California Trip
Day 1:
Today was the first day of my California Trip. Instead of cleaning house and packing all weekend, I managed to just do a bunch of fun stuff with Richard. We are so awful about accomplishing stuff on the weekends. We did however cut his hair. He had grown it out to 5.5”! Now it’s less than an inch! I really liked it long, but I think short is probably my favorite. It seems manlier on him, I think. But, back to my story: Normally when we go on vacation I pack for weeks in advance, and have an agenda for each day planned out with reservations and everything. This time is the complete opposite and so far I’ve really enjoyed that. Richard did a bunch of laundry while I was asleep last night and we just grabbed a bunch of things we thought I might need and packed them in a bag this morning. I don’t think we spent more than 40 mins. On top of that, until I got here, I didn’t know whose place I was staying at. (I’m up at the Cabin with Eli and Ben tonight and tomorrow)
I left about 7:30am Mountain Time. It was hard to say good bye to Richard. I almost never go anywhere without him…especially not drive clear to California alone. In fact this is only my 2nd solo road trip and the last one was only a 4 hour journey. I got into Hat Creek at 4:30 Pacific Time
I’ll spare you the stories of mind-numbing I-80, the important part was I got here safe and no tickets J Its been a wet year here too in California and everything is super green because of it. I Love it here so much! Even with as excited as I am to leave for Hawaii this spring, it will be sad for me not to be able to just hop in a car and get here and I think part of my heart will always reside in NorCal.
Eli was at my parents place so I stopped there to say hello and have some AWESOME dinner. Then we drove up to Lassen. It was like I never left! I think it’s so fun here at the park because no matter when I come or how long I am here I always end up making instant friends with the other people living here. We watched part one of the last Potter movie and now everyone is fast asleep. I think I’ll join them. See you tomorrow.
Day 2:
I’m sleeping on the living room floor at the cabin so I woke up with Eli and Ben since they have to be to work by 7. I leisurely got ready. I drove up to get the pass from Eli so I wouldn’t have to pay to park. I found him and Ben up at Summit Lake campground, digging fire pits and picnic tables out of the snow! There are still huge drifts up there. I think there is even more snow this year than last year, and last year was an unusually heavy snow fall. Ben told me they got a foot of snow this year in June. I hung out with them for a little while and then drove back down to Manzanita Lake. It was so weird to walk around the lake and not be greeting people and answering questions. It’s actually pretty weird to be anywhere in the park and not be working here.
Manzanita Lake was especially beautiful. I forgot to charge the batteries for my camera so I took some on my phone. Before I had even made it ¼ around the lake I came across two teenage deer eating the fresh growth from the manzanita bushes. I was at most 10 feet from them. They couldn’t decide if I was a threat or not. They would get all nervous and stare at me, then calm down and eat some more, then get panicky again. Eventually they decided it would be best to wander off. Oh I forgot to tell you it’s very cold here still. I had to wear a long sleeve thermal shirt, a sweatshirt, full length pants, wool socks and hiking boots just to be comfortable. I have the trail all to myself. I just love how empty the park is. Its also pretty early still. About ½ way I found one of my favorite hangout spots and watched the fish jumping to catch their breakfast. They would send ripples through the otherwise perfect reflection of Mt Lassen. Little wispy clouds kept getting caught on the peak. I hope the pics from my phone turn off. I propped up against a rock and took a little cat nap in the sun. That warmed me up enough to take off my sweatshirt. As I continued around I found the most adorable family of ducks. Mama Duck had 8 little tiny babys darting in and out of the reeds and playing on the log. It looked just like a scene out of a kids book.
The rest of the way around the lake was more and more happy nature. A fence lizard was out doing his morning pushups, and a pygmy nuthatch was searching for bugs. I also got to see a western tanager and a red headed woodpecker, along with the usual jays and cowbirds. I got to last year’s burn area and a mama chipmunk was scolding her 4 tiny babys that were dashing around one of the trunks of a burned out tree. I just love baby animals so much! The chipmunks and golden mantled ground squirrels seem to particularly like this stage of the burn recovery. I was finding a ton of deer track in the ashy soil too. My favorite muskrat wasn’t at his spot this trip. I wonder if he is here this year.
Went and saw some of my old coworkers at the museum. The 2 older ladies were telling me that a few of their sons were in the same educated and unemployed category as me. I’m so lucky Richard has a full time job. It’s too bad he couldn’t come this trip. I would be nice to share all this beauty with someone else.
Day 3:
We went to watch the last Harry Potter last night. It was pretty good! I had watched the first half earlier and got bored a lot, but this one was much more entertaining! I even cried at one point. We got home and I crashed. Slept from 11:30pm til 10:00am! I went over to our friends Jeff and Amy’s cabin. Amy just had their first baby and he is a handsome little boy. He has just started smiling and I got to see some of them J they lived in Hawaii for several years. I got to talk to them a lot about ins and outs of island life. I’m just so excited when I can post about our life in Oahu! There will be soo many pictures.
Went back to Hat Creek today, I am staying with my mom and dad at our friend’s vacation rental. It’s a duplex to the home I grew up in from age 3-9 so it’s been really nice to hang out here again. It’s so quiet and there are tons of fence lizards running around outside on the cinderblocks and lava rocks. Basically I spent the day just hanging out with my parents and enjoying the relaxing time. Still no internet but we do have a land line here so I got to talk with Richard during his lunch break! Funny how no cell reception can make you so grateful for a land line. I’m finally decompressing from city life too, it usually takes a few days. I just love it out here – it calms me on a cellular level. It’s a total mind and body detox. I’m sleeping in a real bed tonight too! I have been sleeping in a mummy bag on couch cushions at Eli’s and Ben’s so I am especially excited to spend a few nights in a nice comfy queen sized bed. Good night everyone.
Day 4:
AHA! Today we went back to my parent’s place in the orchard, aka Orchard House. Here the internet is hooked up HOOORAY!!! So everything above got posted then. Sadly I haven’t been taking many pictures… Maybe I’ll take more when Eli, Ben and I go camping. The big event of today was me giving my mom a perm! It scares me every time. She has long hair like mine so it takes almost 2 hours to roll. It turned out awesome! I have given her 2 or 3 perms before but I think this one turned out the best! She is super happy with it too. It’s really nice too because it would be almost $150 to get it done in a salon but we can do it for about $25! I’ll see if I can get her to pose for a picture but she’s kinda camera shy. After we finished her hair I went to go visit our family friends around the community. I started out with Peggie. She might as well be my aunt. We hung out for a while just talking about life, her family, our move to Hawaii. On the way out from seeing her I ran into her husband Ross. It was funny because I was in my pick-up and he was in his and we were those two people who block the roads in rual areas hangin out our windows and yakking at each other. Eventually some tourists needed through so I told him I’d try and swing by later so we could have a real conversation. Next I went to visit the Shannon family. I used to babysit their 2 little girls when I was younger… Now they are both taller than me!!! Totally messed with my head! It was fun though to see how grown up they both were. Oh and today marks the first day in a new chapter in my life. My dad had been saving this book for me for a while now and today I started reading it. It will be the first book I have read casually since I started college! I am loving it! It’s called The Highest Tide. So far it has been a really good read. I have discovered though I am a much slower reader now than when I was a teenager. I bet it will come back though.
Day 5:
Today was more visiting with friends. Got to see our friend Page. He is a cool old guy who taught me just about everything I knew about computers before I left for college. I always extra enjoy showing off my work from school because he understands how much work it takes to create this stuff. Also got to see our friend Jim. He has spent time both in Utah and in Hawaii so it was really fun to talk about our move with him. I sure am going to miss everyone here in Hat Creek.
This afternoon my mom took me to her physical therapist; she has been very worried about me having chronic back pain at age 22. He is really really good at what he does, so I was excited to get to meet with him. Sadly it wasn’t good news. He is pretty sure I have arthritis in my lower back’s vertebrae. He told me what kind of doctor to go see in Utah once Richard and I get our insurance figured out. He also showed me a bunch of exercises that can help with the pain, so I’m excited to try that. When my mom and I got back from town I had to hurry up to Lassen to meet Eli. We were going down to Redding to go swim suit shopping. We stopped at Burrito Bandito for dinner!!!! I LOVE their burritos! NorCal Burritos are the best! They seriously weigh at least a pound, possibly two, and it takes me several meals to consume it all. The place we were hoping to look at suits closed before we got there, but we may try again after we go camping. We are picking up our dog tomorrow (she has been living at a friend’s place) and this will be the first time I’ve seen her this trip!
Day 6:
Awe.. Jenny! Eli and I went to pick up our dog Jenny this morning. She has been living with a friend of Eli’s. She is soooo dirty!! He’s got a creek on his property and playing in and out of it is her new favorite activity. She was pretty excited to see me, But more so to see Eli because she is in love with his truck. We took Ben and Eli’s truck out to our favorite campsite only to find they had blocked the road out to it with boulders and ripped the road up with a caterpillar L … We decided this was unacceptable, found a way around the road block and off-roaded it in J It was so beautiful just like it always is. Extra water this year though so it was extra nice! The creek (Butte Creek) was surprisingly not as frigid as usual. It still was cold enough to chill the drinks though so I constructed us a beautiful little creek refrigerator out of stones. It was fun to explore the creek and meadows. We did a little shooting but we didn’t want to attract any unnecessary attention so it didn’t last long. We had hobo dinners and Dutch oven apple crisp for dinner, willow biscuits and S’Mores for dessert. I finished that book I got from my dad. It was really nice, my reading speed has started getting better, but it’s still slow.
Day 7:
It didn’t get really cold til about 4 am then it was soo cold I woke up with muscle cramps from shivering so hard lol. So I pulled the hood of my sleeping bag up so tight I looked like Absolon – the caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland. When I finally woke up for real I made us some yummy breakfast of eggs, bacon and cinnamon rolls. Oh I forgot to mention I’ve just been making food for Jenny along with ours, but more dog friendly of course. I think when I’m grown up and have my own family and dogs that’s what I’ll do too. She seems to enjoy it quite a bit, except when I try to feed her vegetables. She just glares at me like I’m trying to pull off some horrific prank, and slinks away looking betrayed.
We packed up camp and left for my parents. We decided to clean up there considering they have full size showers and then Eli and I went down to Redding to take another shot at swim suit shopping. We came up blank for me but got him all kinds of good stuff. Now I’m back up at Eli and Bens for the night. I’m going to do a little more visiting with friends tomorrow and head home on Monday. I sure miss Richard, but I’m having so much fun out here.
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