The Biscuit is ready to go adventuring again

   POINT RICHMOND, Calif. - California's state parks are closed, victims of the state's pandemic-related, stay-at-home order. But just before the gates closed across the state in early December, Biscuit and I snuck in a three-day camping expedition to Sugarloaf Ridge State Park in Kenwood (Sonoma County), a place that holds decades of history of me.

     Biscuit is ready to go again. Me, too.

Morning view from our campsite

   Adm. Sylvia Fox took a pass on this trip because of tasks she wanted to do at home. Plus, it was going to be damn cold during the longish nights, which spelled quite a few hours in The Red Writer. It can get beyond cozy with the three of us in cold weather.

     The campground is a dry camping spot - no electricity, water from just a few taps and wi-fi is available at the visitor's center at the far end of the area.  No cell phone service at all. 

     But Biscuit and I worked it out, though he wanted to watch a movie, I could tell. Instead, I read book aloud which put him fast asleep.

Biscuit vs. the gophers   

   Biscuit didn't know it, but the trip was an experiment. I needed to see how he and I would fare with just the two of us. Would he wander off? Would he come back when called? Would he eat and be his sociable self, or miss Sylvia too much and mope. Yes, Biscuit is an excellent moper, if he wants to be.

     He didn't wander. He ate plenty and was abundantly social with other dogs and campers. We are working on the recall issue.

     Overall, The Biscuit is now officially cleared for travel, once Adm. Fox and I get the jab of vaccine and feel safe on the road.

   The nearly 4,000-acre Sugarloaf Ridge park is a few miles from Jack London State Park and hasn't changed much since I first visited it in 1970, just arrived in California with my young family from Lakewood, NY after driving cross-country in a 1964 blue VW bus. A ranger named Martin told me if I was looking for an interesting place to check out, I should try this little town not far away called Napa.

     He was right. And a few years later I had graduated from Sonoma State University and was working as a reporter at The Napa Register newspaper. The rest is history.

Pandemic porta-potties

     Portions of the park have burned in recent years in the massive Sonoma County wildfires. But the campground has been spared. This year the pandemic kept it closed for months, then when it reopened the state put porta-potties at each site, cleaning them thoroughly between camper visits. 

     It looks a little odd. 

     But the benefit for campers is they don't have to use their trailer or camper holding tanks if they don't want to.

     Even with many of the trails closed because of the fires, it's a still magical place. And for Biscuit, it was heaven chasing gopher and squirrels.

   We'll go back when the state gives the all-clear, days are longer (and warmer) and the Admiral wants to join the gopher hunting and other fun.

Campsite in the woods, with a private toilet

One of the trails still open after the fire

I had wanted to climb Bald Mountain this trip - no go though

The water is ok for washing, but not for drinking

The creek had frogs and creatures aplenty

Some low-end glamping tents for rent

The Visitor's Center, staffed by volunteers

Biscuit on point - watching gophers

 

Pandemic prompts local & driveway camping

   POINT RICHMOND, Calif. - The long-planned grand adventure of traveling to Oregon & Washington, then east across the northern U.S. and eventually to the Maritime Provinces of Canada has been downsized.

Camp set up at Olema

     Maybe a better description would be miniaturized.
     Thanks a lot, coronavirus!
     Instead of thousands of highway miles, The Red Writer for the balance of this summer will likely do mostly local travel, going to places like Olema, Calif., adjacent to the Point Reyes National Seashore.
    We did one foray there to shake down the rig last week. Another four-day expedition begins Sunday.
     How local is Olema to Point Richmond and SF Bay?
    Thirty miles.
     But last week's trip proved that 30 or 3,000 miles doesn't make any difference in enjoyment.

Biscuit searching for gophers, moles and voles

     We camped among the trees at a private campground. Our Yorkie pup Biscuit was able to run free. And Admiral Fox and an amiga made it to nearby Limantour Beach for a hike while I stayed at camp and practiced the ukulele with Biscuit as canine critic.
     I think Biscuit would have preferred to go to the beach with the ladies, but he was a good sport.
     The only real excitement came a 2 a.m. the first night when we were visited by a hungry raccoon. He got in the tent and absconded with a ripe avocado, passing up a tray of apples and bananas.
     Because the campground is in Marin County, his choice of foods is not that surprising.
     The state parks in California are slowly re-opening, filling up campsite reservations as soon as gates open.
     Once Labor Day is past however, campgrounds will be mostly empty and The Red Writer can expand our travel radius with plenty of places to stay.
     One arguably big trip is being mulled.
     A few days ago a newspaper story about Modoc County in California caught my eye.
     It's a last-frontier kind of place. Kind of wild west. Undeveloped wooded property there is pentiful and relatively cheap. Maybe buying a few acres might be worth considering.
     Might have to break out my cowboy hat to wear on that trip.
     Oh! And Modoc County has not had a single case of COVID-19.

Downtown Alturas in Modoc County, Calif.

The tent has a footprint as big as the inside of the trailer

Test campsite - at our condo in Point Richmond

The Red Writer is safely back in Point Richmond

   POINT RICHMOND - A summer full of travels and adventures that began in early May closed out Sunday when The Red Writer trailer pulled into the condo driveway after the final leg of a cross-country drive - a 250 mile, 5-hour push from Fallon, Nevada.

The Biscuit

     A 3,000+ mile trek from Seneca Lake to California was supposed to go across Ontario, Canada, through the upper peninsula of Michigan and then on a northern route though Montana until turning south in Oregon.
     Note the words supposed to in that sentence.
     What happened?
      His name is The Biscuit, an 8-pound Yorkshire Terrier who joined the family mid-summer and wreaked a certain amount of havoc on travel plans. Ok, a lot of havoc. Originally he was to be a travel buddy on the return trip West. But after only a week in NY it was obvious he was too young and too much a puppy for me handle alone.
   

Admiral Fox with The Biscuit

 Admiral Fox and I flew home with him in mid-July, so he could get settled into a California lifestyle. He's adjusting. We're adjusting. He hasn't asked for a surfboard yet, but he'll probably get one if he wants it. Admiral Fox has had The Biscuit on a daily crash course of learning how to be civilized. His grades are improving she says. (But maybe not quite fast enough!)
      By next spring we all should be ready to drive across the Andes together. Well, maybe something a little less adventurous.
     Wyoming, perhaps? Michigan? Newfoundland?
     After the California hiatus to get The Biscuit home, I flew back to NY to grab the truck and trailer, only to find that the Tundra "check engine" light was on. Santo Crappo. About $300 dollars later - and nearly a week of waiting for the repair shop to fix it - the mighty Tundra and The Red Writer were back ready to roll.
     The quick return drive across the U.S. - a nearly straight I-80 run across familiar territory - was rewarding, if incredibly hot. Every day was 90 degrees or hotter.

     Only two massive thunderstorms overtook me - both times while safely in campgrounds: one in Davenport, Iowa, the second in Ogallala, Nebraska. Quite a change from the eastward trip.
    I have a notebook full of entries about the people, places and adventurous mishaps (of course...) from the westward leg of the trip. Those will spill out here in coming weeks as I try to make sense of my handwriting.
     But for the moment, here are a few photos.

The Red Writer at Bud and Roxanne Hooper's house in Lakewood, NY

Wedged in with other highway adventurers at an RV rest stop in Ohio

The entrance to the Strategic Air Command & Aerospace Museum in Ashland, Neb.

Lakeside campground near Ashland, Nebraska

Near son Jason Fitzgerald's house in Minturn, Colorado

Sunset at Ely, Nevada

Back in California - at Donner Summit

First heat, now humidity - welcome to the Midwest

   ASHLAND, Nebraska - After days of high-altitude camping in Colorado, Admiral Sylvia Fox and I dropped down to North Platte, Nebraska last night, then quickly scurried this morning for three hours to arrive at Eugene T. Mahoney State Park near Omaha.

The Red Writer at Eugene T. Mahoney State Park

     The heat has been about the same as the mountains.
     Hot, hot, and hotter, sprinkled with momentary lapses of slightly cooler air, followed by blast-furnaces doses of more temperature spikes.
     But when we got out of the Toyota Tundra at North Platte, we had something else to contend with: Humidity.
     It was like walking into a sauna - a really hot one.
     Today we are set up in a nice shady spot at this state park and plan a three-day stay. Or longer. The air conditioner is doing yeoman service. And unlike last night in North Platte, there is a nice breeze - even if warm.
     I visited this state park two years ago when I was driving my little red Nissan truck from NY to California.
     It's just as fabulous as I remember it. Hiking trails, small lakes, the Platte River, a fabulous aerospace museum within walking distance and a very neat town just four miles away
     Now if I could just breathe a little easier. Humidity and I have never been close friends.
     On our way into the lodge an hour ago (where this is being written), we got a close up look at the new Airstream trailer design. Several people who have come to take a peek at our T@B trailer have mentioned they were debating between getting a new Airstream like this and a T@B.
     It's very space-age but I think I'll stick with The Red Writer.

Not your father's Airstream trailer