Week 585 - From Death do Us Part - 10-29-2017

From Death do Us Part

We parted from Death Valley after just one day. We would have stayed a few days but we were on a mission. We needed to get to Napa by Thursday to meet up with daughter Emily and take care of her kids while she is at her teacher's conference.

Many folks ask us if Ellen drives the MotherShip. "She can but Pete loves to drive". This seemed like a good place, desert road, no traffic, for Ellen to take a turn. She took us down the road until she announced "This is boring, take over Pete".

On our last visit to Death Valley we left on the Emigrant Canyon Road heading to Ridgecrest. The road was narrow and somewhat rough, but not that long. See Hitting (or missing) the Open Road. This time we stayed on the fully paved road and thought it would also be short.

But is was 50 miles before we got off these slow speed roads.

The views are great. Take this road when you can, just allow extra time.

We love the desert. Without all the trees in the way, you get to see everything!

Reaching Hwy 395 you don't find a lot of people. Big Pine is tiny; Bishop, a little bigger.

But mostly the 395 is a pleasant ride without traffic.

Arriving at June Lake we thought we might stay there. Warning! The roads in this town are as narrow as we have ever driven. The entrance to this RV park looked rough. We parked the MotherShip and Pete walked to the park and decided not to stay. We made a three point turn back onto narrow roads and got outta Dodge!

This rock teeters over the June Lake Fire Department. We waited for a while to watch it fall but it didn't move, so we did.

From June Lake we continued North. We have stayed at Mono Lake before so we continued on.

We cruised past West Walker River and landed at Topaz Lake staying at Topaz Lodge RV Park.

The shortest route from Topaz Lake to Napa is highways 88, 89 and 50. Pete's memory from decades ago is that Hwy 50 is a freeway. Highways 88 and 89 are beautiful drives and not too slow. After a short jaunt on 88 and 89 we got to the 50. Turns out memories are wrong. Much of the 50 is twistier and slower than the 88/89.

1) It was a long day and we broke Craig's 2-2-2 Rule but got to the Napa Elks. 2) "Hurricane" Hannie looks into the bag to see what she can toss around as she did with all of Pete's stuff.

The views from the Napa Elks RV sites are fabulous.

We spent a nice four days in Napa. Not only did we get to spend time with Emily, granddaughters Micah and Hannie, we also got to see Ellen's best friend Janet. Janet works for Cal Fire and came up from Atascadero to help with the horrific fires in Santa Rosa / Napa area. We saw a little bit of the burnt areas leaving Napa on Hwy 121.

The 121 meets the 128 and joins Interstate 5 at Williams. Granddaughter Micah took these photos.
1) Dust storm from a tractor along Hwy 5. 2) After the dust cleared it was an easy drive to the Durango RV Resort in Red Bluff, CA.

Our river view site at Durango.

Next week we'll spend time with Pete's sister Donnalee in Redding. Then to Emily and Chad's house in Butte Valley. On November 7th we will finally get to Stanford to have another look at Ellen's knee. We appreciate prayers for wisdom for Dr. Huddleston whom we will visit.

With love, Pete, Ellen and Mandy

Photos from Oct 2017