Annual Thanksgiving Weekend at Lakeside RV Park in Pahrump, NV.

This has become an annual event for us every year on Thanksgiving weekend.  I think this is our fourth year going to this RV Park.

We started out at our usual 4am depart time, the weather was good. 

Our first stop in Peggy Sue's Diner, north of Barstow, for breakfast and to also give Buddee his breakfast and walk.  We arrived at the Diner a little before 6am so we fed Bud and he got his walk in before we had breakfast, Diner opens at 6am.

With everyone fed we are off to Pahrump.  We go to Baker and hang a left headed to Shoshone.  It is a nice two lane road across the desert.  It is usually a busy weekend for off-roaders dry camping along the road.  This year was no different and we saw several little cities of all kinds of RV's and off road vehicles along the road.

We hung a right at Shoshone and arrived at Lakeside RV Park in Pahrump at about 10am.

We love this campground for its fall colors.

 

After we got checked-in and got setup we called friends who have recently retired to the community of Pahrump.  We then joined Eldon and Nancy for a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner at Preferred RV Park in Pahrump.  We had a great time visiting and enjoying the traditional Turkey and dressing.

Usually we head into Death Valley for a day trip of sightseeing, but this year we decided to check out Mt Charleston and the snow.  It is nice to just visit snow and not have to live in it.
So Friday that's what we did.  It was a nice drive and I have added a few photos of the day trip.

 

 

 This is heading up Kyle Canyon with Mt Charleston up ahead.

 

 

 As we got closer the snow got deeper.

 This was up at the Lodge area.  We didn't see any ski lifts open, but did see some sledding going on.

 The return trip back to the main highway we headed down Lee Canyon.

 

On Saturday we met with Eldon and Nancy at the Nugget for a morning brunch and then they joined us at the MH for a nice afternoon visit.

Sunday we were up early and headed for home after a great weekend.

 

 

 

Grand Tetons-Yellowstone Trip

We started our two week vacation on May 25th heading for two days and three nights in the Grand Tetons NP and six days visiting Yellowstone NP.

First night stop in Cedar City UT at the KOA we got up at 3am and were on the road by 4am.  Arrived at the campground without incident and got setup for the night. 

Got up and on the road by 9am the next morning heading for Traveland RV park in Logan UT for our second overnight stop. Unfortunately our second day of travel was not without incident. 
Just south of Salt Lake City the passenger front tire tread separated from the tire doing 65mpg down Interstate 15.  Let me tell you there was several more gray hairs added to my head.  We managed to limp off the freeway and called Good Sam Roadside Assistance.
They managed to find a new tire and have it on the rim and back on the RV in four hours.  Whew!!!  Don't want to do that again. Still managed to make it to our destination on the same night.

Here is a picture of the tire!

 



The next day we got to our first destination, The Grand Tetons NP.  This park has some fantastic views and very majestic mountains.  It is very hard to put into words so I hope that the pictures will do it a little more justice. I will admit the pictures do only so much and they can't show the views like being there in person.  We spent two days and three nights in the park, staying at the Colter Bay RV park.  Nice park with Full Hookups and close to the Jackson Lake Marina.  We did have rain while we were there so there wasn't much sunshine but we still managed to do what we wanted to do while we were there.  Most of the rain was at night so it made for some good sleeping weather. They said there was a resident fox but we didn't see it while we were there.

   

 

Then we were on our way to Yellowstone NP.  This is one of our favorite parks, so far.  We love all the animals that we see when we go there. We setup up our home base at Grizzly RV Park in West Yellowstone. Nice RV Park with Full Hookups.  One of the reasons we decided to do a spring visit was being able to see all the young animals and to avoid the mosquito population.  The weather is a little cooler but that is okay with us.  I would much rather use the furnace a little in the morning and evening than having to use the A/C.  The sleeping is much better also.  We spent most days inside the park driving around and checking out all the animals. One of the best viewing areas for animals is the Lamar Valley area on the Northeast side of the park.  One day we spent staying in West Yellowstone, we did some shopping and Robin did some laundry.  The last day we were in West Yellowstone we took a little side trip to Mesa Falls Scenic Byway in Idaho, about thirty miles from West Yellowstone.  It was a nice little scenic drive with two stops at two awesome waterfalls.  The last falls we stopped at, the Ranger Station had a scope set up watching an Osprey nest with Mom sitting on her eggs.  Pretty cool to see.

 

 

Rancho Jurupa Campground

Last weekend we had the opportunity to check out a new local campground in Riverside county.  It is a county park, website here .  It is only a 40 mile drive from the house so it makes a good weekend getaway.  Though it might be considered an urban park it has a nice country feel to it. 

The campground itself has two camping areas,

Cottonwood loop, the newer of the two, which is where we stayed.  This loop is much nicer than the Lakeview loop, but it is a little further away from the lake, It is still within walking distance.   It offers FHU and free wifi and cable. So it has lots to offer for a county campground.

Lakeview loop, I am not sure of the amenities of this loop, but it definitely has more mature shades trees.  In the summer that would definitely be a plus. 

As I mentioned it also has a stocked lake, and I actually saw someone carrying a nice stringer of fish.

There are also a couple of kids playgrounds in the day use area and a mini golf course.

The sites are good sized and if you review the campground map carefully you can find some that have large grassy areas around them like Site# 217, the one we were in.

Across the street there is a big sport park, we did not check it out.  Sounded to much like work.

We were both getting over a cold so we stayed pretty close to the site and just sat and enjoyed the sunshine.  The weekend ended in a very windy night that had us chasing our patio furniture around at 2am.

It was a nice campground and one we will definitely be going to again.  One thing you might want to consider is that it will probably get rather warm in the summer months.

Didn't take to many pictures, but enjoy the few I did take.

Christmas at Santee Lakes 2012

With the Christmas season here again, we set off to spend a few days at one of our favorite campgrounds, Santee Lakes.  I am off work until Jan 2, 2013 but Robin had to be back to work after Christmas. 

We checked into the campground on the Saturday before Christmas and we were staying until Christmas day. A friend of ours who winters in Quartzsite joined us for the stay and celebrate the Christmas holiday  The weather was on the cool side and we did get some rain on the morning before Christmas.  But otherwise it was all good. 

The dogs, as always, enjoyed being out and about and Buddee enjoyed long walks around the lakes. We always like spending time watching all the ducks that are always on the lake and they are always looking for a free meal.

The Christmas Eve dinner consisted of Prime Rib that was slowed roasted in Karen's slow roaster/BBQ.  This was a test for a Prime Rib in the roaster and it passed with flying colors.
Along with the Prime Rib were side dishes of mashed potatoes, green beans, candied carrots and a perfect ending of pumpkin pie.

On Christmas day we leisurely packed up and headed back home.  Robin back to work and me to do some chores.

Hope you enjoy the pictures and wishing everyone,

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!

We spent our annual Thanksgiving weekend at the Lakeside RV Park in Pahrump, NV.  The weather was perfect, lots of sunshine and no wind.  We stay at the same campground every year, I really like the fall colors and if we don't feel like cooking the restaurant is pretty good.
Saturday night is prime rib buffet....YUM!.

A friend from Quartzside came to enjoy the weekend with us.  For T-day dinner we had a Honey Baked Ham w/mashed potatoes and candied carrots....another YUM!

On Friday we took a drive into Death Valley to take a tour of Scottys Castle only to find out that is really was never Scotty's Castle. Info on Scottys Castle.

One the way back to the RV park we took a little detour on the Borax Canyon road.

Saturday we stayed in town and went to a couple of small swap meets and stopped at the local Winery.  We relaxed at the campsite and enjoyed the sunshine.

It was a great weekend and can't wait to get out again.  Hope you enjoy the pictures.

Big Bear, Serrano NF Campground

We had the pleasure of spending last weekend at Serrano NF campground, next to Big Bear Lake.  We took the day off on Friday to get an early start up the "Big Hill" before the temps got to hot.  It was also Robin's birthday so we wanted to enjoy the weekend for as long as we could.

We arrived before noon on Friday and our site wasn't available yet so we parked off to the side and waited to get the signal that it was ready.  We waited about half an hour and we were waved into the campground.

The loop we were in didn't have any hookups but the sites were large with lots of space between campsites.  There were mostly tenters around us. It was in the mid 80"s and humid but we had lots of shade.  The evening cooled off nicely so we had good sleeping.

Saturday we woke up early, Buddee (dog) wanted to get the day started with his walk, so off we went to explore the area.  There is a bike trail the goes along the campground with the lake nearby so Buddee got this walk and back to the campsite for their breakfast, Buddee and Liz.  About 10am it clouded over and the T-Storms started.  Nothing scary, just a nice rain that pretty much continued off and on for the rest of the day.  Weather cooled down to mid 70's, we could sit under the awning and watch the rain. After the heat and dry weather we were experiencing at home it really felt great.

About 3pm the sun came out for awhile.  There was a big classic car show in Big Bear for the weekend, I am sure they didn't appreciate the rain like we did.  There was a caravan of all the cars making a trip around the lake, which brought them right past the campground.  We went down to the road and watched as all shapes and sizes of custom autos drove by.
It started raining again shortly after the drive by. The night was dry and sleeping was good with the cool temps. Here is sampling of the cars in the show.


Sunday morning it was time to pack up and head home again.....another great camping weekend.  Hope you enjoy the pictures.

Guajome Campground, Oceanside, Ca

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Get your own

We worked a half day on Friday and took off for a weekend campout at a local campground.  This campground is located east of Oceanside and is part of the San Diego County Park Sytem.  This little park has 35 campsites.  W/E with a dump station located at the exit.

We got to the campground about 2pm, traffic sucked.  We had reserved site#18 for our stay.  The site was great, long and plenty of camp space.  We relaxed the rest of the afternoon, maybe even dozed off a little bit.  Dinner were cheeseburgers and salad and baked beans.

Buddee and I spent some of the weekend exploring the lake area and the little hiking trails.  This area has lots of birds and different vegetation.  We had lot's of little walks enjoying the area.

It was a very relaxing weekend.  We are going to come back to this campground, it is within an hours drive of home and doable over a weekend.  It must be popular as it was booked all weekend.