Bailey Has Left Us

God, I hate doing this.......  but I need to write this to help me get through this tough time. After being diagnosed with kidney issues a few months ago, our beloved Bailey passed away on Tuesday, Dec. 6th.  In September, after running a bunch of tests, the vet told us it would be 'sooner than later' but we still had hope.  But she experienced all the symptoms we were told about and got progressively worse into December.  We had returned from our Christmas Camping Club outing where she really lost a lot of strength.  She always wanted to go in and out of the rv on her own but this time I had to pick her up.  Before we returned home on Sunday morning we asked our friends to come over and say their goodbyes because in our hearts we knew she wouldn't be back camping with us again.  Once home on Sunday, we had family over and all of them said their goodbyes as well.  Sad time since she was not yet three years old.  On Tuesday evening we kept visiting her on her bed and both of us 'gave her permission' to go be with our other four legged friends in heaven.  About 8:00pm she took one last breath and then left us.  But in keeping positive, we still have our strong memories of the good times.  Like all of the dirt days at the park and when camping when she would always find that muddy spot to roll in,

 

and all of the lakes, rivers, and streams she liked to swim in. Definitely a water dog!
I will always be reminded about how smart she was and how obedient and loyal she was. Never fought with anyone, loved kids, adults, other dogs, even cats!   She would go up to strangers, wanting to meet them and be petted.  She loved that! She loved chasing squirrels but I doubt she would hurt it even if she could catch it! She was known at the park as the dog who loved her sticks.  She was always seen carrying sticks and sometimes branches that were over 5 feet long!
I could go on and on, but all that said, we loved her and will forever miss her! They say that time heals all wounds so I think in time the heartbreak and saddness will ease for us.  We try to always think about the good times and that sure helps a bunch. Go be in peace in heaven, sweet little girl!
 

2016 Trip -22) Trip Summation & Stats

We were out on the road from June 1st to August 7th – a total of 68 days.

We drove a total of 4,339 miles in the motorhome and 1,139 miles in the car! Remember – our car does not accrue towing miles - that was just from driving around. We did share driving with another car and that doesn’t include those miles!

We stayed at 27 different RV parks.  Shortest time at a park was overnight.  Longest was 11 days. Using the ratings like we did last trip (from 1-10, 10 being best) we still found there were no parks we gave a perfect score of 10.  Three parks got a 9, five parks got an 8, three parks got a 7, five parks got a 6, eight parks got a 5, and three parks got a 4. (for you RVrs I have the file with names and addresses and the ratings for each park so if anyone is interested, let me know and I’ll send it to you.)  The parks we rated a 4 we probably wouldn’t go back to.  Those with a five were good for overnight or just ok for a couple of days. Some were sparse; some were tight for our rig. Those with 6-9 rating we liked very much and will stay there again in a minute. Turns out we enjoyed all but a few of the places we were in. Since the Passport America parks are ½ off the advertised price (with limitations) we always try to base more at those. Turns out we ended up staying in 12 pa parks, less than half. The others were found mostly in Trailer Life.   Some parks we found were close to the highway and easy in and out. We liked that (unless they were too close!).  Some were extremely hard to get to or were a distance from the things we wanted to go see.  We didn’t like that but that’s part of the adventure.

We made 8 fuel stops for the rig.  This coach has a 150 gallon fuel tank.  Note – I can go a lot farther on a tank of fuel than in the old rig and we did but I still have a policy not to let the fuel go below a ½ tank.  Usually way before it gets to ½ tank I start figuring where the next stop will be.  Rick & Janie and Bill & Treasa have smaller fuel tanks but when they stopped we just hung around so we could still travel together. Turns out on this trip all of our stops were at Flying J except the first one in Kingman when I couldn’t get in so I went next door to Chevron.  We have an account with Flying J so we search out those stops along our route.  Also they turn over their supply very quickly so we are assured of fresh fuel.  Stops were:

(1) Kingman, AZ ($2.49 per gal),
(2) Albuquerque, NM ($2.41 per gal.),
(3) Checotah, OK ($2.21 per gal),
(4) Sioux Falls, SD ($2.17 per gal.),
(5) Rapid City, SD ($2.37 per gal.),
(6) Aurora, CO ($2.29 per gal),
(7) Beaver, UT ($2.55 per gal.)
(8) Barstow, CA ($2.61 per gal). 

That made the avg. price $2.37 per gallon. I still have over 3/4 tank so I won’t fill up for the September club outing (probably good till we head out in October). On last year’s trip the avg. price was $2.74 per gal. so we think we did ok.  I got a high of 9.2 mpg on one tank and a low of 6.8 mpg on my worst tank. On the lesser mpg runs we were pulling high mountain grades. On the best tank, we were heading down from the hills into the deserts. Even with that, average was 7.6 for the trip (probably would be over 8.0 without air being on).  That’s definitely lower than the last motorhome we had but right at what we expected for this coach given the 400 hp engine, plus the size and weight.  

Highlights on the trip:  for me were the day of fishing at Hesperia Lake, the four days fishing in Branson, the show SIX in Branson, Lambert’s (restaurant), the Truman Library, Arthur Bryant’s (bbq), the Corn Palace, the Firehouse Brewery in Rapid City, Mt Rushmore, and my hike there, the Garden of the Gods, the Pike’s Peak Cog Train, the Olympic Training Center, the Air Force Academy, the Coors Brewery Tour, Woody’s Pizza, the Celestial Seasonings Tour, the White Fence Farm restaurant, Zion Nat’l Park, the Terry Fator Show, the Blue Man Group Show, and visiting with Lee & Lyn.  I think my two favorites were the fishing in Branson and the show SIX.

Except for the fishing (not her thing), Lydia enjoyed all of the above and listed her favorites as the Library, and the various quilt stores along the way!  

Now expenses!  This trip was comparable to the 87 day trip we took last year, except that I had a few rv expenses this time!  The $1100 tire plus the $200 deductible for the solenoid replacement were expenses we should expect but hate to pay.  But we still tried not to buy everything in sight and other than a few things we didn’t expect to buy I think we did pretty well. I was especially glad not to have any major mechanical issues on the trip.  I was pleasantly surprised that we only had minor issues and nothing major mechanical with the coach. I have to have the transmission serviced, the aqua hot water heater looked at, and the material on two awnings (one slide out plus the Girard main awning) needs to be tightened up. 

Dumb stuff!   I looked at my last summation from the maiden trip in this rig to Oregon in 2013 and reread all my dumb stuff so I just had to put it in writing again for this trip!  Among other things –  a couple of times we failed to turn on the hot water tank between trips and didn’t discover it until the next morning when we showered…  More than once we left the locking drawers unlocked and drove off.  I guess these are all minor things so I’m, good with that.

Traveling with Friends.  We left California with Bill & Treasa and with Rick & Janie.  This year we again all six of us did sit down and plot out the details and the nights and the places we wanted to see. Each of us had things to suggest.  We also had to set up the second half of the trip after B&T left us after Branson. It’s not easy when six people with opinions (and attitudes!) get together for any length of time on the road.  This is the second time we have done this, so we knew what to expect so I think it was successful.  I would travel with either of these couples again. We had many, many fun times that will remain in our memories forever.

So, what’s next?  We still want to take another cruise. Just not sure when.  We are definitely going back to Hawaii.  We were there for our 25^th anniversary and want to celebrate our 50^th there in 2018 so that’s being worked on…. We have almost covered all of the 48 states but we still want to travel to the New England area so maybe that will be on our future travel list. Of course I always want to go fishing and June Lake is on MY radar again.  We’ll see. Hopefully, the good Lord will keep us healthy enough to do all of the above.  We have been thinking about a lot of things these past few years.  California has been wonderful and has given us a good career and homes but its changing and so are we.  We have been thinking about a major move and we can’t get it out of our minds.  It may happen sooner than we all think once we figure it all out. Stay tuned…..  

Almost done…..  just wanted to say thanks to all of you who followed my blog.  Even though only a few of you made comments it was nice to know they were being read!  I am funny about capturing our adventures in writing and in pictures.  It’s not for you that I do this – but rather for us to look back on later in life (or have our kids read to us in the home!). Thanks to my sister, Penny for taking care of the mail, and watering. Thanks to both our boys.  Jeff did a ton of work to get our living room remodel done, plus he painted awnings for us.  Randy installed the reverse osmosis system we bought several years ago so that’s in and working now. Thanks to Bill & Treasa and Rick & Janie and especially to Lydia for putting up with me on this 2016 trip!  See you all on the next adventure……..! 

 

2016 Trip -21) Santa Paula, CA to Long Beach

Fri. 8/5…  (Santa Paula, CA)   Mapes and Wampler got into camp today so we now have all ten rigs for this outing.  Paul & Pauline said they will be driving in tomorrow from their Simi home to visit with us.  They recently sold their rv so it’s nice that they still want to come visit. Since tonight is the opening ceremony for the Rio Olympic Games, I decided to hold the Board Meeting on Saturday in order to be able to go to dinner and then be able to watch if they want.  Mike has an outside tv so that is an option if the weather is nice enough. We didn’t have any plan for dinner which was set as ‘on your own’.  Some went south to Santa Paula, we went north to Ojai with Bill & Merlyn, Ed, and Rick & Janie. The plan was to go to Carrows but we found they were one of those that have closed.  So we went to Ca’Marco Ristorante for Italian.  It was an unknown but turned out to be one of the best meals we have had on our trip!  We will be going back again when in that area.  After everyone returned, we did sit out at Myer’s rig to watch opening ceremonies, or should I say commercials.  Jeeze, we know companies want to advertise but that was ridiculous!  I went in early and taped the rest of it to watch tomorrow.      

   

Sat. 8/6…  (Santa Paula, CA)  Got the rest of the opening ceremonies. I was disappointed in the whole thing but each country does it different so it was still ok. We had our breakfast continental style which was very good. 

 

 

 

Then I held my board meeting.  Last one as we leave office after two years as presidents. Fun times! Afterwards the guys played poker (I finished runner up), and then we got ready for the bbq tonight.  The current and past presidents always provide and cook burgers and hot dogs at this outing. Gary and I were the only presidents/past presidents in camp so we got the job.  The large bbq up by the clubhouse was in use by another group so Gary and Jim set up three smaller ones in our area.  We enlisted Rick to help man one so we managed to get everything done so we could eat.

 

 

 

Thanks Rick, Jim, and Gary. The food was great and the company was even better!  After dinner we said our goodbyes to Paul and Pauline and then set up the campfire. I cleaned up some of our stuff in preparation to head home tomorrow and then went in to watch the Olympics. 

 

   Sun. 8/7…  (Long Beach, CA)  We got up unusually early this morning.  Rick & Janie were leaving to go visit Janie’s daughter and grandkids. We had to take down our canopy but that went fairly quickly.  We left about 9:30 and got home around 12:00pm.  It had been a long trip but it was sure fun.  But it is still nice to be home, especially safe and sound.  Jeff has done an outstanding job on our home.  Here are some more pictures….. 

 

Nice job, son, you make us so proud!  Next up was to take care of the mail, and unload the motorhome.  We will clean it up really well but that will take a few days as we have drs appointments and other things to take care of.  Also I need to sit down and write a summation of the trip.  Watch for that post in the next few days.      

2016 Trip -20) Castaic, CA to Santa Paula, CA

Tues. 8/2…  (Castaic, CA)  Today was prep day for our campout.  We went through the fridge and cabinets and cleaned out any old stuff.  Then we headed to Walmart to get stuff for tonight and for the weekend. I stopped and had the car washed so we are good to go. 

 

 

 

 Lydia fixed burritos for us all for dinner. We talked with Jeff about how the house is coming.  He says it’s mostly done.  My sister is having cleaners come today so we’re happy about that.  Looks like we’ll have a new room to enjoy when we get home this Sunday! 

Later, we hit the pool and relaxed in the spa as well.  Tomorrow we leave for our last stop.      

 

  Wed. 8/3…  (Santa Paula, CA) Since we changed our park, this morning’s drive was only 38 miles! We didn’t even hook up the tow car.  The car needed gas anyway so Lydia stopped on the way for a fill up.  We are now at Ventura Ranch KOA (tl$57.), in Santa Paula, CA.  This is our camping club’s normal outing weekend so we planned our trip to start and end with these campouts.  We thought only Ed & Betty were the only others to arrive today. Gary & GG were already here when we arrived!  Guess we missed them on the Wednesday arrivals. The rest come in on Thursday and Friday.  This turns out to be one of the few parks we visited during this trip that does not have sewers.  But it has 50 amp to runs our systems. So we are good on power but will have to watch our water usage for four days.  But it’s cooler now and we will be outside more than inside plus they have a dump station which we will use on the way out on Sunday so no worries. Also we set up the large canopy so we would have shade for our group.

We had called Betty and we are all having dinner together tonight. But before we ate, we spent some time getting Ed’s satellite dish up and working.  He has HD now but needs some more pieces to get it set up.  The girls went to town earlier and brought back KFC for dinner. Afterward, I walked Bailey and Lydia crashed for the night.    

 

Thur. 8/4… (Santa Paula, CA)   This morning we slept in and then caught up on America’s Got Talent the results from last night.  We met up with the others under the canopy and spent the day watching the rest of the group come in. Myers, Kenney, Jones, and Spaulding came in today.  Two more tomorrow.  We brought out tuna sandwiches and chips and had a nice lunch.  We decided to go to dinner in town (Santa Paula) tonight.  We went to La Cabaña since we had a 10% off coupon in our campground handouts.  The food was really good but the service was not.  We returned and walked Bailey a while then sat out until the weather got cooler and most drifted off to their rigs for the night.  We watched tv for a while and turned in.     

 

2016 Trip -19) Las Vegas, NV to Castaic, CA

 

Sat. 7/30…  (Las Vegas, NV)  We got a voicemail last night from our campground in Acton.  They don’t have power in the park and don’t expect to by the time we get there.  So we called around and now have changed our agenda.  We will still stay in Barstow on Sunday but then head to Valencia Travel Village for Monday and Tuesday.  We could probably go straight to Santa Paula but our sites there do not have sewers and we want to minimize the days there.  So even though Travel Village is only 15 miles away from Santa Paula we can at least arrive with empty tanks. That settled, we kicked back for the rest of the morning, and then decided to drive to downtown Vegas and walk the ‘Fremont Street Experience’. 

 

 

Now this place is under a large roof with electric lights and music.  We had seen it before but we wanted to see what has changed.  It was pretty much what we remembered.  Lots of people partying and shopping and coming and going into the various casinos.  Plus lots of street people with buckets for donations…….

 

I sent this picture out to several folks, including my sister. 

 

Reaction from all was more or less…’yuuuck!’ We walked and shopped a bit then headed back down the strip toward home.  We stopped at Circus Circus to see if the RV Park was still there.  Yep, and still as nasty as ever!  The area around CC is being renovated.  Part of The Riviera across the street has been imploded and what’s left is being prepped for the next round. There’s a place called Paradise Park coming in as a Wynn property and there’s also a place called The Alon under construction where the Frontier once was.  A Chinese hotel just off the strip called the Lucky Dragon is also beginning construction. When we come back in the future it will all be new again!  Anyway, after returning and cooling off a bit, we waited until we heard back from Lee and Lyn about dinner.  We met them at Cracker Barrel at 3:00 and still waited to get in.  No problem – they have a gift shop!  After a nice meal we left to go back and relax a bit before settling in for the night.  We leave tomorrow. 

 

Sun. 7/31…  (Barstow, CA) Today’s drive was 166 miles but we had to climb Baker Grade in the heat.  No problem but it was still a hot day!  Temps have been 115° most of the days in Las Vegas.  We are now at Shady Lane RV Camp, Barstow, CA (tl$39x1.).

 

 

Temp here right now is 102°.  This park is really old, BUT we all like it!  The staff is very nice.  They parked us and said, ‘Eat lunch and relax and come in and pay whenever you’re ready’! What they don’t have in amenities, they make up for in friendliness and cleanliness. That rates them higher in my book! We rested and cooled down a bit and napped. Janie is cooking tonight so we went over at 4:00pm for a chicken and broccoli casserole (from the 2001 NSDC cookbook) which she made for the first time.  It took a little longer to cook but it was very good.  The broccoli didn’t set well with my stomach later but I still liked it!  The park is kind of tiny so it was a short walk for Bailey. We made several rounds.  From our site, you can see the Skyline Drive-In Theater.  They remodeled this theater and show movies on two screens seven nights a week! We returned to the rig and it has cooled down a bunch and Lydia was asleep already.     

 

Mon. 8/1…  (Castaic, CA) With our new destination 125 miles away, we slept in and left about 9:30am.  We chose the route through Pearblossom Highway and I14.  Probably not the best choice because Highway 18 was closed and we had to detour.  Plus there was a fire next to the I14 so we had to reroute a bit.  But no worries. We are now at Valencia Travel Village (tl$45.), in Castaic, CA.  Our camping Club comes here every year so we know this place well.  We are here for two days. We are up front by the pool and I had to jockey a bit to get in the tight space (A11) but we’re good now.  We relaxed and then I gave Bailey a little walk.  She did not like today’s ride and got sick twice. But she’s eaten a bit and seems to be ok.  Lydia went over to the laundry to wash a few things.  She found her first machines that do not take cash – only credit/debit cards!  I was there with her so we used my card and she got 3 loads washed.  We’re good now till we get home.The weather is cooler here (96°) so hopefully it will cool off even more and she will be ok. We decided to go out to eat while here because we know the restaurants.  Rick chose since his birthday is Wednesday but we won’t be near that many places in Santa Paula.  So he chose to take us to Red Lobster.  We had a nice meal on their gift cards.  Thanks, guys!  Afterward, we walked Bailey and settled in for the night.      

 

2016 Trip -18) Las Vegas, NV

 

Wed. 7/27…  (Las Vegas, NV)  This morning (9:00am) we went over to the Oasis Grill (in the park’s clubhouse) for breakfast. They had 2 eggs, bacon or sausage, hash browns, & toast for $4.99. Plus we had a voucher from the desk for two free coffees/teas.  Really good for $10.78!  Afterward, (around 10:00am) we took off for the strip.  Now this was an adventure. 

 

 

Ok follow this – park at Mandalay Bay (they told us in the office which resorts are free parking – turns out this one is not), walk thru the casino to the tram, ride the tram to the Excalibur 1 (we thought that was the end), walk the bridges over to the MGM side, walk down the escalator to get to the M&M’s store, walk thru that (and buy some stuff), walk the shops and then head back across the street bridge, to the New York New York casino, and to the Hershey’s store (no sale there), walk back to the Excalibur 2 tram stop, express tram back to the Mandalay Bay, walk thru the casino and to the pay-for-parking kiosk ($7.), check out.  We think we could have parked for free as the register says scanning license plate and the arm opened without our ticket, drove to Target for a few makeup thingies, and then home!  We rested for a while and I let Bailey out for a few minutes to pee.  Too hot for her paws to walk anywhere until the sun goes down. We left again at 4:00pm to go to dinner and the show.  We drove to the Mirage and checked out our handicap privileges.  We have free access!  Yaay!  We made our way thru the casino

  and to the buffet (prepaid as part of our show package).  The food was really good and   we   stuffed ourselves!  Excellent clam chowder soup, Bill! That done, we made our way to the theater to see Terry Fator ($95.ea w/dinner).  If you don’t know who he is, he won the first America’s Got Talent and is a smash hit in Vegas!  He is a ventriloquist who sings through his puppets.  The guy puts on one hell of a show and has an amazing talent for different voices.  We had seats to the left of the stage 4 rows back.

The puppets he used on this show: Winston the Frog, Walter T. Airdale, Julius, Vikki the Cougar, Duggie Scott Walker, Emma Taylor, Hypen the 5th Beatle, Maynard Thompkins, Donald Trump, Rusty the Robot, & Fernando V. Francisco.  He also gets a person from the audience and dresses them as Lady Gaga and has fun with that! 

We got out around 9:00pm and walked back to our car and drove back down the strip to our rv park (we are a few miles south of the strip just north of South Point Casino) so the drive took some time as the strip was packed!  But it was nice and we got to see part of the water show at the Bellagio. We walked Bailey since it was cool enough for her now and then went back home to watch AGT results show.  

 

Thur. 7/28… (Las Vegas, NV)  This morning we went back to the Oasis Grill for breakfast again and again it was yummy.  We now know the cook who came out and spent some time with us.  We called Lee and Lyn and made arrangements for the day.  We went to their home (in Henderson about miles) and had a nice time visiting. 

 

 

They fed us a light snack which was nice as well.  We left to come home to rest before our outing tonight.  We left about 4:30 to head to The Luxor for their buffet, which was good but not impressive, and then to our seats for Blue Man Group ($99. ea).  We were out of the ‘splash zone’ for the show.  Those folks just past Rick & Janie got rain gear to cover up with! 

 

The show was really entertaining.  Nothing is said, just slapstick comedy skits, but everything is funny.  I always enjoy that type of humor.  We weren’t allowed pictures during the show but we took some before…

 

And after….

 

Afterward, we drove home (easier drive tonight) and again gave Bailey a good walk/run thru the park. The sprinklers were on but it is still super hot so that helped cool her a bit.  We hit the hay right after that.       

Fri. 7/29…  (Las Vegas, NV)
Lydia and Janie were going in to get their nails done but this time the guys passed. We hung around the coach and then I took Bailey out before it got too hot.  When I returned I got some stuff cleaned up and then relaxed for a while.  Lee and Lyn came by to see the rig and visit for a bit.  They took us out to the Cheesecake Factory for a nice dinner. Thanks, guys!  They returned home but we made plans to meet tomorrow at the new Cracker Barrel which is just across the freeway from our park. We went over to the pool for a few hours to relax.  I walked Bailey again and we settled in for the night.