Up the River

July 4, 5, 6, 2012

Our favorite cheese place, Loletta Cheese Factory was closed, can you imagine that, closed on 4th of July, Ha Ha, just kidding.  They deserve a break too.  Just a little north of Ferndale, CA on Hwy 101 is the town of Loletta and the Loletta Cheese Factory.  We usually stop there and stock up on their delicious cheeses.  We have watched this mom and pop place grow from a small store front to beautiful gardens out back, a gift shop and last time we were here (at least 7 or 8 years ago) we heard that they had even acquired their own dairy farm.  I just love to see these small town entrepreneurs make good.  We could order by mail but it's more fun to stop at their shop.  If you are in the area it's worth a stop.  Plenty of room to turn around.

Onward to our next favorite place is lunch at Crescent City.  I'm not sure of the name of the place but it is a big tall two story white building in the parking lot of The Citizen's Pier, sort of to the south.  Their fish is fresh, fresh, fresh, right off the boat.  We have had dinner and lunch there over the last 30 plus years and it has always been good.  The white two story building is the new place.  The old place was blue I think.  It was really old, it always scared me when we climbed the rickety old steps to get to the restaurant.  Fond memories.

So after a great lunch of ling cod and coleslaw we headed up the coast to Gold Beach, Oregon and the Motel 6 again.  This is where the famous Jerry's Jet Boats go up the Rouge River.  They have various lengths of the trips, but since we decided two days ago to go it was going to be all the way or nothing.  We signed up for the 104 mile round trip experience.  This was a first for both of us.  The trip left at 0800 sharp boarding at 0745 and Buddy to the day care place at 0730.  AM.

Our trip was a BLAST! You have to put this on your "Bucket List".  We got back at 3:20.  Half way up was a potty break and then on the way back was a lunch stop.  The pictures are still only from my phone and it was very sunny out and Capt Jeff likes to spin us around a lot.  I am having to use the phone for pictures a lot because SOMEBODY left the camera's power cord at home.

It was a bit chilly when we took off but clear blue skies just a little ways up the river.

This is one of those old beautiful bridges, started building it in 1961 and completed it in late 1962.  In December 1964 the year of the 100 year flood the water almost went over the top of the bridge.  The great flood of 1964 was disastrous for the entire coast.  The Eel River down in the Redwoods of California flooded and there are still high water marks above the new Hwy.


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In 1964, a severe Pineapple Express event, known as the Christmas flood of 1964, brought heavy rains to coastal northern California. The Eel River drainage area was particularly hard hit. As it lies close to the coast and mostly without dams, the storm produced a flow of more than 750,000 cu ft/s (21,000 m³/s), including 200,000 cu ft/s (5,700 m³/s) from the South Fork alone. Almost every river town was submerged, bridges were destroyed, and some were never rebuilt. The deepest floodwaters were nearly 70 feet (21 m) above the normal river level. The Eel River estuary and its bordering towns—Rio Dell and Ferndale—were particularly hard hit. Several thousand people were left homeless by the floods and hundreds of head of livestock were lost.

I only mention the flood because as a child we often camped in the Redwoods and every where we went camping was no longer there and the river had actually changed course in the area of Big Basin State Park and probably many other places.  I was in high school at the time of this flood, living in Sacramento.

Capt Jeff, takes his job very serious.  His Grandfather started the business

 Same bridge, after we went under the bridge Jeff turned the boat around to get another look at it

We saw MANY eagles, osprey and fledglings of both.

Way up river

They have many years when the river gets real high but not called a flood.  Can you see the long tree trunk sitting on top of the rock?

 I don't remember Jeff's dog's name, she goes on every trip

A view from the deck where we had lunch.

Taking a short little rest in a cove out of the wind.  The boat had three very large engines and Capt Jeff is a real professional getting us around every rock and then some fun spins in the calm waters.

We saw lots of deer and several river otters along the way.  

This little guy was sharing the cove with us.

Wow! what a great day we had.  When we made the reservations they had names of Doggie Day Care Places.  The one we had, the lady met us at the boat to pick up Buddy and then brought him back at the proper time.  She had two dogs and she just lets them play in the house.  She even took pictures of Buddy and emailed them to me.   Her name was Sandy but I don't remember the name of the day care. We would definitely use her again.

The next day we drove home, but along the way we ran across another herd of elk.  There were at least 11 of these bull elks.  No cows.  We were told, by an 8year old that this time of year all the Mommy elks are off taking care of the babies and the Daddy elks are over here for us to see.  The grasses are so tall you have to look really hard to see them.  Can you spot them?

Well home again, I sure missed our trailer.  We don't very often go on a week long trip in just the car.  Our Ford diesel avg 12 mpg when pulling the trailer and the VW Jetta diesel avg 42 mpg.  With all the expense of hotels and eating out all the time it is probably the same cost.  Of course if we were to go 2 - 3 weeks by car I don't think we could afford it.  Not only that but our beds in the trailer are pretty darn comfortable and of course we have all our stuff to make it comfortable.

Well that's it,  safe travels to all and thanks for stopping by.

Joe and Nancy

Russian River Wineries

July 3 thru 8, 2012

Leaving my sister's house we decided to head over to Hwy 101 and the Russian River Wineries.  We have been down Hwy 101 many times but we have not been to the wineries in the Russian River area since about 1990 when we moved to Washington.

We found the West Side Road along the Russian River and there must be new wineries every 1/2 mile.  We were looking for a small winery called Porters Creek.  Sure enough we finally found it and it's still very small and the wine still very good.  But, when did wine get so expensive?  Or, have we been drinking too much "two-buck-chuck"? (Which is actually $2.99 in Washington but $1.99 in California).

We stayed in Cloverdale a small little town a few miles north from the Russian River wineries.  This was only about 170 miles from my sisters place in Auburn, CA so we had plenty of time to visit a couple of wineries before we checking in to our motel.  (Motels and eating out all the time is sure strange)

All the pictures in this blog were taken with my phone.  Some are good and some are not but it's all I have and many times it was so bright out that I could not see the screen when I took the picture.

This is Hop Kiln Winery.  I was not aware that many many years ago hops were grown along the river valley here.  This is the kiln used to dry the hops.  After visiting this place we started noticing other old hop kilns in the area but not preserved like this one.

Beautiful grounds around the winery

This is the Porter Creek Vineyards  that we were looking for, I'm amazed that we found it, 

everything has changed so much.

The parking lot, house and the tasting room is a small shed behind the house.  Excellent wine.

Gracie was there to met and greet Buddy

Leaving the winery, this vineyard across the street was a major dairy last time we were here

in fact at one time we came around the corner and saw a dead cow in the pasture so we always knew where this winery.  We had joked about this being  "the dead cow winery"

Leaving the next morning was July 4th, and everyone was lining up to see the parade, we were the last car through before they closed the street.

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Continuing north on Hwy 101 we spotted this herd of elk just south of Big Lagoon

Our next stop was in Gold Beach, Oregon.  More on that in the next blog

Safe travels to all, thanks for stopping by

Joe and Nancy

Gold Country

July 1, 2, & 3, 2014
Grass Valley, Nevada City and Downieville, Northern California

Still visiting family, Joe and I decided to visit the historic gold mine towns of Grass Valley and Nevada City.  At one time we lived in the area and we like to go back and visit now and then.

Grass Valley dates from the California Gold Rush, as does nearby Nevada City. 

Grass Valley is the location of the Empire Mine and North Star Mine, two of the richest mines in California. Many of those who came to settle in Grass Valley were tin miners from Cornwall. They were attracted to the California gold fields because the same skills needed for deep tin mining were needed for hardrock (deep) gold mining. Many of them specialized in pumping the water out of very deep mining shafts.

Grass Valley still holds on to its Cornish heritage, with events such as its annual Cornish Christmas and St Piran's Day celebrations.^[7] Pasties are a local favorite dish with a few restaurants in town specializing in recipes handed down from the original immigrant generation. Part of Disney's 1957 film Old Yeller was shot here.

Downtown Grass Valley, everything looked about the same as it did 20 years ago

 except I think the brick cross walk is new

Looking the other way down Main Street

A replica of a stamp machine that hammered the rocks into small pieces in order to get to the gold.  There are hundreds of miles of tunnels under the streets of Grass Valley.   Mules were used underground to pull the mining carts and lived their entire life in the tunnels.

Close up of the stamp machine.  These were very loud and they had many going at the same time.  They could be heard for miles around.

Buddy taking a little rest

Nevada City, about five miles away

The Grass Valley & Nevada City are historic towns along Hwy 49 and Hwy 20.  If you are in the area it is worth a stop for a few days or a couple of weeks.  A good place to stay is at the Nevada County Fairgrounds in Grass Valley that way you will be close to everything.  About 65 miles to Sacramento and about 65 - 80 miles to Lake Tahoe Area.


Another beautiful day and another side trip, this time to Downieville, north on Hwy 49  from the Grass Valley area.   The discovery of gold in Downieville was panning in the river.  The current population is now about 250 and lots of tourists.  The area is well known for mountain biking, fishing, camping and still panning for gold.
 From Wikipedia  Downieville was settled in late 1849 during the California Gold Rush and was first known as "The Forks" for its geographical location and shortly thereafter was renamed after Major William Downie (1820-1893), a Scotsman who led the expedition up the North Fork of the Yuba River and who was the town's first mayor. Major Downie's travels are documented in his 1893 autobiography, "Hunting for Gold." Downieville reached a peak population of over 5,000 people in 1851 but declined sharply by 1865. Downieville is situated at the confluence of the Downie River and North Fork of the Yuba River.  In July 1851 Downieville gained a distinction it may not have wanted when a mob lynched a Mexican woman, known as Juanita, for the murder of a white miner. It remains the only lynching of a pregnant female in California history.
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Downtown Downieville

You never can tell what you might see there

The river runs through it

crossing the river

The gallows are still there sitting just outside the county court house and sheriff's office

On our way home we stopped at this swimming hole on Oregon Creek

Another stop at our favorite swimming hole on the South Fort of the Yuba River. 

 The rivers and creeks in these mountains are always crystal clear.

Looking down stream and a piece of the new bridge at the top of picture

And, looking upstream

When the kids were little we came here 2 - 3 times a week

Standing on the old bridge looking down stream and the new bridge.

I have driven over this bridge many times and now the beautiful old bridge is only for walking, I'm glad they didn't take it down.  It's very narrow and if a log truck was going over the bridge the cars would wait for their turn.

The end of a beautiful fun filled time visiting with family and driving around

 seeing all the old familiar places again

Safe travels to all and thanks for stopping by

Joe & Nancy