California Here We Come ~ In Bits and Pieces ~ Kernville First.

I’ve decided to begin doing short posts because we have had surprisingly limited internet speeds and that makes blogging very time consuming. Plus, those who know Frank know we always have to stay busy and finding time to write when we aren’t driving or doing is difficult.

Once we left Grand Junction, we high tailed over to California, choosing to save exploring Utah for the fall when it might be slightly cooler than it is now.  Everyone knows California has some beautiful places and we wanted to explore a few from the RV.

Scenes as we drove to Kernville.

Kernville is on the southern edge of the Sequoia National Forest about 50 miles east and slightly north of Bakersfield, CA. The drive to Kernville was scenic and easy with a one night stop in Hurricane, UT just to break up the drive.

When I think of California, I envision the coast, so I enjoyed seeing the arid, mountainous aspects of the state.

Can you imagine trying to cross this terrane in a covered wagon?

Our RV park in Kernville was the Kern River Sequoia RV Resort.  The campsite backs up to the Kern River and our particular site had a small stream behind it. The stream was a very popular spot for neighbors to plop their chairs in the stream while the kids played in and around the water.

I forgot to take a pic of the campground but you get an idea in this picture.

Our sons joined us for the weekend so our family was together for the first time since Christmas in Bonaire. That was quite a treat!

As usual, we stayed very busy, mostly mountain biking.  Frank transferred the mountain biking bug to Clayton way back when he was in high school, but Hunter was slower to get hooked.  However, after this trip, Hunter has also succumbed to MB Fever.

Three amigos prepping for a ride.

I dropped off the guys at the top of Cannell Trail and they spent the next several hours bombing down the mountain then riding back to the RV. Cannell is listed as an Epic Trail by IMBA (International Mountain Biking Association) and it needed to be done.  Frank reports that this isn’t the best Epic he has ridden, but they still had a great time.

Cappy really wanted to run the whole trail!

Captain really wanted to run the trail, but it was too long for her.  She trotted along behind Frank near the drop off point until it was time for them to leave.  The trail was beyond my comfort zone and I was the designated drop driver, so once Frank, Hunter and  Clayton left, Cappy and I hiked a bit and enjoyed the scenery.

Clayton, assessing the mountain?

Hunter looks very serious about this ride.

Do those cute ears make you think of Yoda?

Our campsite was well shaded and the little creek behind us was great for cooling off for both us and the dog.

Why don’t you get wet instead of taking my picture?

Floating the Kern River was pretty popular but we only had a couple of days in Kernville and biking took precedence over all else. In addition to two mountain bike rides, Frank and I enjoyed a few excellent road rides after the kids returned to work. (It is really strange to have our kids leave for work and we just continue to play!!)

Not a bad view as we biked along the road.

I find it very difficult to reconcile the visual effects of the mountains and the streams when I am biking. Often it looks like I’m riding downhill but feels like I am riding uphill because of the illusion the landscape creates on the incline. Generally Frank reads the grade better than I do, so I follow his lead on which direction to ride first so I’ll have a downhill ride on the way back.  But it is hard to believe him when my eyes are trying to tell me I’m going downhill!

I guess this is a gentle way of increasing my trust in Frank’s decisions because once I turned around on the rides, I was very surprised to find just how uphill the ride was on the way out. Going home was definitely downhill ~ woohoo!!!   Even when the road appears to be going downhill, if I am riding against the flow of the river, I know I am moving uphill….

Does anyone else experience difficulty determining uphill from downhill when the mountains converge near the road you are riding?

Anyway, Kernville was an excellent first stop in California. Of course it was heavily influenced by having the family together!  I’m very happy we will be in California and in closer proximity to the kids for a few weeks!

~HH55 Catamaran Update~

Although there is a looonng way to go, the most recent update from HH shows some exciting progress on our cat.  Apparently the interior painting is now complete and exterior paint will begin this week. Very exciting!  I just have to remember that even though these steps make it look like we have made a big leap toward completion, there are many less obvious and vital steps before completion.

Starboard aft berth.

Facing forward in the master hull; two sinks inboard, the head outboard, then the shower.

In the second photo, you can see some of the customizations HH has made on our hull.  LIB was set up as a four cabin, four head boat which was perfect for chartering and actually was very comfortable for us while we lived on board. However, on out HH55 we have chosen to reduce the number of heads and showers to just one in each hull.

In an effort to retain personal space and convenience when we revert to sharing a head, we redesigned the forward area of the owner’s hull. We changed the head from an enclosed area that included one sink, one shower and a toilet in the following way:  1. we removed the doorway into the whole area to make it feel less congested, 2. we enclosed the head for privacy but still allow access to the shower if someone is using the toilet and 3. we added a second sink so we have our own spaces.

Although we had our own heads on LIB, we think these small alterations to our HH55 will allow us to easily share one bathroom and reduce the total number of heads on board.

We very much appreciate Gino Morrelli’s help reworking the spaces in our Morrelli and Melvin designed HH55.  Gino knows every space and weight of these boats and he was instrumental in helping us figure out where to make interior changes that would make this awesome boat work for our purposes.

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