Up, down, hot, cold, lush, dry

Fallon, NV – We’re now in Nevada! And even though we covered 148 miles, it seems like we've en-tered another world. When we got on Highway 50 this morning the day was beauti-fully clear.  The road continued to rise as we got closer to the Sierra Nevada Mountains and Lake Tahoe, and the temperature did just the opposite.

Glimpses of snow-capped peaks became more frequent, and then, when we rounded a bend, we saw the white stuff on the ground by the highway – just little patches in the shadiest spots, but snow nonetheless.  Magnificent ponderosa pine trees lined either side of the highway, tall and dark green, throwing cool shadows across the road.

We passed a couple of small towns, but the one that made us laugh was Kyburz. There was one lone truckstop with a sign that read: “Welcome to Kyburz. Now leaving Kyburz.” It may as well have added “don’t blink!”

Four, five, six thousand feet of elevation, noted the roadside signs. And on the RV’s thermometer, the numbers plunged from 17C to 11C and even down to 3 degrees Celsius.

At a pullout, we left the highway to really take in the scenery.  Under a bright blue sky, pine trees stood tall and behind them were folds of mountains, richly green with forest and, further away, white with snow.  A bright blue tongue of water was visible in the distance; our first glimpse of Lake Tahoe.  We shivered in our light clothing when the breeze whisked past us, and Val couldn’t resist picking up some roadside snow to toss a snowball. (Not at me!)

The road took a steep decline as we approached the town of South Lake Tahoe.  We were hoping for a pullout once we got closer to have a good look.  We did see the lake’s beautiful blue water, studded with whitecaps, in between a few buildings.  From that point on we passed casino after wedding chapel after hamburger joint after condo, without any public spaces in between. To be fair, there were pullouts around the east side of the lake, but they were all on our left side with almost no warning to allow us to slow down and make a turn. Too bad.

By the time we were on that side of the lake, we had left California with nary a sign to indicate that we had crossed the state line. And then came the large, frequent and generous pullouts! None with a view of the lake!  But we stopped anyway for lunch and took in great lungsful of clear mountain air.

In no time, we had descended from the mountains and were in a completely different landscape of high desert plains studded with sagebrush and hardly a tree anywhere. We passed through Carson City, Nevada’s capital, and on through Dayton and Silver Springs – all with a distinctive cowboy-western look and feel, with corrals and tumbleweed and big sky. Such a contrast!

Rich man, poor man

Placerville, CA – After picking up some brochures at the KOA office, we decided to drive in to Placerville and visit some local museums. The GPS took us there in an easterly direction via the state highway, and as we came to a rise of land, off in the distance was a breathtaking view of the Sierra Nevada mountain range, all white with snow, and the rolling green foothills between us and the horizon.

When we arrived at the town’s museum, we found out it was closed.  It’s not exactly high season for tourism right now, so we weren’t too surprised. After driving around a bit, we spotted the Chamber of Commerce with a “Visitor Center” sign, plus a city lot across from it offering two hours of free parking.

Brooks was the name of the woman who greeted us inside and offered lots of useful tips and advice about visiting the area, as well as more maps and brochures.  The main street of Placerville has lots of vintage buildings, and we stopped for a tasty lunch at Bricks, on Brooks’s recommendation.  We also visited the hardware store down the street, which has been in continuous operation since 1849!  It had worn wooden floors, stone interior walls and a huge inventory of fascinating items.

We headed out of town, after our little stroll, on Highway 49 toward Coloma, the town where the discovery of gold triggered one of the biggest migrations of people in US history. The highway had more twists and turns than any other we’ve been on this trip, through hills and valleys, and with almost no shoulders at all.  It also had lovely rural scenery of small farms, grazing sheep and trees with spring-fattened buds.

Marshall Gold Discovery State Historic Park is the name of the former town of Coloma, which is now almost entirely made up of preserved historic buildings. The spot was chosen in the late 1840s for its river and for the tall ponderosa pines – a perfect setting for a sawmill that would provide wood for the construction of buildings in New Helvetia, the town 45 miles to the west that would later become Sacramento.

James Mar-shall was the partner of town builder John Sutter, and the man who would construct and run the sawmill.  Workers had dug a chan-nel from the American River for the sawmill, but it needed to be deeper. After further digging, Marshall went, on the morning of January 24, 1848, to inspect the watercourse, and noticed some shiny flecks in the water.  He picked them up and had a closer look, and realized it was gold.

His comment about the discovery to the sawmill workers was like a match striking dry grass.  Word of it spread like wildfire, and the Gold Rush was launched.  Thousands came to seek their fortune.  Marshall’s life did not unfold as one might have imagined, however.  The sawmill was abandoned, and his efforts to find more gold were not successful.  He bought land and cultivated grapes, but by the time he died, at age 74, he was alone with only $200 to his name.  Ironically, the monument that was later raised to honour his role in US history cost $9,000 to build!

Golden opportunities

Placerville, CA – We’ve made ano-ther move, as we have done multi-ple times this trip, but today’s was significant. After head-ing west, more or less, ever since January 9 when we left Ottawa, today we made the turn to travel east.

Planning this leg of the journey will be an interesting exercise, because we will have to take a lot of factors into consideration. We always try to limit the distance to under 250 miles per move so fatigue doesn’t set in. We are now heading toward mountains, and that means high altitudes, and that can mean freezing temperatures overnight.

An overnight freeze could damage the RV plumbing unless we drain the pipes and detach our water hose.  We also have heaters for the holding tanks, and of course the furnace keeps our tootsies cosy but also mitigates against the plumbing issue. We just have to watch the weather and altitude with each change of venue.

Our trip today brought us along Highway 116 through Vallejo, on the shore of the northernmost bay near San Francisco. From there we headed northeast on Interstate 80, past fertile fields of grapevines and cattle farms.  The sun was shining and the air was beautifully clear, although as the day progressed great billowing clouds began to form to the east. 

We drove through the state capital, Sacramento, shortly before arriving at our destination. This city was a major distribution centre during the Gold Rush of the late 1840s, where railroads, stagecoaches and roads intersected and fortunes were made.

Gold was first discovered right around here.  Placer (pronounced “plasser”) gold was found as nuggets of various sizes mixed into soil, and the main way it was collected was by panning in streams. This town was called Dry Diggin’s at first, because miners here would truck shovelfuls of dry soil to a place where they could run it through water to sift out the gold.

The other nickname for Placerville was Hanging Town, because numerous outlaws were dispatched here at the end of a noose.  When the town started to be more settled, citizens thought it might be better to rename it. The town is at the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains.

Before settling in at the KOA here, we went into Shingles Springs, the small village nearby, in search of fuel for the RV.  The cashier at the gas station gave me a free bottle of chilled water after I paid for the fuel.  We then turned in to the Honda dealer across the road, because we needed a new wiper blade for the car’s back window wiper. They had a caddy there where you could help yourself to free popcorn, so I filled a small bag to munch on.

On signing in at the RV park, our host offered us a free container of instant hash brown potatoes, and a small gift bag with candies and a garbage bag. We did rather well today; maybe we should have tried panning for gold too!

It all started with a grape

Petaluma, CA – As I headed out of the KOA park to the early service at the Epis-copal Church in Petaluma this morn-ing, I saw two cows calmly grazing among the flowerbeds.  They are quite big animals when they’re not dotting a hillside 100 yards away! By the time I returned, the cows were nowhere to be seen, so they must have found their way back to their appropriate grazing spot.  Maybe the fresh green sprouts were too tempting; everything is bursting into bloom here.

Our outing for the day was to see the wine country of Sonoma and Napa, although it didn’t take much driving to come across endless vineyards, covering the rolling hills with striped rows of dormant vines. While we are not avid oenophiles, and I actually don’t drink wine since it can trigger a migraine, we still appreciate the art and diversity of wine making.  It would be unthinkable to travel through the heart of the California wine industry and not stop in for a look-see.

A beautiful castle set against a mountain backdrop and surrounded by acres of vines was our first stop just outside Sonoma.  The owner of the Ledson Winery built the castle as the family homestead, but there were so many inquiries about when the winery would be open to the public that he turned it over to the business and set up house elsewhere.

Even on a Sunday morning, there were groups of wine enthusiasts in various wood-paneled tasting rooms, looking much like students in a classroom.  Lots of vintages were on sale in the wine shop, as well as accessories and deli offerings.  Outside, the expectant vines, pruned lovingly for optimum output, stood ready for a new growing season.

We continued along the highway into the town of Sonoma, and made our way to the town square.  Sonoma City Hall stood at the centre of the square, surrounded by green space, and in a ring around the park were small restaurants, hotels, boutiques and gourmet food shops with free tasting signs in the windows.  Naturally I had to pop in for a chocolate tasting or two!  We ordered lunch at the Sonoma Cheese Factory and enjoyed it on the patio outside.

The Kunde Estate Winery on the Sonoma Highway covers 1,850 acres, with a wide variety of soil types, topography and even climate conditions, all of which produce different grapes and different wines.  Apparently the volcanic soil from lava flows five million years ago, in which some of these vines grow, is responsible for producing the “complex, intriguing wines” described in the estate’s literature.

It was inter-esting to compare different vineyards.  Some vines were slender and young, while others had clearly been there for many seasons, with thick woody trunks and twisted branches. Colourful wildflowers flourished between some rows, while other vintners kept the rows free of all extraneous vegetation.

A few miles further along, we came to the town of Napa, with its Victorian houses along the main street, lined with more fruit trees covered with a white froth of fragrant blossoms.  Our pleasant Sunday drive continued through more huge tracts of vineyards as we circled back to the KOA. 

The land of giants

Petaluma, CA – The KOA staff here gave us a little pamphlet with a self-guided tour of the Sonoma area and the nearby redwood forest, which we decided to follow today.  It was a clear sunny day, in the low 60s F, as we set out past rolling green pastures of local farmland.

From wide farms and ranches, we proceeded into more forested areas, passing lots of vineyards on either side of the highway.  Unlike the lush green vines hanging richly with grapes that we saw last summer in the Niagara region, these vines were naked branches, dormant and black, awaiting the coming growing season.

The first stop was at the Kozlowski Farms, where the small store displayed shelves full of jams and chutneys, salsas and sauces – with sampling stations – as well as a bakery case full of homemade pies, tarts and squares filled with fruit grown a few yards from the store.  We selected three jars of jam, a blackberry oatmeal square and a couple of small apple tarts for later consumption.

It was close to lunch time when we stopped at the Korbel Champagne Cellars, a large establishment founded in the 1880s. The Korbel brothers found that the region’s early morning fog and long summer days produced some of the best champagne grapes in the world, and apparently the Korbel Brut is the most popular champagne sold in the US.

We sat on the patio next to a trickling fountain to enjoy our freshly-made deli meal.  It could have fed four of us, but it was delicious! Lovely scents from the beautiful gardens nearby wafted past as we ate.

A string of small resort towns followed, with picturesque boutiques and eateries nestled in among groves of tall redwood pines. There were lots of weekend visitors enjoying the outdoor patios and window-shopping as we drove by.

Long lines of cars were parked along the road as we approached the Armstrong Woods.  We managed to squeeze our little Honda into a roadside spot, and set off on foot along the shortest of many walking trails in the forest.

It was lovely to feel the spongy ground under our feet and to gaze way, way up to the top of these ancient giants.  The woods were chilly in the dense shade, and the wooden rails along the trail were heavy with emerald-green moss.  A wonderful smell of wet earth and pine needles surrounded us, and we could hear the trickle of a small stream nearby. The oldest trees were around 2000 years old and soared more than 300 feet into the sky.

After a magi-cal stroll, we continued toward the Pacific Coast and joined throngs of visitors look-ing out at the crashing surf and harbour seals lolling on the sand, and gazing out to sea in hopes of spying the spouts of passing whales that migrate along the coast this time of year. Our tour brought us home again, past peaceful cows grazing in the lengthening shadows, after a perfectly lovely day.

Small town claims to fame

Petaluma, CA – After a long and very full day in San Francisco yesterday, we decided to take it easy today and take care of some housekeeping chores.  I opened the Zanin barbershop for one special client, and we topped up the windshield washer fluid reservoir in the RV – exciting stuff like that.

It was also time to replenish the grocery supply, so we drove in to Petaluma with our list in hand. The town is quite pretty, especially right now as all the fruit trees are bursting into bloom, and the daffodils are up as well.  The historic downtown section looks like it belongs in a movie set, which it has done for some classics such as American Graffiti and Peggy Sue Got Married, among others.

The town’s name does not come from “petal”, as one might think because of its strong agricultural character, but rather from an early native name meaning “on the back side of the hill”.  Some interesting things happened in Petaluma.

The town got its biggest boost during the California Gold Rush, when thousands flocked here to make their fortune. Following the devastating San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the town became a staging location for rescue efforts, since its bedrock foundation spared it from much damage.

The Mediterranean climate and fertile soil gave Petaluma its strong agricultural base, and for a time the chicken industry was responsible for its nickname of Egg Capital of the World.  In 1911 the very first airmail letter was posted from here, making the trip via airplane from here to Santa Rosa, just a few miles away.

More recently, in addition to its role as a movie location, Petaluma was a longtime host of the annual arm-wrestling competition (called wrist wrestling at first), and still gleans international headlines every year when the World’s Ugliest Dog Contest takes place. 

The hand-built guitar amplifier designed by Randall Smith of Mesa/Boogie of Petaluma was the preferred choice of Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, and actors Lloyd Bridges and Winona Ryder come from here.

We didn’t buy eggs, exhibit an ugly dog or shop for a guitar amplifier, but our little grocery-shopping trip into Petaluma on a sunny spring day was a very pleasant interlude for us!

Prison bars and cable cars

Petaluma, CA – The alarm clock roused us from sleep at six o’clock, because we had a 35-mile trip in to San Francisco and we had to report at the bus tour terminal for 9:30.  Tales of traffic jams on the bridges prompted the early departure, since we would be heading in at the height of morning rush hour.

Our precaution was merited. We made it in with almost 30 minutes to spare, but it meant we had time to get parked and check in without the slightest hyperventilation.  Always a good way to start the day.

The notorious federal prison Alcatraz was our first destination, via a ferry boat ride across the San Francisco Bay.  The island of Alcatraz is surprisingly close to the mainland, considering how impenetrable it is reputed to be – or rather inescapable.  Icy water, infested with sharks and rife with undercurrents, presented a strong deterrent to prisoners, although our guides told us the sharks were small bottom feeders with no interest in a diet of human flesh.

The island was first used as a fortress to protect the bay, because of its strategic location. It became a federal penitentiary in 1934, and until it closed in 1963, it housed, on average, 260 inmates.  Prison guards and their families lived on the island as well, in quarters next door to the prison block.  The island is a bird sanctuary and boasts some beautiful gardens that were established by the non-prison residents.

It amazed me to see, in the bookshop and gift shop, the huge range of products related to the prison that were offered for sale, from coffee mugs to replicas of the keys used to lock the cells, fridge magnets to reproductions of wanted posters of the worst felons. They even had the elderly William Baker, prisoner number 1259, seated at a table signing copies of his book about his days in Alcatraz, with a lineup of eager buyers!

Back on the mainland, we connec-ted with our city tour bus and headed out to see the sights.  It was great having a dri-ver navigate the narrow streets and steep hills while we simply gawked.  Houses on the city’s streets are jammed one against the other, block after block, with hardly a blade of grass or tree anywhere. There are no grocery stores or gas stations, and we were told there are only three car washes in the entire city!

We visited the Golden Gate Bridge – with time to actually walk on it and feel the rumbling traffic zinging past – and Golden Gate Park, a beautiful green space with gardens, playing fields and museums.  Chinatown – the country’s largest – fills several city blocks, and the Haight-Ashbury section of town still bears the psychedelic graffiti from its hippie days in the 1960s (remember? “If You Are Going to San Francisco…be sure to wear some flowers in your hair.”). 

Cable cars navigate some of the steepest hills in the city – there are 48 hills in all, and some almost made us dizzy as we looked down from the heights.  The locals are very conscious of caring for the environment, with hybrid taxis and recycling programs. We rounded out the day with a seafood dinner at Pier 39, overlooking the bay as the sun dipped and the lights began to sparkle across the water.