Back to Fresno–Back to Caching

We have been quietly thinking about placing a few caches lately.  While we were in Elkhart we place a small Altoids tin cache in front of the RV/MH Hall of Fame.  Thus far it has been found 13 times and 10 Travel Bugs have been traded there.  That is a pretty active cache and we are thrilled that people have visited this great  RV’ing Museum. At that time we also were notified that 2 of our caches in Fresno had gone missing.  As soon as we got back to Fresno we check on Lean on Me #1 and found it was still there.  This is a picture of that Lean Rail designed by Julie, our very talented granddaughter.

We checked out Lean on Me #3 and it was indeed missing so we replaced it, but this time across the street because the “Muggle” factor was too great.  That means there are just too many non-cachers that are hanging around that could take the cache when they see it being found.

Remember, in our last blog we learned about the Merci Train.

We looked up the California train and placed a cache, “Forty and Eight”, there.  It has been found 4 times.  We told the story of this interesting piece of history for the cachers in Fresno.

During this caching activity, we got on line and ordered several different kinds cache containers.  We place a very unique cache container right in front of our old house.  It was a pretty tricky cache and we labeled it a 3, 5 being the hardest and 1 being the easiest.  We were pretty excited when a local cacher, Dr. A, came to find it and  left this log, “ Buford1 and I got to the cache site and I thought it was going to be a quick grab, but it turned out I was fooled. So we searched and searched. "B" from T&BnaRV came out to find out who was looking for the cache, and also very nicely shared a pathtag with each of us. I was focusing in on something that I thought might be the cache, but Buford1 was afraid I might do something wrong and so convinced me to be cautious. Finally I went and got a hint from the RV, and it turned out I was right on track, so got to gloat a little bit to Buford 1! This is a very creative cache container, and I'm giving it a favorite point- in fact the first favorite point I've awarded! Thanks for a great night caching FTF with a super cool container. #2405”.  This from a cacher that we have admired her cache ‘hides’ and her impressive ‘finds’, 2,405, for a couple of years.  If you want to check out the information on “Eastside Connection”, check it out, but I can't show the picture because it would give it away.

Another activity we went to was the placing of an Eagle Scout project by McKenzie, the son of friends, Don and Michele.  He did all the research, planning and building of the recycling bin for the Ronald McDonald House in Fresno.  His story even appeared on the front page of the Life section of the Fresno Bee.  We were so proud of McKenzie and this great supportive family

		McKenzie’s Eagle Scout Project VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We took Mom to Chukchansi Casino Buffet to have dinner with our friends, Cool Judy and Luke Rinehimer.  We traded stories, laughed, ate until we couldn’t eat any more and practically closed the buffet.  It is such fun meeting up with fellow RV’ers.  Judy and I have worked together on Smart Phone and Geocaching Workshops.  Even though some times we don’t see each other for many months we just seem to pick up where we left off like no time has even passed.   We just love the closeness of our RV friends.

We were also busy with the usual Doctor’s appointment and lab visits.  We had some work done on the Jeep, and just the usual daily ‘stuff’ that keeps us busy when we visit Fresno like helping with computer challenges of friends and family.  Though we were pretty busy following the Big Fresno Fair, we were getting a serious case of “Hitch Itch”, so last Friday we left Fresno and traveled to the Santa Maria.  We are staying at the SM Elks Lodge, a very nice full hook-up on a paved pad.  This conveniently places us between Solvang and Pismo so we can take day trips in the Jeep. 

We have been caching and eating and even met for lunch with our Special Quest friend, Deborah.  Stay tuned for pictures of our coastal adventures in the next blog.

Home Again, but only for a short visit

Sometimes I write a blog to let everyone know where we are and what we are doing.  Other times I write a blog to help me remember what I we did.  This is one of the second kinds of blogs so if this is not your cup of tea, check in next time.

We were in a hurry to get back to Fresno to get some work done on the RV, update some medical prescriptions, get some banking done… just mundane stuff.  The best part of coming back to Fresno was spending time with our family.
When we arrived, hungry and hot, from the desert we were greeted by Granddaughter, Julie, and her boyfriend, Claudio.  Julie has been a loyal employee of Chipotle and Claudio now works there as he waits to join a fire department or ambulance company.  Those kids know how to order the special dishes.
It did not take us long to hit the road again, this time to the Golden Spike Rally in Carson City.  We had a great three days but no rest. This was our agenda:  
From the day we arrived at the Gold Dust Casino RV Parking area we were busy.  The next day started early with a light breakfast then we carpooled the short distance to Mills Park to ride the 24” gauge open air train.

Then a delicious lunch, trip to the Nevada No. RR museum.

The car on the left proved to be a very special discovery. It was one of 49 antique box cars filled with many treasures, china, jewelry, dolls, art work, etc.,  sent to the United States in 1949 by the people of France to thank the US for their generosity following WWII.  These box cars, called “Forty and Eights” because they carried 48 equipped soldiers or 8 horses.  In 1947 the people of the US had sent 700 hundred box cars filled with food, shoes, and clothing to help the people of Europe following the horrific occupation by the Nazis. While we were visiting this museum we asked where the California car was and were told, “Fresno”.  Boy, we made plans to look that up when we got back to Fresno.
Following the museum tour we had a ride on the 1926 Edwards Streetcar. 
 


We finished the day at Reds Old 395 Grill with a scrumptious dinner and an amazing decor.


Sunday we again carpooled to the Virginia &Truckee East Gate RR Depot to ride up to Virginia City.

This is our Golden Spike Club. 

We laughed at the hilarious Out House Races with entries like The Flapper Crapper, and The Urinator –a tribute to Arnold.


We were again stuffed by the time we left the Red Dog Saloon.


THEN that evening we ate again at the OleOle at the Casino. Who says Golden Spikers do not know where to find good food?
After all that fun, food and friends, we were on our way back to Fresno to work in the Floriculture Department at the Big Fresno Fair.  Our daughter, Jennifer, is the Superintendent of that department. There are a lot of plants and flowers shown in Floriculture: Orchids, Cactus, Green plants and every day a different group of flowers are brought to the building starting at 6:45 am.  Every day of the fair, daughter-in-law, Olivia, and I would greet those early rising gardeners, register the entries and help the judges by  logging their results.  It was a long 13 work days, but also lots of fun. To see a fun blog on the fair, check out granddaughter, Julie’s, blog, http://tedthetravelingturtle.blogspot.com. 
This is getting pretty long and I still want to tell you about our latest caching adventures, the “Forty and eight” and the “Eastside Connection”, so stay tuned.  The next blog will not be delayed as long as this one.  Currently, we are spending the week in Santa Maria, CA, so I’ll have time to tell you all about it.   So until next time, we are still caching on the road.

A State A Day Heading West

On Monday, Sept 12, we left Elkhart, IN, and our friends, the Russell's and the Whites, to turn our nose West.  We were on our way back to California to see our wonderful family.  We took the lesser traveled county roads south around Chicago.  No need for that kind of stress as we remembered the crazy hit and run driver that challenged the Diplomat and lost on her maiden journey in 2005 on our way into Chicago.  It took us a little longer, but the scenery was much nicer and the drivers nicer, too.

We decided to stay the night in Utica, IL, at Hickory Hollow, a Passport America Campground for $17 a night.  This great campground sports a friendly staff that gave us a discount coupon for a pizza, and also very clean grounds.  We did not unhook DA TOAD, our Jeep, and ordered a mushroom pizza and a beef roll – delivered!  Outstanding!

 

Tuesday we drove west on I-80 into Iowa.  We saw a sign that the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum was ahead in West Branch, Iowa.  He was the only president from Iowa.  We have seen over half of the Presidential Libraries so we just had to stop.

Things we learned while visiting:

1) Herbert Hoover was raised a Quaker and graduated from George Fox University before entering and graduating from Stanford with a degree in Geology.

2) He was a mining engineer in Australia and China discovering  gold and a process for recovering zinc before becoming president .

3) He never took a dime in salary as president and used his personal wealth to entertain in the White House.

4) He, like all presidents from Lincoln to Obama, was vilified in the press, but had many world changing accomplishments.

We find that visiting Presidential Libraries is like a 3 unit history course, but a lot easier to learn.

		Herbert Hoover Presidential Museum VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We walked up to the Hoover gravesite, a simple grave with a view of his childhood home and birthplace.

There was a very interesting ‘traveling’ display at the Museum, School House to White House.

A couple of our favorite pictures were little Dick Nixon in his tie and bare feet (front row – far right) and JFK’s graduation picture (look at those shoes).

Then we were on the road again, but not before getting a cache in Iowa, our first in that state.

Our next stop for the night was in the Wal-Mart in Newton, Iowa, the town that my dad was born in, my grandmother was raised in, my grandfather came to after he arrived at Ellis Island, and my gr-grandfather, the city clerk, was killed while riding in a motorcycle side car. 

Wednesday morning we had a little hiccup  with our batteries as I had left the inverter on all night long with a bazillion things plugged in and the generator wouldn’t start.  The easy fix was to quickly unhook the Jeep, get out the jumper cables, and jump the RV batteries then start the generator. We were on the road by 9:20 am which is really early for us.

So our next state to stop in was Nebraska.  We passed by Kearney, but it was too early to stop so we went on to North Platte where we were familiar with the Hidden Lake Campground, another Passport America. Cost=$15 cash for 50 amp. That was all we needed.  This is right along the South Platt River which was in flood stage.

Thursday morning we left Newton in the rain. And it rained all day; that is the easy man’s way to wash the rig.  While getting a cache at a rest stop in Colorado we decided we were sort of close to an old (relatively speaking as he is lots younger than us) friend and colleague, The Dr’s Dahl, Richard and Frances.  They have moved to New Mexico and with a slight change to our route, we could visit them on our way home.  So with a quick email our Jell-O plans were changed and we drove south on I-70 and around Denver on the new toll road, E-470 south.  We never saw where we could pay, we might get a bill from a photo of our license plate, but our friends, the Willis’s said they haven’t gotten a bill yet since traveling on this road.  This was a great way around Denver.

When we got into Colorado Springs we hit a downpour. Traffic was stop and go for about 5 miles so we adjusted our travel plans from staying in Walsenberg, CO, to another Wal-Mart in Pueblo, CO.  We picked up a couple of things from the Wallyworld and had a nice evening watching TV while I worked on a program for the CCSPCA.  This time I remembered to turn off the inverter when going to bed!

This morning we opened our drapes to see the mess in the grass that other RV’ers had left next to the parking area.  We got out our trash bag and long handed “picker-upper” and policed the area just like we go with the Golden Spikers in Indio. Hopefully it will be an example to the several RV’ers watching us.

So now we on On The Road Again, driving down I-25 then on to 39 S to Logan, NM.

Addendum:  I tried to post this yesterday from about 1 pm on. NO Service anywhere near Logan. So last night and this morning we were out of contact with the outside world. Thankfully we had Richard and Frances as guides.

Famous Friends and Famously Found Cache

We are staying at the Elkhart Campground where the Famous Nick Russell stays when he is in this area of Indiana.  As a result all his friends seek him out as he is very famous.  He is the famous author of the Kindle book, Big Lake and many other books; he is the famous publisher of the marvelous RV newspaper, Gypsy Journal; creator of the famous Nick’s Blog, and he is the very famous Rally Master of the Gypsy Gatherings. From the day we arrived until we left, there was a constant string of friends visiting Nick.  We knew most of these friends as they are often at Nick’s rallies as we are.  Every night we went to dinner with the Russells and Greg and Jan White.  The Whites are parked next to Nick and Terry, and also very special friends though not quite as famous. 

Getting together with RV friends always results in lots of laughs, first with Chris and Jim Guld of Geeks of Tour then with Dennis and Carol Hill of RV Driving School.  We had dinner with the Russells, the Whites, and Al Hesselbart of the RV/MH Hall of Fame that resulted in more laughs and we enjoyed real good Mexican food.  We caught up with geocaching friends, Cindy and Will Olsen, who we first met at the Yuma Gypsy Gathering Rally.  We ate dinner with Mike and Elaine Loscher, another couple that is a part of Nick’s Rally startup team.  It was so good to see them again as it has been 18 months since we saw them last, but surprisingly we resumed our friendship as if no time had passed at all.  Funny about this RV’ing lifestyle, we meet with friends, separate for months and meet up again and our friendship remains as strong as always.  We just love it.

We did manage to do a few little touristy things.  We visited the New York Central Railroad Museum in Elkhart.  If you can judge a museum by the amount of ‘stuff’ they display, this is one of the best museum focusing on one railroad company.  In addition to the rolling stock and the history display they have a very extensive working model railroad display.

If this engine and the cab that Tom is sitting in looks familiar, it is because you probably saw the movie, Silver Streak. Tom even checked out the ‘dead man’ brake on the floor; yes, it was there.

A very interesting display in the museum was an engine made entirely out of toothpicks.  It took 7 years to complete, 40 pounds of glue, and 424,250 toothpicks to complete.

The other interesting thing we saw outside the museum was this:

This vehicle was perched atop two gondola cars, rocking back and forth, unloading RR ties as the train was moving along the tracks.  I posted it on Facebook and our friend, Leroy Willis, got back to us and told us it was a ‘car topper’ and it was designed to do this. 

Another museum we went to was the RV/MH Hall of Fame.
 
The displays were fantastic.  These are just a few of the RV’s in the museum.

While talking to Al Hesselbart we approached him on the possibility of placing a geocache at the museum.  Al thought it was a good idea so we went back to our RV and made up a cache, wrote up the description, hid the cache, and then applied to Groundspeak to publish the cache.  We thought it would take up to 3 days, but within an hour it was approved and published.  Within the next hour it was found.  SO COOL.  To see where this cache is placed, log on to Famously Found.   

This was a busy 5 days in Elkhart.  We pulled up next to the Russell’s and White’s rigs to say goodbye.  Even Greg’s cat, Mister, came out to say goodbye.

So we are On The Road Again, Caching Places that We’ve Never Been.

Fast Track Travel

Just to think we were in Maine only 4 days ago. We moved to Massachusetts to the very nice Ludlow Elks.

This is the picture on Google maps. We were parked on the grass between the red roofed building and the white roofed building. 

One of the things we enjoy about staying at the Elks are the great people we have the opportunity to meet.  The first night we stayed there (and were told there were no activities planned) the grassy area started filling up with people, beer, food, and there was lots of loud music.  The Jack and Jill event attendees were very curious about this big whale of a RV sitting in the middle of their party.  They did not have a problem with it, they just wanted a tour. So we did a couple of tours.

While in Massachusetts we wanted to get some caches and since we were only only a couple of miles from Connecticut wanted to get some caches there too.  There was a town called Windsor Locks down in Connecticut and Tom wanted to see the Locks.  The TomTom took us to the town, not the Locks and we got lost.  We turned around in a driveway at the end of a dead end road.  Two girls, twins, about 16 came to the car as we turned around and we asked them about the Locks.  Well the conversation continued… California, school, their future, etc.  We had so much fun visiting these friendly girls.  Before we left a crowd of about 10 other teens joined the twins.  I wonder what the neighbors thought.  The twins eventually told us how to get to the Locks.  We first took a slightly wrong turn and this is what we saw: a deserted, graffitied, and recently flooded area.  I thought we were in a CSI story.

		The scary side of town VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Well, we did get turned around and found the right road right by the canal that bypassed the mighty Connecticut River.  We found a cache then drove 4 miles down the canal and saw the actual Locks, built in 1829.  They are not used any more, in fact haven’t been used in many years.

Just on the other side of the canal was the Connecticut River. There has been so much rain in this area, the river is closed to boating and swimming. 

		Raging Connecticut River VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We left the Ludlow Elks and drove 273 difficult miles to the Waterloo Moose. The non-toll roads were so hilly that when we left Waterloo we decided it would be toll roads on the rest of the way to Elkhart, IN. 

The next day we drove 249 miles to Ashtabula to the Elks lodge which sits right on Lake Erie.  We sat on the patio and watched the white caps on the Lake.  We left Ashtabula this morning and drove 304 toll roads to Elkhart.  These two days cost $65 just to drive on bumpy roads and through construction zones, but the road was pretty flat and we probably saved the toll fees in fuel. 

We arrived this afternoon at Elkhart Campground and soon were greeted by the greatest welcoming committee, Nick and Terry Russell and Greg and Jan White.  There were lots of hugs, but not much conversation as Michele, the lady who will be fixing our damaged slide topper, arrived and we spent the next 2 hours disassembling the cover.  We went to a quick dinner at Perkins, a real come down from the fabulous lobster we had been enjoying.  More about our Elkhart visit later.