Paso Robles day 2

I've always said that memories that you don't remember aren't worth having. Jenny and I have had a truly memorable couple of days. September 11th will forever have 2 meaning for us. Today we said goodbye to the Forester. We rented a trailer, pulled it to the salvage yard and loaded it with our stuff. The new bike rack and the new rooftop cargo box were prioritys. Our plan is to head East, avoiding Atlanta at all costs. I spent a portion of this afternoon cancelling our reservations for campgrounds we will not be visiting on this trip. We hope to be home in 8 days. Tomorrow is Needles CA.

Paso Robles CA

I hope everyone on the East Coast is asleep. We are not any where near Sequoia. We were headed that way on a rural 2 lane road that was pretty bumpy. One of the particularly bad bumps rocked the MP side to side. The accident in Oregon apparently weakened the tow plate under the Forester and the twisting moment broke the tow plate. The car broke free and careened over an embankment down a 60° slope for 150 feet. It didn't roll but it is totaled. We had it winched up the slope and towed here. There are several problems that we haven't had time to address yet. Some of them might not have a solution. We are tired but unharmed. The car broke free and crossed the oncoming lane of traffic. We are lucky there was no one in that lane. We will be busy tomorrow figuring things out. No need to call I'll keep blogging our plans.

Pinnacles day 3

That pine cone comes from a Towani Pine. The only pine tree in the park seems to be that kind. That's quite a difference from

the Coastal Redwood. We did 2 hikes today, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. We especially wanted to visit Bear Gulch Cave. It's not really a cave but it's a huge rock slide with some of the rocks being as big as a house. The CCC, using a lot of imagination, constructed a trail going up down, around and through the this pile of rocks. This was done in 1930, so nearly 100 years ago. We move tomorrow to a commercial campground near Kings Canyon and Sequoia.

Pinnacles day 2

Those acorns are from a Valley Oak. Google claims it's the largest oak in North America. I'm not so sure about that. There is a woodpecker out here that eats acorns. It drills holes in dead wood and stores acorns in the holes. Unsurprisingly that bird is called an Acorn Woodpecker. We had a great hike today. Very scenic most of the time and a little sketchy some of the time. See pics. More tomorrow.

Pinnacles National Park

This is the least visited National Park in California. We drove through miles and miles of farmland to get here. Square miles of grape vines. The park is divided into East and West half's. There is no road that connects the two. We are camped on the East side and will probably stay here all three nights. There are plenty of sights to see here. Apparently this park is home to many California Condors. We will keep our eyes open for a possible sighting. We were able to find the Dish satellites so we have TV but our T-Mobile hotspot is pretty weak. I am going try to post this. We'll see.

Placerville RV Resort day 2

Another great day visiting with Rick and Chris. We drove into Folsom in their Tesla and had lunch. The Tesla appears to be a video game that you can drive. Pretty cool. Placerville was the center of the California gold rush, in fact, just a few miles from here is Sutters Mill, where gold was first discovered. That discovery was the the start of the invasion of California by the 49ers. Tomorrow we move south to Pinnacles National Park. Our route will take us back through Sacramento in order to get us back on interstate 5. It wasn't fun the first time. We will leave a little later to avoid the morning rush. 

Placerville RV Resort

We made it here unscathed. The drive through Sacramento was a white knuckle adventure. Our friends Rick and Chris Arkus served us a absolutely gourmet meal on their back patio. The Chicken was melt in your mouth tender. It was California, free range, organic, fed baby formula and gently massaged daily by specially 

 trained chicken masseuses. Yum. Thanks for the great meal.