Week 17 - Paso Robles, Santa Monica and Huntington Beach - 12-10-2006

Hi from Home and Huntington Beach,

Sunday Nick barbecued a delicious dinner at our campsite in Paso Robles. Tuesday we drove the Motorhome to Santa Monica to visit our friends, David and Marlene, whom we had met in Palm Springs. Pete dropped Ellen off at their beach house and had to drive 12 miles just to find an illegal spot large enough to park. We will never do that again in the motorhome. They have a beautiful home and Ellen had a lovely visit, once the stress of the drive wore off.

The rest of the week we spent on the beach in Huntington Beach. During the days we went into town to watch NCCS boys and girls play basketball in a tournament. It was good seeing old friends again. On Thursday, Ellen took a break from basketball, and met our granddaughter Kalonie, her mother, Sonya, her sister, Delaney and her other grandmother, Anita at Knotts Berry Farm. We had a lot of fun going on all the rides.

Nick, John, Levi and Pete having dinner.

David and Marlene's beautiful home in Santa Monica on the beach.

Several days spent at Huntington Beach.

NCCS girls basketball team that Pete coached last year.

Pete and Ken working together on stats.

Friends Toni and Paul , grandparents of Lady Crusader Brandi.

Anita, Sonya, Kalonie and Delaney met up with Ellen at Knotts Berry Farm

It is now Sunday and we are in Irvine to get the oil changed in the motorhome. Then off to Long Beach to find a place to park and leave the motorhome when we go to Catalina Island to watch NCCS basketball teams play in another tournament on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Then home for Christmas.

Love, Pete and Ellen

Motorhome Q&A: How do you connect to the Internet? We use two connections. 1) Verizon AirCard: This card inserts into our notebook computer and allows connection to the Internet while we are traveling. It has really been amazing. We are probably connected 99 out of 100 hours. For example, early on our trip we we traveling through Arizona on highway 71 from Quartzite to Prescott. It was dark, we were tired and needed to stop. Ellen got on the Internet and found Desert Palms RV Resort in Salome. When we got there, the host Harry, asked "What are you doing here and how did you find us?". Apparently no one comes in the summer! The next day as we drove out we could see that Salome, population 1,690 was in the middle of NOWHERE. And yet we had Internet connection. The AirCard connection will be one of two speeds: slow and slower. 2) WiFi is faster. At campgrounds or WiFi hotspots we connect by wireless. The WiFi is faster when it works. However, more often than not, the WiFi service has been poor or non-existent.

Photos from Dec 2006