MEMORIAL

This is mainly for my family.  Below is a link to a memorial slide show with pictures of dad/grandpa.

SLIDESHOW LINK

A Mix of Joy, Gratitude and Pain

The Greatest Generation lost another member this morning.  Walter M Dews Sr died peacefully in his sleep after a family Thanksgiving celebration.  He was ready and he died just as he hoped and predicted he would.  RIP dad.  We will miss you.  Oh yah, say Hi to Mom for us all. She's been waiting for you.

Jr.

RETIREMENT DAY ONE

The day finally came.  Last Wednesday I completed the sale of my business and became fully retired. After 44 years it was time to put the business in the hands of a younger generation and move on with our retirement. Thursday was our first day and we took the Jeep and headed out for a nice hike to a place called Rainbow Gardens.  I hope this is not a metaphor for retirement in general because while we did get in a decent hike there was no rainbow.  I suppose we should have known.  After all this is the Mojave Desert.

Our "hiking trail" also turned out to be a Jeep road.  That is fine, we like taking the Jeep into the desert however we were hoping for a real hiking trail, what we got was a road.  We eventually parked the Jeep about half way to our goal and then hiked the road the rest of the way which gave us a decent workout.  The only other living souls we encountered on the whole trip was whoever was in the helicopters that were flying over the area on their routes back to Las Vegas.  Having a whole road to yourself makes for a big, wide hiking trail.  There were certainly no trees to climb over that had fallen across the trail and no moss to slip on.

The pictures do not really provide good scale so it is hard to appreciate the distance that they cover or the size of the geographical formations.  I also only took my cheap point and shoot camera so had limited ability to zoom and format.  We were in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area and on the way back we spotted some much more colorful formations worthy of a tripod shot with the good camera.  That will be a future trip.

In summary we got a lot of solitude, a good hike on a nice, almost too warm day,  and some views that were worth the effort and some future exploration.  Our hiking boots got some exercise too.  All in all we are grateful that we could start our real, actual, retirement in this way and not in wheelchairs.

Click on any picture for a larger view.

Always interesting to see earth that is just pushed up as if  by a giant mole.

N 36 9.279   W 114 56.422

BACK IN LAS VEGAS

We have been back at our lot in Las Vegas for almost just a full week now.  We have washed the coach and the Jeep and cleaned things up and gotten some bookwork done and had company for dinner and seen a doctor already.  Been to the pool once too.  Since our last post we made our way to Cathedral City and visited with my dad before coming here and settling in for the winter.  We will miss our friends and family in Seattle but we like our place here very much and we have even more family here than we have in the Puget Sound area so we won't be lonely.  Especially when some of you come to visit us.

All tucked in.

We cut this plant back to just a 6" stub before we left in May.

We learned that you can't leave candles in the storage locker here in the summer!

Vegas Sunset from our driveway.

Day Two - Coburg

We left our campground a bit behind schedule this morning but still managed to get through Portland before noon which was my goal.  Arrived in Coburg about 2pm.  Have an 8 am appointment at Cummins in the morning.

At a rest stop with some of Paul's friends.

We have a room with a view.

Think it's gonna rain?

Can you tell we are in Oregon Duck territory?

Blog Wake Up

Well after a couple of unexpected delays we are finally ready to get back on the road.  Leaving Seattle today in the rain.  In some ways that makes it easier to leave.  We are initially headed to Palm Desert, CA to visit my dad who lives in Cathedral City.  Then it is back to Las Vegas and our lot in the Las Vegas Motor Coach resort.  Nothing new or exciting about our route so probably not much to report along the way.  At some point we will break out into the sunshine and eventually we will be in the desert and thinking about the abundance of nice clean water in Seattle with no shortages.  Oh well, can't have everything.

UPDATE:  Did I say we did not expect much to report along the way?  We were stopped in a rest area on I-5 eating our lunch when this trailer full of camels pulls up besides us.  Now that is a little unusual for the Pacific Northwest.

Experiment With Sound

I had made a short sound recording related to our last post but could find no way to just add a sound file so I created a very short slide show with just enough pictures to go with the sound recording I made.  So if you like the sound of steam whistles turn up your speakers and click above.

Mount Rainier Scenic Railroad

Arriving to pick us up.

Yesterday Arlyene treated me to a ride on the Mount Rainier Scenic Railroad and it was a treat.  I do think the name should be changed to the Close To Mount Rainier, Kinda Scenic, Railroad.  We only saw the mountain on the drive down, never from the train and the scenery is what you might expect traveling down a valley near a big Pacific Northwest mountain.  We crossed a few creeks and a river once or twice, saw a farm or two and some pretty dumpy living abodes close to the tracks.  What this trip is really about however is old railway stuff and on that score I rate it much higher.  I am not what you would call a railroad buff like my friend Craig but I really do appreciate these steam engines and all the old steam powered logging equipment and the history that goes along with it.  The ride is about a half hour one way at the blazing speed of 10 mph but it feels faster then that because the track is old and so are the cars.  At the far end is a museum and rail yard called Mineral.  There we found lots of cool stuff including several engines and steam operated logging equipment.  The entire trip is about 2 hours.  There is also a  later in the day trip that includes dinner cooked at Mineral.

Following are a few pictures.  Click on any of them for a larger picture then to go back press the ESC key.

Blowing off steam while waiting to pick us up.

Do we look excited?

Not very good at "Seflies"

Not butt friendly.....

Old time roadside in Elbe

This one is for Craig.  Well...they are all for Craig.

LAKE PLEASANT 2014

We are back at Lake Pleasant now for 4 months or so..  Site 215.  If we get bored here we have the play ground right behind us.  Traffic from south Tacoma to Bothell was surprisingly heavy for late morning on a Sunday.  Welcome to the Puget Sound gridlock.  Trip was otherwise uneventful.  The new air governor seemed to be doing its job just fine.

Now we have a very dirty coach to get cleaned up this week.  It will be nice to have two cars again too.

Now in Space 215

Plenty of space.  At least for now.

It can get a bit loud back there when occupied.  Have to turn down my hearing aids I guess!

Trees!! Mountains!!

As we traveled up I-5 to Eugene today we saw trees and snow covered mountains--sights we haven't seen for many months.  It felt like the first time I left Southern California to my new home in Seattle.  Never having been north of Bakersfield (at age 23) I found there were trees, "growing on the side of the road, and nobody planted them!"

Mt. Shasta

Durango RV Resort Red Bluff, CA

We have made it to Red Bluff, CA, staying at the Durango RV Resort on the Sacramento River.  Tomorrow we continue north to Eugene, OR (our longest driving day 360 miles).  On Friday morning we have an appointment at the Cummins repair facility only a couple miles from the RV park we will be staying in, then Saturday move on up to Castle Rock.