Yucaipa, CA

Yucaipa, in the San Bernadino Mts, has a population of 51K and an excellent regional park.  We stayed here 3 years ago and are delighted to be back.  The park has RV and tent camping, trails, water slide, frisbee golf, 3 small lakes stocked with large trout, game fields and more.  I rank it one of the top 4 parks we've visited in North America.  The other top-ranked parks are one each in MN, NB, OR.

Middle Lake, lots of fishing.  Saw a beautiful 8 pound trout caught by a teenage girl who was justifiably proud to show it off.

Upper Lake with woman, dog, rocks, fishermen.

Fantastic weather here, mid 70s for highs, sunny, 40ish for lows.

Slab City

See my NYE Trip post of 12-17-11 for Slab City background info.

It's not your mother's campground and one night was more than adequate, although we'd planned to stay for 2.  Lot's of trash lying about, some self-propelled and humanoid in appearance but most of it inorganic.  'Tis indeed a strange brew with more than a touch of post-apocalyptic.  We're not sorry we stopped though, have to cater to one's sense of adventure and curiosity, after all.

To be fair, the people we chatted with, the ones who were passing through or just there for the winter, weren't strange at all.  Sandi (see below) was okay, too.  Most of the folks we assumed to be permanent residents, however, were decidedly lacking in visual appeal and basic social skills - like responding to smiles and a friendly 'Hi' from Trish and I as we strolled around.  Stoned?  Mentally challenged?  Possessed by non-verbal alien life forms?  Several bricks short of a full load?  Hard to tell, probably a mixed bag of the above.  Or, maybe they're mostly normal, unresponsive only because they're tired of being considered the main stars in the ongoing freak show.

Artist and sophisticate in residence, Sandi. Trish bought 3 of her finer pieces.

The Range has live music on Saturday nights.  There's lots of comfy seating - if you're into getting goosed with bare rusty springs sticking out of 30-year old bus seats and (un)stuffed furniture.

Main entrance to the Range, no bull.

Salvation Mountain.

Gotta LOVE it!

Once a pickup, now..........?

Whatever.

Yeah, REPENT!  Or we'll throw your miserable sinful carcass in the cell in the back of The Bible Truck and drive you around so everyone can hiss and boo and throw nasty rotten stuff at you.

A parting shot of Salvation Mt.

Lemon Aid

The Lemon
The vast majority of newer AZ homes are built on a slab so there's no crawlspace.  No crawlspace means no worries about water getting under the house, no vapor barriers, no venting.  It means that directing runoff rain water away from the foundation is not critical to the long term health of the structure.  It doesn't rain that much here anyway, it being a desert. 

When it does rain here, though, likely as not it'll be a downpour, a regular flash flood gully washer.  Most homes here don't have gutters and downspouts; water just runs off the roof and continues on its merry way to its gully of choice, no problem.  No problem, unless: a generous share of the roof's runoff water just happens to be channeled to a spot directly in front of the main entry.  And that's the case at 400 Stallion Lane: any attempt to enter or leave the building (take your umbrella, Elvis) when it's raining will be rewarded with an impromptu shower.  That's The Lemon.

The Aid
It rained last week and the entry shower was fully operational, bring your own soap and towel, please.  Trish said, 'We should do something about that, divert the water somehow.'  Duh!  Why didn't I think of that?  She went on to suggest a rain chain, a device that serves the same purpose as a downspout but is a quantum leap more attractive.  Right on, Babe!  But first, let's move the shower nozzle so the rain chain doesn't block half the entry.

So, it's off to Lowe's for gutter and brackets, and online rain chain shopping.  Several websites offer rain chains of copper and aluminum.  There's your basic, plain-Jane rain chain drain from Spain* and your more elaborate devices like strings of funnels, in various shapes and sizes.  I opted for the hammered aluminum funnel, a clean, sleek design that elegantly and eloquently reflects the highly refined, yet subtly understated, tastes of the sophisticated homeowner (that would be me).  Oh yeah!

Lemon Aid Pix

We like the way this little project turned out.  It really was a little project but the reward seems not so little.  I'm now qualified to act as design consultant on similar projects you may be considering. Consulting fees will be dependent on the scope of work, certainly affordable by anyone with a high 6-figure income. 

* Mine came from India.  But some of the others may be from Spain.

NYE Trip

Hosting a NYE party has been a long standing tradition for us.  But, this year we're doing something quite different, taking the EDGE on 6-day excursion to southern CA and spending NYE in a municipal park we like.  The park is in Yucaipa and has a muni golf course nearby.
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En route, we'll spend a couple nights in Slab City, aka The Slabs, an abandoned WWII military base southeast of the Salton Sea.  Slab City, featured in the movie Into the Wild, is now an off-the-grid (boondocking) hangout for RVers.  The 'permanent' population is a colorful mix of dropouts, aging hippies, Jesus freaks and artist wannabes.  Come winter, hundreds of RV snowbirds join the action, most of which I assume, are relatively mainstream types.
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Over the years, the locals have created many pieces of imaginative junk art and have painted graffiti/murals on the few remaining structures.  There's a year-round flea market (of course) and there's often live music in the evenings.  It's an interesting one of a kind place and the natives are reputedly friendly and fun.  I'll take lots of pix for the blog so check back in late December. 
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Ho, ho, ho.  I've gotta go.

Christmas Family Album

Here are selected members of our extended family in their Christmas finery.  They all wish you a great holiday season and new year!

Ranger the Wonder Dog

Pancho the Musician

Grunt the Party Animal

Lil Ms Liza Lizard

Harvest!

Since buying my first home 40 years ago, I've nearly always had a veggie garden.  There's some truth to that old saying, 'you can take the boy out of the country but.......'  No matter the crop, there was always a little thrill in seeing the little green shoots break the ground surface about 10 days after planting.  Weeks later, it was especially gratifying to harvest the first crop and have the produce for dinner that very same day.  You can't get fresher than that and the flavor - yum! 
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Take your grocery store tomatoes and deport 'em back to their country of origin; they look great but I suspect that a used Domino's pizza box has more flavor.  Come to think of it, the box likely tastes better than the pizza, too.  Domino's is lousy.  Better yet, have a tomato fight: great exercise, lots of fun and delightfully messy!  A word of advice for the novice tomato hurler: wait until they are really ripe.  You want maximum mess and minimum bruising (of the people, not the tomatoes).  I digress.
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Now, growing our own veggies doesn't fit our life style.  But, citrus does well here so I decided to remove a ho-hum tree and replace it with citrus.  Ho-hum is the common name for the genus Buttuglyus - a huge family of boring, nondescript plants which have, for reasons unknown, an overpowering appeal to prior homeowners - the folks who owned the home before you.  Our LHC home was no exception, had several varieties of ho-hums.
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I planted the young citrus tree, a mandarin orange (Algerian clementine), in late spring, 2010.  We'll have our first orange harvest this month - only 9 oranges but not bad for a tree that's only 32" tall.  It will eventually reach 8-10' in height, and of course, will have larger crops.

Autumn

It was deeply imprinted in my youth, this love of the autumn season.  Come October, the crops had all been harvested on the Minnesota farm.  Birthing and shearing and numerous other livestock-care tasks were completed.  It meant that the frenzied 12-hour days of sweat and grime were over for a while.
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That's not all it meant, though.  The first frost came along and the plague of mosquitoes and flies went away.  The hot sticky weather ended and the outdoors became a place to enjoy rather than endure. We launched into glorious fall colors of oaks and maples and sumacs.  It meant hunting season had arrived - spending enjoyable hours tromping through the woods and fields in search of squirrels or game birds to grace the dinner table.  It meant going back to school and spending time with friends and classmates seldom if ever seen in summer months.
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And it meant food - which is what inspired me to draft this.  In autumn, images of rich fragrant stews and pot roasts come to mind and have me salivating in true Pavlovian fashion.  Back in the day, most produce was only available in season; come fall, there were fresh apples, oranges and other fruits to enjoy.  And, of course, there was Thanksgiving, the favorite American holiday.  Yes, that annual feast tends to be a gross overindulgence.  But it still has that great feel to it, the feel that comes from knowing the hard work is done, the harvest was good and family will be gathering to enjoy the bounty - and each other.
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Happy Thanksgiving everybody!  I have much to be thankful for and I hope you have also.

Jimmy

Jimmy crack corn and I don't care.

I don't think anybody else cares, either.

Jimmy always was kinda goofy.

Now, he's just sittin' out there crackin' corn.

Don't know what he plans to do with the cracked corn.

Don't think he does, either.

Jimmy needs help.

FAVs

My mate

Family

Friends

A sense of humor

Crunchy peanut butter

Mountains

Pulp fiction

Sunshine

Olives

Denim shirts

Naps

Streaming

Campfires

Single malt Scotch

Puns

Digital photography

Thunderstorms

Helicopters

BLTs

Cordless screwdrivers

Cutoffs

Pickleball

Stuffing

Smartphones

Travel

Wit

Online shopping

Habanero cheese

Words

Classic rock

Beer-butt chicken

Happy 40th!

Yesterday's parade was the 40th annual such event, honoring the birthday of the London Bridge here in LHC; it was completed in 1971.  Everybody loves a parade, they say.  But 'they' are wrong: I don't love 'em.  Was in too many when I was in the military, marching on scorching hot pavement, getting cooked in the sun, wearing heavy clothes, carrying a heavy rifle and assorted other crap, getting dehydrated, getting headaches.  No end to the fun.  I can handle watching one occasionally, though, especially if Trish and Ranger are in it.

The Marine band was near the front.  There are a lot of veterans in LHC and the Marine Auxiliary is large and active. 

Mr and Mrs Clyde, Omar and Abdul, Shriners all.  This shot and some of the others aren't very good cuz I was shooting into the sun. 

Little rigs with big Shriners.

Austin-Healey, the car I really wanted when I bought my first set of wheels.  Couldn't afford it, got a used MGB instead.  Couldn't afford that either, had to borrow from my Dad.

Didn't realize McC made flying chainsaws.

A pickup cozy?  In Arizona?  Huh!

Here come the Pet Partners!  Poodles dominated.

Foreground: old fat fart.  Background: Ranger and Mommy Dog working the crowd.

I'm late!  I'm late!

This is after half a night's sleep, leaving Vegas at 5 AM and driving to LHC.  Takes dedication - and a lot of energy.  Tired woman.

An impressive pre-high school band.  Sharply dressed and great little musicians.

Finis.

Off to the Races

Above and below is the first race we saw, a women's event.

Getting the checkered flag.

 Lake Havasu is the venue for numerous boating events and races, ranging from small remote-controlled model boats up to unlimited off-shore behemoths with 1000s of horses.  There's no speed limit on this lake.  Put the peddle to the metal, Babe!  Last week the event was the world finals in jet ski racing with 30+ categories of competition.  Yesterday we packed a lunch and our folding chairs down to the island to watch a couple hours of the action.
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At noon they sang the national anthem, followed by a flyover of 4 Marine fighter jets out of San Diego. Forgot how loud those buggers can be close up; poor Ranger went apeshit.

Large crowd, dozens of vendor and food tents, city in background.

Hydro Man above and below.  A large (6"? diameter; 50' long) hose is tethered between harness and floating power source (motor and pump).  It can push the rider up to 30' in the air or along the surface at a pretty good clip.  Reminds me of a character in a Spiderman movie.  Or was it Batman?  Superman?  Chickenman?  Dipstickman?  No, pretty sure it was Spidey.

 

WMDs

Guys, you know the drill when it comes to painting a house: pressure wash, scrape and brush, calk, prime the bare spots, 2 coats of paint, have a brewski.  And, you also know that women go through a similar routine every morning when they ‘put on their face’ (often, less the brewski).  We don’t know, however - at least I don’t - how many coats of whatever go wherever when women do their thing.  Frankly, it’s best that we don’t.  This is a mystery that doesn’t need solving.
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Another thing I didn’t know and didn’t want to know is that among women’s myriad tools and devices for applying said faces is a free-standing mirror.  And, the thing I most didn’t want to know is this: one side of that mirror magnifies.  A lot!  Most folks are wearing glasses by the time they’re 45.  This is a curse in some ways but a blessing in others.  One blessing is that our eyesight continues southward as we age, thereby sparing us the emotional and psychological trauma of actually seeing our deteriorating faces when we look in the mirror.
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One recent fateful morning, Trish had things all laid out on the counter, ready to put on said face; before starting though, she decided she’d better walk Ranger.  All unawares, I walked by the counter and got a glimpse of myself in the mirror - the magnifying side of the mirror.  HOLY CRAP!  Nearly had a stroke.  There they were in all their glory: all the blemishes, all the wrinkles, all the wild hairs spurting out of my nose and ears - all the stuff I was blissfully unaware of from my daily glimpses at conventional mirrors, sans glasses.
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After changing my underwear, I sat on the edge of the bed and as my heartbeat returned to normal, I reflected (you knew that was coming) on this horrific event.  The humane thing to do, I thought, is to get the word out on these ............ these domestic WMDs of self-image.  So, pay attention, guys: if your main squeeze has a makeup mirror, give it a wide berth.  Steer clear of all known or suspected face-application areas. If you’re unsure about the safety of a particular room or area, have a youngster precede you.  Enter only after you hear the kid shout ‘CLEAR!’
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Going a step further, we need to act!  We need to protect future generations from these WMDs.  We gotta track down the purveyors of these devices, destroy their inventory, and level their manufacturing plants.  The purveyors, of course, should be put on trial for crimes against humanity.

Homicide

I spent most of my adult years in the Pacific NW where there's 9 months of rain and 3 months of dry.  About 4 days after the rains stopped, everybody was out watering lawns and plants.  Didn't seem like there was such a thing as too much irrigation.
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Now I live in the desert; very dry, very hot.  Seems logical that you'd have to water the living crap out of everything virtually every day.  Right?  Wrong!  The plants are different, the soil's different, it's a whole 'nother shooting match entirely.  Cacti have attitude: 'Go ahead, dumb ass, water me once a week, see what happens.'  What happens is they quickly become sullen and lethargic.  Keep it up and it's, 'Up yours, sucker.  I'm outta here.'  Game over.  Post mortem: homicide.  Weapon: water.  Perpetrator: me.
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Homicide victims are not noted for their photogenicity and cacti are no exception.  Pix of the survivors are considerably more appealing.  Here are 3 that have yet to succumb to my ministrations.

Golden Barrel Cactus

Echinocactus grusonii

Tubac Prickly Pear

Opuntia macrocentra/violacea

Century Plant

Agave americana

Doggerel 2

Readers' comments were positive on the first doggerel, so here's another one.  Gotta warn you: this one really stinks!

MANURE!

This was written for, and first read at, the Delaney family reunion in July, 2005.  My siblings and I relate to manure as only one-time farm kids can.  It’s audience participation: listeners are encouraged to shout 'MANURE!' where indicated.

Making hay is our biggest chore,
Three crops each summer, sometimes four.
A hundred tons a year or more,
And all will end up on the floor.  MANURE!

It comes in varied shape and size,
Horse apples, sheep pellets, large cow pies.
Whatever the size or configuration,
I’d much prefer constipation.  MANURE!

It splats and plops, oozes and flows,
It covers floors and walls and clothes.          
It’s on our shoes, our shirts, our hair,
It permeates our underwear.  MANURE!

We fork it from the gutters,
And wipe it off the udders.
We shove it here, we pile it there,
It tears our eyes and fouls the air.  MANURE!

The spreader flings it wide and high.

And as it plops down from the sky,

We cower on the tractor seat,
And shower in that fragrant treat.  MANURE!

On the day I turned eighteen,
I left to make the college scene.
It’s over finally, in the past,
I’m outta’ here, I’ve forked my last.  MANURE!

In ending this, I should mention,
In case you haven’t paid attention,
Though perhaps I’m just a picky chap,
I’m really not that fond of crap.  MANURE!

Mike Delaney  
6-20-05
All rights reserved.

Doggerel

Sporadically, very sporadically, I'm inspired to write bad poetry.  I call it doggerel - for reasons that will soon become obvious.  Also sporadically, I inflict these literary gems on innocent, unsuspecting friends and relatives.  Since returning to LHC, there's been a lack of breaking news and exciting adventures to report but I feel obligated to post something.  So, here's a doggerel.

HOLEY WOMEN

The barbaric trend in female fashion,
Is body puncturing, with a passion.

Like members of the Zulu nation,
They glory in self-mutilation.

The holes are for attaching things,
Chains and pins and studs and rings,

To noses, tongues, lips and nipples,
A host of dangling participles.

Studs and metal everywhere,
Living ads for ACE hardware.

Do they think they’ll win men’s hearts,
By punching holes in body parts?

Maybe some guys like to squeeze,
Women holier than Swiss cheese.

But I feel this fashion’s overrated,
I still like mine unperforated.

Mike Delaney

6-30-05
All rights reserved.

HEAT!

Last night at dinner I asked Trish, 'What's the highest outdoor temperature you've ever experienced?"  She wasn't sure but guessed that current high temps (108-115) in LHC were likely the highest.  They are certainly the highest I've ever 'enjoyed'.
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That said, I'm actually enjoying them more than I anticipated.  Well ......... okay, maybe tolerating them better than I anticipated is more accurate.  It's that dry heat thing, don't you know.  'Dry heat' is something of an ongoing joke, oft-mentioned with a dash of sarcasm.  But, I'm here to tell you, it's real.
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As you know, heat index reports the 'feels like' temp, based on actual temps, humidity levels and, I suspect, a bit of smoke and a mirror.  LHC is very dry - often dryer than Death Valley - and the heat index is typically 5-7 points below actual temps.  More humid parts of the country boast (?) heat indexes that can be 20+ points higher than actual temps.  We hit several such places in our summer travels (OK was the worst) and you know what?  You can have 'em.  All of 'em.
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Back to the original question, what's your personal high?  The high for this coming Thursday in LHC is supposed to be 119: that'll be a new record for us.  After considerable soul searching, deep thinking and internal debate, I've decided that I will not aspire to higher achievements in this particular field of endeavor.

Recap

For those into meaningless statistics and trivia, I offer this recap of our summer travels.  Number of:

1. States we hit: 23

2. Provinces: 5

3. Days: 80

4. Miles we towed the trailer: 8719

5. Miles we put on the pickup: 11263

Comments:

1.  Halifax, NS was my favorite place in Canada.

2.  Canada touring is spendy.  We've now seen the places that interest us, doubt we'll visit again, with the possible exception of Vancouver and Victoria.

3.  Generally speaking, Canadian folks seem louder and more raucous than their neighbors to the south - and less privacy conscious.

4.  Lake Powell is fantastic: put it on your 'must do' list.

5.  This blog is ongoing.  Stay tuned.

Day Trip

Finally, after 10 days of cooling our heals, we were ready to go sightseeing again.  You get kinda road weary after 10000 miles in the saddle.  Today, we did a day trip loop and viewed 3 nearby national monuments.

Montezuma's Castle N M.  Trust me, Montezuma had nothing to do with it.  Some confused early settler thought that Aztecs lived here.  He/she was 1000+ miles and 200 years off the mark.  Regardless, the name stuck. 

The first question that pops into your mind when you look at it is 'how'd they get up there?'  It's 100' above the valley floor.  This plaque helps.

Actually, this was home to a mixed bag of natives from the Hohokam and Southern Sinagua cultures.  It was occupied for about 300 years until 1400, when for unknown reasons, they boogied on down the trail to places unknown. 

Montezuma Well N M.  I guess this was named by the same idjit.  It's a collapsed limestone cavern fed by underground springs that produce a tremendous volume of water.  The natives dug mile-long canals from this sink to irrigate their crops.  The water stays a constant 76 degrees year round.  Note the cliff dwellings in the upper left corner.  The well is similar in nature to the cenotes of the Yucatan but in this case, the surfacing water was caused by erosion rather than a humongous asteroid.  

Tuzigoot N M was our last stop.  The word means 'crooked water' in Apache.  It's a hilltop pueblo that had 77 ground floor rooms and numerous upper story rooms - how numerous we don't know because the ground floor is all that remains.  I didn't take any pix cuz I couldn't find a good angle to capture the thing.  Here's a link with pix: http://www.nps.gov/tuzi/index.htm

Rocks

Took another hike in the granite dells near our campground and took these up close and personal pix of the rocks.

There are hundreds of balanced rocks in the dells, many appear so delicately balanced that a mere flick of the finger would send them tumbling.

Another balanced rock.  It's really tempting to give them a shove - but I didn't.

The patterns in the rocks are interesting, too.  Not being heavy into geology, I don't know what causes these striations and at the moment I'm too lazy to google it.

Prescott 2

The area we're in is known as The Granite Dells.  Tom Mix, cowboy movie star of the early 1900s, once owned a ranch that included The Dells and several of his movies were filmed here.  It certainly fits the classic 'western badlands' movie sets.  Another such area is Monument Valley on the UT/AZ border; it's more open but has numerous dramatic rock formations.  Many of John Wayne's westerns were set there.

These 6 pix were taken on a hike near our campground.  The first is looking down on the campground from one of the higher granite formations directly behind our rig.

Different angle, same subject.

Looking north from same area as last pix.  The next 3 pix are of Watson Lake, a reservoir, about 1/2 mile south of the campground.

Taken through a balanced rock 'window'.

Rather scenic, huh?