Peace, love and family in Northern California

We handed over the trailer and Loretta to the shop to get the body work done and settled in for the long wait. Lance's Mom was kind enough to let us beach ourselves with her in Napa, and the two cats and the dog enjoyed being house-dwellers again, taking advantage of her good nature by asking her to open/close the door all day long. She'll need a new hobby now that we've moved along. And probably new floors because they are wearing pathways in and out.

Mandarins from the Loomis, CA area - the best in the nation

Lance went to check on Loretta and the trailer and got a "we really don't want to do this" price for the trailer repairs - more than the trailer is worth so Lance found a trailer specialist and moved it down the street to a different shop.

We have a long project list but couldn't get much done with stuff being sprawled everywhere - the trailer in one shop, the bus in another with the tools, the trailer contents in Mom's garage in Napa, the boats stored in Mom & Dad's backyard in Lincoln... so we focused instead on being present where we are: visiting friends and family and enjoying Northern California. Dad's finally retiring and so there was an epic party to pull together. And lots of good food and laughter. Win/win.

Gifts representing Dad's long and successful truck-driving career:
a 53' freight trailer, a set of triples, and a double tanker.
The award is for a million incident-free miles,
a truly impressive accomplishment.

In less time than we expected we got Loretta back from Dr. George's RV Repair. They did an amazing job matching the paint and the fiberglass repair is flawless. All in all, impressive work. When Lance went to check on the trailer however, the shop was disturbingly empty and he had a weird moment where he wondered if it was gone for good along with the technicians, they are now almost two weeks late handing it back to us and not returning his calls. Time will tell. Good thing we emptied the contents out before handing it over to the repairmen first but I don't want to start my sticker collection back from zero. Well, on second thought I suppose that wouldn't be the worst thing...

Ladder #3 and the newly refinished bumper, on a peaceful Napa morning

We expanded our Thousand Trails membership to add the California/Arizona zone (another $50/yr) and checked Loretta in to a quiet little park outside of Lincoln, CA. This part of the Sacramento Valley is within a stone's throw of the Sierra Nevada foothills, not far from Sutter's Fort where the gold rush kicked off; it's a very rich agricultural area too; the park is surrounded by walnut trees, almonds, and some sort of wet grasses that are too short and green for us to identify yet. There's a little pond with assorted fish stocked by the park and lonely dirt and grass roads where Chloe can run free. And the birds... oh the birds... they are everywhere. Many folks in the park wander around with binoculars, and I find myself mesmerized by the large flocks that undulate together over the wet fields while hunting just before sundown.

We've dubbed him "sweater cat" and we serenade him
with his own song to go along with Chloe's barking

The neighbor has a pair of cats that patrol the park wearing red sweaters. It makes me giggle every time I see one of them, if they were children they'd definitely be receiving all the bullys' attention. Chloe, apparently is a bully at heart because she comes un-freakin'-glued every time she sees one of them. Funny at midday; less funny at 6am.

Since the boats, paddles and fishing poles are scattered across the state there isn't much for us to do out here at the Thousand Trails in Lake Minden except enjoy the silence, so we are gleefully soaking it all in. Last night we sat with cocktails and watched the sun set, a nearly everyday occurrence in our RV life but a daily habit that quietly slipped by the wayside when we were hotel- and house-guests. Soon enough our trailer will be back (or we'll get a different one if it has truly disappeared), then we can wrap up the projects, pull our stuff back together and make our plan of attack for the Spring and Summer. For now a little downtime is just what the doctor ordered.