From pine to fir and back again...

Click photo for a slide show

Wednesday was a travel day.  We packed up and hit the road, heading south from Sisters.  Just south of Bend, OR, we stopped at the High Desert Museum. What a treat.  The museum is privately maintained and is a treasure trove of facts and artifacts of the high desert area, including eastern Oregon, parts of Nevada and Arizona.   

I was not able to get too many pictures, because most of the indoor exhibits are priceless old documents and artifacts kept in low light, and flash photography is prohibited.  Outdoors, our timing was bad for seeing the critters. The otters were asleep and other critters in hiding.  Nevertheless, we thoroughly enjoyed our visit and would recommend this stop to anyone traveling in central Oregon. 

When we had sated our curiosity at the museum, we hit the road and headed south to LaPine State Park.  It is a lovely park situated on the Deschutes river in the midst of a pine forest.  In Sisters we encountered mostly Ponderosa pine, but the pines in the SP are a different variety, possibly lodgepole or sugar pine.  The river is beautiful, as you will see in the photos.  Our campsite was situated about 50 yards from the river, although the forest blocked the view of the river. 

While we were strolling about the park, we encountered a couple who had just come from Crater Lake.  They encouraged us to hurry there, so as to arrive before it is closed for the winter.  They recommended a campground near the lake, but it sounded like it was too small for Sadie and basically amounted to a dry-camp area. 

Later we spoke with our next door neighbor, who recommended the Crater Lake RV Park, situated on Hwy 62 between Crater Lake and Bend.  We opted for this park, because it sounded like a better fit.  We have not been disappointed.  We left LaPine SP yesterday morning and checked in at Crater Lake RV Park in the early afternoon.

Click photo for a slide show

The camp hosts, Dennis and Judy, are delightful people who made us feel welcome immediately.  There is lots of hiking to do, and the park is clean and well-cared-for.  It is nestled in the woods; many varieties of fir and pine trees. We hiked one of the trails yesterday afternoon and discovered a reservoir created on the Rogue river by a small hydroelectric dam.  The area around the river apparently suffered a forest fire some time back, but is covered with new growth, especially Ponderosa pines.  In the slide show, you will see Jill standing by our next Christmas tree! 

Today, we plan to drive back up to Crater Lake National Park, which neither of us has seen in decades.  It promises to be a fun day.  We are paid up for three nights in the RV park, so there will be more adventures to come.

Smoke and Sisters

 

We left Dallas on Monday afternoon. Initially, I had planned to be on the road by noon, but as we were hooking up Daisy Mae behind Sadie, we encountered a problem with the new towed-vehicle brake monitoring system. After some troubleshooting, I determined that the problem was in the cable that connects the towed-vehicle wiring to the the coach wiring. It seems that one of the plugs on the cable was installed incorrectly and reversed the polarity between the two vehicles. Once I changed the wiring of the plug, the brake monitor light on Sadie's dashboard started working just as it should. I must say it is a comfort to know what Daisy Mae's brake system is doing, while I am towing her.

The other fly in the getting-off-by-noon ointment was that our neighbor, kitty-corner across the street from our home, came by to introduce himself. He is a pleasant chap and chatty. Did I mention that John likes to talk? We had not had the chance to meet him before, and by the time we were done chatting and got the brake monitor wiring figured out, it was closer to 2:00 PM when we hit the road.

There was a good deal of smoke from forest fires in the air as we crossed the cascade mountains on highway 22. Otherwise the scenery was breathtakingly beautiful. (I suppose you could say that even the smoke was “breathtaking,” but that is a different story.) Sadie found some of the steeper climbs a bit challenging in terms of keeping her speed up, but overall, she did just fine. It was a hot day, and I kept my eye on the water and oil temps, but we had no mishaps, and when we crested the pass and started down the other side, the temps dropped right back down to normal.

We arrived in Sisters, OR (named for the nearby Cascade Mountain peaks, Faith, Hope and Charity, which together are known as the Three Sisters) about 4:45PM. Since we hadn't made any plans to stay in any particular RV park, we were a bit nervous when we didn't find many RV parks to choose from. We made a fuel stop and inquired about parks and were directed to the Sisters RV Park and/or the KOA “on the other end of town.”

Before we encountered either of them, however, we stumbled on Sisters City Park, which is not only beautiful, but located within walking distance of the charming commercial district. It is a first come, first served park, with full RV hookups, nestled in a grove of pine trees. Nevertheless, we found a site where we could get a clear shot at the southern sky for our satellite dish. We have thoroughly enjoyed our stay.

Last evening, we had dinner at the Three Creeks Brewing Company pub, located on the southeast end of town. The atmosphere is family friendly, the food was spectacular pub food, and the ales, which are brewed on the premises, were quite competitive with the better microbrews we have encountered.

Tuesday morning, we had walked the commercial section of town in the morning and found it to be lots of fun. The people are friendly, and the architecture is all done in a fun “old west” theme. Having scoped out the shops yesterday, we had a plan for this morning. We walked into town and made a stop at the Sisters Bakery (not to be missed; get there early for bear claws, which are to die for) and then on to the Sisters Coffee shop. We sat under the pines on the patio to the side of the shop, sipping the hearty brew and munching our bear claw, maple bar and peach scone. All in all a very enjoyable, if not the most healthful, breakfast.

The weather is cooling off. It was near 90 yesterday, but it's only supposed to be near 80 today. We will bid a reluctant farewell to Sisters, but we will be back to visit, without a doubt. Our objective for today is La Pine State Park.

Gearing up...

Hooray! We are planning a getaway in Sadie!  It has been a long summer filled with landscaping and waiting for our granddaughter, Ryanne, to be born.  Now those exciting developments are behind us, and we have an opportunity to hit the road.


Of course, when we hit the road, we have to make sure Sadie is in tip-top condition.   There are a couple of  things that have been on my mind for a while.  Sadie has had a couple of very minor oil leaks that stained the floor of her garage.  I determined that one of them was coming from one of the hoses that go to the oil cooler. The other is a bit enigmatic.  There has been a little oil dripping off of the drain plug for the oil pan.  The confusing thing has been that there is oil in the surrounding area as well.

Today, I decided to change the oil and inspect these problems.  I started by draining the oil and removing the oil filter.  Removing the drain plug revealed that the gasket under the plug was disintegrating.  I made a trip to the auto parts store for oil, filter and a new drain plug gasket.  Having installed the plug with its new gasket and a new filter, I moved on to the leaky hose.

To my delight, I was able easily to remove the leaky oil cooler hose. I had spoken with a counter man at NAPA, who told me that the best way to fix such a hose (rubber hose with steel pipes swaged onto each end) was to remove the rubber hose and replace it with a new hose with hose clamps.  When I took it to NAPA today, the same guy said that they could actually put some fittings onto the steel pipes and swage the rubber hose onto them. I left the pipe with them. It should be ready for installation tomorrow morning.

When I returned home from NAPA, I decided to install the long-overdue dash monitor for the brakes on the towed vehicle.  I have had the parts, but not the gumption to install them.  Since I had already been under Sadie on the creeper for quite a bit of the day, I decided to string the cable from the rear bumper to Sadie's dashboard.  There was a small, red LED on the dash that I have wondered about for some time. When I inspected it today, I found that it was not hooked up to anything!  That was perfect.  I needed to put an LED on the dash to light when the toad brakes are applied by the surge brake system. The LED was already there; I just needed to hook it up!

After stringing the cable and hooking up the LED on Sadie, I proceeded to check out the part of the installation that involves the towed (Daisy Mae).  I discovered that there are two switches that are activated by the brake pedal.  I don't know yet what they do, but they are readily accessible. I just need to determine 1) which switch to tap into and 2) which wire on that switch to tap.  The rest of the project will be simply a matter of stringing the wire...about 5 feet, versus about 35 feet on Sadie.  I will tackle that tomorrow.

The next project will be to move the satellite dish so that it can stand up without fouling on the AC housing.  When I originally installed the dish, I measured the appropriate distance from the base of the AC on the roof.  I didn't notice that the housing extends a bit beyond the base.  Now when I try to erect the dish, it hangs up on the front of the AC unit and stalls the motor.  It requires my climbing on the roof every time I want to set it up. So, it must be moved.  I will tackle that before our trip, so we can enjoy TV if we want to .


In the meantime, Jill has been loading our essentials aboard Sadie: food, clothing and various supplies. I think we will be ready for a great trip, come Monday. Stand by for more Travels with Sadie.

Of goats and toads

It is good to be out and about in Sadie again. We decided that, since it has been three months since our last outing, it is about time.

After a good deal of agonizing over where to go, we settled on the Devil's Lake RV Park in Lincoln City, on the Oregon coast. The reasons we chose this park are the following: 1) it is not a long drive, 2) we have not been to this park before, 3) we like Lincoln City for its many shops and nice beaches.

The caper began last week. I was grateful to be able just to go out in the garage and get to work on Sadie. After checking all of her mechanicals, I rolled her out on the driveway and gave her a bath. That led me to do some further cleaning and polishing. Sadie looked about as good as she ever has under the current management, when I was done.

Saturday was given over to cleaning up the interior and packing the necessaries for the trip. For reasons that neither Jill nor I can now remember, we pretty much took out of Sadie everything that we usually carry aboard, when we moved into the new house. So, we had not only to load everything, but also to remember what we needed.

This morning, we put a few last minute items aboard, hitched up Daisy Mae behind and departed for the coast. We had some light rain along our route, which of course, completely negated the exterior cleaning I had done. Nevertheless, Sadie purred along as if she was happy to be on the road again.

We arrived at the Devil's Lake RV Park and checked in. After reading RV Park Reviews' website, we weren't sure what to expect. To our delight, the park is quite lovely. The spaces are paved and reasonably level, although I did have to get out the leveling blocks to keep the left front wheel in contact with terra firma. The utilities are all functional and the wi-fi service is among the best we have encountered.

While I was hooking Sadie up to the utilities, a beautiful big Tiffin Phaeton coach stopped in the road behind our space. The husband and wife were fussing with their tow bar, and Jill overheard them saying something about needing a hammer. I offered to look and see if I had one aboard (which, of course, I didn't). Then, I looked at the problem they were having. One leg of their towbar had not extended when they started to move the coach. That meant that towing their Jeep was not going to work too well.

After sizing up the situation, I recommended that Harold (the husband) drive the coach down the slight incline behind us and make a right turn, which would extend the left arm of the tow bar to full length. He did so, and everything worked as expected. Harold thanked me profusely and said, "I'd buy you a beer, but I am going home." I told him, "What are RVers for, if not to help each other in a jam?"

After Mr. and Mrs. Harold were on their way, I finished hooking Sadie up to the utilities. Next came lunch with Perry (Mason). Then we had a short walk, loaded Pogo into Daisy Mae and went for a drive. We saw things we haven't seen before.

At one intersection we saw a sign advertising the Barking Dog Farm organic veggies. We decided to see what we could find out and headed up a road that follows the Siletz river. We never did find the farm, but we found a couple of RV parks. Both are right on the river, but one looked pretty nice and the other looked kind of crummy. The crummy one charges $40 a night for a waterfront site, with water and electricity, but no sewer or wi-fi. Cable TV is an additional $2 per night. Yikes! I think we will stay right where we are, for $27/night!

We took a drive through that spendy park and the best thing we saw was a pair of goats munching on the grass.

On the way back, we stopped at the popular Tanger Outlet Mall in Lincoln City. We looked at a lot of stuff, and Jill purchased a small plastic container in which to keep treats for Pogo in our end table at home. Otherwise, we weren't even tempted.

Incidentally, I forgot to mention that we have had blue skies and sunshine ever since we arrived here this morning. So far, it has been a marvelously enjoyable trip. Tomorrow, we will do some more exploring. I hope the weather holds, so we can take a walk on the beach. But if it doesn't, we will find some other way to enjoy ourselves!

Stay tuned for more travels with Sadie.

All good things must end

This post is a day late, because yesterday was our travel day. We left Cape Kiwanda RV Park about 11:45 AM and headed for Dallas. The weather was spectacular. We had a nice walk on the beach before we had to pack up and go.



Pogo was not as friskie yesterday as she had been. We think the poor old girl is not a puppy anymore and was sore from her previous days' exploits, i.e., running like a maniac on the beach. The weather was the best yesterday of all the days we were at Pacific City, but then that was both predicted and predictable, since it was the day we had to leave!

After our beach walk, we climbed over the dune that separates beach and town, and I had to make a panoramic video:



We packed up Sadie and hit the road. The drive through the Coast Range mountains was beautiful. It is difficult to capture the beauty of God's creation on film under the best of circumstances, but doing it from a traveling motor home is really a challenge. Jill rose to the occasion with the photos at the end of the slide show below, which is a recap of our entire three day adventure. (Click the photo for a slide show)


As we were enjoying the drive homeward, there was one primary question on our minds: When can we come back to this wonderful place?

What a difference a day made...

Today was the perfect storm of weather, attitude, location, company, and opportunities. We started the day with a walk on the beach. It was sooooo different from yesterday's walk on the beach. The sun was out; the wind had died to virtually nothing; the tide was up. Pogo was lovin' it. She is, as Jill says, a completely different dog on the beach.



I couldn't resist a few arty shots of the surf and Haystack Rock. I never knew that this Haystack Rock existed, until this trip. Let me modify that; I knew it existed, but I didn't know it was called Haystack Rock. I grew up going to the beach at Cannon Beach, a few miles north of here. There is where Haystack Rock lives...or so I have always believed.


Jill, unfortunately, had other ideas about photographing Haystack Rock. No accounting for taste:


On the way back up to town, we encountered this guy: a California gull, lounging on one leg in the edge of the surf.

We passed him by and headed back up to the village of Pacific City, where we took a walking tour of some of the residential area. There are some really nice homes right on the waterfront, and others that are a block or two away from the water. Many of theses homes appear to be pretty new, so I conclude this is a thriving vacation community.

Pogo began to lag behind, so we decided it was time to take her home. We put her in the motor home, and then Jill and I went to the Pelican Brew Pub, which is just across the street from our RV park. We had a lovely lunch with a view of the water. The clam chowder was spectacular. I think they may have slipped some cheese in there with the clams and potatoes. We'll be back.

After lunch we returned to the coach with resting on our minds. Pogo and I got the best spot:
I promptly drifted off and didn't reawaken until a little after 5:00 pm. Jill had put on her swimsuit, so I jumped up and changed, too. We got to the pool in time to have a nice swim and relax in the hot tub. We were pleasantly pooped when we returned to Sadie. Leftover pizza from Doryland Pizza (where we ate last night) was our dinner. We are now happily relaxing after an amazing day.

Neither rain nor sleet nor dark of night nor GALE FORCE WINDS!!

Today was a day of exploring and relaxing. Above is a photo of Sadie in her "berth" at the Cape Kiwanda RV Resort. This is a nice park with a combination of transient and resident occupants. It is very nicely maintained and quite comfortable. There is a store with gifts, groceries and RV supplies, and an indoor pool/hot tub area, which we have not yet enjoyed.

After breakfast, Pogo needed a little walk, so we took her on a tour of the park. That was not, however, adequate exercise to exhaust either her energy or our enthusiasm. So, we ventured out onto the beach. Unfortunately, I had forgotten the camera, but it was so windy that we may not have been able to get any decent photos anyway. At least that's what I thought, until this afternoon, when we ventured out in similar wind to relieve Pogo's biological needs and got this picture:
And this one:
And here's a shot looking out from the RV park entrance down the street to the beach:

The building on the far right is the Pelican Brew Pub,
where we may have dinner this evening.

Saving the best for last is always fun. So, in that spirit, here is my favorite traveling companion:

Edit: Jill read this post and when she finished she looked out the window, and saw this: