Cars, Trains and Boats

It was another beautiful Sunday morning (Oct. 14) as we made our way down from the foothills and into the agricultural flatlands of California's central valley.  This time it was a short hour-long drive to the very small town of Nicolaus.

We found our RV park at Lake Minden and pulled into one of the narrow spaces.  Unlike Lake of the Springs RV park, Lake Minden was compact with tight spaces, more activity and no deer.  The lake was the main attaction.  It was like an oasis in the heart of the farmland.

Ron's passion for trains put the California State Railroad Museum first on our list of places to visit.  Sacramento was only a half hour drive, so we spent the day visiting the museum and wandering the streets and shops of historic Old Sacramento.

The railroad museum is incredible . . . probably the best one in the country.  We never get tired of seeing its displays.  There are more than 20 restored locomotives and railroad cars, thousands of smaller exhibits and artifacts, and an extensive collection of toy trains that includes an operating Lionel layout. 

Here are a few photos of train stuff:

Huge Cab-forward Engine - Built in 1944 and taken out of service in 1956

Old Timer wood burner from the early 1800s
 

Train Kitchen

Restored dining car displays table settings from different railroads



Operating toy train lay-out

An important part of California's Gold Rush history has been preserved in Old Sacramento State Historic Park along the banks of the Sacramento River.  This district was the commercial center of the Gold Rush.  It was also an important transportation crossroads, connecting supply roads from the mining regions to the railroads and river steamboats.  Sacramento became the state capital in 1854.

It was interesting to learn that, after the city's commercial district had gradually moved eastward, the old district became a slum.  It continued to deteriorate until a redevelopment plan was adopted in the 1960s.  Since then, 53 commercial buildings have been preserved or reconstructed and Old Sacramento is now a National Historic Landmark and major tourist attraction.  With lots of shops and restaurants, it's a very nice place to spend an afternoon.

 

Second Street - Old Sacramento

Old Sacramento

Ron was ready to make another trip to Sacramento to see the car museum when he discovered that the International Auto Show was taking place.  So, while Bonnie was learning the creative art of "beading" at the RV park, Ron returned to Sacramento to the Auto Show.

The show featured the usual new car models as well as historical vehicles, horseless carriages, classic cars, art cars, motorcycles, etc.  This year, electric and hybrid vehicles were especially popular.  But we won't bore you with dozens of car pictures.  Instead, we'll include just a few of the more unusual vehicles.

This is an "Art Car", plastered with pens of all kinds.

Ron found the most interesting part of this show to be a small display of restored recreational vehicles.  He talked with the owner of this 1948 travel trailer who did most of the restoration work in his driveway.  It was like new inside and out . . . very nice!

And how about this motor home?  It would attract a lot of attention in any campground.

On Oct. 20, Lake Minden was the site of the annual hydroplane races.  It wasn't a real big event and the boats were fairly small, compared to those that race in Seattle's Gold Cup on Lake Washington.  Even so, the participants were enthusiastic about their sport and the competition was fierce.  It was a fun event for the campground to watch and a nice way to spend our final day at Lake Minden.

California Gold Country

 

Lake of the Springs RV Park

On the final day of September, we said “Goodbye” to Weed and continued south on I-5.  About 230 miles later we arrived at Lake of the Springs.  This beautiful campground is tucked into the rolling Sierra foothills with lots of oak and pine trees, nice views and trails along the lake. 

 

Deer and wild turkeys wander freely throughout the park at all hours as if we humans weren’t there.  It was amazing to sit outside in the evening and watch a family of deer pass through the campsite, just 20 feet away.

A small portion of this sprawling campground offered full hook-ups (water, electric and sewer).  Since it was fall, there we no crowds and we were able to nail down one of the most convenient spots in the whole place with full hook-ups, peekaboo view of the lake, and within easy walking distance of the campground store, lodge, mini-golf, shuffleboard and laundromat.

Many RVers are avid TV watchers who often have satellite systems that are roof mounted or set up on tripods.  Either system requires careful aim at the right satellite to get good TV reception, and trees are often in the way. So, when we’re lacking good entertainment, it’s always fun to watch our neighbors fiddle with their dish antenna, sometimes for hours, trying to find the best location.  We also hear some folks suggesting that park staff “top” the trees to improve their TV viewing.   Our TV reception comes to us via our simple rooftop antenna . . . no satellites involved.  If we can’t get a station, we listen to the radio, other music, or enjoy the silence and sounds of nature.  At Lake of the Springs, we could pick up just two TV stations.  One was a shopping channel with sound but no picture and the other was a religious station with nothing but Bible scriptures.  We didn’t watch much TV and didn't miss it a bit.  Ron did go over to the lodge to watch a couple football games, since the lodge had a satellite dish.
 

Lake of the Springs is a couple miles from Oregon House, which is not really a recognizable town, but a scattered rural community.  The “town center” of Oregon House is a combination general store and deli where local folks can have breakfast or lunch, get gas or propane, rent a video, read the newspaper and buy their milk, bread, liquor, fishing tackle and other necessities.  It’s no Walmart, but it serves the purpose in a much more personal manner.  The local Post Office is a mile or so down the road.

Dobbins Farmers Market

A few miles further down the road is Dobbins, another small community.  We missed it the first time we drove by, but later returned in search of the Saturday morning farmers market.  It’s a very relaxed and friendly market with a nice variety of fruits and vegetables, along with arts and crafts items such as jewelry, tie-died apparel and some very unique bird houses.  We picked up some multi-colored cherry tomatoes, berries and a very sweet melon of some kind, similar to a honey dew.



Dobbins Store

Like Oregon House, Dobbins also has a small market, along with a school, Grange hall and attractive small white church.

One morning we drove over to Brownsville, another small community.  We were standing in the middle of a bakery parking lot looking around and wondering where downtown was when a friendly lady named Lynn noticed that we were possibly lost.  She asked if we needed directions and, after we explained our purpose for being there, we all went into the bakery and talked over breakfast.  It turned out that Lynn had lived in Malibu and worked for many years as a set designer for television sit-coms.  When she retired she moved to Whitefish, Montana for a short time, but it was too cold for her.  So, she bought a small farm (75 ac.) just outside Brownsville and is in the process of restoring the 130 year old farmhouse and the grounds.  She was excited about her project and, since we showed interest, she invited us over and gave us a tour.

Partially restored farmhouse

Lynn's horses love pears

Lynn had two “rescue horses” that she adopted from Horse Plus Humane Society near Rackerby.  She suggested that we stop by and see what they are doing, so we did.

We got a personal tour of the facility and got to meet some of the horses that are being cared for.  Horse Plus takes in a few goats, cows and other animals, but specializes in horses that are mistreated, unwanted or in need of care.  They help about 1,200 horses a year.  A main mission is to save horses from “killer buyers” who gather up unwanted or sick horses, ship them out of state and sell them for slaughter.  Unfortunately, there are more horses in need of good homes than there are homes.  So, if you have a small ranch, you can adopt a very nice healthy horse from Horse Plus for around $400 . . . an excellent deal!

One of the horses ready for adoption

This guy needs a home too.

We have both been through this territory before and have visited the historic gold mining sites and gold rush towns.  So, we didn’t want to do too much of that again.  We did, however, drive up the road to spend an afternoon in Grass Valley and Nevada City.

In 1850, George Knight stubbed his toe on a piece of quartz laced with gold and that started a rush to Grass Valley, which became the richest gold mining city in California.  Unlike many gold towns that became ghost towns, Grass Valley survived and prospered.  It now has about 13,000 residents, a busy and attractive downtown, and plenty of tourist attractions, including the famous Empire Mine (now a state park) with its 367 miles of passageways.

Grass Valley

We walked the downtown and stopped at a local saloon for a cool one during Happy Hour.  The main attraction was a small bar dog who sat on his stool and greeted everyone coming in and out.  Very cute!

This dog has his own bar stool.

Nevada City, another historic gold mining town, is a short distance from Grass Valley. We stopped to pick up a little railroad history at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad Museum.  It’s a small but enthusiastic operation and they stayed open after the 5:00 pm closing time to make sure we got the full tour and more information that we could digest.  Volunteers are rebuilding some very old wooden rail cars while maintaining a couple of old narrow gauge steam engines.

Rebuilding an old wooden railroad car.

We had a great time during our two weeks at Lake of the Springs.  Now it’s time to move along down the road a few more miles.

 

Moving South

Idaho is a great state with lots of nice people and interesting things to see and do.  We could have spent more time there, but we wanted to move along to Oregon fairly quickly.  As it turned out, the Potato Museum was the highlight of our Idaho visit.  Since departing Pocatello on September 17, we’ve moved ahead 1,000 miles.  We crossed Idaho and eastern Oregon and landed in the dry manzanita and scrub oak foothills of the Sierras near the very small rural community of Oregon House, east of Yuba City.  We lacked good internet service for a while, which explains the long gap since our last blog entry.  But, let’s not jump too far ahead too soon.

Caldwell, Idaho RV Park and pond

The long drive from Pocatello to Boise, mostly on I-84, was comfortable but, frankly, not very interesting.  We passed Boise and stopped for a night in Caldwell before crossing into eastern Oregon.  The Caldwell RV Park was a step back in time.  Many of the old deteriorating travel trailers in the park had obviously been there for years and the park itself was suffering from a lack of maintenance.

On the positive side, the park was on a small private lake and adjacent to the Boise River, with nice walking trails along both.  On the other hand, the park was also adjacent to the freeway and a rail line, which produced an irritating duet of constant noise 24/7.  We stayed one night and were very happy to move on into Oregon.

Eastern Oregon is beautiful in its own unique ways.  It’s hilly with lots of rocks and sage and clearly not designed for human habitation.  Surprisingly, right in the middle of this vast expanse of open space lies Burns (pop. nearly 3,000).   We wonder how Burns manages to survive.  It doesn’t seem to change much from year to year.  Most newer businesses have located along the highway, leaving the old downtown with an abundance of empty storefronts.  Burns serves the basic needs of surrounding ranches and small farms and is a convenient pit stop for people traveling between Boise and Bend.  That’s probably all it needs to keep the town alive and its service businesses healthy.
 

Old Camp Casino RV Park

This year we discovered something new in Burns . . . the Old Camp Casino.  It was listed in one of our campground books as having a reasonably-priced RV park, so we decided to give it a try.  The casino itself is fairly small but had a nice little restaurant as well as complimentary coffee and soft drinks (Ron is highly attracted to freebies).  The casino is housed in a fabric covered tent-looking onion-shaped structure on the edge of town.  It provided a quiet place to park overnight with full hook-ups but it was a bit sparse and short on amenities.  That might explain why we were their only guests.  The casino was badly in need of business, so we had a hearty lunch and Bonnie tested her luck at the penny slot machines.  Luck was with her that day and she managed to walk away a few dollars ahead.

The only other “camper” at the casino was a friendly single guy living in a pick-up.  He tipped us off that that a group of antique motorcycles would be roaring through Burns that afternoon.  So, Ron went down to the Best Western Motel to take a look.  He knows very little about motorcycles, but was very impressed that a group of about 70 antique bikes, all of which were at least 80 years old, were doing a cross-country ride (the Motorcycle Cannonball) from New York to San Francisco.  It was quite a spectacle . . . not something you see every day.

Motorcycle Cannonball - Burns, Oregon

We arrived in Bend, Oregon on Sept. 19 and set up camp at the Thousand Trails park near Sunriver.  The last time we camped here was the first week of May 2010 and it was cold and snowy.  Not this time.  This year it was hot and smoky, thanks to a forest fire west of Bend.  The campground was nice and woodsy and very comfortable.

Gary and Terry stopped by for a visit.

An old friend from Ron’s high school days lives in Bend.  They lost contact and hadn’t seen each other for nearly 50 years, until a high school band reunion got them back together last year.  We got together with Gary and his wife Terry at the Bend Oktoberfest and a couple other times during our week in Bend.  They gave us a tour of the area and invited us to their home for a delicious barbecued lamb chop dinner.  In turn, we hosted their visit to our humble campground and some casual shopping in Sunriver Village.

After a week in Bend, we followed Highway 97 south through Klamath Falls and on to our next stop at the Friendly RV Park in Weed, California, near the base of Mt. Shasta.  While in Southern Oregon, we wanted to visit some friends in Medford but didn’t want to take the motor home through the Rogue Valley, then over 4,000 ft. Siskiyou Pass.  Our solution to this dilemma was to camp in Weed and do a day trip in the Honda back to Medford (about 80 mi.).  It worked out very well.  We had breakfast with Dennis, who Ron worked with for about 15 years.  Then, we spent part of the afternoon with Eric and Lynne . . . friends since 1979.  We don’t see some of our friends very often but we value their friendship and it's well worth going a bit off our route for a quick get-together whenever we’re in their general neighborhood.  Who knows, the next opportunity could be years away.

Mt. Shasta at dusk

The state of California is heavily agricultural, so they are particular about what people bring into the state.  If you've ever driven into California, you're aware of the agricultural inspection stations that are placed near the borders.  They check mainly for fresh fruits, vegetables, plants and even firewood.  We had some firewood, but they didn’t ask . . . so we didn’t tell.  When asked about fruits and veggies, we told them we had some small items in our refrigerator, and a small papaya that we purchased at Harry & David in Medford.  The inspector said he would normally ask us to dump the papaya, but he let it pass this time.  Nice guy . . . excellent papaya!

We were nearing the end of September, but fall was nowhere in sight.  The forecast was for gradually higher temperatures in California’s central valley, with 100 degrees forecast for Redding.  After three nights at the Friendly RV Park in Weed, it was time to hit the road again.  We had five or six hours of travel ahead of us, so we got an early start and headed south on I-5 into the great Central Valley.

I-5 southbound near Lake Shasta

Lake of the Springs

Our destination was Lake of the Springs, another Thousand Trails RV park about 70 miles northeast of Sacramento in the beautiful foothills of the Sierras.

We’ll tell you more about that area in our next blog entry.  Stay tuned.