Currently we are still in Auburn California but are starting to make plans for the next couple of weeks.

Tomorrow we will move the Flying Scotsman down the hill to Sacramento into the Calexpo RV park and enjoy the sights and downtown of that town until the evening of the 30th of April.

On Tuesday the 1st of May we will head north toward our friends in the Seattle area and at that point decide our direction of travel to the north or east as it suits us.

This particular shot was at Holly's Hill winery and some very good syrah ... mellow like the blogster, eh.

In the Placerville area where Bill works and lives they have an annual two weekend event called their Passport tasting event. You get a representative passport with all the participating wineries and you get their page stamped as you taste around the county.

Here's an expert vintner ... no wait this is Bruce impersonating someone important behind the bar at the winery where brother Bill is the wine maker and tasting room host for this event at the Jodar vineyard.

And a short distance down the road is the Chateau Davelle winery with friend Eric and Bill discussing vintner secrets ... or something like that. The paintings on the wall were all done by Eric and to the left are his grandmother, child and wife ... really beautiful and are on the labels of his wine ... excellent wine as well!

Almost like we were in Italy but actually at the Miraflores winery; quite a Tuscan reproduction.

Oops, our driver forgot to part the limo in the designated spot ... actually a bunch of well wined folks going from tasting to tasting in style.

And if you have an Italian themed place then you need pizza.

Well you have all seen the BBQ towed by the pickup in Texas to whatever event it is needed at; here it is the pizza oven complete with flaming wood ... good pizza too.

For these posts I use Blogger.com which has been a good input to the web for our travels. They have now changed their whole format which web page gurus like to do and I cannot do anything. For some reason now they have a 2 or 3 picture limit and that will limit how I post my stuff. Anyhow now looking for a way to do our blog other than Blogger.com which is a part of Google ... FYI

After a great night in the Carson City Nevada area we unplugged from the great park there and headed north and then west on what was planned to be a short 120 mile run, mostly on the Interstate.

Our route north on Highway 395 took us through Carson City itself and then on to Reno where we caught I-80 westbound for the last quick part of the trip. After being inspected at the California border by an agent who actually looked in the fridge we zipped up to 8000 feet again and the Donner Pass rest area where we paused and had a bit better lunch than the ill fated Donner party many years ago.

Even Buster was happy to see the welcome facilities at the rest area ... no, most of the liquid there came from the melting snow, not Buster.

And then we zipped down the hill for the last ... fast ... 50 miles or so ... ooo not so fast.

I-80 was closed at the 164 mile marker and we were diverted onto State Road 20 toward Nevada City. The freeway is used by thousands of trucks daily on this major route toward San Francisco and we all ended up in a queue at a walking pace.

Trucks as far as you could see in front and behind us ... no other RVs.

Actually the scenery on this small road was beautiful and our snail's pace allowed us to get some pretty neat pictures; actually getting out of the Flying Scotsman to shoot a few like this.

Finally after our "short" 120 mile trip and five hours later we did end up at a really nice RV park in Auburn which is about 40 miles up I-80 from Sacramento.

We'll be here playing with brother Bill and our friends Bob and Julie Tillema until Friday the 27th or so ... enjoying the wine and hospitality of the gold country in the California hills!

Leaving Lone Pine on the 16th we made the easy 229 mile trip north to Carson City along Highway 395 with the Sierras always on the left; the recent snow creating a really neat photo opportunity.

This is a really nice road and has many quite new rest stops for the weary RVers.

The terrain varies from our starting point of 4000 feet to well over 8000 several times and I'm sure our gas mileage wasn't quite the 8 or 9 MPG we have been getting.

Here's one of the summits called Deadman Summit which probably has a really interesting story behind it. And all the way up the road we kept hitting patches of snow even though the temperature was about 55 degrees or so.

This is the Mono Lake area and part of a huge volcanic caldera created eons ago.

Our last descent of the day brought us down to about 5000 feet in Minden a suburb of Carson City and the Silver City RV Resort.

This is a new resort with paved roads, concrete driveways, and an impressive central building with pool and spa. We were one of the few transient buses and it was very private. The road noise was very noticeable especially after the last few very quiet parks, but a beautiful park indeed. So far the parks have averaged $30-40 per night.

We departed Las Vegas on Sunday the 15th and after filling up the bus we headed out on State Highway 95 toward Death Valley. More stark and spectacular terrain as we pressed on toward the desert on an anticipated 229 mile run for the day. The temp this morning was about 40.

After about 100 miles we entered the Death Valley National Park and descended to its sandy bottom. Here's one of the GPS units we have as we stopped for lunch in Furnace Creek ... reading -185 feet ... now that's pretty low.

Immediately after that we officially entered the park and stopped at the ranger station to browse and pay fees if any. This appears to be a quite new facility and is well manned and maintained with adequate RV parking.

When you leave Furnace Creek you actually go a bit lower and I think we hit -252 or something like that. The scenery is really awesome and the road appears to go off into nowhere ... pretty close.

After the valley part and still on Highway 95 we began the climb to our destination of Lone Pine California for the night. We climbed to over 8000 feet and stopped at a rest stop at that altitude for some shots and let the driver take some deep breaths.

Then with several stops to let the brakes and driver cool off we descended back to about 4000 feet and arrived at the Boulder Creek RV Resort in Lone Pine. This is a nice gravel park with some amenities and friendly staff.

That was an awesome day and these few pictures don't even come close to showing the nature of that drive.

Our initial intention at this point was to head around the south side of the Sierras and visit both the Sequoia and Yosemite parks from their western entrances. That all changed because the parks were still closed due to the massive storm that had hit a few days earlier so we then planned for "Plan B" ... always gotta have a Plan B.

So then the next destination would be Carson City to the north and then over the mountains westward toward the Placerville California area.

Bits and pieces ...

A bit of catch up here for what we have been doing and right now we are in Carson City Nevada. As usual sometimes the connection on the road is iffy especially when we move every day or so.

- First ... Buster. He was diagnosed with diabetes in Bryan and we give him his insulin shot twice a day but he continues total incontinence and we are getting diapers to keep him going. This is a bit frustrating and we will have him checked again when we stop in California for a breather.

- Fuel prices right now are not bad at $4.19 and we will fill up tomorrow before going into California. The Flying Scotsman has averaged 8.2 mile per gallon for the 2,000 miles so far from our departure in Bryan.

- In Vegas as we unhooked the bus from the car I placed the quick connect bar off the car on the ground near the bus and promptly ran over it ... 20 tons of RV can really bend metal. This is a serious situation as without this piece you will not tow the car, period. I found a local RV repair garage and Frank said .... "Yep, all ya got to do is pound it a bit with a big hammer,"  I sort of knew that but didn't have a big enough hammer. Fixed for $28 and good to go.

- The ATT Hotspot I am using for internet is wonderful so far. Compared to the first year we were doing this we have not had to use any of the local WIFI services at all and just use the hotspot thing ... great.

Anyway that is a bunch of travel related stuff and we have about 300 pictures of our run through Death Valley and to here in Carson City to post but I have to sort it out first ... but the scenery has been breathtaking to say the least ... wow!



After we departed Dewey toward Las Vegas we went through Prescott and then some really beautiful territory on the way.

The state roads in northwest Arizona were really great and Interstate 40 was truly awful. We were pounded with the worst road surface we have endured and compounded by a steady 40 MPH wind from the left at one time hitting about 55 or so ...

And then came over a hill and wow the Lake Mead area. Here's the Colorado River below Hoover dam shot out the window at 70 to the left of the bus from the right seat.

Then Hoover Dam itself out of the right side with all the tourists lining the dam walkway. You can see how the lake level is down from its planned high level.

Just beyond the dam another really nice shot of Lake Mead on the slope down toward Vegas.

Then ... bam ... you are in .... let's see New York here ... absolutely breathtaking.

Here's the Ballaggio Casino and the fountain display in front. The music and lights and water are awesome and synchronised perfectly for a perfect evening.

Inside the Bellagio the live floral arrangements were spectacular ... and this is just the lobby!

Of course across the street is a bit of Paris with a replica of the Arc de Triomphe.

And the iconic tower and its restaurant.

Then, walking inside the Planet Hollywood mall we had this scene. This is from our table at an Italian restaurant in the "food court" all indoors and in it we had some of the best Italian food we have had ... perfect pastas and service and price.

Then back outside to the Bellagio on the way back to the casino for a couple of quick pulls on the slots and to retrieve our car. The walkway to the casino is in the thing to the left of the picture and involved a quarter mile moving sidewalk along which we took this picture ...

... through the portico toward the Paris section of this nutso and so over-the-top city.

Hey, Jo-Anne then did one pull on the dollar slot machine and took home $60 which paid for the whole evening ... what a way to end the Vegas adventure.

As we prepared the FS II to depart Tucson the next morning we got a couple of cool shots on the evening of the 10th of April looking west from our site.

The one above almost looks like it could be done of a pyramid in Egypt and the below picture really was pretty spectacular. Temperature was about 80 but the humidity an unbelievable 7% ... crunchy.

The reason we left on the 10th was that Camping World had gotten our new awning (left rear here) and could install it that morning. They did a super job in the time promised and for exactly the amount promised ... first time for everything I guess!

After departing Tucson we motored up I-17 and then State Highway 69 through uninteresting northwest Arizona for 220 miles until we got tired and ended up in the little town of Dewey ... yep look it up.

Here's our quarters for the evening ... not really but an interesting entrance item at the Orchard Ranch RV Resort which sits at about 5,000 feet altitude.

The park bragged about its nice wide and long pull-through sites and we got the biggest which was way too short to keep the car attached but fortunately wide enough to park beside. Also the ditch in front of the bus was so deep that there was no way you could pull forward anyhow.

In the morning I backed up and then we hooked the car on when we got to level paved ground. And we were off to Las Vegas.

Last Friday Bruce was treated to a visit to one of his old work places while in the Air Force here in Tucson. We visited the Titan Missile Museum which houses the last Titan II ICBM missile system. Bruce served here in this an other sites around Tucson from 1975 to 1978 when he then transitioned to flying the crews out to the sites until 1979.

 
All the rest of the Titan II missile sites were destroyed per US-Soviet Union negotiations but fortunately this one has been preserved by private enthusiasts to exhibit the epitome of cold war force and deterrence.

Below was my view as I approached the missile site for 154 below ground alert cycles. The massive door is the light colored thing in the center. For the museum they have a bunch of vehicles that were there during some maintenance events but not during a normal alert.

A shot of the 9 megaton warhead the biggest ever produced and fielded in this country. 9 million tons of TNT would make a big hole and explosion, eh.

Here's the commander and his deputy at the launch console that only a few years ago would have and could have sent that weapon on its way to the USSR in about a minute to launch and 30 minutes to the target. This was serious business and I had to memorize every tube, relay, valve, button and switch in the massive control center and launch complex.

As I was a real live veteran of this actual complex the guide deferred to me for a couple of explanations and then the very interested young men on the tour wanted to be with me at the launch console as we went through a simulated launch sequence ... I think their grandma was also very interested in the subject as well.

On Thursday the 5th we headed up to Mount Lemmon on a 30 mile spectacularly winding road. As you move from the desert floor at about 1800 feet toward the summit of about 9000 feet the foliage transitions from the cholla and palo verde here ...



through a pretty good saguaro forest ...

through some steep and rocky terrain ...

to where we had our picture taken by another nice tourist at about the 4000 foot level ...

finally arriving at the Ski Valley resort at the top.

We had lunch at the Iron Door restaurant where we ate on our first arrival here in 1975. I think the little wooden bears have been in the lodge since then still guarding the fireplace faithfully.

I had my favorite Iron Door chili and corn bread which is their speciality and Jo had a chicken salad sandwich which were both excellent. Hers was accompanied by some of the best German potato salad which was made by one of the wait staff with her German  grandmother's recipe.

And then topped it off with some wonderful rhubarb pie!

All in all a great day on the mountain and one of our favorite places to visit ... spectacular vistas and great food!