Ten years ago my friend Joey Myers and I were sitting in the living room of our dear friends Jack and Myrna Moyle. They have a 110 acre ranch near Jamestown in the Red Hills Area of Environmental Concern which is managed by the BLM. Joey and I had flown in to say hello. After a bit I mentioned that his ranch would be a beautiful place to host a fly-in and campout. Without hesitation Jack said, “Well you should put something like that together.” So I did.
But before I tell that story, I need to tell the story of this ranch. Jack and his wife Myrna bouth the ranch over 50 years ago. There was one small shack on the property, no trees, no electricity, no utilities of any kind. Jack and Myrna were raising their family of 7 in a one room shack. When they weren’t working Jack and Myrna disassembled some chicken houses on another property they had purchased. Myrna pulled the nails out of the wood and straightened them while Jack was hammering those same nails back into those same boards to expand their small home. They added on three more rooms, a barn, some other makeshift outbuildings and planted a bunch of trees to keep their house cool in the summer. No utilities remember?
One day a mutual friend named Jim Hembree landed on a dirt road that ran through Jack’s property to stop for a visit. Jack was enthralled and wanted to learn to fly too. He firgured that dirt road would make a great runway to fly from. Being a heavy equipment operator by trade he expanded that dirt road and graded it and then had a runway! He bought a Piper Cub up at Columbia Airport and began getting flight training in it. He had the instructor fly him down to his runway on his ranch and teach him how to land there. After that Jack completed his pilot training by taking off from his runway, flying up to Columbia, taking his lessons, then flying back home to his runway.
Fast forward a few years and a few months and we had our first annual Red Hills Fly-in on Memorial Day weekend. This past weekend was our 10th annual and likely last fly-in. So much could be written about it but I like pictures so I will let the pictures tell the story.
We got to spend two wonderfully peaceful nights in the company of friends in a beautiful setting. You can’t ask for more.
For years ever since I started dreaming of taking off on a non-stop RV adventure one of my bucket-list items was the California Super Boom. It only happens in the high desert in heavy rainfall years and this was on of those years. So I decided, why wait? 2 years from now is not guaranteed so we went this weekend!
We drove down I-5 and stopped off for lunch at Harris Ranch. We ate the sandwiches that Cristy had made that morning but once we smelled the meat cooking in the sandwich shop we decided to eat lunch there on the way home. After topping off the truck’s tank in Bakersfield we continued on up the Grapevine until we hit highway 138 and took it over to Lancaster. I hadn’t yet decided where to go see the super bloom but the last long stretch of Hwy 138 into Lancaster made up my mind for me. The wildflower just went on and on.
We finally made it to The Californian RV resort and checked in. I asked the lady at the front desk where was the best place to see Wildflowers. She said it was out on Hwy 138. Right where we spotted them on the way in. It’s just over the hill from the Antelope Valley Poppy Preserve but she said the preserve was usually very crowded and parking is difficult. Hwy 138 was a much better option. She turned out to be right.
After a nice long sleep in the first day we headed back out to Hwy 138 and, well, I’ll just let the pictures speak for themselves.
There are a lot of places you can go see the flowers but it turns out this little stretch of Hwy 138 was pretty good. The lady at the front desk was right, there was no problem finding a place to park and we were the only ones out there. It was perfect.
Well for several years now (yes, litterally over seven years) I have been researching trucks that would be capable of pulling the a 5th wheel we plan on buying in the future. I have hashed out the numbers on how much weight they can tow and more importantly, what their payload capacities are. I knew I wanted a Ram but lately I decided to give other brands a fair shake. After test driving some trucks I came back to Ram which has the best mix of comfort and towing/payload capacity.
This pas Fall we attended a rally for Lance Owners of America and my poor Ram 1500 barely made it up the hills to Shingletown where the rally was held. Several of the women my wife was talking to told her that I needed a new truck not only for comfortably towing the trailer but for safety as well. Well, that was the final push we needed to upgrade my truck. Since we didn’t want to go through this again we went for a Ram 3500 1ton truck. We wanted a short bed because this would be my daily driver for the next 3 years. We wanted a single rear wheel axle truck as well so Cristy could drive it and not worry about the extra width. Truth be told I didn’t want to worry about it either. We also knew we would buy a used truck because we couldn’t justify paying the prices they were asking for a new truck.
We shopped around for a bit and some of the trucks I had my eye on either sold quickly or were still too expensive. I saw a good used truck at Antioch Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram and sent an email asking about it. I received back the same reply I had on many other occasions; it had been sold already. The salesman then emailed me and asked what I was looking for specifically in a new truck. I replied that I couldn’t afford a new truck and was looking for used. He then sent me a couple of new options; late 2023 models as the 2024 models were already out. The kicker was the price was LOWER than the used models I had been looking at.
We made arrangements to drive out there on Saturday to take a look at the two trucks. When we got there he told us that one had “just sold yesterday” and there was someone coming out in a day or two to look at the other one and would I be interested in taking a look at some 2024 models? I will spare you, gentle reader, my reaction. Suffice it to say my words were unkind. About midway through my tirade (yes I kept going) the salesman backpedaled big time and said, “Well, you’re here on the lot now, if you like it and want to buy it we’ll sell it to you.” He still had to endure the last half of above-mentioned tirade.
He stomped off and found the keys and by the time he returned he acted like we were old friends. We took a test drive and decided that this just might be the truck we were looking for. It ticked all the boxes I had for wants on the truck:
Dual climate control (so we don’t fight over the temperature)
8 inch display screen rather than the 12 monster some of the cars have.
Manual air controls (as well as software controls on the screen)
Cummins High Output turbo diesel
4 Wheel Drive
Short bed
Cargo and bumper cameras
So we pulled the trigger and bought the truck when we were only intending a test drive. But it was the right truck at a lower price than the used trucks we were looking at thanks to all the year end incentives the dealership was being offered. And we had an original factory warranty which we would not get with a used truck.
So what is it?
2023 Ram Big Horn 3500
For tech spec geeks here are the goods:
Engine: HIGH-OUTPUT 6.7L CUMMINS TURBO DIESEL I6 ENGINE Transmission: Aisin AS69RC Heavy Duty Axel Ratio: 3.73 Horsepower: 420 hp Torque: 1075 lb-ft MAX PAYLOAD LB: 3,824 MAX TOWING LB: 24,378
We have already customized the truck with a few minor modifications.
Roll n Lock bed cover
Weather Tek bed mat
Wheel to wheel running boards
So far we’re really enjoying the truck. It’s a great commute vehicle that is a pleasure to drive. I love the throaty growl of the Cummins engine. And the one trip we did take towing our travel trailer was amazingly relaxing. I left the truck on cruise control all the way up into the foothills and it never downshifted once. This will be a great hauler for our “someday” 5th wheel trailer.
First off, sorry it took so long to post part 2 of this series. The truth is, time when by so fast, I never got a chance! In Part 1 I talked about our trip to Mt. Lassen National Park. In this posting, I’ll document what we did during the final two days of our stay.
Friday
Cristy wanted to take a drive into Redding and check out the mall and pick up some items from Sprouts. I politely asked if I could stay with the trailer. Cristy was happy to agree because that meant she could spend as much time at the mall as she wanted to. So off she went and there I stayed.
I fixed a couple of small things on the Lance and then tried to make some contacts on the local Ham radio repeaters in both Redding (W6STA) And Shingletown (WO6P) .
There wasn’t anyone on the two repeaters I checked so I decided to take a walk. Right across the highway was Airport Rd. I checked Google Maps and there did indeed used to be an airport across the highway from where we were camping. It was about a 3/4 mile walk so I decided to go check it out. It was a beautiful walk. When I got to the airport I could see that they had closed it and MEANT IT. They had planted so many trees such that it was impossible to use as a runway ever again.
Apparently they only use it for local recreation and a once a year star gazing party. I walked all the way to the end of the old runway and the peace and silence was stunning. Then I had a sobering thought; “I wonder if they have mountain lions around here?” Now, I’m not worried about bears or coyotes. But the big cats must be respected. I had zero weapons on me except for a pocket knife. I started heading back down the runway as quickly as I could! I kept scanning the ground for cat tracks but never saw any. Nor bear tracks. Just a few coyote tracks. I also noticed zero deer tracks which is probably why no cat tracks. It was the longest runway walk ever.
I finally made it back to the campground and wandered around checking out every square inch to see what we had missed. The KOA Shingletown/Mt. Lassen Holiday Resort is an excellent park. They have a wilderness area behind the park that is actually bigger than the camping area. There is a bird watching area there with feeders stocked with food to attract local birds, there is a RC car track, there are two huge swings, an area they call “Fort Imagination” which has tons of logs, sticks, and old tractor tires to build any kind of fort the kids can come up with. Cristy’s favorite was the huge tree swing. There is even a night trail; you walk it with your flashlight and shine it around to see all of the “eyes” (small reflectors) staring back at you from the woods!
Later that day after Cristy had come back and finished her swinging we went to a pot luck put on by the Lance Rally folks. I had the best jambalaya I had ever had! I came to find out that these folks who made it live right next door to us in Salida. Well, practically next door. After dinner that night, like every night, we sat by our fire bowl and talked at looked at the stars. One night we even found fireflies! Which… weren’t fireflies. Turns out the staff at KOA a pranksters and aimed one of those laser Christmas decoration at the trees which makes a remarkably good fake firefly effect.
Saturday we just hung around the park and did absolutely nothing. We did take a short drive to look at a few properties that were for sale. Nothing remarkable to report.
Sunday we watched our church online and did much the same as Saturday. We enjoyed the park so much we really didn’t feel like going anywhere. We did drive in to Shingletown to gas up and pick up some water for the trip home. That’s when we came across Reed’s, my new favorite store. It is a combination IGA Supermarket and ACE Hardware store! Genius!
Monday morning we slept in, cleaned up, said our good-byes and hit the road. We will definitely be back but this time, with a stronger truck!
We attended our first Lance ralley ever this year. It was the 9th annual rally held at Shingletown/Mt Lassen KOA Holiday. What a wonderful kampground and very nice bunch of people!
Day 1
We drove up I-5 through California’s Central Valley and encountered the usual traffic along the way in Stockton and Sacramento. But as soon as we got past Woodland all the traffic just seemed to disappear. We didn’t even see the trucks leave the freeway, they were just… gone. We stopped for lunch at Granzella’s in Williams and then finally arrived at the KOA at 3:15pm.
We were warmly greeted by both the KOA staff and the Lancer’s who were organizing the rally. This rally is put on by the Lance Owners of America and is only one of many. Lance campers and travel trailers have a very small and loyal following. I got the trailer levelled and set up (with not a little help from Cristy) then went and got the T-shirt I had orderd, got a raffle ticket, and then we took a nap. Usually one of the first things we do on a travel day. The day ended with an appetizer pot-luck and introductions. We were the only new people so only we got introduced!
Day 2
The next day was a free day so we took off and went up to Mt. Lassen National Park. I haven’t been there since I was 12 or so. We took our time and stopped at the Loomis Museum and Ranger Station at the north entrance to the park. It was only a 15 minute drive from the campground. We took a walk from the ranger station down along Manzanita Creek down to Manzanita Lake. A quick 15 minute walk. Then we set off along Lassen Peak Highway.
We drove along until we came to Summit Lake and got out to stretch our legs a bit. It was pretty but there really weren’t any trails so we moved on.
We drove on and finally stopped at Kings Creek Trailhead. It was lunch time and we were ready to eat. We walked down to the creek and found some nice rocks to sit on next to a small cascade in the creek.
We continued on up the highway, and I do mean up. We took time to stop at some pull outs and admire the views.
Finally we made it up to the summit. We were determined to see how high up the summit trail we could hike. We made it from the parking lot to the sign that said, “Summit Trail” before we decided to turn back. A couple of flatlanders attempting to climb the summit of Mt. Lassen with no preparation, what could possibly go wrong. We decided that the truck was an excellent mountain climbing vehicle and we had made it as high as we were going to go. Incidentally if you zoom in on the picture on the right, you will see the foolhardy souls who opted not to drive their truck up to the summit. Also, that rocky point in the picture on the left is NOT the summit, it is quite a bit higher than that.
At this point the road finally started sloping downward. It was a very short drive to Helen Lake. I had a lot of fun telling people we drove to Helen, took some pictures. It makes more sense if you say it out loud.
Mt Lassen
Our next stop (about 500 ft away) was Bumpass Hell Trailhead. I will cut to the chase and say we did not hike all the way to Bumpass Hell but we did make it about half way until the altitude and lack of water got to us and we turned back. Still there was some beautiful scenery (and shenanigans) along the way.
Our last stop before turning around and headed back down the highway was the Sulphur Works. It gives you a small preview of what Bumpas Hell is like but without the hike.
Boiling mudpot at the Sulphur Works.
And that was about all we had energy for. We made the hour and 20 minute drive back to our campground, cooked dinner, and watched Thursday Night Football. All in all a great 2nd day!
This past weeked Cristy and I camped at Barret Cove Campground on Lake McClure. We stayed in Loop C site 13. Good, level site. Had a huge ledge going from the paved road into the campsite if you pulled in from the wrong angle. Water, electric, and sewer. One of the few campgrounds that actually enforces quiet hours.
What, you want to read more?
My Ham radio club was having an event called Field Day this past weekend. It’s basically an event where Hams hold a contest to try to contact as many radio stations as possible. That’s not my cup of tea but it seemed like a good excuse to get away, especially since the following week at work was going to be stressful. The location was at Barret Cove Campground on Lake McClure also known to the older folks as New Exchequer Reservoir. The campground and surrounding recreation area as well as the lake is owned and managed by the Merced Irrigation District. Who by the way have a great reservation system for their campground, including a video tour that lets you see the camp sites prior to booking a reservation. Reserved campsite show up on the video with a red marker, available sites show up as a green marker. So after making reservations a few weeks before Cristy and I loaded up our Lance 1995 and headed up to the campground.
It was only about an hour and twenty minute drive from home but the roads were fairly narrow. Luckily there was not much traffic so the one lane bridges leading up there near the town of LaGrange were not an issue. We arrived and checked in and then navigated this maze of a campground. There are a couple hundred campsites, many of which are primitive but also many have full hook-ups, 30A electric, water, AND sewer. Kind of a rarity for this type of campground. We finally found our spot in the C-Loop and Cristy guided me over our two-way radios as I backed in. After a couple of back-and-forths we finally got the trailer settled in a mostly level spot. Half the site was graded up to the road correctly, the other half had a huge lip that my truck almost couldn’t drive over. That just meant that I could only pull out in one direction. I thought that might be an issue but it turns out it was not.
We got into our site and got about the business of getting everything set up: level the trailer, put down the stabilizers, extend the slide-out, and since it wasn’t windy, extend the awning. Then the most important part; taking a nap.
After my nap I put out our chairs, set up the Blackstone and grilled up some chicken for dinner. The weather was perfect. We opened up all the windows, opened the door, and with the vent fan running it was the perfect temperature inside the trailer. We could feel an occasional cool breeze blowing through which made my nap even perfecter.
There was a large group camped across and in the next two sites so there were a lot of children running around but at least they kept to the street and their own sites. I parked the truck strategically to give us a front “wall”. We were already thinking that we probably wouldn’t be getting a good night’s sleep but miraculously they all quieted down at 10pm. Like a switch had been flipped. Quiet hours are from 11pm to 7am but like most parks we didn’t think they would enforce them. But every night the park ranger came past our loop at about 11:15pm to check on everyone. Nice to see a park actually enforce the quiet hours. We had our chicken dinner, watched some YouTube and then fell asleep in a very quiet campground!
The next morning was peaceful until the surrounding kids all woke up. There was a flurry of activity from about 8am to 10am for breakfast until they all took their boats and headed for the lake. Then it was dead quiet for the rest of the morning and afternoon. We had already decided that we were mostly going to just hang around the trailer and relax on this trip and that’s just what we did. We did take one trip down to Robert’s Ferry Nut Company about 30 minutes away. Cristy bought some almonds for her mother and I got bag of almonds for myself and one of their almond-butter milkshakes. Which did nothing but raise my blood sugar I’m sure but it also raised my happiness level exponentially. We also stopped by a lavender farm where Cristy bought some soap and some honey. You are also invited to go out and cut your own lavender but first, you must understand the relationship of bees and lavender. I can’t remember the name but it’s just east up Highway 132 on the right side of the road a short distance from Robert’s Ferry.
We came back and had a salad for lunch and then just relaxed the rest of the afternoon. When the sun started to set (on both nights) I lit our propane fire-bowl and we sat in front of it to keep the chill off off and talked. A Filipino family walked by so I struck up a conversation in my VERY LIMITED Tagalog. They were suitably impressed so I called Cristy over. I told them I had been teaching her Tagalog and I wanted them to evaluate how much she had learned. 🙂
We chatted for a while and even though we had already eaten hamburgers for dinner, they invited us over for leftovers. We had lechon kawali (chopped pork), pinakbet, and rice. It was delicious and I was now officially stuffed. But you never insult a Filipino by turning down food. The entire family was very warm and welcoming and really filled Cristy’s heart. I even got my very first “mano po” from one of the kids. They insisted we exchange contact info so they could invite us to their future get-togethers and camp-outs.
We headed back home to sit around the fire some more and listen to the wild turkey’s tuck themselves into bed for the night. Apparently they fly up to the highest branches they can reach and hunker down for the night. This was about 40 feet up in this tree.
On Sunday morning we woke, had breakfast and listened to our church, Almond Valley CRC, online. I was a little concerned on how I was going to get out of the camping spot with all the kids and boats and everything near us. However, by the time church was over they were mostly packed up. By the time I finished dumping the tanks and walked up the road to say goodby to our new friends, everyone near our campsite was gone. We finished hitching up and drove home.
All in all it was a very restful weekend in spite of all the noise from the kids. Cristy felt recharged and regenerated, especially after the warm welcome from the folks up the street. I felt rested to and ready to take on the stressful week ahead. Soli Deo Gloria.
Last January (2023) I noticed some cracking on the interior plastic of my refrigerator. The fridge still worked but I hated looking at the cracks and at the time we had no clue as to what had caused them. Knowing that I want to sell this trailer some day I decided to replace the refrigerator. Watching the videos on YouTube showed that it wasn’t that complicated. So I ordered a refrigerator and then had it shipped to my house. I hired a mobile RV tech and we gave it a go.
We got the old refrigerator out of it’s cubby hole and then tried to get it out the front door. We couldn’t. There is a sharp, narrow 90 degree bend to get around the kitchen cabinet and out the door of the trailer. Try as we might we just couldn’t do it. I helped him put everything back and gave Lance Parts and Service a call. The appointment was 3 months away and I had to ship the fridge down to Lancaster, CA where they were located. That turned out to be another whole blog post. Let’s just say, I finally got it down there.
We told them we would be arriving the night before so we could be there in time for the 7am appointment. They said we could stay in their parking lot where they had electrical and water hookups. We took advantage of the electrical, didn’t need the water. The drive down was fairly exciting, just a normal day on Highway 99 and the Tehachapi Pass.
We spent the evening in their parking lot but they have wonderful landscaping so it felt more like an RV park. Also, the temps were low enough that we didn’t need the AC. We sat out in the grass and enjoyed the cool evening breeze before turning in. We dropped the trailer off at the service location which is basically the delivery entrance for the manufacturing plant. It took an hour to get it all checked in. The lady at the service counter said she’d call me when it was done.
It took them longer than they expected because the fridge was the same width but slightly shorter. They didn’t want to give it back to me with a gap above the fridge so they had to fab up a new piece to close the gap. That meant it would take an extra day.
Sidebar: The lesson I learned was that I should have ordered the replacement refrigerator through Lance. That way it would have fit the existing cutout. I tried to save a few bucks by doing it myself and ended up paying more. Lesson learned.
Cristy and I had to stay at a hotel over night so we chose one next to food and shopping down in Palmdale. I have to admit it was kind of cool to see the Lockheed Skunkworks hangars. I thought they would be a bit more secretive. The two Lockheed Martin hangars dominate the landscape. The next morning at breakfast I got a call from the Lance service department that the trailer was ready. That was good news as I thought we wouldn’t get that call until late afternoon. We finished breakfast and drove back up to Lancaster.
When we went to pick up the trailer we found they just left it right outside the gate. Barely any room to maneuver my truck to hitch up. No place to turn around. They expected me to back out past two parking lot entrances and out onto the main road. With the way people drive down there I told them no way. I asked them to turn the trailer around. They ended up moving it out into the turn lane in the center of the street.
So what are my thoughts on the whole experience? Lance did swap out the fridge and did a good job fabbing up the new wood surround. The fridge was the same width but a bit shorter and they finished it off nicely. The door swung the wrong way. I asked them why they didn’t go ahead and reverse the door swing so it would match the old refrigerator. I basically got a “not our job” answer from them. They then told me the door isn’t reversible anyway. Uh-huh. I reversed the door this morning with zero experience. Took me about 30 minutes. They could have done it in 10. Not a huge deal but geez.
I also asked them to look at the gap between the bathroom wall and the ceiling. They said it didn’t look right but didn’t look like a huge problem either. If I want them to investigate why it happened I’d have to bring the trailer back at another time and leave it with them for a day while they measured things. Okay, we may do that. I’m also going to take a picture of the gouge they put in the door frame when they swapped the fridge. They can fix that next time too.
So I guess I expected more from them. Maybe I expected too much. I feel like it was the same service level I get at the DMV. Just… basic stuff. No going out of their way to make the customer happy. Just doing EXACTLY what the customer asked and no more. Okay. That’s fine.
I really like our 1995 travel trailer. We enjoy travelling in it. That being said the customer service is lackluster. We will probably not be a repeat customer. We will be wanting something bigger next time anyway.
It’s been a couple of months since we got to get out and camp and this past week we finally got out again. We went back to an old favorite, Jackson Rancheria RV Park. We never go to the casino, we just use the RV park as a jumping off point to explore the Jackson/Sutter Creek area. We pretty much visited the same old areas we always go to. We had coffee at Choc-O-Latte in Sutter Creek, we shopped the shops in Sutter Creek and old town Jackson.
THE Choc-O-Latte, served with a chocolate dipped Oreo
We had lunch at Cavana’s Pub and Grub in Sutter Creek. There really isn’t much to tell about this trip except that we really enjoyed getting away and the sunsets are awesome!
OMG!*Insert wolf whistle*
That’s all we got this time. See you on the next trip!
We hit the road around 7:30am or so. We were about to drive through the windiest portion of the trip home. Winds were manageable but were forecast to pick up as the day went on hence the early (for us) start. We did encounter higher winds between Barstow and Tehachapi. I kept my eyes on the traffic moving in the opposite direction looking for RV’s specifically. My thought being that they were coming from where I was going to, if they made it, I could make it. The wind was on our nose the entire way. The truck had to stay in 3rd gear just to maintain 60 MPH! We stopped for lunch and ate it in the trailer. I can’t even remember where that was. Some rest stop out in the desert. When we finally hit Tehachapi it was such a relief because the wind just stopped. We climbed up to the pass and made the long decent into the Central Valley and finally into sunny skies. We finally got home around 3pm.
Closing thoughts
We truly enjoyed our trip to Sedona and surprisingly Cottonwood. It was a wonderful time of reconnection with ourselves and with nature. We enjoyed our hikes and the beautiful scenery. We had long conversations. We discovered new things about ourselves. This year’s Sedona trip helped us begin an exciting new journey in our lives. This trip opened up within us a new resolve to not only seize the day, but to seize every moment; carpe momentum.
We began the bittersweet drive home. It was hard to leave the Cottonwood/Sedona aea but we missed family. I was a little worried by the weather forecast. Winds were forecast to be 30mph gusting to 40. I really didn’t want to tow a trailer in that kin of weather. The saving grace in all this was that the wind was mostly going to be coming directly at us. Bad for gas mileage but good for stability. And indeed as we drove to our intended destination the winds proved to be manageabe.
Our plan was to drive to Barstow and spend the night and then drive home the next day. We drove ost of the day and finally arrived at Peggy Sue’s 50’s Diner at around 4:30pm or so. Let me just say it’s not the prettiest place to overnight but there is a LOT of room to park and it’s free. We picked a spot off to the side and at the back of the parking area. We kept our shades drawn due to the incredible amount of trash around… and big rigs. Again… free. And safe. But not quiet.
We ate dinner at Peggy Sue’s. It was okay. Not great but tasted good after a long day. We lingered and talked over dinner and then headed back to the trailer and fell asleep to the sound of the freeway and helicopters landing at the US Marine Logistics Center across the street.
Air Prayer 