PASO ROBLES, CA
Feb 5th: Our first stop is an overnight stay in Paso Robles. This is wine country and Paso Robles has a lot of scenic and wonderful wineries along Highway 49.We are staying at WINE COUNTRY RV RESORT, just outside of town on Highway 49. This is a first-class RV park with level, manicured sites. Great WiFi and cable TV. But it is very expensive, $80 a night. Visiting the wineries are also expensive. Tasting charge is around $25 and that fee does not go towards any purchase of wine. So be prepared to spend a lot of $$$ to go wine tasting.
Helene immediately found a place to hang out.
DEATH VALLEY NATIONAL PARK
We are spending the next three days visiting and exploring Death Valley National Park.
Feb 6: It's a long boring drive to our next destination. But we did pass an interesting sign. Driving along Highway 15, I saw this
street sign and had to google it. How
many of you know about this road? Curtis
Howe Springer founded several health spas during the 1940’s and built one in
this area; officially Soda Springs at the edge of a dry lakebed. Historically, it was a small freshwater source
used by local Indians. Springer renamed it Zzyzx (Zeye-zix) Mineral Springs
resort in 1944 claiming it to be the last word in the English language. Today
the road leads to a mineral spring and there’s a mineral spring/health center
that has been built up around it. Interesting things you discover in your
travels.
After about a 7-hour drive, we arrived; just before dark. We are staying at Shoshone RV Park in Shoshone, CA. It’s about 50 miles to the visitor center in Death Valley NP. This place is the most decent RV park that is close to the Park. The RV parks inside the park are sloppy, crowded, no WiFi and worse. This place is somewhat rural, and very small. About 35 sites. Considering we are in the desert; this place has lots of trees and the sites are shady. No cable TV, but we have WiFi. There is also a pool that is fed by a natural warm spring.
Of all the RV parks we have stayed at, this place has the largest library for book exchange that I have ever seen. I found 5 books by James Patterson; the current author I am reading.
Feb 7 & 8: The next two days were clear, sunny and warm as we explored Death Valley. We visited several sites, did short walks and drove through beautiful scenery. We could not visit Scotty’s Castle as all roads leading to it and the Castle itself were severely damaged during the flash floods of 2015. Yes, 5 years ago and they are still working on it. The estimated damage was around 20 million. They hope to complete the repairs by 2021.
⇧ Zabriskie Point ⇩
Harmony Borax Works ⇩
The mined borax (salt minerals) were hauled 165 miles to the railroad town of Mojave by 20 mules. The teams averaged 2 miles an hour and took 30 days to complete a round-trip. The tank at the end of the two box cars held water for mules and man. ⇩
Mesquite Flat Dunes ⇩
⇧ Dante's View of Badwater Basin ⇩
Artists Palette ⇩
Badwater Basin ⇩
Feb 9: In the wee hours of this morning, strong winds hit our area. Our trailer was rocking and rolling the rest of the morning. We were to depart this morning for Anaheim. But as the winds continued to get worse, we decided to stay in Death Valley another day. We hung out in the trailer and tried to enjoy the thrill ride of the rocking and rolling and prayed that tomorrow would be a better day.
Feb 10: The winds were still blowing this morning, but decided to take our chances that it would be better when we got out of the flat desert.
We left early and by noon, after a 4-hour drive, we arrived safely in Anaheim. Our home for the next two days is ORANGELAND RV PARK. It is a fairly nice park. About 200 sites. We have a deluxe site so we have grass and a nice patio table and chairs and it is a pull thru (expensive though; $90 a night). The standard sites are laid out like a parking lot and back to back. The best thing is the park is full of orange, lemon, and grapefruit trees. All are full of fruit and free to pick.
The park is walking distance to the ART station (Anaheim Regional Transportation). For $1.50 (Sr 1-way) we can ride to Disneyland instead of paying the $25 parking fee. We bought a 3-day pass and went to Disney Downtown for dinner. What a beautiful night. Tomorrow we go to Disneyland.
DISNEYLAND
CALIFORNIA ADVENTURE
Feb 11 & 12: We visited both parks at noon instead of early morning. We missed out on getting FASTPASS, but we also missed the unbearable, gridlock crowds. In the afternoon, the wait times were not that bad; 25min at the most for the rides we wanted. However, you do need to get there early for FASTPASS for any of the Star War rides, Indiana Jones, and Radiator Springs Racers. Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge in Disneyland was most impressive. The place is huge and you feel like you are right there in the movie. We saw Chewbacca and he had a horde of kids following him, running to keep up. Cute. They even had a sleeping Loth-Cat in a cage. The creature was breathing. All the young children really thought it was a real creature. Their comments were priceless.
⇧ Loth-Cat ⇩
Disneyland and California Adventure
⇧ Huge stone ball that rolled around by force of the water
⇧ A wonderful lunch/dinner at Wine Country Trattoria
⇧ We did get a fastpass for this ride for 7:20pm.
Never rode this at night.
What a thrill, but kept my eyes closed ⇩
Good bye California, hello Arizona. Stay tuned.
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