no doubt that it's tall.



The two of us at an overlook of Lake Tahoe.



Our RV backed onto the beautiful Truckee River which is the only outlet from Lake Tahoe.



Photos of each of us as we walked around the various Lake Tahoe paths.

Make Mine 14 AWG

Although the Great Wall of China can not really be seen from space, there is a man-made object in Northern Utah which can. It is the Kennecott Copper Mine near Herriman, UT. As we approached from the east, I commented on the hills we could see as being the “largest landfill project” I had ever seen. I did not realize they were tailing piles from the mine until Ellyn said they were from the copper mine. I was astonished. (I would have been less so if I had studied up on where we were going but I like to be surprised)

So 20 miles or so later, we arrived at the entry gate and paid our $5.00 entry fee and the drove the 8 miles and 873 ft. up to the visitor center. We looked around at the exhibits in the center to learn as much as we could about mining, refining, and smelting copper. An amazing by-product of the process is a large enough quantity of gold and silver to pay for the operation. Wow! They have been mining this particular vein of copper for 110 years and have plans for possibly mining it from underground after surface mining is no longer feasible, in another 5 or 10 years.

Like the Grand Canyon, the scale is almost impossible to grasp by looking into the pit, except for the machinery moving around in there. It can be deceiving until one of the dump trucks comes close enough to see how large they are, like when they are near a recognizable object, such as a pickup truck. Then the mind starts to boggle. (photo on left: In left lane, the tiny dot of a vehicle is a pickup truck followed by a "small" mine dump truck. In the right lane is the "large" mine dump truck. As you can see, it could carry many of the pick-up trucks! Now, that's huge!) As we were getting out of our RV, we noticed a car nearby with people pointing and taking pictures of us. So we walked over to talk to them. It turned out they were tourists from Israel. They were going to meet some friends and go to Yellowstone, Brice, Zion, and some of the other western parks. It was funny that they thought our little RV was big enough to take pictures. With the car in tow it is 50 ft. but they had just looked at 100 foot long dump trucks and 30 billion cubic feet of hole. I guess this was just too real to pass up.