Staying cool

These last couple of weeks have been quite hot in San Diego, especially inland where we are! Good think that our A/C is working well. Today I brought my friend Sophie to see the house. We exchanged some ideas on interior decor. I am very anxious to get the green light to start furnishing and decorating but until then it just happens in my mind. After the house visit Marion (Sophie's daughter) and Eva arranged a tea party under the slide out... with chilled sparkling cider instead of hot tea, of course!

Aren't they precious?
Hope that you are all staying cool!

Sylviane

A step closer to getting the new house!

Well, it is looking pretty good for the house. It’s just an awesome property. There is a 3000 acre preserve owned by the city that is right next to the property. It has lots of trails for biking and horseback riding. As a preserve this huge area will not get developed. Very cool to have this set aside right in our back yard!

I just love this place and it’s looking real good that we will get it.

Yesterday we sent an addendum to the contract for terms that are required as a result of the appraisal. There may be some negotiating to see who pays for what repairs. We expect that the seller will pay for all the repairs but still need to hear from the seller.

Very good family friends have just moved back to san diego. They lived in Paris for the past couple of years and flew into LA Monday night. We surprised them by bringing the bus up to pick them up at LAX. Several friends came with us and it was a fun welcome back party! Champagne and laughter and food. There were four ladies, six kids and Me, the driver (BTW I only had one sip of the champagne for the welcome home toast). It was a blast and Sophie was surprised to see we picked her up in our bus. She hasn’t had a chance to see it since we finished it. The kids were playing back in Ben and Eva’s room most of the time. For me it was just awesome to look in my mirror and see everyone having a good time.

I think there will be a basic difference now in the way we use the bus. For the past year the bus has been our home and our platform to live a traveling lifestyle. In the luggage bays I have all my tools, spare parts for the bus, gold mining gear, fishing gear, survival gear, camping gear, and gear and gear and gear.... On the car we have bikes and boat and stuff that just couldn’t get squeezed into to the luggage bays.

But now I see us using the bus more as a vacation RV. Most of the gear we have now won’t be needed on the bus all of the time. We can just bring what we will use for that trip. The mentality of vacation travel verses "the traveling lifestyle" will be much different too. We loved the traveling lifestyle, don’t get me wrong, but naturally there’s going to be a difference as we use it more for vacations now.

The past three weeks has been an intense period! I am looking forward to things settling down a bit and spending more time with Sylviane and the kids.

Bluegrass festival

Ben and Eva spent the last four days at the bluegrass festival in Vista. They were part of a kid's camp where they learned and practiced some songs. In the picture Eva is on the left side, in front, looking at her guitar (well, her grandpa's guitar!) and Ben is also in front but on the far right. They both had a wonderful time making friends, performing and spending time with grandpa and grandma. I wish I knew how to put a video on the blog that way you could hear them play and sing too. It was so cute! I had tears running down my cheeks... can't help it!
They will be back tomorrow morning.
While they were gone, instead of shopping for flooring, I did some spring cleaning... just to try to keep my mind off the house... the wait and uncertainty is driving us nuts!

Thank you for keeping your fingers crossed for us!

Sylviane

Still waiting...

Today an appraiser is coming to see the proprety. Maybe we'll find out what his price is late today or more likely tomorrow. Our offer might be higher than the appraisal price which will result in more negotiations. We just need to buckle up and hang on to our seat for this roller coaster ride!

Today Ben and Eva are going with their grandparents to a bluegrass festival which they've been going to every year since the festival started six years ago( Eva missed the first year!). They will both be part of a kid's camp where they practice some songs together or as different bands and will perform on stage on Sunday. They will both be playing the guitar. They couldn't wait for this day to come. It's always a bunch of fun spending a week end with grandma and grandpa... staying up late, sweet treats and who knows what else... it's their secrets! I am so grateful for this close relationship they have with their grandparents.

What will I do without them for four days? Well, I will go check out some charter schools in the area that offer homeschooling program and learn more about them since it would be the first time we use them. I'll go get some color samples for the walls of the house and look at some flooring... a lot of fun stuff!

As if all this wasn't enough for excitement for this month our good friend Sophie is coming back to San Diego next week. She has been gone for a whole year living in Paris, France. August is a very special month indeed! Lots of great changes...

Sylviane

Some news on the house.....

This roller coaster has been a nerve wracking ride with thrills and tense moments. We did not hear anything yesterday as we expected to, regarding our offer for “The House”. Last night and morning was a bit low and we were looking at other possibilities from the list we have on line.

There were three houses that we liked the most out of all that we saw. But still none of them fits us, not nearly as well as the one we really want. "The House" fit us just perfectly. Looking at everything else on the market made us want “The House” even more. I felt drained, and I felt tired. I wasn’t feeling as positive as I have up to this point.

I called the lending agent to ask a question but only got his voice mail. He didn’t call back for awhile.

Finally I saw a call come into my cell phone...... it was from our agent!

He said that we had a counter offer from the Owner (a bank). So now we are back in the game after feeling like we were out. The news of the counter offer finally, slowly, sunk in, it looks real good for us at this point!

There is still a concern about how the appraisal comes in, and what things need to be fixed to be eligible for an FHA loan. But we are still in the game and in the lead. It looks real good right now but it’s not for certain. Dang this feels great. Keep your fingers crossed for us. I will keep everyone updated as we hear more.

Memories and Feelings

Sylviane has said much of what I am writing here but I want to share my perspective. Some of what I write here has already been said on the blog, but I needed to repeat it just to try to make sense.

Living on the bus the past 11 months has been an awesome experience. As we contemplate settling in one spot, many of the memories and feelings flood back to me. From our stay at Malibu beach, Campland on the Bay (San Diego), the desert in Quartzite Arizona, Disneyland, windy Bodega Bay, Mendocino and Quincy. The hiking and fishing, crabbing and gold panning, the exploring of new towns and new rivers all come back to mind. Swimming in the surf and time with the family. I think time with the family just hiking together, or telling stories around the campfire were awesome. The special things like abalone picking, horse back riding, seeing all the deer and so many other things, are great memories too. This has been a trip we will all remember for the rest of our lives.

One of the reasons that we wanted to travel is to find a place to settle down. My goals were to just work remotely via computer wherever we found the most desirable location to live. Be that Mendocino or the Sierras, Oregon or anyplace in the country that we decided was the best. Of course the thought of not living near the ocean is just out of the question. We tried real hard to convince ourselves that maybe if we found a place with a river and/or a lake that we could sacrifice being close to the ocean. But after a lot of thought and discussions we decided that we just can’t live away from the coast. Mendocino was awesome. We all liked it a lot. The fishing, the abalone, the basic attitude of the residents, are all great. But it was very secluded. Sometimes my job would require me to meet in person. It is hard to avoid meeting in person or on jobsites completely, even though I would like to do all of my work remotely I now have learned that is not practical. To fly out of Mendocino was a tough couple hour drive to San Francisco, then another flight to wherever I needed to go.

Not sure I ever described what I do for work on this blog so I will give a quick idea of what that is:

I work for a construction company as a project manager. So I negotiate and write contracts, change orders and basically over see specifics projects to make sure that it completes on time and below budget. I also work to insure the client is happy with our services. I made arrangements with my employer that I would work half time for half pay as we traveled. It has worked out generally well. The biggest frustration was having poor internet and cell phone signals, often we had a complete lack of service. It was taking much more time for me to do my work, often I worked 5 or 6 hours in stead of just 4 hours. There were so many fun things to do like fishing and panning for gold or getting some more abalone, that sometimes I felt like there was not enough time to do all that I wanted to.

A month or so ago Sylviane and I decided that we definitely want to end up living in San Diego. Up until 12 days ago we had planned to travel at least one more year. But I tossed out the idea to Sylviane that maybe this is the best time to buy a house. We know where we want to live and it appears to be a very good time for buyers right now. When we add into the equation that our cash flow is slightly negative as we are traveling, the conclusion is that we may not have the cash in a year from now to buy a house.

I expect that we will still be able to take extended vacation several times a year. The bus is all set up for working as we travel. Depending on what stage a project is in there will be times that we can take month away without affecting the project. The start and finish of a project takes the most time so during those periods there is extra work. I don’t mind that type of "seasonal" highs and lows, if fits my style.

We looked at a house last weekend that we like a lot and made an offer. With luck we will hear tomorrow if they accept it. I hope they do because we all love that property.



Bill

Nothing yet

Latest update on "our"(positive thinking helps!) house:
The propriety is being appraised tomorrow. Things seem to be going in the right direction. Bill was told that the final decision would be made on Sunday. I think they like us and we are with no doubts the ones who want it the most. We'll see....

Thanks all for your comments!

The kids and I spent the afternoon at the beach today with our friends.... it was cold... we didn't stay long. The air is quite smoky from the fire in Santa Cruz.

Sylviane

Surprise!!

Hi everyone,

Sorry for leaving you without any news from our adventures for so long.
Here is briefly what we’ve been up to for the last month.
We left Quincy and the mountains in the middle of July to come south to the Monterey area. Bill had to be around to help start a job on the navy base in Monterey and has been going to work everyday. We’ve been staying in a koa camp near Santa Cruz that is geared toward children and families. Ben and Eva have been having a blast and made new friends. We’ve also been visiting with our friends from Modesto... many play dates and sleepovers... a real summer vacation!
This stay also had us reevaluate our priorities and needs as we ran out of steam. Is "a life on the road" the right choice for our family anymore? Traveling is a full time job just by itself. It has been a challenge to keep our needed routines and habits going. Working part time for Bill has often turned into a full time job where the internet connection was slow or intermittent. It’s very frustrating especially when the outdoors is calling you. Anyway, it would take me pages and pages and more pages to explain everything that went through our heads during the last month.
A week and a half ago Bill and I made the decision to buy a house. The market is at its "best" for buyers and it’s the right time for us. San Diego is our choice, THE place that feels like home to us. We contacted a realtor, went through long listings, drove nine hours down to San Diego last Saturday, visited some proprieties, found the perfect one and made an offer. That easy... well, it has been a roller coaster of emotions condensed in such a short amount of time. We are waiting to find out if our offer is accepted or not. Maybe we’ll find out tomorrow! The wait is just so unbearable. We haven’t slept much lately. Bill trying to learn everything about buying a house since this is our very first one and me repainting, remodeling and furnishing the rooms in my head.
To us it is a great and exciting change in our life but the down side is that we are stopping the traveling full time. We will still take "Thelma II" out for more adventures during numerous vacations (I hope!) and the rest of the time it will make a lovely guest house.
These last eleven months on the road have been awesome, a very positive adventure, and have taught us a lot about our family dynamics and what our needs are individually. We do not regret any bit of it... we’ve gain so much from it!
Hope that this gear shift isn’t too disappointing to you! (I still expect to keep the blog going)

I promise to keep you updated on the house hunting.

Sylviane

A day in town

Yesterday was town day. It started with the library in the morning. Each Tuesday they have a kids program where they read and do crafts. The children are completely taken care of so I was able to zoom around the library and do some reading. Ben and Eva had a lot of fun there and are looking forward to going back next week! After that was chore time at the Laundromat. We wouldn’t have enough water in our tanks for doing laundry... we are almost taking dry showers to conserve water. We had a picnic there while the machines were doing their job. The kids were good helpers after I found the off button to the big screen hang on the wall but before that they were glued to it learning about cooking from the food channel... It could have been worse, though, like the news or cartoon network. After all the clothes were neatly folded we stopped by the sewing shop to find some help with our project. Eva wants to make herself a summer dress. We’d done the fun part already, choosing the pattern and fabric. I thought:"we have a sewing machine and everything we need... how hard can it be to make the dress?" Well, I changed my mind as soon as I opened up the pattern... that’s why we stopped by the shop to find more help. The lady there gave us the contacts of the Quincy’s sewing club maybe someone there will be of assistance. Eva is really anxious to start on her dress. Hopefully it will be done this summer.

In the evening we made a camp fire and roasted some freshly caught trout and crawdads.
Yummy!

Sylviane

Elvis and the rattlesnake

The other day when we were mining for gold dad heard and saw a rattlesnake, he cut its head off with one side of his digging bar... it still moved as if it was alive! That evening dad brought home the rattle.
Elvis is a California king snake. Dad thought we should call him "Elvis" because Elvis was the king of rock’n roll. We saw Elvis four days in a row around dad’s mining pit.

Ben

Gold!

The other day, for the first time, I did some panning here at the camp. Bill does the hard work, the digging, vacuuming and shoveling then Ben and I put that material through the sluce box to get rid off the bigger rocks and dirt. After that only black sand, small rocks and gold are left. Then it’s time to pan all that is left to get down to the gold! Well, guess what? I found some... it was quite exciting but not enough YET to make Bill a new wedding ring with. He lost his a few years ago and we are planning to replace it with the gold we find... let’s be optimistic! The ring was made from gold that his brother had mined for in Alaska. Read more about our wedding rings...

Sylviane

Our 4th of July celebration

We spent the afternoon in a small town called Taylorsville watching a rodeo. I thought it was a perfect way to spend Independence Day, very American... except that we didn’t have cowboy’s hats! I didn’t enjoy all the parts of the rodeo as I though they were quite rough on those little calves but the horses were beautiful and so well trained. After that we took some dirt roads to go check out another river where we could go "golding"... but for sure, without taking the bus along! We probably spent 2-3 hours on those roads and did a little panning but didn’t see any shinny speck. Back to town we grabbed some food at the supermarket for a picnic at the golf course and got there just in time for the fireworks.
It had been a long day and everyone went to bed but me. I watched a French movie on Bill’s computer with earphones not to bug anybody. I enjoy those movie moments!

Sylviane

In the woods

Last Monday we moved to this more remote part of Quincy... anyway, I think we’re still in Quincy. It’s a 15 minutes drive to town from our camp. The first part is a rocky, bumpy, dirt road. The bus did just fine on that road, though. Bill drove very slowly. I was following him and it was amazing to see that giant machine going between the trees without getting stuck! The paint got a little scratched on the sides and the top. Now we’ll have a matching bus and car. Because during one of our scouting trips Bill took the car through a gnarly dirt road that got narrower and narrower, fortunately he was able to turn around and come back safely... result many, long, deep scratches along the side of MY car ;-) It is now an officially off road vehicle.

We’ve been doing some fishing, prospecting (not rich yet!) and swimming. The river is very pretty and there is a walking trail that takes us pass a natural spring and to a series of nice cascades.

I also found great classes in town... on raw food, yoga and African dance. I don't know if we unknowingly just pick places that offer these type of classes or if they can be found in every town! They must be part of my journey!

Have a great 4th of July everyone!

Sylviane

A piece of paradise

On the way down to Oroville back to the storage... by the way, the main reason for us to stay in Oroville was to get a small storage and unload some extra gear to lighten up the bus. But by mistake we left there a container with gold pans and other prospecting material which we definitely need right now... so, on the way down to Oroville we stopped at a river that I absolutely loooooove.

I have a thing for rivers, swimming holes and clear water! It is such a gorgeous place; the water is green and so clear! There are no settlements on the bottom that clouds up the water.

Last time we were there, about five years ago, a trout swam right to the edge of the water so we had a good look at it. With faster reflex we could have taken it. We had a lot of fun. There is nothing better than swimming in a cool, well, cold water and lay down on a hot boulder to warm up. Can’t wait to go back and explore the creek up stream to find another piece of paradise.

We are leaving camp today. With all our scouting trips we found the perfect spot except for the mosquitoes, though they are everywhere and can’t avoid them! We’ve joined a gold mining association that has a lot of claims in the area. We’ll be parked in the wood next to the river. It is not a campground so we will be on "conservation" mode, no endless supplies of water... we’ll be off grid for a while... free of rent!

Sylviane

As you can see I didn’t do the driving on the way to Quincy. If you look hard at the above picture you can see Bill driving through a tunnel with a truck coming at us head on. It took us three hours from Oroville, about 80 miles, estimated time from yahoo map... 1 ½ hour. It was a beautiful drive up on hwy 70 along the north fork of the Feather River. It is nice to go slow as we have time to admire the beauty of nature.

We are staying at the pioneer rv park which is nice and quiet. Each site is spacious with trees between them, not big enough yet to offer descant shade, though. They have several restricting rules. One is about the children being supervised at all time... they can’t just bike around the camp. Not really a kid friendly place... that’s probably why I haven’t seen any around.

Yesterday we went on a scouting trip to find a remote place to camp and/or to do some gold panning. We ARE in gold country, you know! Found a pretty lake, silver lake, 6 miles up a dirt road too twisty for taking the bus on it. Plus there is no swimming aloud in the lake since it is a reservoir. So far only in Modesto have I seen a reservoir where you could swim in. After checking out an other lake, Bucks Lake, we took a side dirt road and followed it through the forest until we couldn’t go anymore.

Didn’t quite reached the river for we didn’t have the right equipment to hike down to it about a mile horizontally and about 500 feet vertically. On the way back, through a different road, we stopped by a little stream that had a claim on it so no gold panning aloud so we just went to put our feet in the water and enjoyed! It looks like all the streams and rivers around here have been claimed for prospecting. We saw a few dredges along the north fork.

Today will be another scouting trip to find the ideal spot.
Sylviane

Father's Day postponed

Hope that you had a healthy, happy Father's day.

Bill has been sick and in bed since we arrived here last Thursday. He spent Father's day in the ER to figure out what was going on. We decided that it wouldn't do for a Father's day celebration so we postponed it until he gets better. Good for us, now we have more time to prepare his special day. They didn't find anything wrong and Bill's already doing a little better today. Tomorrow we'll be heading to the mountains, to Quincy. I will be doing the driving if Bill isn't feeling up to it... yeah, right! The only time I drove the bus was before the conversion was done on a freeway in Arizona which was straight and almost deserted :) I loved it tough.

HAPPY SUMMER EVERYONE
May your summer be full of sunshine, precious family time and outdoor adventures!

Sylviane

Travel day

Travel days are quite exciting... going to a new place... but also a lot of work. We were hoping to be out of the campground, yesterday, by 10 am. Well, it was a little bit later when we stopped to get some propane and hitch the car, still in the campground. While checking the bus, Bill found out that we had a flat tire. It was a back tire, the one in the inside which is hard to see. Using the air system of the bus Bill was able to inflate the tire. It didn’t seem to loose air after that. It could have been pretty dangerous if Bill didn’t notice it. That tire could have heated up and eventually caught on fire. Thank goodness for his good eye! It was 12.40 when we finally hit the road. It was a slow ride all the way to Willits through the forest on a twisty road. The bus doesn’t do up hill very fast, plus Bill stopped at pretty much every turnout to let the cars pass. After that the road took us by some lakes, through some hills to finally bring us in the valley which reminded us of the Modesto area... farming and orchards. We saw a lot of rice fields.

During travels I usually stay in front on the passenger seat except to go make sandwiches or something else easy. I tend to get motion sickness so it helps if I keep looking at the road. I also really enjoy looking at the scenery. The children spend their time playing in their room, drawing at the table or seating in front next to me, reading or counting how many new beetles we see. It's a lot of fun!

We arrived at the Koa campground in Oroville around 7pm. We usually eat out on travel days. There is already a lot to do to set up camp so it’s nice not to cook. We gave it a try, last night. We walked over to the casino, that is right next to the camp, since they have different restaurants (the only ones around... at a walking distance!) Well, it didn’t take us long to be back out the door. Too much smoke... just not the right place to bring kids to diner. So we ate at home that night!

Today, while Bill was catching up with work since we have cell service here, the kids and I went for a refreshing dip in the pool.

Sylviane

Bill’s Birthday

One week after Ben... it’s Bill’s turn to be celebrated!
We started the day with a nice breakfast. We bought a new bread machine that makes amazing breads, well, it is not only the machine, I have to say that Bill is quite an expert as he’s been making breads for many years now. But that machine helps a 100% whole wheat rise well. Usually we don’t go for "more expensive means better" but for this bread machine it is true. Check it out if you’re thinking about buying one, it’s worth the money!

Got a little side tracked here... Back to Bill’s birthday.

The kids and I made him a wind chime with one of the many abalone shells we have, sea shells and drift wood. We took advantage of Bill being gone one day last week to work on it. (Bill had to go back to Modesto for work) Turned out real nice!

After breakfast we packed a lunch (it’s all about eating, isn’t it?) and went for a walk through Caspar South to a marine reserve. On the way there we saw deers, quails and their chicks, wild turkeys and we also found some ripe yummy blackberries and some that were not. We had the beach all to ourselves that’s where we had our picnic. It’s a gorgeous beach with dark sand, surrounded by cliffs and so relaxing... just the sound of the waves.

We finished the day with a big carrot cake (Bill's favorite). We used a recipe from Evelyn our ex-neighbour from Modesto. The recipe is actually from her Mom. It is very moist and delicious. Feel free to email me for the recipe. I haven't had better carrot cake than this one but next time I need to remember to cut the quantities in half. It's way to much for the four of us. It made a good breakfast this morning, though :)

Happy Birthday!

Sylviane

Ben’s Birthday

Yesterday was a long eventful day. It started at 5.30 in the morning. We all got up and the boys got ready to go get some abalone. Slow start, it took a while for Ben to wake up as he is not an early bird... he takes that from me! They left around 6.20. Eva and I waved good bye and started on the birthday cake, blowing the balloons, decorating the bus and making breakfast. They came back 2 ½ hours later, Ben had got his limit again, three nice abalones. Great start for this special day. After breakfast Ben’s godmother, Natacha, called from Switzerland and he got to open her presents while talking to her (yes, even before he blew his candles!). She had given me his presents while we were there last March, that’s some good planning on her part!

After lunch we headed to Ricochet Ridge ranch for a ride on the beach. On the way there we took advantage of cell service to call Grandma who for the very first time was not with Ben on his birthday. She was even there, in Guam, when he was born! We missed her and Grandpa but we took them along in our hearts.
Ben had been dreaming to go horseback ridding for a long time. What really interested him was to be able to guide his horse himself. I was a little worried because sometimes on those rides the horses will not respond to any commands but just follow the horse in front of them. But, what a treat... we got an awesome ride along the beach, saw some seals close-up and on top of that the horses were very responsive so Ben got to practice turning, stopping, pulling his horse away from good grass and even trotting. He had a smile on bigger than his face. Eva was ridding a cute pony and had a wonderful time too. They are already talking about having a horse when we settle down somewhere. Well, they’ve had that wish for a long time but this trip reinforced the idea a whole lot!

After that we moved the party to the beach for cake and presents. We finished the day with nice meal... Bill made some abrellanos for diner which is Ben’s favorite abalone recipe. It was delicious! We topped that with an episode of the little house in the prairie. It was a wonderful day filled with memorable and precious family time.

Now my boy is 8! Even if Grandma is set on him being 6 forever:)

Sylviane

Catch of the day

I woke up early today so I took off to go skin diving to a new place. I heard it was good for abalone. It was great diving. Diving in the kelp beds is a treat. I saw some jelly fish, a small eel abut 16 inches long, a china cod (that I shot at and missed, darn it), and lots of nice abalone. I like to be in the kelp forest, it looks so cool shifting back and forth with the serge.

I get some exercise doing something I love, plus we get dinner too, it’s hard to beat that! I got three nice abs, there’s only two in this picture, I put the biggest one in the freezer. The fish I speared is a sea trout (also known as a greenling).

It felt good to get some exercise, not just the diving but the walk back up the cliff, and the hike along the trail on my way back to the car was a work out too.


Abs are a lot of work. But it is all fun work. First the diving, then clean the abalone, clean the dive gear, pound out the abs, dip them in flour, egg/beer mixture and finally pat on the bread crumbs. During this last phase of putting the abs in the beer batter the kids asked if Mom would show them some yoga poses. Here’s a quick pic that I took.

Sylviane has been doing yoga each morning and now the kids are starting to get interested in it too.


Dinner was great, there were no left over’s.

Tomorrow is Ben’s eighth birthday. He is so excited, so is Eva. I will wake him up about 5:30 so we can go get some abalone to start the day off. :)

Bill

Crabs for dinner

The kids and I set out yesterday to hunt some crabs and what a blast we had. Sylviane helped us get a picnic lunch together and put sunscreen on the kids. I grabbed some squid from the freezer and got our gear ready. We have these new crab snares that we wanted to try out. They have small cages made of wire mesh that form a cube of about three inches. It has a hinged door to open and insert the bait and some heavy fishing line rigged into loops that will snare the crabs. Ben, Eva and I each had a snare and we walked out to the rock coast and set them out. Eva caught the first two crabs and oh what excitement. Ben was so cool saying "wow Eva you are good luck for crabbin". Her smile was priceless.

We spent the whole afternoon out on the rock just pulling up the snares and yelling "a crab, a crab, I got another crab, get the net dad!". It was the best day I ever had getting crab. Ben caught several crabs at one point and Eva hadn’t got any in awhile. Ben said "hey, Eva come try my 'good luck' spot and after you get two we can switch again”. It was a fine plan because sure enough Eva got crabs in a short while. It never stopped being exciting every time we pulled up the snares and saw a crab. Each of us used the measuring tool on the crabs we pulled in to see if they were legal size. Ben really liked to pick up and handle them and I kept worrying that he was going to get pinched. Pretty soon Eva was getting into grabbing these snapping critters and loading her own into the bucket.

Eva did so well that soon she had gotten more than either of us boys. Ben decided Eva was good at deciding when to pull up the snares because she was a natural to know just the right time, so he asked her to decide when to check. She liked that responsibility. The kids wanted to stay and keep on crabbing, it was such a fun after noon, but it was after 5:00 and time to go cook dinner.

What a meal! We ended up getting 3 dungeness crabs and 11 rock crabs. I put two of the biggest in the freezer for another day and cooked up the rest of them up. Eating crab is a messy business but it’s just as tasty as it is messy. We decided next time we will eat them outside.

Bill

Gotta do what you gotta do

The internet connection isn’t very good where we are. They say it was because of the some big rigs that are parked in front of us and are blocking the signal. I bet the people behind us don’t get any! Bill still has to do his work so he made it work by relocating his office! It worked better up there.

Bill, Ben and Eva left earlier to go spend some time at the beach, fishing. Yesterday Ben caught a rock crab with his fishing pole. It was exciting! Now I think I’ll go do some reading. I had brought a couple good magazines from Switzerland that I haven’t had a chance to look through yet... aaahh, relax time!

Sylviane

Nina

This is my doll Nina that I made myself with a little help from Mom. I made her ball dress all by myself. I sewed it by hand. It took a long time to make my doll though. I'd like to make some shoes for her and a night gown. I'm also going to make a bed and a blanket for her. I already made the pillow with the sewing machine. I love to sew and make stuff for her.

Eva

Life is good

Our friends, Terry and her daughter Shannon from Modesto, came to stay with us for the week end. It was good for Ben and Eva to have a friend to play with. The three of them had a blast at the beach making up all kind of stories while Bill was enjoying some reading about seashore life. During that time Terry and I were in town enjoying some shopping and some "raw vegan" lunch.

It has been a very pleasurable week end but as all good things must come to an end (wait a minute, I don’t really like that saying... it’s not always true) they left this morning after we took a walk through Mendocino and a lunch at the beach.

I think that I’m falling in love with this part of California. It is so green and wild flowers are growing everywhere. My favorite little town is Mendocino. It has a strong feel of community, uniqueness, health and nature consciousness and creativity... a lot of artists are living there. You won’t find any big chains in the town and they have no parking structures or even lines on the asphalt. I think I could live around here. It’s the first time I say that about an other place than San Diego and maybe it won’t be the last... really, we are just starting our trip, there is so much more to see. What is your ideal place to live?

Sylviane

Awesome abs

About 30 years ago my dad let me take scuba diving lessons and he learned at the same time. We used to go out diving at the kelp beds in San Diego and hunt for abalone. Sometimes we got skunked but we usually managed to get a few nice abalone if we made three dives. Now days they don’t even allow the take of abalone south of San Francisco because there are so few left.

Let me tell you this place we are at now is just awesome for abs. We first came here a few years ago on vacation mostly just passing through, that is when I heard that there are abalone here. And that is also when I started planning for the time I could come see if I could actually get an abalone again. It's been over 15 years since I got one of the tasty creature...

It is not allowed to take the abalone using scuba gear so you need to free dive for them or by rock picking. Five days in a row we both got our limit. That is a lot of abalone! Ben is getting good at finding them and prying them off the rocks, and let me tell you that is no small feat. Low tide is the time to go "rock picking" as they call it.

We just suit up and go feel the rocks below the surface of the water until we feel an ab, then we pry it off and measure to see if it’s at least the legal size of seven inches. We are allowed to take three each per day but not more than 24 in a year. It is very regulated and with good cause. There are a lot of poacher out trying to ruin it for the rest of us. Every week there are reports of the game warden arresting someone or a group of people poaching. To do it legally we need to buy an abalone card. It has 24 tags and we must attached a tag to each ab as soon as we take it out of the water. We write down the date, time and location we took the abalone on the tag, and again the same info on our card.

My good friend Joe used to go ab diving with me often when I first learned to scuba dive and I wish he could be here to see this place.

It seems like the ab hunt takes the whole day even though we have been getting back by 9:00a or so with our limits. First I need to clean the wetsuits, then we go to the this cool cleaning station the RV park has set up for cleaning the abs. After we get them all cleaned and sliced we need to start the soup, made from the trimming, and pound the slices. It’s a ton of work but oh so worth it!

Have you ever eaten Abalone?

Bill

Eating right

This is a view of our colorful counter top in the bus. Since I've started reading the book "You are what you eat" -recommended by my good friend Marie-Laure-I'm being more aware of what I put in my mouth. I'm thinking more about what my body needs are rather than what tastes good. Though, I've always been reading the ingredient list from what I buy to avoid artificial colorants, preservatives and other huge words impossible to read. We have a smoothy made with fresh fruit every morning (or so)... a motivation from my friend Tricia who makes yummy ones.



But today....I got a very special treat. Unless you are a raw vegan, you probably don't know that Fort Bragg has a very special culinary institute. Well, I had no idea either until I stumbled across a flier for a Organic Gourmet Raw Vegan Lunchon...so I went! What a treat, it was wonderful and delicious. The theme was "flavors of the Mediterranean". Au menu: hummus, falafel with tahini sauce, tabouleh, greek salad, carrots with moroccan spices, dolmas with middle eastern marinara, apple baklava and music. I wish you could have been there, Marie-Laure! People from all around the world come to study raw food in this institute. Some of the students that prepared the lunch were from Japan, Iran, Mexico, Wisconsin, Texas, California and other places that I've forgotten already. I enjoyed it so much that I bought a raw recipe book... can't wait to try some!


Bon appetit!

Sylviane

Abalone

So far my dad and I have caught 25 abalones total.
There are so many ways to cook abalone:
- You can fry it,
- You can sauté it in butter
- And you can make ab-relleno
So far I mostly like the ab-relleno and the fried abalone.

Ben

The trees

In bodega bay we went to "the trees". Over there it’s like the coolest jungle gym ever! I said I could survive there for ever only if I had my dad’s 22 (riffle) because you can see quail down the road. The only problem is that there’s no fresh water. Me and Eva found our own little places where we would sleep if we lived there. At my place I could hang my binoculars, backpack, water and hat. And we even had a picnic there.

Ben

Rhododendron park

We've been staying at Pomo RV park since we arrived in Fort Bragg last Sunday. It's a peaceful campground where each site is surrounded by greenery which makes it very private...perfect for doing my yoga outside. Through out the whole park (it really looks more like a park then a campground) we can see a lot of rhododendrons which were in full bloom when we arrived... gorgeous! That reminds me of a beautiful one we had in our yard when I was growing up. My Dad and my brother, as landscape gardeners, would really appreciate this sight.

We've seen rhododendrons since Bodega Bay, wild in the woods, through towns and on the side of the roads. There is a rhododendron National reserve North of Bodega Bay, unfortunately we didn't get to stop there. It's easy to notice them now that they are in bloom. We are going through this area at the perfect season!

Today is a travelling day. We are moving camp....not too far though, only a couple of miles south to Caspar Beach. We won't have the privacy we have here as the campground is smaller and everyone is right next to each other with nothing in between them, but the location is ideal. Right across the road... is the beach. We'll be there for about three weeks. That's our latest plan!

Sylviane

"That’s why we call it Blowdega Bay"

That is what the park ranger called Bodega Bay when I asked if the wind always blew so hard. Prior to arriving at Bodega I had visions of launching our sailing dingy and fishing up a storm while visiting this area. The first day that I mounted the mast on the boat, and pulled the halyards to raise the sails, the wind just kept gaining strength. Finally by the time I had the boat ready to launch the wind was blowing about 25 knots and gusting over 30. Ben was even more bummed out that me when I decided it wouldn’t be safe and we had to abandon our sailing trip. The next day we tried again. But still it was just too much to set off at the boat ramp. The wind wasn’t so bad across the sand spit at the beach so we wheeled the boat over to give a go at a beach launch. I had the mainsail reefed down hard and we did manage to get out on the water with our fishing poles and gear. Ben, Eva and I took off with a spurt as a gust grabed the sails just as I pushed away from the beach, it left me wondering if this was really a good idea. I told the kids to hold on tight as a gust healed us over. I eased the mainsail sheet and headed into the wind but my heart was thumping a bit. I came about and headed back to the beach where we launched from. A few more gusts, and lots of tracking down wind, and we finally got back to the beach but further down wind than where we began.

So I unloaded the kids and fishing gear and figured I should get out by myself just to learn how the boat handles in these conditions. I did ok and I was more at easy not having to worry about the kids but still it was just too gusty for this little 10' dingy. Most of my sailing experience was on our old yacht Thelma, she liked these types of conditions.

The cold wind never let up and we didn’t even try to sail after that. We did have a bunch of fun in Blowdga bay despite the cold bitter wind, especially at the very cool location on the bluff that had trees that made a natural fort of sorts. The trunks and branches were huge and grew along the ground making a great jungle jim and rising up to a canopy that resembled a roof. The kids each found there special spot to have their picnic. I brought my plant book to try to learn what local plants are edible. Eva fell off a branch and twisted her ankle, she ended up hopping on one foot for a few days but she is doing better now.

For a school trip we went to the marine lab ran by UC Davis. They gave us an educational tour and it was very cool. Ben was able to answer a few of the questions asked by our tour guide too, he already has learned quite a bit about sea creatures.

Oh yeah I collected up about ten small sea urchins when we went to the tide pools and ate some nice uni. Lots of work and much smaller egg sacks than the ones in San Diego but still they were tasty and fresh.

Hope to have more to say in the next few days. With luck I will get to do some spear fishing and we will be on an ab hunt...

Bill

Fort Bragg

We are breathing the cool fresh air from the ocean again. As you can see I'm doing my morning exercise as I've been doing every week day for many weeks now.

We realised yesterday that next week end is Memorial weekend...didn't make reservations in advance but luckily we found a great place to stay near the beach. I think we'll be here for a while...lots of fishing, snorkeling, abalone hunting... Bill's in paradise! I also found a great yoga studio and read an add about an African dance class in the area. Soooo exciting! Can't wait to go try it on Wednesday. I did some African dance in Vancouver , Canada where I was studying English eleven years ago and really loved it.

What's your plan for Memorial Day week end?

Sylviane

Cloverdale

Here we are in Cloverdale with good internet connection, yes! We'll be here for a couple of days just long enough to warm up our bones from the cold wind of Bodega Bay and to catch up with laundry (6 loads so far and 2 more to go) since we were dry camping in Bodega ( no hook ups).

The weather here is drastically different...as I'm writing this, I'm sitting just under the AC that is blowing nice cool air. The children and Bill are gone fishing at the catch & release pond and I bet that when they come back they will be ready for dip in the pool!

The bus is filled with a wonderful smell of fresh bread baking... no, we didn't get a new bread machine, Bill made it by hand like he used to do on the boat when we were cruising.

Tomorrow we'll be hitting the road again to go north back to the coast to Fort Bragg area. We are all set up to do some snorkeling and go abalone diving, well Bill will do the diving we'll be watching him from above. I hope that the conditions will be ideal and that we'll have internet connection to tell you all about it.

Sylviane

There are new pictures on the photo gallery to check out!

The tide pools

Today we went to the tide pools. It is very cool there. There is lots of little
sea urchins, a sunflower starfish and a lot of little star fish, little fish, and dad found a not- very-lively Crab.
We got a lot of big mussels and sea urchins. But we found out the mussels weren’t safe to eat so we’ll use them for bait.

Ben

Blog written last Tuesday