GrannyDani, une femme d'un certain age: September 2021

September 13, 2021

We said goodbye to our Bella today.

It was time.

But it hurts so badly.

Saturday we took a trip to Amador City. The smallest (land mass) city in CA! It was darling - and did some great Christmas shopping there. They have an AWESOME small museum - all about women in the Old West - the typical wives and ranchers, teachers, but also prostitutes! Very interesting. They were just closing so we rushed through it - I definitely want to go back and go through it again

And I found out something new - the brothels (at least in this city) used TOKENS!

Then we went to a winery - I picked it only because I thought the name was ironic - Drytown Cellars in Drytown CA: "Drytown is the oldest community in Amador County, and the first in which gold was discovered. It took its name from Dry Creek, which runs dry during the summer. However, it was certainly not "dry", as stories tell of there being up to 26 saloons...".

Drytown Cellars is lovely. Tasting are $5 - and you can get food - lovely charcuterie tray for one....and the bottle prices are SO REASONABLE! And we enjoyed several of their wines. And the people there are so nice and friendly

The best were the dogs. Many were old and just liked to sleep....but one was a true rock hound! We were so slow and it took awhile before we realized what he wanted to do when he kept coming to us and dropping rocks at our feet....yup. pick the rock up, throw it, and he would find that exact rock, bring it back, and drop it again and again and again....he was the youngest dog there!

It rained! From about 0200 - 0630 - nice and steady, not hard - but a sound we havent heard in awhile!

And Sunday got sunny but it was cooler ....mid 70's not mid 80's.....a perfect day to go drink more wine. At a winery that Drytown Cellars recommended because of its location - and what a beautiful location it was !

Iron Hub Winery and Vineyards (ironhubwines.com) - the winery is lovely - the people are so friendly - tastings are $10/person and you dont pay if you buy a bottle of wine. They too have food but we ate lunch before we went. We also did not know there was going to be music there - a gentleman who played guitar and sang - much better than the group at the campground the night before (the music was fine but the singer....well...). But we could just have sat there all day looking at the view:

We left Monday morning - surprisingly AHEAD OF SCHEDULE! So we went home a different way. Stopped at Bass and hubby found a vest to replace the one that has "disappeared" (AKA he left it somewhere and has no idea where). And then we stopped here to eat lunch:

Growing up I would HATE when we stopped there - because of course dad wanted all of us to order the soup because it was the quickest meal - but YUCK pea soup???? And as an adult I have grown to love it! But this was the first time in a long time and what was disappointing was they dont serve an assortment of bread and rolls now, just one type.

And that was our trip!

5th Annual Northern California Grand Design Rally AKA Our First Rally

Back in July, while camping at Home - Jackson Rancheria Casino Resort (jacksoncasino.com) we met several people while at the pool. One, who also has a Grand Design, told us about the Rally. Who knew! Never heard of such a thing! He told us it was probably booked but go ahead and sign up on the waitlist.

So we did. And just a couple of weeks later we heard we made it into the rally - and confirmed our reservation and paid our money.

So on Thursday September 16 we hitched up and traveled to Plymouth Ca to the 49er Village RV Resort | Sun RV Resorts. What a shock that was. See that part of the name - Sun RV Resorts? Well, the other Sun RV Resort we stayed at was Cava Robles | Sun RV Resorts. These two resorts could not be more different.

The one in Plymouth - well, I am surprised that Sun puts their name on it. What. A. Dump. So we did find that it was a campground built back in the 1960's (maybe) and was family run. And Sun bought it oh 3 - 5 years ago. And they have lots of plans for it. Apparently they have done a lot of work already - there are 3 very big banks of solar lighting they have installed, and I guess a lot of work on the sewers and all.

I have to admit the pool area was beautiful - 2 big pools and a largish hot tub - lots of chairs etc.

We were in site 193. Looks good on the map doesnt it? FAR_SiteMap_2018_Rebrand_Web (netdna-ssl.com). HA HA HA. It is stuck right next to the dumpsters - on a sharp corner - and there is not one part of the site that is level. And we could not get our travel level at all. Did our best...And there was an eroded part of the roadway at the front of our site that was a little mini pond the whole time we were there.

Could not back up into it, so we went to drive around the campground and come in a different direction. Well, these sites were built for 1960 - 1970 size trailers. Not trailers from the 2000. Not only were they narrow and packed together(think of a can of sardines - over filled in the can) but they are so short that it was very difficult for anyone to park their tow vehicles at the site. So you could not easily get around the campground because of trailers trying their darnedest to get into their sites, and you had to maneuver around vehicles parked partway into the very narrow street. So we finally made it all the way around when hubby said f*** it - looked at the fact that the campsite behind us was empty and he pulled around and drove through that campsite into ours just as though it was a pull through!

And flies! Oh my - the only other time we have ever dealt with so many flies was when we would walk past or through cow pastures! Everyone was complaining about them - we thought it was because we were next to the dumpster! Wrong - they were EVERYWHERE! Finally went to the store and bought fly strips, which did their job but didnt really help....

The best part of the rally? The seminars - able to get our recall fixed there at the site rather than waiting 8 weeks for an appt, hitching up, driving an hour, 5 minutes of work, driving home an hour, parking and unhitching - getting our tanks flushed and cleaned out - having the guys from Happy Daze stop by the trailer and answer questions....The swag bag was nice. We did not win any prizes - not even the 50/50 prize or the grand prize (the return of your registration).

Apparently this rally had the largest number of first time Rally attendees ever....

The Camp Crawl was fun - even tho we are not huge drinkers. And with our swag bag we did get 1 ticket for a free meal at the caterer on site - and we used it the night of the Camp Crawl (they need to chose a different caterer - the trip tip was over cooked and dry, the chicken a little undercooked, the ranch beans were the most disgusting beans I have ever tasted, the potato salad was little chunks of potatoes and mayonaise and that was all, nothing else. The coleslaw was good - no comment on the rolls, because we didnt get any.....) so the only food we tried were the ELK TACOS and they were TO DIE FOR! Most of the drinks were tasty - there were a few we dumped...