~Monday, July 27, 2020~
Day 43
A pancake breakfast then some blogging work. Much accomplished on that today, thanks to great customer support. While I did that, Jeff took a 2 hour walk in the 100 degree weather. On his walk, he witnessed a few homeless people trying to put out a small brush fire along the Kern River Bed. We used to see quite a bit of that along the Napa River, some of which got out of control and required emergency response. Ugh!
Next plan was to talk to Chris from Ford and dial in our next loaner car. The plan is to have a smaller car that we can drive outside the Bakersfield area with, to get out of this heat and do a little exploring, preferably at a higher altitude. The answer….a new Ford Explorer, which we’ll swap out with the loaner truck that we were so grateful to have for the last week and half. Once again, Chris came through.
While Jeff and I were doing a little route planning and making calls to check on site availability, he jumped out of nowhere and ran out the door. One of our neighbors across from us was in a mobility scooter and completely fell over. With the high slope getting into his driveway, he normally takes a straight shot in to get over it, but this time had gone in at an angle, and met dirt. Not a great way to meet your neighbor but meet Larry we did. Later that day as Jeff and I were playing a game of Cornhole, he stopped by to chat. Retired and traveling solo from Michigan, he is scoping out places ahead of time that he and his wife, who retires in March will someday see together, preferably without the heat. Bakersfield was just a good central point for him (as it is for many travelers) driving through California. He prefers RV parks but explained one of the limitations in owning an older RV (Class C such as his), is when you get to the 10 year mark or older, a lot of RV parks won’t let you in. I guess they don’t want their parks looking run down and junky which kind of makes sense. There’s even age discrimination with RV’s, go figure. Yes, within 20 minutes I learned his whole life story and received a dinner invitation from us, when he returned on Friday from his trip to Yosemite with his son. Can’t wait to exchange ideas. Oh, and I thanked him for taking away the pain of me losing miserably in our Cornhole game 4 points to Jeff’s 18.
Then we met some new neighbors from Argentina. Their story is amazing. Evidently they were traveling along with their 2-½ year-old son, in the U.S. in their newly purchased used travel trailer, with the plan of traveling 3 months when COVID started and their borders shut down preventing them from getting back into their country. They are trying to get an extension on their visa as it expires in the next week or so. When the borders reopen, they’ll sell the trailer, hoping they can sell it close to what they bought it for, then return home. In the meantime, they are making the most of it.
Had a delicious dinner of turkey/veggie burgers and rice, with a little French Cafe music in the background. Hopefully a day of exploration tomorrow.