The Great Northern Trek: Our stay at Medford/Gold Hill KOA

Late May 15th, we pull into the Medford/Gold Hills KOA and park.  We sleep.

The next morning, however, we are enjoying some tea and pancakes outside under the trees when Don, one of the people who work at the campground, comes over and introduces himself.  Technically, he met Bre the previous night but seeing as how it was late, they only chatted for a bit.  Don apparently has lived quite the interesting life!  We spend hours talking to him, listening to his stories about his life, the beautiful girl he adopted with his wife at only 24 years old, his travels around the world, his various occupations and his life in Hawaii giving rides to tourists.  He has the kind of life we hope we’re having.  Something you know he looks back on fondly and feels truly blessed.  He just completely wins us over and I believe he feels the same about us.

Later that day, we take our little GEM out in hopes of finding a place to have some lunch.  We drove along the Rogue River, saw a yurt, traveled a dirt road, realized that Bre will try to take anything off road if given the slightest encouragement (read encouragement as “no fence”).  Eventually we find a small park and sit for lunch.  Again, you can see our pictures of everything on our Facebook page.

During our return trip to the park, a rather large and exceedingly LOUD female child obnoxiously screamed how she liked our car.  I had a brief moment in which I questioned my own self image of that age and wondered if I too was that annoying.  I decided that although I could very easily be considered annoying at that age (and even now), I wasn’t rude or obnoxious to strangers.  Loud and boisterous with my friends, oh hell yeah but I kept it mostly to my circle of friends.  I think…  Anyhow, the GEM gets quite a lot of looks whenever we drive her and we’re quite use to being the center of attraction.  Though sometimes… it’s not exactly all that good (more on that in a few entries).

Back at the park we bump into Don again and get a very interesting history on the area and how apparently there is still gold in the river!  Yes, the panning for gold isn’t just a gimmick there!  People have been finding quite a bit of it in the area and Don is one of them.  Almost made us want to stick around the campground and try our hand at it but we knew we had to get going to Eugene.  I think we’d like to have a weekend or so there just to have the gold panning experience and see what we find for fun.

The Great Northern Trek: From Stockton, CA to Medford, OR

Monday, May 14th we leave the Stockton/Delta KOA and continue with our drive north.  We ended up making a quick stop at a truck station to pick up a new cap for our radiator.  Ours wasn’t quite working right and causing the signal to go off.  

This ends up being the most boring stretch of our journey with so very little to see roadside.  Endless fields of… nothing.  Except for the sea of cows.  I mean… cows for as far off into the horizon as you could see across the flat desert land.  Just… cows.  And you can imagine the stench that accompanied that view.

We saw a lot of “Congress Created Dust Bowl” signs.  If you don’t know the story behind them, you really should Google it.  It’s an interesting struggle that is currently happening in our country today.  Our economy is causing the government to cut back on particular programs or shrink their budgets.  This is causing water shortages with farmers because the government is decreasing their water rations and/or upping the cost of water.  This is making food more expensive to grow.  That in turn makes it more expensive to buy.  It’s amazing how delicate the balance is in our economy.

Other than signs and cows, another common roadside feature is the random rundown vehicles sprinkled every once in a while like milestone markers.  The patches of rusty piles of junk spotting the landscape amid farmland, bogs, vineyards, train tracks and the occasional empty field.  Sort of odd to see them and a real reminder of just how “disposable” people feel even things like vehicles are.

Just outside of Redding we decide to stop for the night and sleep.  We are a few miles from Mt. Shasta but not very keen on driving at night.  We find a truck stop, park and go to sleep.

The next morning we pull out bright and early only to have the Madame stall on us.  We assume we didn’t let her warm up enough and start her again.  She runs for a bit perfectly fine.  We pull out of the parking lot and… she stalls!  We turn onto the side road after starting her and she dies again.  Guess what… our batteries still weren’t charging!  Grrr!  Bre soon discovers she can bypass a regulator switch that is malfunctioning and all is good!  Er… except that we are now on a very narrow dead end street.  Ut oh!  And just as I decide to play traffic conductor, a police officer comes along for me to wave down.  We tell him the situation and he stops traffic long enough for us to back out into the intersection and turn onto the road heading the right direction.  THANK YOU MR. POLICE OFFICER!

Less than two miles from the truck stop exit, we see a rest stop… after we had been searching for one the previous night as a truck stop isn’t exactly the best environment for me.  Always one when you don’t need them.

After that it was rather smooth sailing for the remainder of our trip.  Albeit, very slow at times as we crawled up some pretty steep mountain roads but still, it was a quiet ride from Redding on out.

One thing that was a huge disappointment was my camera decided to set the timer just as I wanted to take a picture of the “Welcome to Oregon” sign.  Oh well…

After entering Oregon we made our way to the Medford/Gold Hill KOA for the night.  In case you’re wondering why we are stopping at all of these KOAs during out trip after stating how done we were with the Ranch, it’s because we can stay at them for free due to Bre being a manager.  Of course that isn’t a lifetime of free passes but it was recent enough to make this trip a little less expensive and that’s all we needed.

The Great Northern Trek: Stockton/Delta KOA

Our stay at the Stockton/Delta KOA was just wonderful!  We arrived Friday, May 11th in the afternoon.  We settled into our spot (of which, Bre’s amazing driving skills again impress bystanders as she parks the Madame next to a tree and literally has her leaning against a branch but never scraping it).  I finally got to take a REAL shower for the first time in ages!  No, I haven’t been boycotting cleanliness but the water was so bad in Santa Paula that I had to take buckets of water from our reverse osmosis to bath in.  It was nice to have a hot running shower.

On the first night, Ellen brings us about the camp for a tour.  Let’s start by saying that we love Ellen but she’s a bit… distracted often.  For example, if she has something she wants to say, she sort of stops listening to whatever it is you might be saying so she can remember it.  She’s zooming around the camp in a golf cart with only a flashlight to guide her, flying over speed bumps, shining the flashlight not on the road in front of her but whatever attraction she wants us to see.  It’s a bit terrifying.  At one point she launches Bre temple first into the edge of the cart’s roof and STILL wants to continue giving us the insane tour.

After the tour, we go to her RV and sit inside for some conversation and much petting of the furbabies.

The following morning, I decide to make blueberry pancakes and ask Tim & Ellen if they would like any.  Ellen pops in for some and brings a plate to Tim as he is working that morning.  She then tells us that she’s like to drive us around town and show us the sights!  We’re both a wee bit leery of taking another one of her “tours” and really would simply like a day to relax.  Okay, so by “relax” I really mean that Bre repairs our AC unit and batteries, I cook pumpkin pancakes, seitan and minced meat pies while doing laundry and some cleaning.  But we were left alone and thought it just complete bliss!

Later that day we accept an invite from the campground manager, Scott Haar.  Very sweet guy!  We just loved him to pieces!  He took us out to Mexican food and again reminded us why we are SO over it for a while.  It wasn’t bad but it wasn’t spectacular.  Meh.  Scott, however, made up for it with some great conversation and a lot of laughter.  Honestly, if we are in area again, we’re stopping there and spending more time with the dude.  Just awesome!

The following day we “relaxed” again though this time with a lot less work involved.  We invited Scott, Tim & Ellen over our place for dinner and though all agreed, it seems Scott was detained by the season finale of Survivor.  This also led to my discovery that Bre had actually signed up for this show at some point when it originally started but ended up not doing it (obviously).  Cool little tidbit of info I didn’t know about my wife.

We built a campfire and all sat around it trying to stay warm.  Because of course, it’s extremely windy and very cold on the only night we decide to stay outside and build a fire!  I can’t say that the dinner was all we thought it would be.  I shan’t be mean here because in truth, we love Tim & Ellen as they are great people.  HOWEVER… politics is NOT an acceptable dinner conversation topic.  PLEASE don’t keep pushing the topic when it’s painfully apparent that you either 1) disagree with your host and/or 2) are the only one happy to talk about it.  Also, please don’t tell me about my own country’s politics.  Trust me when I say, I know them better than you.

Yet I cannot decide what was more … surprising? …rude? …shocking?  The fact that the conversation was repeatedly driven into the brick wall called “politics” or that by the end of the night Ellen asked me if they could take home some of the minced meat pies I made.  Why would this be surprising?  Because I wasn’t serving them at the time.  I had mentioned that I made them earlier and that perhaps we would all have some later if we felt up to it.  I didn’t realize I was promising them to her to take home if we didn’t eat them right there.  I can understand as people often rant and rave about my food but I’m not use to someone asking if they can take the food I cooked home with them to eat.  This isn’t a restaurant, you don’t get a doggy bag!

The following day we decided to pull out after lunch.  We invited Scott over so he could try some of the chicken seitan I make and he raved about it!  And he looked to be in completely ecstasy while trying my cream cheese filled pumpkin pancake roll ups.  I love people who love food. =D  All in all, it was a great visit and we really hope to stop in again the next time we’re in the area.

The Great Northern Trek: Day 1 & 2

I’m really trying to get to all the blogging of our trip so please bear with me.  I managed to make several draft posts during out trip so I would remember key points and am now so thankful I had the foresight because you would be looking at blank entries right about now.  To see the photos from the trip, you should head on over to our Facebook page for Hiding in Pink Camo.  I’ve posted them all there under the album “From Santa Paula, California to Eugene Oregon”.

We started our trip Thursday, May 10th from Moorpark.  Which means that we weren’t able to see our friend Mary on Wednesday night as previously planned.  Not too much of an issue but it would have been nice to see her.  So on Thursday, we were suppose to meet up with our friends Tim and Ellen at the Stockton/Delta KOA but if you were following us on Facebook you know that didn’t happen either.  What did happen was the Madame suddenly dumping a whole lot of gas all over her back end and the South Wing (our trailer).  We are extremely lucky that she didn’t catch fire.

Sadly, this wasn’t the sort of problem that either of us knew much about so we started searching the internet for some assistance.  Bre found a website called RoadsideAssistance.com which should really be named RoadsideAssRaping.com!  It’s nothing more than a finders fee of $95 for them to find a local company to assist you.  Basically… exactly what we were doing but without the bullshit and lies.  This company implies they are the actual repair company but in truth, they are just middlemen for several companies nationwide.  Total ripoff.  We break down about 4:00 pm.

After receiving several confusing phone calls from various people, one of which was obviously a mother working at home with her screaming kids in the background, we’re told someone is finally coming to help us.  It is roughly 7pm when we’re told this.  Finally at 9:30 the mechanic shows up.  Very long and painful story short, by 1am we were nearly $1000 lighter in the wallet for a $40 fuel filter on the Madame.  Apparently we were charged for the mechanic’s driving time… including him getting lost.  We are so tired and discussed by then that it no longer mattered.  They had us by the short hairs and there was nothing we could do about it.  We’re just happy the Madame works and that we will be able to continue with our trip.

We sleep roadside off the I5 in Fresno on our first night of our trip.

The drive from Fresno to Stockton/Delta (as we are determined to meet up with Tim and Ellen) was pretty much uneventful.  We stopped briefly at an overlook to ensure the engine batteries were charging.  They seemed to be having an issue at that time and we put on our trickle charger.  We also greatly impress everyone at the overlook with Bre’s amazing driving skills as she maneuvers the Madame around the small parking lot.  As a side note, we had a very helpful trucker signal us that one of the Madame’s bay doors was open!  Nothing would have fallen out but it was very nice of him to do so.  Very cool.

We decide to fill up on some gas before pulling into the KOA where Tim and Ellen are, only to have the Madame refuse to start!  Those damn batteries weren’t charging at all!  Thankfully we had a jump pack and could start her up again in a short amount of time.

We finally make it to the campground, park and sleep!

We decided to stay at the park for a few days to catch up on laundry, figure out what was the issue with the batteries (fixed it), adjust some odds and ends about the Madame and get a chance to relax a bit.  I’m unfortunately dying from heat exhaustion and dehydration from the trip, which is a big reason we opted to say for a few days before continuing.

Tim and Ellen were very gracious hosts and their furry kids were so much fun to visit with.  The first night we were over at their RV and just chatting the night away.

Funny commentary during our trip:

• Bre – “It’s good to stop every once in a while to stretch, get something to drink… make sure the Madame isn’t on fire.”
• Deven - We are the Rogue Unit of Evasive Specialists (R.U.E.S.)

In the meanwhile…

Though I’m not able to update much while we’re on the road, I give you this video in the meanwhile…

And the craziness begins again

Wait… that title implies it ever stopped and well… we all know better.  But it did die down a bit there, didn’t it?  Or just stretched itself out to the point that it became such a part of our every day that we stopped noticing it.  Either way, this feels like there’s a “newness” to it.

We’re here in Moorpark and soon to leave to destination unknown.  We were suppose to meet up with our friend Mary at the Visalia KOA today but that didn’t happen.  Tomorrow we head out to Stockton/Delta KOA and visit Tim and Ellen.  From there, we’re hoping to make it up to Mount Shasta (another KOA because we get a discount due to Bre having worked for them) then onto Eugene.

We’re a bit bummed out at the moment as we thought we were coming to Moorpark with a slightly different plan.  Jason, Bre’s former boss at the RV Service job, had agreed to let us come out to his shop and he’d help Bre with replacing the roof of the Madame.  Albeit, we weren’t expecting him to take the entire time off and help her, but instead just lend a hand for the difficult parts.  Mostly because I’m utterly useless in these types of situations not only because of my broken back but because I can’t come in contact with the adhesives she needs to use.  Prior to our arrival, Jason discussed our plans with Tony, his partner in the company, and everyone was fine with the situation.  We would come and stay, fix our roof, in exchange for painting a mural on the wall inside the shop.  Good?  Good!

We arrived late Friday night, set up the Madame and snoozed.  Saturday Bre started the huge project of replacing the roof.  All was fine.  Sunday, Bre took the day off because her back was killing her and because she would need Jason’s assistance with the next steps on the project.  He hinted at coming in on his day off and she said no, not wanting to inconvenience him.  Monday morning arrives and things are going okay until Bre goes inside to talk to Tony.  Apparently Tony no longer likes the arrangement and wants us off the property at night and that we cannot stay later than Wednesday.  He stresses this so much that Bre gets the distinct impression that he truly dislikes her suddenly.  I mean, like he cannot stand the sight of her yet there is no cause for it that anyone can see.  Even Jason doesn’t seem to understand the sudden change but we all realize that to keep the peace in their business relationship, we all need to adhere to the new plan.

So we do.  We pack up at night and drive a few hundred feet to another parking lot of a company that Bre is friends with the owner only to return in the morning to continue working.  What we didn’t realize about this change in plan was that now Jason was unable to actually help us during business hours.  It would be only after Tony left each night that Bre could get any assistance.  As you can imagine, pulling off the old rubber roof, replacing the wood underneath where needed, adhering a new rubber roof, etc. is an extremely difficult task for just one person.  Not to mention the heat was unbearable on the roof.  We had thought that she would be able to work inside the large building they use for a shop but obviously that was nixed.  We thought she’d at least have more help with the difficult parts, but again, that was a no go.  It has been an extremely frustrating and upsetting past few days.

At this point, Bre no longer cares for Tony whom she liked and respected dearly just prior to this.  We don’t blame Jason for anything and understand he was keeping the peace.  We feel horrible that we caused any trouble, as unintentional as it was.  It’s very frustrating that people cannot keep their word and not only come up with lame excuses but drag other people into it.  If Tony hadn’t stopped Jason from helping us, we would have been done a day sooner and out of their hair just that much quicker.  But he had to cut his nose off to spite his own face and now we are still here, past our deadline and unable to leave without causing possible issues with the Madame.  Not to mention, we didn’t make reservations at any campgrounds because we thought we would still be here painting a mural.  Grrr…

Saying Goodbye to Santa Paula

FINALLY, we are able to leave this place!  We have but a few last minute details to take care of and we’re gone.  We’re taking our time and having a nice leisurely morning as there is no rush anymore and won’t be for the next two weeks.  We have enough funds to reach Oregon and pay for a month or so of rent.  This will give us enough time to find something suitable for work and get Bre some much needed rest.  Over then next week she’ll be redoing the Madame’s roof and we’ll be creating and applying her graphics.  Afterwards, we have a mural to create for a friend and then off on our trip up north.

All morning I’ve been doing the “this is the last time I’ll [fill in the blank] here!”  Yes, we leave Santa Paula with much glee.  The sun is shining and it promises to be a beautiful day here.  And it seems fitting that even Gaia is blessing our departure.  Though… how I feel at the moment, I’d see rain the same exact way. LOL!

Another fabulous adventure about today is we finally get to take the GEM into town as we will cash Bre’s last check and pick up a few groceries.  Though we’ve ridden the GEM about the grounds a great deal since we’ve gotten her, we haven’t taken her into town because she was in need of a tune up and a bit of body work.  Both of those were accomplished over the past month or so and we finally have a short enough errand to run that we have a good test drive for her.  We’re excited!  Though we don’t have means of locking her yet, so I will have to wait in the car while Bre is inside.  This will let us know the amount of attention she draws and what sort of security she’ll need.  Though I suspect they are more common in Oregon (or at least less of a fascination) and we might not need to go to any extremes.  Then we move the south wing and drive the GEM inside, strap her down and poof!  Our car is stowed!

For now, I think I’m going to enjoy my morning tea and watch the sun rise over the mountains… for the last time while here.

A Calm Morning

Since coming to Santa Paula, I’ve had quite a few beautiful sunrises and sunsets.  I’ve seen some truly glorious moments in nature that will forever be embedded in my memory.  From the peacocks to our beautiful grove where we had our ceremony, the area provided us with plenty of natural beauty.  In many ways, we’ve had such an amazing time while here and are truly happy to have had the experience.  Despite how things have ended with Bre’s job, the place, the people we’ve befriended, the landscape, all of it will be greatly missed.  There are quite a few people that touched our lives and our hearts while here and though we will miss them, we know it won’t be the last time we see each other.  Besides, the wonders of the internet makes friendships across distances seem “just down the road”.

It’s a bittersweet goodbye.  Sort of…

I would be lying if I tried to pretend the adventure of our road trip and subsequent stay in Oregon wasn’t rejuvenating our souls.  We have been happier in the past few days than we have in months!  We’ve talked non-stop about our trip, plans, who we are going to visit, who will come visit us in Oregon, what our immediate and long term plans are once we’re up there, etc. etc. etc.  We’re going over the Madame with a fine toothed comb, making sure we have her ready for the trip.  I’m charging the camera batteries and making sure we have internet the entire way.  We’re plotting our course, making reservations and counting down to the moment when our trip really begins.

All this is not to imply we aren’t nervous.  Oh quite contrary to popular belief, we actually have some worries about our plans.  Who wouldn’t in our situation?  We aren’t exactly sure how things will go regarding Bre working as soon as we get up there (and honestly, I’d love her to have some time off) nor where we might be (especially if we can’t get the Madame’s exterior looking relatively decent soon).  But we also aren’t as worried as most people would be.  We do have my artwork that is slowly bringing in some money and Bre has had several job offers in the area already.  We know things will work out but are, naturally, nervous.

Besides, as beautiful as this morning was with fog, clouds and mists rolling along the mountain tops will pale in comparison to the trees and forested areas of Oregon that I’m so longing to explore.  I love the beauty of the desert landscape but it is nothing compared to the woods.  I’m excited to go hiking again!

Ego, it will get you every time

So my latest rants on Facebook have been about someone who was trying to help us but only ended up making things majorly worse.  Enter Roger, a resident at the campground and someone that has been known to help out whenever possible.  Nice guy and all.  Bre’s done favors for him and his wife, they’ve done some in return, it’s all good.  Recently Bre and Roger discussed the Madame, the odd conditions in which she had been painted and Bre’s desire to eventually have her buffed down to the diamond she is.  Roger volunteers to do it for her!  Bre asks if he’s sure because the Madame is HUGE and that’s quite a daunting task.  He says sure and that it would only take him a few days at most to complete it.  He says he knows how to buff and did it for years.  He doesn’t ask for any money but obviously Bre and I want to give him something.

Well…

Here it is, TWO WEEKS later and the Madame looks beyond horrible!  She has a small area in which Roger did some great work and it reflects like a mirror.  Otherwise, the Madame is half (top) untouched and looks like it did before; and half matted, splotchy black and UNFINISHED!  For two weeks this guy would show up, not show up, show up for a few minutes, show up and sit in his truck for a half hour to forty five minutes before coming to buff for an hour, stayed a few late nights, whatever.  Despite that for two weeks our home was deafening with the sanding and buffing, smelled horrible of the spray paint he used when he would accidentally sand through the Madame’s paint, reeked of him smoking until we finally had to practically yell at him he was killing us with it, and was a complete pig sty with his trash EVERYWHERE; we were ever hopeful that the mess he was making would be worth it.  It wasn’t.  He wouldn’t accept any help from anyone else, at all.  He wouldn’t listen to Bre’s advice on how to sand it despite her being a painter, working with carbon fiber (requires TONS of sanding) and being a RV tech.  Not until the last three days would he listen.  He tried begging Bre to stay here longer (as if we could) because he couldn’t come close to finishing it alone.

Bre gave him a few hundred dollars (all we could spare) despite him stating he didn’t want any money for the work, it was suppose to be a favor.  Bre at least wanted to cover his expenses if possible.  We offered him lunches, drinks, whatever.  When he finally relented and accepted help, Bre offered Bob (the person recruited to help) a tune up on his bike in exchange and he agreed.  When Bob had to work on the third day, Roger recruited Jeffry.  Apparently he promised Jeffry some money that he didn’t actually have himself and so he asked Bre if she had any.  She explained that she gave him all the money we had except for what we need for our trip and hadn’t any.

First Jeffry left, shortly followed by Roger who promised to return, still determined to finish the job.  We went outside to see the Madame in the sunlight and both of us nearly cried!  She looks like she was graffiti-ed!  Now, we have no extra money (Bre’s last paycheck is going for our insurance) and are trying desperately to find someone who can help.

Many parks don’t want to become trailer parks and require a rig to look acceptable and/or be within a certain year range and we are cutting it close as it is.  Now… now we are so embarrassed by how she looks and are upset anyone would do this!  We know it wasn’t on purpose but we’ve been left in such a lurch and he hasn’t even so much as said a word of apology or a way to rectify things.  Even his wife was here telling him he was in way over his head and that he seriously needed to fix things before he made them worse.  We also found out the “buffing experience” he had previously was only on surfboards.  Yeah… not even close to the same thing.  *sobs*

Not Monday Monday!

After a brief conversation today, Bre and I decided that we might be staying a wee bit longer to ensure she receives her check and we can cash it with no problem.  It also gives us a few days of being able to finish the projects we have going on in the Madame without the constant interruption of work.

Egads!  There is so much to do.  That’s what happens when you stay in one place too long.  You get … spread out.  And you accumulate stuff.  Which is the death sentence in RVing terms.  Though to be fair, we have been renovating the Madame and have had to keep or purchase the tools to do so.  And I have a business going on with Rue Apothecary, so again, we have more things than most full time RVers do.  Scratch that!  We have more things WITH us than most full-time RVers do as it seems so many of them have homes or storage units somewhere.  We don’t.  We have everything with us.  So we need to be extra crafty in how we have our home and trailer.  None the less, eventually we will be ridding ourselves of a great deal of weight once the Madame is done being renovated (if that day ever comes) or once we’ve found a nice piece of property we like in the middle of nowhere and can create a storage shelter.

Anyhow, that puts our travel plans off for a few days but it’s better that way and hopefully there will be little fuss made over it by the owner of the campground and the new managers.  *rolls eyes*  Wish us luck.