Bakersfield, CA in Orange Grove campsite

Well, we have arrived in Bakersfield, CA and we had some challenges along our way. Lary had to put in a new battery even before we left home, and then we spent a very chilly windy night in Walmart Nanaimo parking lot Saturday night.

We wanted to head out early, but then found that the first Duke Point ferry off the island wasn't until 10:15 AM. Thank heaven that sister Jen knew that so we made a reservation on the Saturday evening.



Sunday morning we got the ferry we wanted, in fact we arrived ages ahead of time, so we were off. Ferry cost $228. ouch.



US Customs loves us so much that they pulled us over to inspect, and took away some Chinese snow peas and some Green onions, most of the allium family is forbidden at the moment.



Spent the first night in Centralia WA, furnace worked well and we needed it.



Next day off at 8 AM and in rain until southern Oregon when the sun came out. Drove right through to Redding CA and even there it was chilly, but clear, and there were roses in the campground. We enjoy JGW RV Park on Riverland Drive, they have tons of drive through sites, and very easy access off the highway.



Next morning the battery wouldn't pull in the slides, it kind of died so we called a mobile mechanic, he came pretty promptly, and found a circuit breaker near our battery had tripped, so they reset it, and we were off again.



He suggested that with 3 slides we should really have a pair of batteries working together, so that we something we planned to do soon.



We reached Loomis in CA and it is near our friends Corky and Cynthia Guenter, who we had met in Budapest this past autumn. They live in Folsom, outside Sacramento. Set up in the Loomis campsite, and made an appt with Camping World very nearby for the next morning.



Spent a very enjoyable evening with the Guenters at their house, and stayed the night with them. They fed us monster steaks, and tons of win



Next day we took the trailer to Camping World, they put in a second battery and then tested our electric system. The tech found that our 30 amp extension cord was badly frayed both ends, hmmm, and that we could use a change of circuit breaker to our converter. It had been tripping a lot ever since we got the new trailer, so we made an appt for them to do that the following morning. Cynthia cut Di's hair, and did a great job. We took Cynthia and Corky out to dinner, and spent the night in the trailer in the parking lot of Camping World.



Up and into their shop at 8 AM, the same tech changed the circuit breaker as mentioned above, and we had them mount a carrying tube for the sewer hose, under the body of the trailer. Di also bought a carrying tube for one of her flutes there, we won't tell anyone that it's really a carrying tube for sewer hose!!!



Off just after 10 AM that morning, and drove right through to Bakersfield that day, long but clear without much wind or weather to speak of.



We are in a lovely park here, it's an orange grove as its name says, and there are tons of trees, all covered with oranges not quite ready to be picked yet. So very pretty. We can't pick the oranges on the trees inside the park, but it's OK to pick them at the edges of the park so we will likely do that tomorrow AM before we leave.



Today we went into Buck Owen's Crystal Palace, a music venue and dining room, full of his memorabilia, he died in 2006, but won a ton of awards and had a very successful career. It was fun to see his clothing, guitars, and tons of photos of him with many recording and giants of the screen and music industries. Then we went to a couple of antique malls, it is cold overnight, but warm during the day, the campsite has morning coffee and donuts on offer, and this morning there was a craft show put on by the Elks who are camping here at the moment. The park is enormous, gravel sites, but very wide, long and mostly pull throughs. It must be very popular in warmer weather, the orange trees dividing each site make it very pretty indeed. The office people are super friendly too. We shopped for groceries at Albertsons.



Forgot to add that we finally broke down and bought an AT & T pay and talk phone, and we called June Carlson who is in our house for 2 weeks, all well there, and weather sucks as it's rainy and windy, and will be for some time to come up there. June had a conversation with Dyson vacuum cleaners tech support as our vac wasn't working when we left home, but it seems to be working now. Thank you June.

Off tomorrow toward Desert Hot Springs, it's again chilly tonight down here, but hey, it's not raining or windy. And it's winter here too, after all.



We are already appreciating the bright blue skies down here.