Day Tripping

No Rest For The Weary!!

That's how life has been for the past month or two.  Ever since my return to full work duties we've been to many locations to repair various broken plastic items.  Some work sites have been day trips.  Some work sites have been over night trips.  All have been without our home.  Roamin has had to stay in Rocklin because there weren't any RV parks nearby.  After this past week living out of a suitcase in hotels, it sure feels great to be home again!

In early July we took a day trip to Carson City, Nevada.  This was work related in a sense.  We ordered a generator and had it shipped to a store there because it isn't sold in California.  Fortunately, we live close enough to make a fun day trip.  

We decided to take the scenic route past Lake Tahoe on our way there.  Although the scenery was pretty, the traffic was horrible.  It was Saturday of the July 4th weekend.  Seems everyone and their uncle was in the area.

There were a lot of people on the beaches, a lot of people walking along the streets visiting the stores and eateries, a lot of people enjoying the afternoon sunshine.

Lake Tahoe has a shoreline of approximately 71 miles.  There is never a bad time to visit the area.  The summer months recreation includes swimming, boating, scuba diving, mountain biking, hiking and many more.  Winter activities include skiing, snow mobile rides, snow shoe excursions plus others.  It's a popular year round destination.

Our time in Carson City was brief.  After picking up the generator we needed to fill our empty tummies.  We ended up having a delicious burger at a restaurant in the downtown area.  It was once a famous hotel.  It sits across the street from the State Capital Building.  

   
While taking a brief stroll through the capital grounds and along the street I noticed something embedded in the sidewalk.  And another.  And another.  Google told me why they were there :-)

Turns out there is a self-guided walking tour.   You can find and learn about the historical landmarks with a map purchased at the visitor center or free online.  Only wish we had more time to take the walk.  Next time around.

The remainder of June and all of July found us going from place to place repairing slides, water tanks and even an auger at a food processing plant.  Sometimes we brought Rufus along for the ride and sometimes he went on a doggie vacation, meaning he stayed at someone's home and got to play with his friends :-)

The Legacy Ranch had a broken bulk head fitting on a 10K gallon tank that needed to be sealed.  We were able to repair the damage while enjoying the sounds of horses neighing in the back ground. 

before

after

nice view

We've been to Stanislaus Foods a few times.  Their augers take a lot of abuse so when they break, we're called in to repair them.  Of course we couldn't bring Rufus along on this trip.  He was visiting his friend Nash and his owner Sheri.  He didn't miss us at all since he was too busy rough housing with Nash, napping, taking long walks and lounging poolside!

Most of our playground slide repairs are out in the heat and sunshine.  We recently purchased a shade canopy.  We think it's the best $50 investment ever!  Not only does it keep us out of the sun, it keeps our work area out of the sun as well.

Usually we try to schedule our repairs around Mother Nature.  But this summer has been very hot and the work still needs to get done.  On this particular day the temperature was a whopping 108 degrees Fahrenheit.  The canopy helped, but so did the cold water :-)










We got an emergency call one Monday morning in late July.  Good thing we didn't have onsite work scheduled for the day.  A fire truck had a leak in one of it's tanks.  We told them to bring it by our shop and we'll get you back on the road.  The owner was from Montana and had been battling the Detwiler Fire in nearby Mariposa County outside of Yosemite NP.  This fire hugely impacted us because my Mom lives in the area.  She and her husband had to be evacuated for about a week.  Luckily they were able to hitch up their 5th wheel and stay at the local Red Cross shelter while Montana Fire and others worked to save their home.  Mom and Roy are safe and back home now :-)  The fire truck was repaired and was on it's way to another fire further north in Redding, CA.

heroes come in all shapes and sizes!

After we finished up with the fire truck we loaded up Red and headed out again.  This time we were back in the Lake Tahoe area.  Incline Village has a park with two play areas.  Due to the extra volume of snow they received over the winter, their playground slides were in need of major repairs.  We knew it was going to be a huge job so we set aside two work days (just in case) to complete the task.  It did take us the two full days to repair all of the damaged areas!

another beautiful work location  :-)

We did manage to find a geocache while we were in the area.  Do you remember the 1960's era television show Bonanza?  It was centered around the fictional Ponderosa Ranch located near Lake Tahoe.  In 1965 a theme park was built on land in Incline Village.  Ron was lucky enough to visit as a youngster.  I had to wait until now to visit.  The land was sold in 2004 and the new owner closed  the theme park. 

The geocache is simple enough.  Take a photo of anything in the area and it's considered a find.  Yep, we stopped by and got a photo or two.  The sign basically says No Trespassing.  All that's left are some unused buildings.  Although we did see a white truck in the yard, we didn't see any people around.

We now have the Nevada souvenir on our Geocache profile page :-)

We brought Rufus along on a few of our recent trips.  He knows the routine.  He lets us do our work and then when we finish we walk around the area for a bit and he gets to run free :-)

this grass feels good under my belly

almost done?

I see Mom, can we go run around now?

On our last trip we brought home our newest addition to the "R Family".  Rainier is a beast!  More on Rainier in my next post.  Here he is parked next to our site in Rocklin this morning.

Rainier is a Ford F-350 dually :-)