Welcome Station and around the area

The hose project continued...

Nancy and I rolled and hung some of the "west side" hoses... I didn't have my "control sheet" with me to record where the hoses ended up being stored, so I took pictures so I could remember until I got back to the rig -- the hoses marked Red are at location 2...

... the hoses marked Blue are at location 3.

On Thursday morning, Nancy had offered to show Carl how she fixes fermented dilled cucumbers -- so he met her in the apartment kitchen and she gave him a lesson! We now have two jars of dilled cucumbers processing on the counter of Gracie and more cukes to do another batch in a few days.

Gracie in her spot (site 00) at Welcome Station RV Park.

Another picture of Gracie in her spot. It was quite shady which was nice as the weather was unseasonably warm (in the 80s while we were there).

By Friday afternoon, we had made such great progress on getting the hoses disconnected, drained, rolled, put away, and documented, that Nancy recommended that we take a trip to Wells to get mail, and then a drive up to Angel Lake to see the fall colors.

Wow -- such colors on the quaking aspen!

It was so beautiful!

With the bright blue skies and craggy mountains beyond!

Angel Lake

On the spillway at Angel Lake

Friday was the last workday for Casey and Jake. It was good to have them there to help with the rolling up and storage of the hoses (and so they will know where they are all stored for next season). It was also the last afternoon that Nancy and Steve could both be away from the campground until after the campground closes in a little over a week.

Around Welcome Station

We arrived at Welcome Station RV Park on Tuesday afternoon. 

New residents at Welcome Station are two kitties, Patches (pictured above) and Shadow, on "Vole Patrol"!!!

There are a LOT of voles here... previously, Gayle's kitty Frosty did a great job on Vole Patrol, but he is in Michigan with Gayle this summer, so reinforcements were brought in! They are young but doing a great job!

Meanwhile, Steve, Jake (new co-manager), and Art are also digging holes -- but this one was to put a French Drain in to relieve the soppy ground produced by a spring that would occur next to the vegetable garden.

Patti was working on a "hose layout" project - documenting and helping to label hoses so they could be efficiently stored for the winter and then re-deployed in the spring. She is talking with Nancy and the-other-new-co-manager Casey about what she was doing...

Checking the documentation to make sure that the right hoses are indicated in the right places...

... making corrections to documentation.

They have quite the hose-irrigation system here -- with high volume pumps at the streams providing water pressure to operate 64 (!!!) hoses with water tractors and sprinklers distributed around the grounds.

Meanwhile, Carl was working on projects in the garden -- spreading piles wood chips on the path and working on Nancy's compost pile (here he is watering the compost pile).

We are glad to be able to help out, in very small ways, with the operation here!

Traveling south on Monday

On Monday, we woke up at the Harvest Host site where we stayed in Nampa, Idaho...

Gracie parked at the Harvest Host

We headed south and a little east -- going toward Twin Falls, Idaho...

When we were passing through Twin Falls, we saw this gorgeous area far below the level of the town along the valley of the Snake River -- a golf course and housing.

We were on our way to our friends' RV park near Wells, Nevada...

As we drove down US 93, we saw wildlife overpasses along the way.

When we got to Nancy and Steve's, we got settled into our campsite. Our friend, Jan, had been here for the summer and was scheduled to leave on Tuesday, so Nancy and Steve planned a dinner as a send-off for Jan and a welcome for us!

Steve was grilling T-bone steaks -- Carl got a picture of the pellets that he uses.

T-bones on the grill!

Nancy had made a beautiful apple pie -- with apples grown on their property!

In fact, most of the meal was composed of things grown either at their RV park (in the garden) or from local producers (the beef is from a local farm). It was so good, and great to get to visit with Jan before she headed out. We also got to meet the young couple, Casey and Jake, who will be managing the property for Steve and Nancy next year.

East Across Oregon!

On Monday, we drove east across Oregon to Idaho...

We took US 20 out of Bend. I had never been beyond Bend toward the east in Oregon (in other words, I had really only been in the coastal area and just east of the coastal mountains in Oregon). I wasn't sure what to expect...

We were in high desert...

Beautiful vistas.

This illustrates something I have seen in Oregon (and other states, I think) -- where there will be an indication of a weight limit, but the sign specifically states for Emergency Vehicles -- I am not sure why... anyone know?

Some more of the varied geology

As we got further east, we got into irrigated farmland -- near the center of the state, the irrigated land was growing hay. Further to the eastern edge, there were crops being grown - corn (being harvested), soybeans (though the beans were already harvested), onions (also already harvested), sugar beets, as well as grass hay and alfalfa.

Town of Vale, Oregon with murals of the Oregon Trail on some of the buildings

We were staying the night at a farm in the Harvest Host system near Nampa, Idaho.

We were parked along a field where they had goats...

They obviously were used to Harvest Host guests giving them treats!

We enjoyed seeing the goats out of our windows!

Shopping in Bend

We finished up shopping in Bend on the weekend, stopping at Costco...

... where Carl once again expressed his longing for a big flatscreen TV and amazement at how inexpensive they are! At least he has stopped saying that we could put an 80+ inch TV in Gracie, in place of the front windshield, with a camera on the back side so we can use it when we're driving! Now he is trying to figure out if it will fit in the Williams' Casa (park model) in Mesa. I continually say, "I don't think that will work..."

We then went to Winco... We like Winco stores -- they aren't available everywhere, but where they are, they have a huge produce section, lots of meats,

... and a pretty large bulk food area. I took a picture of this so I'd have the instructions on how to prepare the steel cut oats that we purchased.

They are a huge store, so we also get our steps in when we shop there!

We will be in areas with less access to groceries in the next week or so, so we hope we've got all we need onboard.