Monday, March 21, through Wednesday, April 6, 2011: In Palm Springs:
We left for the 70-mile trip to the Palm Springs Thousand Trails preserve before 7:00am Monday, to try to get there early enough to get a pull-through space in that very crowded park. We succeeded. Late in the morning, Becky asked me to join her at the local dealer's RV display at the park. It turned out that she had fallen in love with a new 5th wheel there. I had known that she was not thrilled with the external appearance of our rig after 8 years (it is looking a bit tired), but I did not know she was in a mood to get a new one right away. Wrong.

On Tuesday, I saw a dermatologist, Wendy Roberts, MD, about a growth on my left ear that Bob Newhouse had noticed and strongly recommended I take care of. She sliced it off, put a band-aid on the wound, and wished me well. Not counting the blood I splattered during the procedure, it was quite a non-event. I like that in doctor visits.

Surprise!!! We bought the new trailer on Wednesday, arranging to take delivery the middle of next week.




The dealer is taking our current trailer in trade, as is. So, it seems that replacing the entire rig was easier than replacing the destroyed lounge chairs. We celebrated the deal with the Wheelers at the nearby Don Diego restaurant, where I enjoyed one of their "medium" margaritas and some excellent enchiladas.


It will take some effort to get used to a new rig, especially personalizing it and adjusting to the placement of all our stuff. But it will be fun. Otherwise, we played pickle ball and walked the dogs, and on Thursday, we had lunch at the lovely Indio (second) home of Carlos and Denise Solis. Their next-door neighbors, Roy and Edna, joined the group. Fun.

On Friday, Daisy discovered a forgotten package of doggie treats while she was killing time alone in our truck. Somehow, it had gotten lodged between the right-rear seat and the adjacent door. To get to it, she had to tear apart a portion of the seat cushion. I guess she had seen the fun Ramsey had with our lounge chairs, and decided to join in. I have arranged with a local auto upholstery shop (Caruso's) to replace the seat cushion next Thursday. Ah, the joys of pet ownership.

Saturday morning, Ramsey chewed his way through the covering on his soft crate while we were away, and escaped into the rig. Becky repaied the damage (to the crate; there was no damage to the rig) while I went to PetSmart and bought an indestructible crate. Ramsey's adventure happened while we were on an excursion to two sort-of-local attractions: Salvation Mountain and Slab City. The most appropriate description: Bizarre.

According to Wikipedia,

"Slab City is a camp in southeastern California, used by recreational vehicle owners and squatters from across North America. It takes its name from the concrete slabs and pylons that remain from the abandoned World War II Marine barracks Camp Dunlap there. A group of servicemen remained after the base closed, and the place has been inhabited ever since, although the number of residents has declined since the mid 1980s. Several thousand campers, many of them retired, use the site during the winter months. These 'snowbirds' stay only for the winter, before migrating north in the spring to cooler climates. The temperatures during the summer are unforgiving; nonetheless, there is a group of around 150 permanent residents who live there all year round. Most of these 'Slabbers' derive their living by way of government checks (SSI and Social Security) and have been driven to the Slabs through poverty. The site is uncontrolled, and there is no charge for parking. The camp has no electricity, no running water or other services. Many campers use generators or solar panels to generate electricity. Supplies can be purchased in nearby Niland, California, located about three miles (5 km) to the southwest of Slab City.


Located just east of State Route 111, the entrance to Slab City is easily recognized by the colorful Salvation Mountain, a small hill approximately three stories high which is entirely covered in acrylic paint, concrete and adobe and festooned with Bible verses.


It is an ongoing project of over two decades by permanent resident Leonard Knight."


The description appears to be accurate, and the place is worth visiting, if only to remind yourself that there are some very eccentric people in this world.

The early part of the week was spent preparing for the closing of the deal on the new rig and getting ready for the massive job of transferring all our stuff. The storage area on the new rig looked huge until we started moving things over. On Tuesday, we closed the first part of the deal (i.e., we gave them the money and signed a thousand pages of documents) and on Wednesday, we continued the transfer process, leading up to the final closing ceremony in a Flying J truck stop 50 feet inside Arizona (to avoid exhorbitant California sale taxes) where we signed more papers and actually picked up the new trailer. We then drove it 106 miles back to the same site in the Palm Springs RV park, arriving in the dark for the first time in years. It's no fun setting up in the dark.

On Thursday, we set out in earnest to complete the transfer of stuff to the new rig, and failed miserably. We have things parked temporarily all over our site and no place to put them in the rig. It's not as "storage friendly" as our old trailer, notwithstanding that it is larger, and we have not been very efficient in placement, so we have more work to do, a lot of stuff to donate to charity, and some stuff to transport (perhaps) to our storage facility in Las Vegas.

We also had scheduled DirecTV to set up our service in the three TV sets in the new trailer on Thursday. The guys arrived on time. So did the blistering weather. The temperature soared to 103 degrees, and after six or seven power failures in the RV park, the DirecTV guys said rhey could do no more work without electricity, and said they would return Friday morning to complete the job. It was over 100 degrees again on Friday, but the DirecTV people were able to complete the installation, anyway. Good job, guys. One small glitch: Because of the screwy way the rig was wired, the third TV set, the one in the "basement," could not be made independent of the one in the living room. That is, the same show had to be played on both sets. That was
OK with me because I didn't expect to watch the basement TV except for special events, such as the Super Bowl, in which case I'd have it showing on all three sets, anyway.

Because of the power failures, of course, the air conditioning in our trailer was not working well and the place became an oven, so Becky and the dogs hung out outside in whatever shade they could find---and, happily, survived. That night, they all went to bed early due to the exhausting day all had spent.

We had the work done to repair the truck upholstery on Thursday. It turned out OK. Two things didn't turn out so well. First, one of the changes to the new rig we had negotiated was replacing the king-size bed with an RV queen-size bed. (They are 5 inches shorter than regular queens.) The change allows for more room in the bedroom. The dealer took its time locating the appropriate bed and ended up ordering it online, with a five-day delivery time. That meant we couldn't leave the area when we had planned, so we extended our stay and spent the extra time continuing the transfer of our stuff. It was quite a project, but we avoided having to drop off anything in Las Vegas---primarily by donating a lot of stuff to a local charity (Angel View).

The Wheelers were scheduled to leave Monday morning---for points east. We probably won't see them again until September, so we said goodbye Sunday night with a wonderful Chinese dinner at the Emperor Buffet in Indian Wells.

The second thing that didn't work out so well had to do with the magic self-leveling system the new rig had as a major selling point. In short, it didn't work. After several attempts by the dealer to diagnose the problem, it was determined that the computer "brain" needed to be replaced. After some haggling, the dealer agreed to borrow the brain from another new rig. In the process of installing it, the tech realized that the problem was not with the brain but with the fact that two connecting wires had been reversed. Voila! No problem (or so he said). When I still couldn't get it to work, the tech insisted that I was misreading the instructions.

The new bed issue turned out to be a bigger problem than initially thought. The dealer informed me Wednesday morning that the five-day delivery time did not start until the bed was finished (it was a special order due to its being an RV size) and the bed was at least a week away from being finished. That was not acceptable, of course, and, after some heated words, the dealer agreed to deliver the bed to us---wherever we were when it arrived at the dealer---at no charge. In the meantime, we "borrowed" the one from our old rig---simply to be trashed when the new one arrived.

We had predictions of very windy weather the next day, when we were scheduled to leave, so we decided on short notice to head out for Soledad Canyon Wednesday afternoon without further interaction regarding the leveling system. We arrived at the Soledad Canyon Thousand Trails preserve without incident, and settled in to relax for a change.

It was an altogether exciting and fruitful (and expensive) stay in the Palm Springs area.

Tuesday, March 8, through Sunday, March 20, 2011: In Menifee:
We made the 130-mile trip to the Wilderness Lakes preserve in fine fashion, notwithstanding some hefty wind. We found a site not far from the one we had earlier---near the entrance. The Wheelers are here, about 1/4 mile away in a distant site. It's good to see them again.

For quite some time, the gizmo that raises and lowers the legs of our trailer (allowing us to connect to, and disconnect from, our truck, and to level the trailer) has been subtly telling me that it was going to fail at some inconvenient time. Tuesday, it failed---just after I disconnected from the truck. As luck would have it, there was a mobile repairman visiting another hapless RVer. He wasn't able to get to us until Wednesday afternoon, whereupon he diagnosed the problem and, after determining that the necessary parts were available locally, announced that he could fix it forthwith. I gave him a check to cover the parts, and haven't seen him since (but it's now only Monday morning). I hope to hear from him soon.

Also on Wednesday, I played pickleball for the first time since we were last here. I was a bit rusty, so I quit after three games. No use embarassing myself unnecessarily. Becky went to Claremont to have lunch with Michael Sessum, one of her former asssociates at both Union Bank and Sanwa Bank.

On Thursday, we went to Disneyland and California Adventure with Steven Vivell, Honoria's son, who is a "cast member" at the park.


Because he is a cast member (which, incidentally, they call all employees) we got in for free. That's worth $200 these days. Maybe that's at least in part why we we had such a terrific time. Actually, it was a lot of fun. We hadn't been there in at least ten years, and it was fun to visit old friends like the Matterhorn and Space Mountain,


as well as some of the new stuff at both parks. Thank you, Steven, for being such a great host.

The downside of the day was driving to and from the parks. We got stuck in both morning and afternoon rush hour traffic on some of southern California's most congested freeways. The combined 124 miles to and from Anaheim took more than four hours. Very frustrating. We comforted ourselves by having dinner at a sushi bar in Menifee. Yum!

Friday was Becky's day to make the long trek to visit her favorite chiropractor, Mark Adachi, in Glendale. He's a great guy and, as usual, pronounced her hale and hearty.


After her relaxing session with him, she then faced monumental traffic returning to Menifee, and was tense and exhausted by the time she arrived---thus largely defeating the purpose of the trip. Oh, well.

On Saturday, we ventured to Carslbad to visit Bill and Patty Fister. Bill's family lived two doors away from Becky during the many years she lived in San Marino. Bill had been unable to attend the 40th class reunion last year, so Becky took him pictures of the festivities. It's amazing to me how many of the folks they both remembered. I couldn't tell you the names of more than three or four of the people I went to high school with. We had never met Patty---they've been married only 20 years. Nice lady. They treated us to a very nice brunch at the Beach House restaurant in Cardiff-By-The-Sea.


On Sunday, we made the short trip to Temecula to have lunch with Roberta Ruddy and her husband, Steve Walde. Roberta and Becky worked together at Citigroup. They recently moved to the San Diego area from New York City where they had been based for many years. We had never met Steve. Nice guy. Tall.


We had a delightful lunch at the Thornton Winery, then decided to visit some others---to give Roberta and Steve a feel for the "scene" in Temecula, which they had not previously visited. The first winery we went to was Gershon Bachus, which we had enjoyed our last time in the Temecula wine country. We never got to another winery. At this winery, the owners (Christina and Kenny) and winemaker (Joe) chat with the guests.


It turned out that Roberta and Christina grew up in the same part of Long Island, and we spent the next two hours drinking their wine and, in general, partying with them. It was great fun.

The repairman showed up Wednesday evening, and soon realized he had mis-diagnosed the problem with our front legs. He went home to find out whether he could get the correct part locally, and promised to let me know that evening whether and when he would return. I heard the next morning that he would return on Friday. He showed up when he said he would, and fixed the legs. Of course, it cost more than we had thought, but it works!!! He also cleaned our sir conditioners (for the first time in years) and solved a problem we were having with one of our slideoouts. Thank you, George. Good job.

The rest of the week was a combination of pickle ball and shopping. After playing pickle ball on Wednesday, we returned to the rig to discover that Ramsey had torn apart one of our lounge chairs. There was stuffing all over the place. I immediately went into action calling upholstery shops, quickly determining that it would be a wholly uneconomic exercise to have the chairs recovered. (The chairs have to match, of course, so both would have to be done even though only one was damaged.) Becky the seamstress immediately went into action locating some compatible material at a local Joann fabric store, and, on Thursday, patched up the chair in a way that made the damage almost invisible. Good job, Becky.

On Sunday morning, the two of us were the only people to show up to play pickle ball, so we played singles---and did rather well, I thought. When we returned to our rig, though, we discovered that Ramsey had been at it again. This time he tore into both lounge chairs.


Becky quickly did an emergency fix, but it's clear the chairs cannot be saved and we will need to replace them.

Sunday night we had dinner with Dr. Bob and Beverly Newhouse. They had just returned from a trip. We enjoyed seeing them again. Monday, we will be off to Palm Springs for a couple of weeks.

Monday, February 14, through Monday, March 7, 2011: At Soledad Canyon:
The 130-mile trip was without incident. The Soledad Canyon Thousand Trails preserve is one of our favorites. It’s kind of like an old pair of shoes---not particularly attractive, but comfortable. It's located right next to a railroad track that carries both freight and Metrolink trains. We got used to the noise very quickly (they toot---make that blast---their horns every time they pass the park) and, honestly, I like the sound of the trains passing. It's brings on a kind of nostalgia.


We had our Valentine’s Day Dinner at home; take-out Chinese food, and a nice bottle of wine (Cline Zinfandel). Very good.

We have learned that our granddaughter Meghan was accepted at George Washington University (in D.C.) as an early-action candidate. (She graduates from high school on June 2.) Good for her. Congratulations, Meghan. For whatever it's worth, the acceptance letter is quite impressive.

At dinner each night, we have a scented candle on the table---for atmosphere. Tuesday, I forgot to put out the flame before---sitting at the dining room table---using my notebook computer to catch up on the day‘s emails, etc. I was blithely tapping away when Becky screamed that I was burning up the computer. I thought she whimsically meant I was typing too fast. She actually meant that the flame had caught the cover of the notebook on fire. I quickly extinguished it, but the fire left a charred area, about the size of a silver dollar, including a hole about the size of a dime, in the notebook cover. Fortunately, the internal works of the computer were not affected, and, with a not-so-subtle piece of duct tape covering the burn area, the external damage is hardly noticeable.

We had some light rain Tuesday night, and more is expected through the weekend. But it’s not creating any flood conditions, so we are fine with it.

The last time here, we noted that the California rains this winter had washed out a road connecting two parts of the park. No work had been done to fix the problem in the meantime. At a general meeting Wednesday with the manager, he explained that the river running through the park is under the jurisdiction of the federal Fish & Game people because they think some unique fish lives in the sand under the river. They won’t let the park build a bridge over the chasm. At the same time, the County is pressing the park to close the emergency back gate that allows people in the isolated part of the park to come and go, because the County (and the neighbors) don’t like the extra traffic on their street, but the repair that would allow the closing of the back gate is not permitted by the feds. So there is an impasse. And the park residents suffer because the regulators have clashing egos. The manager allowed that the last time the County wanted a concession from the feds, it took seven years to resolve the issue. Save me from government meddlers, please.

Friday was a day of sightseeing at Vasquez Rocks County Park and shopping at Costco. Exhausting. Vasquez Rocks is a very popular filming spot for movies and commercials. Its signature formations are very recognizable.


Coincidentally, we arrived just as a film crew was wrapping up a shoot for what we were told was going to be a commercial for Wendy’s. If you see a Wendy's ad with a light-blue 70's Oldsmobile convertible with four passengers, that't the one. The dogs loved walking the trails among the rock formations. The Costco outing was pretty conventional. The Santa Clarita store is in a normal bedroom community (of 165,000 people, according to the sign at the entrance to the city) so Costco wasn’t featuring caskets to remind us of our advancing age.

We learned Friday afternoon that Becky’s father was in Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena after suffering what was described as a very mild stroke. She talked to him by phone and he seemed fine. He insisted, though, that he was not taking visitors yet. We are going to see him this morning (Saturday). The whole family had planned an 85th birthday party for him to be held at the Il Fornaio restaurant in Pasadena on Sunday. Apparently, Bill’s doctor has said the centerpiece celebrant would not be able to attend. Nonetheless, there is a debate about whether to cancel the party. The Shelton clan likes to party.

We saw Bill on Saturday, as planned. They haven't finished the tests, yet, but he looks good and plans to leave the hospital in a day or so.


The party is still on for Sunday night, but it's been moved to Peter and Terry Shelton's home, with everyone meeting at the hospital first.

We woke up Sunday morning to a quarter-inch of snow on the ground, with more on the local mountains. (We are at 2,600 feet.) Brrrrrrr.


But it's better than rain, all things considered. We went to Pasadena, arriving at 5:00pm, to visit Bill in the hospital and to meet the whole family for a birthday picture. When we arrived, we were informed that he was in the process of checking out and was no longer in his room. The conclusion was that his stroke, if there was one, was extremely mild and left no permanent damage. Whew!!!) We immediately adjourned to Peter & Terry's home for the birthday party. Everyone was there, including Barbara Coad, who is an honorary family member. We celebrated with wine and pizza. Great.


Tuesday was Bill Shelton’s (and George Washington’s, of course) actual birthday, so Becky and I picked him up at home and we had lunch at what has become our favorite restaurant---Taylor’s Steak House in La Canada. Becky’s brothers, Peter and John, joined us.


After lunch, the two of us stopped at the home of Carlos and Denise Solis in Pasadena for some catch-up time. (We hadn’t seen them in a couple of years.) They are old friends---Becky met Carlos when she was active in the Los Angeles Junior Chamber of Commerce.


We spent last winter in Texas and Florida, in part to seek warmth. It didn’t work. This year, we are in southern California, in part for the same reason. It isn’t working here, either. This morning (Friday) we woke up to a temperature of 32 degrees (not for the first time), and tonight we are expecting snow. This afternoon, we went to the Exotic Feline Breeding Compound in Rosamond (near Edwards Air Force Base). There were cougars, lynxes, bobcats, jaguars, etc., all kinds of cats



(and a few peacocks, which are not felines, of course).


According to the docent, two peacocks showed up one day, and just started to multiply.

Even though a lot of the cats stayed hidden in their lairs (it was very cold there, as well), enough came out that it was very interesting.

It didn't snow Friday night, but Saturday afternoon it hailed, then snowed. Whoopee!

Sunday night we had dinner at McCormick & Schmicks in Burbank with Pam and Bob Schacter, old friends of Becky's from college days. (Old timers will remember Bob's father, Norm Schacter, the long-time NFL referee.)


There was a lot of conversation about people I've never heard of, but it was fun, anyway. I had a very tasty crusted salmon and Becky had Chilean sea bass. Yum.

Because we were out on Sunday night, we missed the live Oscar telecast, but I recorded it. The show was pretty awful. We only saw two movies last year, including The King's Speech, which we loved, so we were happy it won the big awards.

On Tuesday, we returned to Pasadena to have lunch with Becky's dad. We chose Il Fornaio since we didn't get to go there for his birthday celebration.

The rest of the week was a blur of inactivity until Saturday---when we boarded the dogs and headed to the Jonathan Club (in downtown Los Angeles) to stay for two days due to prearranged activities. Saturday night we went to the Manhattan Beach second home of Diane Chierichetti and Paul Basile for another “First Saturday” dinner party.


(I have previously reported that at the last one we attended, I had one of my esophagus “incidents” that landed me in the hospital briefly.) Under orders from Becky, I dutifully chewed everything multiple times, and survived intact. The party was a lot of fun; but, unfortunately, I ate (and drank) way too much. Maybe that’s why the party was so much fun. On the way back to the JC, I noted that the traffic on the Harbor Freeway was stop-and-go, bumper-to-bumper at 11:30pm. Awful. I’m glad we don’t still live there.

On Sunday, Becky hosted a lunch at the Jonathan Beach Club for a bunch of her former employees at Union Bank many years ago. I was not invited, of course, so Barbara Coad picked me up and we had lunch at El Coyote, a long-time favorite restaurant dating back to my Hancock Park days starting in 1975. The Mexican food is consistently so-so, but the margaritas are wonderful. We then met Becky at the home of old friends (from Becky’s LA Junior Chamber of Commerce days) Alan and Chris Buckelew in West LA.



We went there to view a slide show of photos of their recent trip to Asia on a Princess Cruise. (Alan is the CEO of Princess.) We are planning a similar trip this November. I almost feel I don’t need to go any more, since they had 2,000 pictures.

When we left Southern California eight years ago to begin our RV adventure, we believed (incorrectly, as it clearly turned out a year later when we adopted Daisy) that it would be very inconvenient to have any dogs, much less our two Dalmatians, Penny and Clancy, with us. We placed them with new homes. In the intervening years, we lost contact with the people who took Clancy, but stayed in touch with Robert and Debbie Schlesinger, who adopted Penny. Over the weekend, Debbie informed us by email that Penny had passed away earlier that week. Debbie allowed that, to the end, Penny was the adorable, trash-eating friend we had so fondly remembered. She included some wonderful recent pictures. Thank you, Debbie. And rest in peace, Penny.

We returned to Soledad Canyon on Monday to spend our last day there, preparing to return to Wilderness Lakes on Tuesday.

Wednesday, February 2, through Sunday, February 13, 2011: Near Santa Barbara:
We made the 198-mile trip from Menifee to (near) Santa Barbara, with no problems. There were high-wind warnings from the Highway Patrol and overturned semis in places we went through, and we felt some serious gusts, but decided to just slow down and tough it out. And we made it.

We landed at Rancho Oso, a Thousand Trails preserve at which we have stayed on several occasions. It’s a beautiful park, deep in a canyon in the Los Padres National Forest, about halfway between Santa Barbara and Santa Ynez, and near Cachuma Lake, without, however, cell phone service available, and only unsecured internet service. But we cope.


We came here at this time because Becky has her annual retreat at the Bacara Resort and Spa, a super-spiffy place on the coast in Santa Barbara---about 45 minutes from the RV park. She spends two days there every year with her buddies from the Organization of Women Executives.




I dropped her off at Bacara at 2:00 pm on Friday, and picked her up at noon on Sunday---in plenty of time to get back to watch the Super Bowl (which I enjoyed immensely). On the way to Bacara on Sunday, I listened to some of the festivities on the radio from the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, celebrating what would have been the 40th President’s 100th birthday. It was fun to relive a part of his era through the presentations. A highlight of my life was spending three days in Washington attending his first Inaugural in 1981. It was a very special time.

On the way back from Bacara, we stopped at a nearby park (whose name I never knew) where they have a Monarch Butterfly sanctuary. The butterflies come every October and leave every February. There are zillions of them in the trees.


In an attempt to preserve my sanity, Becky arranged to board Ramsey while she was at Bacara. We took him to the Buellton Veterinary Clinic (which includes a nice boarding facility) where we had boarded Daisy five years ago. Daisy and I enjoyed the short break from the frenzied pace when Ramsey is around. Ramsey’s body language on his Monday return suggested that he was glad to be home.

On Tuesday, we hit a couple of wineries in the Santa Ynez area. First was the Buttonwood Farm Winery---the one we “tasted” in Pasadena a couple of weeks ago. The winemaker, Karen Steinwachs, whom we had met at the tasting, was there, but quite ill, so we were not given the promised grand tour as the result. We did get a free tasting, though. Their wine is very nice.


At Karen’s suggestion, we also went to Rusack Vineyards, very nice but quite pricey, and Beckmen Vineyards, whose wines were not impressive and whose tasting presentation was less than informative, but whose location was lovely. Becky flashed her Bacara room key, which entitled us to free tastings at the last two wineries. Whee!!!

We had lunch at the Los Olivos Café, a local favorite that was mobbed (Doesn’t anyone work any more?) where we split a pepperoni pizza and, of course, some wine. I realized that it was my first pizza since we returned from Italy nearly four months ago. It was yummy.

Thursday was a scattered day, with our first stop at the Channel Islands National Park Visitor Center in Ventura. The park consists of the five islands (Anacapa, Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, Santa Barbara, and San Miguel, all of which can be reached only by air or boat) located off the coast in the Santa Barbara channel, but the Visitor Center is located onshore at the Ventura Marina. (Otherwise no one would ever go there, I guess.) We had interesting conversations with the rangers.


Then we had lunch at the Brophy Bros. Clam Bar & Restaurant at the marina. I had cioppino, which was yummy---as usual. When we left, one of the locals was perched on top of our truck.


Then we stopped by the campus of the University of California, Santa Barbara, so Becky could see what changes have taken place since she graduated in the early ‘70s. We took our bikes and rode through the campus---like so many of the students. What a mob scene. The campus is, I think, an unattractive hodgepodge architecturally,


but you can’t ignore the beautiful location---right on the ocean. And somehow the air was beautifully clear today and the islands stood out magnificently.

On Saturday we had dinner at the home of Becky’s second cousin, Jean Hawthorne (and her husband, Nat) in Santa Barbara. Becky hadn’t seen Jean in decades. We heard all manner of family horror stories, and had a wonderful time as the result. They are neat people.

On Sunday, we hit a few more wineries (Firestone, LinCourt, and Bridlewood). Each of them was special in one way or another. And the last two tastings were free since we are such special people (and because Becky still had her Bacara room key). We topped off the day with an early Valentine’s Day dinner at the Cold Spring Tavern in San Marcos Pass. It’s a very old, famous, and crowded restaurant, the remnants of a former stagecoach stop. We had a delicious dinner (filet mignon for Becky and swordfish for me). It was a nice way to end this sojourn at Ranch Oso.




.

Monday, January 17, through Tuesday, February 1, 2011: In Menifee:
We made the 90-mile trip from Jamul to Menifee, California, without incident. We arrived at the Wilderness Lakes Thousand Trails preserve just in time to find a perfect site---located near the entrance, so we could come and go quickly and so Becky could take the dogs off-property easily.


For some time, I've been thinking about upgrading our living room DirecTV receiver (it's 11 years old) to a receiver that also is a digital video recorder. (We don't have the necessary basic hardware to include high definition capability.) I ordered the new receiver when we were in Pio Pico and scheduled its installation for January 19th at Wilderness Lakes. The technician (Eber) arrived on schedule and spent the next two hours completing the installation. The only disappointment was that we couldn't figure out how to add a second input line, given how our trailer is constructed, so we cannot use the "record one show while watching another one" feature. Otherwise, the gizmo works very well and is a treat. It's so much easier than dealing with video tape.

We had very few plans for this stay. One was to go to Pasadena on Saturday (the 22nd) for a wine tasting thrown by Becky’s Organization of Women Executives. It was fun. Honoria Vivell and Richard Petrie were there, as were a number of Becky’s buddies from the organization We had a nice talk with the winemaker from Buttonwood Farms (located in the Santa Ynez area). She was an expatriate from the corporate world who started to work there in a peon job as a lark and ended up responsible for all their wines. Quite an impressive climb up the ladder.


Bob and Beverly Newhouse, who live in nearby Murietta, decided to join us at the RV park. They brought their motor home and parked right across the street from us. At dinner (Coco’s) one night, Beverly admitted that she enjoys their RV so much that she really didn’t want to go home. We played Rummikub with them several times. They are fun to be with.


We went to a second-run (i.e., cheap---$3.50 each) theater in Temecula to see Social Network. It was very interesting, and well done. We later discovered we could have picked it up at a Red Box for just a buck.

On Saturday (the 30th) Barbara Coad came down from Los Angeles and we did some wine tasting in Temecula. We ended up at Maurice Car’rie and bought (and ate) one of their loaves of bread that is loaded with brie cheese. This is the umpteenth time we have done that. They are always so good, though terrible for our waistlines.


We went back to Maurice Car’rie on Monday (after a trip to Costco to load up on stuff) and bought a loaf to give to the Newhouses. Except on the weekend, they don’t cook the bread, but leave it up to the buyer to cook it at his convenience. That was perfect for us. After we gave the loaf to the Newhouses, we remembered that they don’t have the necessary type of oven in their RV, so we will have to cook it for them, which means they had to invite us to join them in eating it---which we did on Tuesday (February 1st). Yum!

We played pickle ball several times. Most of the players were the same people Becky had played with when we were at Palm Springs. They were all better players than I am, of course. Eventually, they all left---to return to Palm Springs.





We had lovely weather until the very end, when it drizzled on and off for a few days.

Thursday, December 30, 2010, through Sunday, January 16, 2011: Near San Diego:
We headed for the Thousand Trails Pio Pico preserve in Jamul (pronounced "hah-mool") near San Diego on Thursday, a nearly 200-mile trip. It was uneventful except for dodging a few raindrops. For some reason, we have continued to miss the monstrous weather that has plagued southern Californis the past few weeks. I'm not complaining.

We've never been to Pio Pico before, so it was fun getting used to a new place. It is a very nice park, out in the boonies not far from the Mexican border. (Pio Pico was the last Governor of what is now California before it was annexed to the U.S.)


There is a very visible presence of the Border Patrol in the neighborhood; they even tour the park several times a day. They also make a planned appearance here every month and speak to the assembled campers. we attended the one for this month. It was very interesting hearing what they do and how they do it.


We had our usual New Year's Eve celebration---i.e., we ate leftovers for dinner and crashed about 8:00pm. We had been chilling a bottle of almond champagne from Wilson Creek in Temecula, but never got to it.

New Year's morning we headed for San Diego (about 25 miles) to have brunch with Barbara Coad and her friend Judy Wenker (whom we had met in Temecula) at the Hotel Del Coronado. I had last been there about 30 years ago. It is still a magnificent place, but teeming with tourists.



We were treated to the fabulous brunch by Barbara. Thank you, Barbie! We had self-parked in order to save a buck. The parking charge was $15.00 anyway, even after deducting for the validated first two hours. Ouch! Valet parking might have been cheaper.

I broke a long-standing tradition by barely watching football on New Year's Day. I had no particular interest in any of the games, since no team with which I have a connection was represented. But I did watch the last quarter of the Rose Bowl game, and enjoyed TCU's beating Wisconsin. I have nothing against Wisconsin, but, after all, I am a Texan now. And it's nice to see a small school win against the usual monsters.

The preserve has two distinct parts, the north side has no sewer hookups, and the south side has all of the activities. Due to crowding, we had to take a site on the north side temporarily, waiting for a site on the south side to open up. No problem. It turned out that the north side was a more placid area, and a good one for the dogs. But for a number of reasons, we still wanted to move to the south side. (The Wheelers were there and, of course, we rely on the sewer hookups a lot.) We were not able to get an acceptable site on the south side until January 2. It turned out we were able to get one about 50 feet from the Wheelers.

On Wednesday (1/4), we went on a 13-mile bike ride on the Silver Strand, the sliver of land that connects the mainland to Coronado Island. I hadn't been on my bike for some time, and it felt good.


Along the way, we noticed some California Division of Forestry trucks and men doing some work on the wetlands that are on the strand. It turns out they were replanting some of the natural growth. We mentioned to the boss that they loooked like prisoners, since they were wearing orange jumpsuits. It turns out that's exactly what they were.

On Saturday, we had lunch with Ed and Cynthia Wong at Pacifica Del Mar, a nice restaurant (located, not surprisingly, in Del Mar).


Ed worked with Becky at Sanwa Bank. Very nice people. Sunday was our day to see a movie in a theater for the first time in months. We chose The King's Speech, with Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush. It was terrific.

The next Thursday, we had lunch (at The Fisherman, in La Jolla) with Joan Lewis, the former wife of Judge Ely. We decided that the last time we saw her was at least ten years ago. She's still a hoot, and it was fun catching up.


The next day, we had lunch at their home with Frank and Victoria Hobbs. Frank was a partner of mine at my old firm. He retired from the practice of law in 2008. The firm still carries his name (Rutter, Hobbs & Davidoff). For that matter, it still carries Marshall Rutter's name, as well, and he retired from the firm---but not the practice of law---last year.


Victoria just had a knee replacement, and had to take it easy.


On Saturday evening, we went to El Cajon, to the home of Richard Petrie, Honoria Vivell's beau, who was celebrating his 65th birthday.


There was quite a group of his friends there---mostly current and former bankers. Becky actually knew a few of them from her past banking career. We pigged out on Mexican food. Yum!

Sunday was our last day here, and we relaxed, watch a little football (at least I did, while Becky was busy with the dogs), and prepared for the Monday move to the Thousand Trails Wilderness Lakes Preserve, in Menifee (near Temecula).