Leaving Sacred Rocks and arriving in Arizona

Tuesday 3^rd

They started to tarmac the roads through the campground today.  Our timing, as usual, is great.  A week before or after and we would have missed it!!!  Actually, it wasn’t bad.  Tomorrow they will be doing the part by our site. 

Bryan’s ears are getting better slowly.  He sits or stands with a heated mug over his ear for a lot of the time, but it seems to be helping.  

We went to a little store in Boulevard and picked up a couple of items.  I realized today that this was the town where the recent kidnapping took place where a girl was kidnapped and her mother and brother were found dead in a burnt out house. Here is the news article.   The girl was rescued alive in Idaho and her kidnapper, who had been a family friend, was killed.  Small world, it seems impossible that a quiet place like this with such a small population could have been put on the map by such a tragic event.

I watched Andy play today and he won.   Quarterfinals next against Wawrinka who beat Berdych today.  Everyone is happy that Berdy is out but Andy always seems to have tough matches against “Stan the Man” Wawrinka as well, we will see.  I will probably miss the match as we are moving to our next spot on Thursday when it is due to be played.

Wednesday 4^th

They poured the asphalt by our site today.  Bryan watched them very carefully to make sure they didn’t “splash”  Lily or Tilly.

We went for a walk on the trail in the campground.  They have a labyrinth here that is supposed to help relax you and work out any troubles.  I walked around it while Bryan  and CoCo watched.  It was kind of relaxing but didn’t take me as long as it was supposed to so I’m not sure if I walked all of it although I think I did.  The paths around here are really interesting but we didn’t cover hardly any of the 45 acres that comprises the campground and trails.  Maybe another time, we are still working on the fitness aspect!!! 

We gave our coffee table to the owners here for the park.  It is really too big for Lily and gets in the way whenever we move and so we were glad to donate it to a good cause. 

We started to pack up ready to move tomorrow and researched where to stop.  We aren’t sure how far we will get so have a couple of parks picked out ready.  Working out the route and finding campsites seems to be what takes longer than anything else, especially when you are on a tight budget and need to keep your costs within a certain limit.  Still, what else do we have to do, right!!!!  We are already finding out that plans change frequently. 

Click Here for more pictures of the labyrinth and our walk today

Thursday 5^th

We got on the road at about our usual time of 10:30am.  It is much better without the coffee table as we have room to walk through Lily again with the slides in.  Andy will be playing as we are on the road today and so I will not be able to watch him.  I tried to get the match on my phone and managed to get livescores.  Unfortunately, it was very upsetting watching a score changing and being able to tell he was struggling to hold his serves.  I followed the first set, which he lost after a long final game where he lost his serve.  We were getting close to the campground where we had decided to stop and so I turned it off in the hopes he would play better and that he wasn’t injured in some way.  It wasn’t to be and he lost in straight sets.  Needless to say I wasn’t in the best of moods when I found out. 

When we got in our spot at the campground the jacks wouldn’t come down to level Lily.  The site was quite level and so we left them up as we will be leaving in the morning.  

Bryan is a little concerned about the batteries in Lily recharging.  Yesterday at the campground the power went out for a short time.  Our inverter did what it should have and took over supplying the power to Lily.  I wouldn’t have known the power was out except Bryan was out and met the camp owner who told him.  Anyway, since then the electrics seem to have been acting up and we don’t seem to be getting as much power as we should be.

We went shopping to replenish the fridge and food supply.  

The site here is very basic but the lady that checked us in was very nice and gave us information on the area.  It is a gravel site with a small concrete slab for a patio area.  There is a canal at the back of the campground that we can use to take Coco for a walk.  It will be ok for one night and is very close to the freeway and a Passport America park, which means we get 50% off.

Friday 6^th

We decided we would stop at Casa Grande tonight but the only campgrounds I could find needed reservations and so I phoned before we left to make our reservation for one night.  This is another Passport America park.  At least we are making our membership pay for itself.  

We called the military RV Park at Davis Monthan as well to see if they had any vacancies if we turn up in the next few days.  You can’t make reservations in advance here and so we wanted to see if they were full or not.  They told us there were plenty of spaces at the moment.

The drive was uneventful.  The only stop we made was to fill up the gas tank!!!

When we went to set up at Fiesta Grande RV Park our electrics wouldn’t work at all.  We couldn’t get any power from the post into Lily.  Bryan tried several things to figure it out but was stumped but we were pretty sure it was connected to us losing power at Sacred Rocks.  The generator worked and we managed to get the air conditioning on as it was very warm.  Bryan called a mobile technician who said he would be out after he finished the call he was on.  

Bryan called Johnny Walker RV who installed the inverter to see if they had any ideas.  Now, you may remember that we weren’t impressed with their service division when we had the work done but they were very helpful this time and walked Bryan through some different options.  Eventually, we found out that by turning all the power off and turning all the breakers off and then reconnecting the power and turning the breakers on one by one everything worked.  The system just needed resetting, so we learned something else.  We had the same problem with the internet connection and reset that as well, although the connection here is slow for me.  Our leveling system now works again as well, yippee.  We called the mobile tech to cancel him and saved ourselves some cash!!!

There is a nice dog park here with real grass so CoCo is happy.  We decided to stay here through the weekend and leave on Monday as we are both tired and the people seem very nice and friendly.  Again the sites are gravel and a concrete patio area.  Bryan went to go for a swim but the pool was not very clean and he decided against it.  Someone had put two fake snakes by the pool area as well, supposedly to scare critters away but as many of you know Bryan and snakes don’t go well together and even though they were fake I think they still creeped him out a little.

Saturday 7^th

We had a relaxing day today.  Bryan had to go and buy two new hoses from Walmart as he discovered some small holes in ours when he was draining the tanks and water was squirting out so it was time to replace them.  He went there while I stayed in and watched tennis minus Andy Murray, boo!! hoo!!  Still a good game between Djokovic and Stan Wawrinka. With Djoko winning in the fifth set.  Nadal won his game a little easier in three sets against Gasquet but it was a closer match than I thought it would be.  So it will be Nadal and Djokovic in the final on Monday.   

Bryan watched Nascar and football.  LSU were playing and won their game easily. 

Bryan discovered there are rabbits here as well, as when he took CoCo out for her nightly walk they scattered very quickly from the dog run.  Again, it was a good thing she was on her lead.

Bryan’s ears seem to have recovered now and he is back to normal or as normal as he can be!!!!

Goodnight, tomorrow we will try and take some pics of the park here.  Take Care.

Lily, Tilly & Milly and a visit......

Saturday 31st August

We opened the windows and doors today to try and get some ventilation and to see if it helped Bryan.  Bryan did laundry and I cleaned out the bathroom closets and reorganized.  They tell you that you will need to purge every six months and we have already lived in Lily longer than that.  We were having problems with everything in the bathroom cabinet falling out whenever we opened the door after travelling and so I have reorganised it and hopefully that won't happen now.  We will see!!!  Bryan mounted the extension cord inside of the cabinet so we can have our razors plugged in and out of the way.  It looks much better.

 Notice that I called the motorhome Lily.  A friend of mine told me that her son had called his new dog Lily the same as the motorhome and I suddenly realized that I hadn't been calling her by her name.  Poor Lily, ha!! ha!!  So I will try and remember, Lily = motorhome,  Tilly = Our Chevy Malibu car and Milly = the bear that my sister in law kindly sent me some years ago.  There is a rather long story that goes with Milly that I will tell you another time.

Ok, maybe I'll tell it now.  On one of my visits to England, to spend time with mum while my brother & sister in law went on holiday, I was amused by the number of teddies that were sharing the bedroom.  I decided that I would write a note from one of the teddies to Julie, my sister-in-law, telling her how pleased the teddy was that Julie was back as she was fed up with being kicked off the bed by this intruder (me). On my next birthday I received a present from England in the shape of a teddy bear complete with note.  She had been sent by her relative teddies to keep me company as they had been missing me or something to that effect.  I still have the letter somewhere and if I come across it I will rewrite this with the exact words. And so, Milly was born.  She has always been on all our travels with us, even before we started living in Lily fulltime.

 I know crazy but goes to show that Julie is as crazy as I am!!!!

I watched Dan Evans in his match against Tommy Robredo which he was very close to winning but unfortunately lost.  He has done exceptionally well here and hopefully he will continue to improve.  

Sunday 1st September

Today we had a visit from what I think is a Pocket Gopher.  It could be a vole or a ground squirrel as well, but from my research I think the gopher is the most likely.  He or she was digging tunnels by the side of the motorhome and close to our planter. He was very quick and this picture is about the best I could get.

 He had just finished the hole on the right and was starting on this one at the bottom of the planter.

The link below goes to a video that shows him going back to the hole on the right and filling it in and then coming back and making the hole by the planter bigger and he comes out a little to look at the planter.  He was fascinating to watch.

Gopher Video

We went for a short ride to take a look around.  We went to Lake Morena County Park.  We didn't stop and park as we didn't want to pay the fee. We were going to go to Pacific Southwest Railway Museum but they weren't open.  They usually open Saturday & Sunday but they were shut on this Sunday.

Bryan's ears are still not right and so we have been taking it easy. We are still trying different things to see if we can figure out what will work and if he gets better before we leave we will maybe try a couple of the walks by the campground. 

I watched Andy Murray win and so was happy and Bryan watched Nascar.

Monday September 2, 2013

Today we booked the campground at Pensacola - Oak Grove Park, Pensacola, Florida from December 2nd, 2013 - January 2nd, 2014.  This is the campground by the beach on the Navy base in Pensacola where we have happy memories of good times in the cabins with Ryan & Bryan's parents.  We like Pensacola and it is close to Crestview where we have to register Lily by 4th December so we will spend Christmas & New Year here.

We both felt really tired this morning and Lily seemed very stuffy so we opened up the windows and the door all day to get some air in.  It felt a lot better.

I wasn't going to watch any tennis today but saw that Robredo had won the first two sets against Federer and so had to watch the remainder of the match which Robredo ended up winning in three sets.

I did some more research on "ears" and after trying several different things Bryan eventually got some relief by heating up a coffee cup and placing it over his ear.  He repeated this several times and it eased the pressure in his ear but didn't unblock it.  We will see what tomorrow brings.

Take Care everyone......

Military Beaches and Sacred Rocks Reserve

Tuesday 27th
Bryan wasn't feeling well today.  His ears felt as though they were blocked, like when you go on an airplane and his breathing was affected.  It was really miserable for him.  We went to the pharmacy to get some Sudofed and nasal spray and got the humidifier out.  Nothing seemed to work and so we went to the base doctor and he had an ear infection so got antibiotics for that.  Hopefully that will help.
Here is a picture of the lake from our motorhome site here at Lake O'Neill. The bug zapper seems to be working overtime.  I have also bought a bracelet which I wear when we got out walking.  It seems to help and I haven't had any more bites although they did "fog" the lake Sunday night which probably helped as well.  They will do it again tonight.

Wednesday 28th
We went for a ride to look at the campgrounds that are on the beach here at the base. We didn't get out of the car as we didn't want to risk Bryan's ears getting worse. The campgrounds get booked up quite quickly and so there wasn't any vacancies when we inquired. The first one at San Onofre wasn't too bad and it was nice to see the ocean.

Beach at San Onofre Military Campground

Beach at San Onofre military campground

Campsite at San Onofre military campground.  How about that view!!!

We quite liked it here although the sand would probably be a pain with the motorhome.  There are some sites on concrete which would be a little better.  Dogs are not allowed on the beach though and there really isn't a lot of places to walk them.

Next we went to Delmar campground, also part of Camp Pendleton.  This is a photo of the beach there.  The beach is a little nicer than San Onofre but the campground was worse in our opinion.  It seems popular with surfers.  Also, there were amphibious military vehicles driving through the middle of the campground on their way to and from the ocean.  Hmmm, I guess this is a military campground.

  

DelMar, Camp Pendleton beach

We stopped for lunch before going food shopping to stock up for our week at Sacred Rocks Preserve which is quite a distance from supermarkets.  Andy Murray was playing tonight and so after we got home I settled down to watch him.  He won, yay!!  Quite appropriately, Ryan & Christina posted on facebook that they were at Murray Lake here in California at the same time Andy was playing.  

Thursday 29th

We got packed up quite quickly this morning and left. We were glad to be leaving as the stay here hasn't been the best what with the bugs, bombs and Bryan being sick. We stopped to fill up the motorhome with gas and were on our way by 10:30am.  We had about a two to three hour drive to Sacred Rocks Reserve RV Park.  We made good time and got there about one o'clock.  We got into our site but had trouble getting the satellite dish to lock onto a signal.  Oops, no television.  Now, we are in the middle of the US Open Tennis and Bryan likes his sports as well so we discussed what to do. 

We knew it was because of the trees that were around us so we asked if we could move sites.  They are not that busy and so it wasn't a problem.  It started to rain which made it a little more depressing, now we were trying to move and getting wet at the same time.  At least we had managed to get here before the rain started so didn't have to drive in it. Three hours and three sites later we finally managed to place the motorhome in exactly the right position to get a signal.  Hooray!!!  Now, listen to this - Sue DROVE the motorhome!!!!  Well, not exactly drove but moved it forward and backwards in the spot until the signal lined up with Bryan directing.  Don't get to excited I only moved it about a foot and there wasn't really anything close by to hit.

While Bryan was hooking everything up I made a pizza as we were both starving. 

The park is under new ownership and the new owner had met us as we checked in and when we were trying to change sites.  This park is known for it's solitude and a place to relax and escape the world, so it was amusing to him that we needed the TV so much.  Bryan explained that I was a tennis addict and the US Open was on.  He told us that if we couldn't get a signal and I missed the Open this year he had an apartment in New York that he would let us use for the US Open next year.  Now, I'm not sure if he was serious but it made us laugh and I told him I felt better already.  He drove around the park later asking everyone if everything was alright and to let him know if we needed anything.  He certainly is very customer oriented and it made a nice change to have someone so keen to help.  Let's hope he stays this way and the park prospers.

We took CoCo for a walk, there is a dog run here where she can go and be off her lead and run.  She likes that.

Since we got here this afternoon we have seen hummingbirds, wild turkeys and guinea hens.  Here is a picture of the turkeys taken while we were on our walk.

And here is a picture of Sue and CoCo.  See how CoCo is looking at the turkeys!!

We went to bed exhausted but happy to be here. Oh, and Dan Evans won his second round match, woohoo!!

Friday 30th

Today was to be a relaxing day.  Laura Robson and Andy Murray were both playing.  Laura was on early at 8am and so I made sure I was up and ready to watch her.  Unfortunately she lost but was playing the #5 seed, Li Na who was out for revenge as Laura had beat her at the same stage in this tournament last year.  Andy won although it took him 4 sets.  

Bryan realized that he was out of Sudafed and so we went out to the local small store about 5 miles away and fortunately they had some.  We also picked up some ant killer as we have seen some ants around here.  

Unfortunately Bryan is still not feeling that good although we worked out it is worse when he sits in the living room.  We now think it may be the spray we put down for the bugs when we were at Lake O'Neill that he is having a reaction to.  CoCo has been a little quiet so maybe it is affecting her as well.  Tomorrow we will open all the windows and take the rugs out just to see if that helps.

That's it for now, take care everyone. :)

Bugs and Bombs......

Friday 23^rd - Well, the bombing/firing practice stopped just before midnight last night.  Fortunately it didn’t start again until about 9 this morning.  Today we are going to take it easy after traveling yesterday.  Bryan put BBQ ribs in the crockpot and I made a potato salad.  I just love the crockpot as it doesn’t heat up the RV and we don’t have to BBQ out in the heat.  If any of you have any good crockpot recipes let me know. 

Saturday 24^th – We went out food shopping today and Bryan got home in time to watch Nascar.  The bugs are spoiling this place a bit as I really don’t want to go out and get bit.  I got some vitamin B-1 tablets today as they appear to make some people immune from bites and I am willing to try anything!!!  When Bryan got back from taking CoCo for her late night walk he had seen that a lot of people had got the electronic bug zappers so we decided we will go and look at those tomorrow.

Sunday 25^th – The explosions started at 7am this morning after finishing at 11 last night.  Our neighbor told us today that they are firing rockets, which explains the multiple explosions!!  Maybe we should buy some earplugs to go with the zapper.  

 We went out and ended up buying this Stinger Bug Zapper, we will see how it does.  We also got some marigolds to put in our planter.  I read that mosquito’s don’t like the smell of these, so who knows.  Probably a waste of money but we needed something else in the planter anyway.  

Bryan watched the Saints preseason game against the Texans, which they won.  The camp host came by to tell us that they are “fogging” the lake for mosquito’s between 2am & 4am tomorrow and Wednesday so to make sure we didn’t take the dog out or go out and to shut all our vents.  As we will be in bed at that time it shouldn’t affect us and will hopefully kill off some of the bugs.
Was sad to see Las Vegas got hit with floods in the NW part of town which affected some of my friends.  Please stay safe everyone.

Monday 26^th – Firstly, Happy Happy Birthday to our eldest grandson Bailey who is 5 years old today.  It looks as though he had a great day, thanks to his mum sharing on facebook.
We were going to go to the beach today but it started to rain.  It turned out to be a couple of showers but it was enough to make us change our minds. 

The US Open tennis starts today and so I didn’t need much persuading to stay home.  Two Brits got through to the second round.  Dan Evans, a qualifier, won his match against Nishikori the # 11 seed.  Fantastic match for him.  I have been watching a few of his matches lately and he has been doing very well.  Laura Robson also won her 1^st round match.  She has been out with a wrist injury and so it was good to see her get the win.  My Andy isn’t playing until Wednesday and so I will have to wait to see him.   I’m not sure why the reigning champion doesn’t play until the third day when some players will play their second round matches then. Seems a little unfair, especially when the #7 seed Federer plays the night match on the opening day!!! Some things will never change!!   Let’s just hope it doesn’t rain and put him even further behind and having to play catch up.  Sorry, got carried away; you know me, tennis and Andy!!!!  

On the road again.....

We were up early, had breakfast, packed up and headed out.  I really don't like travel days!!!  Today I was really nervous and I'm not sure why.  It's not Bryan's driving as he is very very good.   I think it is the roads here in San Diego and California.  They are very very busy, that together with the fact that we are driving our home complete with everything we own.  I'm sure I will get used to it.  I don't think it has helped as we have had some minor things break and go wrong and I just worry about what will be next.  Now if we can go through a period where things are ok I will feel better.  I shouldn't worry because we are very lucky to be able to do this and the things that have happened so far haven't really stopped us, they are fixable.  Today, we put some wooden blocks under the steps to get in and out of Lily as they are loose and need rewelding.  These will work until we can get them fixed.
We are now at Lake O'Neill, Camp Pendleton We are in the middle of a marine base, it is huge!!!  There are tanks and military vehicles on the roads and they are practicing on the shooting range so we can hear some loud explosions.  That together with the helicopters flying over means we should have an interesting week.  Surprisingly, Co-Co seems unfazed by it.  Our internet is working, it is the first time we have used it.  Yay!!  
We got settled in and then went and explored the base.  We like to look in the military shops and see what they have.  The Exchange here is supposed to be the largest marine exchange in the States so I was excited to see it.  Hmmmm - sorry Marines but the Navy have you beat.  The Navy exchange in San Diego is much larger.
We took CoCo for a short walk tonight by the lake. The midges were out in force as it was getting near to dusk. Ugh!!!

Returning home after our walk