A visit to Mount Madonna

On Friday, we finally made it out for a hike -- we had decided to visit Mount Madonna, as our neighbors, Steph and Pat, had hiked there last week (they have a blog that you might like to visit - she does a great job telling their story and sharing pictures: https://www.rnewview.com/).

I had looked up online the route to take to drive there, but... Carl got the Garmin to take us there, and... it didn't exactly take the path that Google Maps had recommended...

Initially, the road seemed to be a bit narrower and a little more winding than I had thought...

... but it was really pretty!

Then it changed to a dirt/gravel road...

... a lot narrower...

... and very winding!

But it was still a beautiful drive, and luckily the only vehicle we met happened to occur when there was a wide enough spot for us to pass each other!

When we got to Pole Line Road, there was a huge tree right in the middle of the road (the road went around on both sides).

We got to the visitor center / ranger station where we went to try to pay our entrance fee. Unfortunately it was locked, but a ranger came out and told us where to find the pay kiosk (evidently, had we come up the normal way, we would have driven right past it). She mentioned that the previous day, the kiosk was not working, and advised us that if that was still the case, we should just consider that our visit was free...

We drove a short ways downhill to the entry kiosk and, sure enough, it was still out of service, so we did not need to pay an entry fee.

As a result of going down to the entry kiosk, we were near where the Valley View Overlook and Twin Giants were located... so it was easy to make the decision to check those out...

The Valley View Overlook gave us a view over Gilroy in the valley...

Carl got his selfie stick out and we got a picture of the two of us at the Overlook.

Then we drove to the trailhead for the Twin Giants...

"The International Society of Arboriculture and the National Arborist Association jointly recognize this significant tree in this bicentennial year as having lived here during the American Revolutionary period. 1776-1976 Giant Twins"

Carl dwarfed in front of the Giant Twins

Trail marker and trail by the Giant Twins Trail

From the back we could see that one of the Giant Twins has a large hollow spot -- I guess the Keebler elves might be making cookies in there!

We drove back up toward the visitor center and parked near the trail for the "Self Guided Tour of Mount Madonna's Miller Estate & Nature Walk".

From the brochure:

 Mt Madonna County Park was once the summer home of Henry Miller. He purchased it in 1875 as a nearby retreat from his headquarters at Bloomfield Ranch (south of Gilroy). He chose it for its location, climate, and views. Initially it was used as a rustic camp with a cabin and wood floored tents for shelter. Between 1890 and 1902 he built bungalows for his wife, son, and daughter.

The abandoned estate was in bad shape in 1933 when the remaining buildings were destroyed or dismantled; the largest was moved to Watsonville Road. Since then, nature has been reclaiming the land.

Santa Clara County Parks acquired the lower part of the estate in 1927. In 1953, the County purchased the remainder of the estate (including the building sites) and added it to Mount Madonna Park.

Who was Henry Miller, the Cattle King?

Henry Miller was born July 21, 1827 in Wurtemburg, Germany, as Heinrich Alfred Kreiser. Raised on a farm, he was apprenticed as a butcher at the age of 8. At 14, he left home, roamed throughout Europe, and then immigrated to the US. By 1846, he was making his living as a butcher in New York City. In 1850, fascinated by the Gold Rush, he purchased a ticket to California from a friend. When he noticed that the ticket was "NON-TRANSFERABLE" in the name of "Henry Miller", he adopted the name for the trip. He liked it and legally changed his name to Henry Miller in 1858.

Miller arrived in San Francisco in 1850 with only $6.00 in his pocket and quickly got a job as a butcher. By 1851 he had his own shop. By 1857, he held options on most of the cattle north of the Tehachapi Mountains, making other San Francisco butchers buy their beef from him.

In 1857, Miller teamed with Charles Lux (a former competitor) to buy a large herd of American cattle. In 1860, they formed a partnership as Miller & Lux Company. Over the next 27 years they became the largest landholders in the United States by purchasing and improving a network of ranches throughout California, Oregon, and Nevada. At their peak, they owned well over one million acres of land and had herds of over one million head of cattle, 100,000 sheep, and countless pigs.

In 1858, Henry Miller and Charles Lux married sisters, but unfortunately Henry's wife, Nancy Sheldon Miller, died in childbirth 11 months later. In 1860, Henry married Sarah Sheldon (a niece of his first wife). They had three children: Henry Jr (1862), Nellie (1865), and Sarah Alice (1867). Henry's wife shared his ambition and goals and worked hard to help him succeed. He was very distressed when she died in 1905.

In 1879, at the age of 12, Sarah Alice, their youngest daughter, died in a riding accident. Henry fell into a serious depression and returned to his hometown in Germany to help get over this loss. His son, Henry Jr., became an invalid and died in 1902 at the age of 40. Sarah Miller (Henry Jr's widow) lived at Mt Madonna until her death in 1922.

In 1887, Lux died and Henry Miller assumed control of the company. Miller appointed J. Leroy Nickel (his son-in-law) as president in 1914.

Henry Miller died in his daughter Nellie Nickel's home at the age of 89 on October 14, 1916. Nellie survived her father to become principal heir among 24 others. She died in 1944.

It was said that Henry Miller could travel from Oregon to Mexico without spending a night on land he didn't either own or control.

His empire was essentially gone by the late 1930s.

These are part of the ruins of the large house that Henry Miller built for his wife in 1901 at a cost of $250,000. It included 7 bedrooms and baths, a living room with a veranda on three sides, and a 3,600 square foot ballroom. The foundations of the summer homes of Henry Miller Jr and Nellie Nickel were also there. We found it surprising that they all would have been let go to destruction in such a short amount of time.

Along one of the trails associated with the self guided tour -- these were indicated as "Young Redwood Trees".

These Redwoods are only native to the coast of Northern California because they require its misty climate. They include the tallest and oldest trees in the world. In the mid to late 1800s, Coast Redwoods were heavily logged to built the rapidly growing San Francisco Bay Area. Most of the last old growth trees on the Miller Estate were cut to help rebuild San Francisco after the 1906 fire and quake. Almost all of the redwoods in the park today are second growth, rising from the roots of their ancestors. Redwood trees can live more than 2500 years and grow to over 350 feet tall with trunks up to 25 feet in diameter.

This was indicated as a "Redwood Cathedral, Fairy Ring, or Refrigerator Trees":

When redwood trees are severely damaged or cut down, they recover in several different ways; the most common is for them to sprout new shoots from the old roots which then become a ring of trees (clones of the original). These rings of redwoods are sometimes called "cathedrals" or "fairy rings". These rings are common throughout the park. The "young" trees (most are less than 130 years old) are growing on rootstock that may be up to 1000 or even 2000 years old.

Before iceboxes or refrigerators, the rotting core of the parent trees were sometimes dug out and used as an evaporative cooler for perishables. They were kept cool by evaporation of water from wet organic matter or later by being packed with ice.

The cut stump of the original tree in the midst of the Redwood Cathedral.

The spires of the Redwood Cathedral reaching up to the heavens above!

We took the more normal route on our way back to the campground, but we thoroughly enjoyed all of our trip to visit Mount Madonna!

Cinco de Mayo

Thursday was Cinco de Mayo, so we decided to celebrate with lunch at a Mexican restaurant in Gilroy.

The downtown area of Gilroy has a lot of shops and restaurants -- a lot more active downtown than a lot of small towns we've seen across the country.

Carl got a burrito with rice and beans and I got a chicken quesadilla - yum!

We had found parking just off the main street in a small lot... we didn't notice that there were murals on the walls of the buildings on both sides of the parking area until we returned to the Jeep...

Gilroy - Garlic Capital of the World! (Note the small structure on the left with its own painting of a little boy climbing up it!)

On the other side, "Wineries of Santa Clara Valley". We pass wineries and vineyards a lot when we're driving around!

We are glad to have had an additional week in this area!

Sofa no more, Desk instead!

I blogged a couple of weeks ago that we had advertised our sleeper sofa on Craigslist (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2022/04/sofa-for-sale.html). While we were at Soledad Canyon (Palmdale area/ LA County), we got several contacts -- most were spam. We got one contact that we thought was a real person really interested in the sofa. He was going to come -- he wanted to be sure we wouldn't sell it before he got there because he had over a 2 hour drive to get to where we were -- he was going to come one of two days... we didn't hear from him at all on the first day, so the second potential day we reached out to him by text... and he didn't respond. Oh well...

So, when we moved to San Benito, we re-posted in the new location on Craigslist. We got one contact that seemed spam-like, but that was all. We again re-posted in the new location when we moved to Morgan Hill, and got no contacts - no spam, no real contacts, nothing! We kept on checking to see that it was really listed... couldn't believe absolutely no contacts! Until Monday! We were contacted by a fellow, Matt, that sounded genuinely interested; he would come on Tuesday to see it and hopefully buy it. We went through the process to let the campground know that we would have a visitor coming (it was a non-trivial process but Carl went through all the steps!), and Matt came on Tuesday, but the campground would not allow him to enter! They have a zero-tolerance policy that all vehicles must have proof of insurance to enter the campground. Matt had renewed his policy, but didn't have a printed out card, and his cellular service did not work at the campground, so he couldn't bring it up online... oh my! So close and yet so far!

So, Carl went to get him at the entrance, and drove him into the campground in our Jeep (which many of you know is also our garage (Jee-rage) - full of stuff in the back). Matt came into Gracie, did some measurements to ensure that the sofa would fit into his RV, we started figuring out the steps of how it could be taken apart, and he agreed to buy it.

So... now to get it to his car which is at the entrance of the campground. While Carl and Matt worked on taking the sofa apart, I worked on removing things from the Jeep so the sofa could be put into it. We were amazed but it fit! We had thought we might have to leave the back hatch open, but it even closed up. We drove the Jeep to the entrance where Matt's car was parked (Matt and Carl walked cuz there was no usable place to sit in the Jeep other than the driver's seat). We then transferred the sofa in pieces to Matt's car and he and the sofa were on their way!

We had a folding table that we had thought that we would use to "try out" the two-person desk concept, and we brought it in on Tuesday afternoon... but... since we had the ad on Craigslist, I had done some searching and realized that this area was a pretty great area to acquire used office furniture. We had decided that we would like to get a desk that would have the legs way at the ends of the top, a desk top that would be 72"x29", and two desk chairs, and maybe a two drawer file cabinet. I found a company that appeared to have all the components that we wanted, so we went there on Wednesday.

We forgot to take a picture while the folding table was being used, but this shows the space where the sofa used to be with our printer sitting in the middle of it (after we had taken the folding table down).

TekBenches was a new & used office furniture warehouse in downtown San Jose...

We had decided that we wanted to get a base that was configurable in height and width -- Carl showing it being used as a standing desk...

The adjustment panel to raise/lower the desk.

Carl at a sitting height.

We wanted the adjustable width to be sure that the legs could be at the outer edge of the desk top so the legs would not interfere with either of us while using the desk.

The fellows at the shop put together the base that we were purchasing with the larger top that we wanted - they put it all together, showed us that it worked, and then they took it apart so we could fit it into the Jeep.

The desk top and legs (the base was compressed to its narrowest width and lowest height to fit into the Jeep).

I forgot to get a picture, but we purchased two desk chairs and they were also in there, and we both fit in the front seats too!

After getting home, all that was needed was for us to put it back together just as the fellows at the shop had done. We set about to do this on Thursday afternoon. We were thankful that it was in two pieces as both the top and the base are pretty heavy! We brought them both in and proceeded to re-assemble the desk on the floor of Gracie...

I secured the wires (the fellows at the shop had provided us with all the wire ties and screws).

We got it set up, got our chairs and computers in place, and...

Voila! We have a two-person desk!

We are not anticipating using the automatic raising and lowering, and we're definitely not planning to use it as a stand-up desk, but... we figured the automatic adjustment capability would help us get the desk configured to be most comfortable for our use.

Just one more picture...

After serving as a moving truck for two days in a row, the Jee-rage is back to its accustomed use as a combination Jeep and garage!

So, we are minus one sofa (we still have the jack-knife sofa) and plus one desk and two chairs! We are looking forward to having a dining table that is used for dining, and no longer a multi-purpose space for dining and office/computer work.

Smart Kitties

On one of the Facebook groups I watch, a fellow Newmar owner shared that they had problems that their cat had figured out how to open the screen door:

The cat started by reaching under the screen door... but when that didn't work...

The cat figured out how to open the plexiglass shield in the middle of the screen door (you may be able to see that it is a little bit open and flip the latch (it is just a push-down latch).

Here is a zoom in on their second picture - you should be able to see a cat's eye and ear just inside that slightly opened plexiglass slider...

I commented back to them that I was thankful to have an intellectually challenged cat (Miss Kitty is sweet, and she is trainable and she trains us, but I don't think she would have figured that out == she also doesn't really want to go outside, so that may contribute).

I shared with the original poster that Carl has put a spring closure on our plexiglass slider panel so it keeps it closed (we did it to keep flies out when we might forget to explicitly close the sliding panel).

The spring is connected to the door and plexiglass with command strip hooks -- it was initially a little challenging to open the door, but I'm getting used to it.

So... if you don't have a particularly clever cat, be thankful!

Monitoring

I had posted many months ago about our putting SeeLevel tank monitors onto Gracie (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/06/getting-stuff-done.html, https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/07/advantages-of-seelevel.html). We were not getting very accurate results from our black and grey tanks, so we stopped by the factory in Texas about a year and a half ago (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/12/monday.html). At that time, we felt the black tank sensor was particularly inaccurate, so they replaced that sensor, but also gave us another sensor for the grey tank.

It seemed that the grey tank monitor was less and less accurate -- it would go quickly from empty to 90-95%, but we would know that there was no way we could be that full. Since, when we got to this campground, we thought we were going to be here one week, and since we did not have sewer hookups, we were a little conservative, but not ultra conservative. We know that we can go two-three weeks if we are very conservative -- and we didn't have to do that. Well, then, our stay got extended here another week here (we requested to extend it and our request was granted), and we'd just as soon not have to drive over to the dump station if we don't need to... so it became a little more necessary to have a good idea of how full our grey tank *really* is.

So, we decided to install the new sensor:

Sanding the spot where the new sensor will be installed. The old sensor is just to the left of where Carl's hands are - we *think* the problem is that our grey and black tanks have a plastic weld about 1/4 of the way up the tank from the bottom, and that this confuses the sensor. As a result, what Garnet suggested is that we install sensors just above the weld - and that's what has been done on the black tank. This means that we cannot see any readings (it reads 0%) until the contents of the tank get to the bottom of the sensor, and after that, the readings reflect how much of the upper part of the tank is filled. It isn't ideal (it isn't anywhere near as nice as the way SeeLevel worked on Miss Doozie!), but it helps.

Preparing the wires

Attaching the wires

Readings today (after new sensor has been put into place). If this is correct, with Grey represented as 50%, that's 50% of the top 75% part of the tank, or about 2/3 full at this point (25%+(0.5*75%) = 25%+37.5% = 62.5%).

We think that the new sensor is giving us more accurate readings (it is reflecting how full we *think* the tanks are) -- and we're hoping we'll be able to be conservative enough to wait until we leave next Monday to have to go to the dump station. It isn't horrible to have to close everything up to drive to the dump station, but, even though it is a short distance, essentially we have to close up as if we are driving hundreds of miles - things still need to be secured!

Also on Saturday

In addition to the cooking we did using the fresh vegetables which we had purchased, we also went to a meeting with a "membership specialist" while we were here at Morgan Hill.

We realized that we had not taken any pictures of our site... when we took these pictures, the buddy site next to us was empty...

You can see the empty site next to us. "Buddy" sites are pretty tight - when someone is in the buddy site next to you, you can share items via your windows pretty easily.

On our walk to where the Membership meeting was to take place, we walked by some of the "Getaway cabins" that are located here at Morgan Hill.

We also walked past the pool -- it is the nicest pool we've ever seen at a Thousand Trails property. We haven't visited it yet (hasn't quite been warm enough).

One of the lodge buildings (we didn't go inside to see what was inside it).

The "Wine Room" where our membership meeting was to take place.

We were the only participants in the meeting with Heidi, the local membership specialist, on Saturday, so we could get all of our questions answered. She has since followed up with us, and we have decided to upgrade our Thousand Trails membership to gain some advantages in advance reservations and access to about 20 more properties than we had previously.

Farmers Market

Sorry for no posts over the weekend... I often say that we post on the blog to let our family know that we're alive... so if y'all worried, Sorry!!!

We had read that there was a Farmers Market in Morgan Hill on Saturday, so we drove into town to see what vegetables and fruits we could find.

We parked on a side street and walked down to the train station parking lot where the market was set up. We walked past this apartment building and wondered what the art on the side signified... I thought it looked like a sideways periodic table...

Turned out it was pictures of SunSweet fruit boxes. The apartments are called "Sunsweet" apartments (https://sunsweetapts.com/#). I tried to look up online to see if possibly there had been a processing location for SunSweet there at some point in the past, but I didn't find anything.

It was easy to get to the market...

... there were probably about 20 vendors in the market, and then more outside on the street with non-produce things to sell.

There was a gentleman playing the flute which was nice to add to the enjoyment of the day.

All our purchases!

We got so many nice vegetables! We were busy the rest of the weekend making use of many of the items -- Carl made stir-fry for Saturday lunch with chicken and lots of veggies, we collaborated on vegetable beef soup using our beef bone broth and lots of veggies for Saturday evening, and we made cream of tomato soup with fresh basil on Sunday afternoon. In between, we cooked kale and swiss chard. We still have some green onions, artichokes, and the Napa cabbage to use!