Long Time No See

Yes, it has been quite awhile...  I simply got too overwhelmed with life and the blog suffered.

Both Ron and I needed a break from the stress and decided to take a week long vacation between Christmas and New Year at the Escapees Park of the Sierras located in the foothills outside of Yosemite National Park.  You must be an Escapees member to stay there.  They have a first time visitors discount so our week was only $62 plus electricity.  We ran our electric fireplace the whole week and our bill was just $32!

The park sits on 160 acres, 40 of which remain undeveloped, in the Sierra Nevada foothills.  This a co-op park.  Each member of the park volunteers in various capacities to keep the park in good working order.  When one of the members takes their RV on the road that site is put into "rental status" and visiting Escapees members (like us) can stay in the park.  It's simply gorgeous here and we considered joining the co-op.  But not right now.  So maybe in the future this will be our home base...

there are plenty of open spaces in the park

complete with views too!

During our stay at Park of the Sierras we ventured out to nearby Yosemite and Bass Lake areas.

We entered the park from the south along highway 41.  We've never come in from this entrance.  The cost to get in was $30 per vehicle.  The 5 day pass would have been useful if we had planned to spend more time there.  No worries, we still enjoyed our day!  Not wanting to drive the additional hour to The Valley Floor (we've been there many times), we took another road.  We ended up driving through what looked like rental homes.  There was even a small school.  Perhaps this is were some of the seasonal workers live.  The road ended near some trails.  Hmm, wonder where this goes??

The trail wasn't exceptionally long but we did end up at some gorgeous waterfalls!  Of course we lingered and took plenty of photos :-)


The next day we decided not to revisit Yosemite and instead visit Bass Lake.  Plenty of areas to explore here too.  The lake was so low!

such a sad sight, we need more rain

 
According to the trail map there are some waterfalls around here somewhere.  Let's go see if we can find them.  Never did find the falls, but the adventure sure was fun!

what's that circle thing?

still not sure how it got there, but it looks interesting

the creek is flowing nicely

   
We left Park of the Sierras just before New Year's Eve.  The next day we awoke in a new park.  Still not back to Rocklin.  We decided to get a couple of slide repairs done while out and about.  This is, after all, how we plan to succeed with our 'working retirement' so why not make the most of it.  Nothing special here so no photos.  We did accomplish our goal of finishing the two slide repairs in two days so all is good.

Another Project Is In The Books

before

After our return back to Rocklin Ron began another home improvement project.

Each RV is unique.  The cabinets are different.  The closets are different.  If you've had more than one RV, you know the drill.

There simply wasn't anywhere to put the X-Box.  Roamin had a shelf under the TV with the stereo lower and to the left of the fireplace.  Raven has a completely different arrangement for the entertainment center.

Ron's solution: let's see what's behind there and maybe we can make it work.  Spoiler alert: it worked :-)


So on a January weekend while I was away from home (more to follow) Ron tore into the walls with his trusty tools.  He really does enjoy his DIY projects.  The pantry door came off, then he cut into the side of the cabinet behind the TV.  To his relief, there's plenty of room back there for him to make an added shelf for the X-Box.  

Measurements were taken.  Wood was purchased.  Wood stain was custom matched to the color of the faux paneling.  After many trips back and forth between the house and the shop Ron finally attached the finished shelf to the back side of the fireplace plywood! 

  

    

Each day when Ron began working on the area the fireplace was moved aside.

 Behind the fireplace there are plenty of wires.  That's also where the sub-woofer is mounted.  The fuse panel is under the pantry which adds to the quantity of wires.

The stereo was moved to the far left.  On the right is where the X-Box now resides.  The center cubbie holds our Roku and the X-Box controller.

Part of the idea is to never need to open up the space behind the TV again.  But in reality it's always a possibility.  To help accommodate this Ron made two hinged doors to close up the wall between the two areas.  Plus we don't want the pantry contents to fall into the abyss when we're moving :-)

The cabinet came with one shelf in the middle.  When Ron was done, he added two more shelves in there as well.  Now we have plenty of room for other stuff.  In the process we cleared two other small cabinets.   

after, just needs the trim put back in place

The project came out great!  The X-Box has a permanent home.  I have more open cabinets.  

It's a Win-Win :-)