Back in Havasu

Yesterday we got back to Lake Havasu City Arizona. It was a good drive although a bit windy. I am real impressed the way the motorhome handles in the wind. I went down the road nice and straight and steady with little effort. Not so for the guy in front of me. I watched as he used all of the 2 lanes plus shoulders of the road. People were passing with extreme caution as he swayed right they passed on the left. I kept my position behind and did not try to pass. It took us a little over 3 hours, time wise, but since Arizona is an hour ahead of California it was 4 hours according to the clock. The weather is cool and windy, but I hear that the weather in California turned real bad as soon as we got out of town. There is no threat of rain here and in fact it is supposed to get warmer and the wind should die down. It looks good for Las Vegas (NASCAR) next week. This week will give us a chance to get things cleaned up and a little R and R.

Wrapping it up

Well, we pretty much wrapped up our 3 week California Race and Rally Tour tonight. To night was the last race of this NASCAR weekend at the California Speedway.

It turned out to be pretty good since Susan’s driver lead a few laps and finally came in 3rd at the end. It was much better than last weekend when he crashed out.

Our good friends bought us Garage passes for our birthdays, which occurred 2 days apart over the weekend. We were able to go into the garages this morning and see all the hustle and bustle, as they were getting ready for the big race. Man, were they busy!

The infield parties were real interesting, talk about your freak shows. Tomorrow we are back on the road heading back to Lake Havasu for 1 week, and then it’s off to Las Vegas for the NASCAR race there.

We have just had a great 3 weeks. First NHRA Drag races then an RV Rally and wrapping it up at NASCAR. Who could ask for a better time?

Man did I dodge a bullet

We left Santa Barbara early this morning. We wanted to get to the Ontario Elks Lodge before all the spaces were filled up. I did call ahead and they said they would put a reserved sign out on a site for me but I just wanted to get there early just in case. As we were heading down the freeway I just happened to take a glance in my left side mirror. I don’t know what made me look just at that instance but what I saw was a car coming right at me from the left lane. I heard brakes, moved slightly to the right in an attempt to avoid a collision, and watched in my side mirror as this guy over corrected, turned to the left, slammed into the center divider, spun around, and came to a stop in the center medium. It sounded real nasty. I saw a pickup pull up behind it so I kept on going. I didn’t hear any thunk on the side of the motorhome so I figured I wasn’t hit. I checked the side mirror of the motorhome and saw no damage. But what about the car? I could see no harm in the rear view camera and was hoping the car didn’t get hit. We finally arrived safely at the Ontario Lodge and I immediately jumped out and did a walk around. Whew! No damage. Well, remember the reserved sign? As I was backing into a spot, out came the guy with the reserve sign. Thanks I said but I don’t need it now.

Back in Santa Barbara

We arrived back in Santa Barbara this morning. We parked the motorhome and without even setting up we headed out to the local Laundromat. After all was clean we went back to the motorhome and finished setting up. Tomorrow we will be getting another early start and head on down to Ontario to get setup for the NASCAR race this weekend. Susan is getting excited.

Heading back south

We left San Antonio Lake this morning and I decided to explore a different route for future reference. I will make sure NOT to ever take that route again. It is full of hills and slow turns. Although it is shorter mileage wise, it didn’t save us much time. I always wondered about that route, at least now I know.

Tonight’s stop is in Pismo, actually Oceano which is just south of Pismo. About a block from the Elks lodge, where we are, is the “Drive on Beach”. There has been a steady stream of toy haulers coming off the beach since we got here. The town is packed with RVs in every nook and cranny. By this evening, the area will most likely be cleared out. The wind is blowing strong and steady which it does most of the time here and it blows a lot of sand around. About a mile from here is one of the famous Monarch Butterfly Groves where the butterfly migration stops for a beak on their way to and from Mexico. We visited it last time here so we opted out for this time. We went into Pismo to look for the NASCAR shop that was their last time but it was gone. It was for sale last time we were here and we didn’t know if the new owners would keep the NASCAR theme or change it. It is now a beach clothing shop, like they don’t have enough of those around here already.

We are only going to be here for 1 night then it’s off to Santa Barbara. We want to get to Fontana early so we can get a spot for the Motorhome since it is on a first come basis at the Elks Lodge, and it IS NASCAR weekend.

More good times

We are about to wrap up another great weekend. We arrived here at San Antonio Lake in Paso Robles California on Thursday morning. We got here early so I could set up the Satellite dish for Susan’s NASCAR qualifying. I must have struggled for an hour trying to get the satellite signal. Susan was worried and I knew it wouldn’t be good if I couldn’t get ’r done. Finally, after an hour, I decided to check the motorhome input. Sure enough, the cable was screwed into the cable input instead of the satellite input. As soon as I moved it, the signal came right in.
We are having a great time, but when do we not?

Last night was the big dinner and “White elephant bingo” where everyone contributes to the prize table and each winner gets to pick from the table. There is a collection of junk, novelties, and some pretty good stuff. This is always a good time.

Today everyone is in the clubhouse watching NASCAR, thanks to one of the campers satellite system. Susan is in our motorhome watching Hot Pass.

Tomorrow we will be heading out for round 3 of our 3 week tour. We are heading back to Southern California for the NASCAR race in Fontana. We will take a couple of days to get there with stops in Pismo and Santa Barbara.

The weather has just been fabulous. Today is a bit cooler but still nice.

Round Two

We just had a ball at the Drag Race. Monday morning we pulled out and headed up the road. We made a stop over in Santa Barbara last night and are now in Atascadero. We will hang out here until Thursday to get some laundry and shopping done. On Thursday we are heading up to Lake San Antonio in the hills just west of Paso Robles. We are going to attend a Rally over the weekend with some friends from www.rv.net. This will be number 2 of our 3 week journey of weekends of good fun, good food, and good friends.

Drag Racing

We have just about wrapped up the weekend here at Pomona. We have been here since Thursday for the NHRA Winternationals Drag Races.

For a while it was looking a little iffy with the threat of rain but it held off until Saturday night and cleared enough Sunday to get the finals in.

This is a picture of 24 year old Ashley Force’s car with Father John Force on the far left and Mom in the pink top.


We are here with a group of 6 rigs and we just had a ball of course with good racing, good food, and good friends.

It is just unbelievable how fast these cars are getting. Covering a ¼ mile track at speeds of 330+mph in the low 4-second range is just incredible. We are fortunately to be camping with an ex funny car racer that gave us all the low down on what it’s like to be in the drivers seat. He drove until he crashed his jet-powered car at over 300 mph breaking both legs and an arm. That is when he decided to call it quits. He still gets the bug though.

Tomorrow we are heading north for the second part of our 3 week journey before heading back to Havasu. More fun ahead.

Ready for the Drag Race

We made it to Pomona today. On the way we stopped by the shop to get the U joints lubed. While they were under there they found a grease cup that was torn and replaced it for free. Now that’s good business. At first I thought they may have damaged it with too much pressure/grease but Keith showed it to me and the rubber is just plane shot. This coach is only 4 years old and has a bit over 20000 miles on it. I was surprised to see these things in that bad of shape. I am sure the others are ready to go at anytime too. If you are in the area of Redlands California and find you need service go see the guys at Redlands Truck and RV. These guys know their stuff and will take care of you.

Today we will just sit and relax. Tomorrow the others in our group will start to arrive. We are in a KOA right across the street from the Drag Strip and you can sure hear those Top Fuel cars run.

Made it to Indio

We left Lake Havasu this morning and made it over to Indio California. What a boring drive. I think the California desert has got to be the worst. I tried a different course this time which shaved only about 15 minutes off our time but had about 1 hour and 45 minutes more boring desert. I think I will go back to the old route. At least with the old route we pass through farmland along the Colorado River. We are only going to be here for 1 night then down the hill to Pomona California. We will make a quick pit stop to get the Universal joints lubed that they forgot to do when I had it in the shop Jan 2.

I had to order a new AC power adaptor for my notebook computer since the one I have has a broken wire in it. I have to hold it just right to make connection. On the way over here it disconnected and I had to fiddle with it while going down the road. Susan finally made me pull into a rest stop to fix it before we ended up in the ditch, or worse. So if you don’t hear from us for a while it is because the cord broke beyond repair. I have a new one on it’s way to Lake Havasu right now, so it should be there when we get back on Feb 27.

Getting ready to travel

When they installed my turf, they tried to cut corners by piecing together some pieced. It didn’t come out to good so today they came out and replaced the whole thing. It looks real nice now.

Well tomorrow we are on the road again. We are heading for the NHRA Winternationals Drag Race in Pomona California. I packed up our patio furniture and covered it for the time we will be gone. Our lot looks pretty bare right now but the turf sure looks good. I was looking at the covers and they look like they will only handle one more summer out here. It gets around 120 here in the summer and that will take a toll on everything. I guess it’s cheaper to replace the covers every 2 years rather than the furniture.

Poll Results

Here are the results of the poll question “What region of the country do you live in?”. This surprised me somewhat. I thought most would be from the Southwest because the weather is always good for Rving so I just assumed most readers would be from this region. I'm not surprised to see we have readers from “Another Country” but not only are they from Canada but also we have readers from New Zealand, Australia, England, and also Italy.

I started a new poll. Let's see how much time we all spend in our RVs. See left column.

What a fun day

Today Susan and I went over to some friend’s house here in Lake Havasu. They used to own the lot 2 lots down from ours in the resort but decided to buy a house in town and sell the lot. They have a nice house in an exclusive gated country club community where Arnold Palmer designed the golf course. The girls headed into town and us guys headed for the hills in his Polaris Ranger. Man am I impressed with this machine. We headed into the backcountry of Lake Havasu and eventually cam across some dirt bikers. I think they were impressed that we could keep right up with them. We climbed up and down the same hills they were on. I was also impresses at how well the Ranger handled the woop-tee-doos. That thing has a nice suspension on it.

I was able to add a few photos to the “Problems uploading photos again” post. I got 2 uploaded and it quit uploading again. I will try again another time.