2016 Warner Bros Reunion - Wednesday and Thursday

My brothers and wives and Pam and I have gotten together often during the years and we did so again this past week at Marty's cabin up in the Sierra's.  He built his mountain cabin in the 1980's and had the foresight make a paved RV space with electric hook ups.

We drove in early Wednesday morning and were all set up when Marty and Elena arrived from Tucson.

Pam and I were so excited that the Roadrunner fit well into the parking space right in front of Marty's cabin.  He had insight to plan it out long ago before we ever had an inkling that we would have a motorhome.  We planned on 30 amp service but over the years he upgraded to 50 amp so we were all set!
Brad and Sue drove in next from Sacramento Airport.  They live in Ft Worth.  Reid and Amy soon followed, also flying into Sacramento and taking a rental car.  They live in Albuquerque.

Marty had things planned for us during the week including days for all of us to cook dinner and do a couple of meals.  It all worked out great.   There was a good balance of 'hanging out' and activities.

We changed things a bit on the schedule and Pam cooked tortellini and we had a big salad for dinner.

The notion that 'We have too much food here" became a recurring theme everyday.

 We had a nice time catching up on the back porch and then moved it inside for some more chatting.  We did a lot of that which was great.

The next day, the only thing we had on the agenda for activities was a 90 minute hike around a grove in Big Trees State Park.  It was about 5 minutes up the highway from the cabin in Arnold.

 We had a good group and enjoyed the docent who explained a lot of things about the history of the park and some of the tid bits about how it was discovered.  In the spring of 1852, hunter Augustus Dowd was chasing a wounded grizzly bear and came upon some large sequoias.

 This was back in the '49er' gold rush days.  Dowd was from Murphys, the gold mining town 20 miles to the south.  He told a lot of stories about the place and finally more and more people took the trip and saw it for themselves.

We've been to that park 3 or 4 times over the years and always learn something new every time we visit.

Our shirts are Elena's idea.  She came across a picture of the four of us that she had imprinted on T-Shirts.  

So which one do you suppose is me in this photo?

After our hike, we gathered for a group shot

Then returned to the cabin and everyone helped with dinner.  Elena spiced things up a bit with her 'infused' water that we all enjoyed.

It was Sue and Brad's turn so we chowed down on some brisket they cooked on the grill.

And it was another nice evening to spend on the back porch after dinner.

That's a recap of the first couple of days together.  It was a lot of fun!

Thanks for joining us today on the Roadrunner Chronicles!

Time near Tehachapi

We parked the Roadrunner in Bakersfield and drove over and up the mountain to our friends Bobbi and Paul's place.  It was extraordinary dry in this part of the country but very beautiful nonetheless.
The drive took about 50 minutes and we arrived in town to tour around Tehachapi.

One of the attractions downtown is the train station museum.  It was quite an impressive operation.  Volunteers run the place and as it turns out Bobbi was well acquainted with the conductor who gave us our tour.  That was fun to see.  Friends who hadn't seen each other in a few years.

Meanwhile, we got our tickets and he provided some great background of the importance of the area and the railroad in particular.

The building itself looked fairly new and was -- it had burned down and was rebuilt over the last 10 years -- 2008 to be exact.  It was small and quaint but had a lot of interesting memorabilia in it to make it a very worthwhile way to spend a couple of hours.

Techachapi is along the route connecting San Francisco to Los Angeles by rail.  One of the features along the way is the engineering wonder:  The Loop.  It solves an elevation issue along the route by allowing the tracks to rise 77 feet around a small mountain.

 Internet Photo of Tehachapi Loop

This loop slows trains as they move down the mountain in one direction and enables them to gain momentum as they go up the Tehachapi Pass.  It was completed in 1876 and remains one of the railroad engineering marvels of our country.

The Tehachapi Museum / Railroad station has displays that show the impact of the railroad to the area as well as some of the history of the many railroad companies over the years.

After our time at the museum we spent the day being treated to a wonderful time at Bobbi and Paul's place.  They have a choice overlook of a valley which is pretty fantastic.

 

It was really great to see them!

We weren't sure about getting up to their place in the Roadrunner so we opted to stay in Bakersfield at the Orange Grove RV Park.  Their sites were big and spacious and proved to be a good choice.

One of the days on our way up the mountain to Bobbi and Paul's, we opted to drive over to the grounds of the Cesar Chavez Monument.  He was an important Latino labor leader in the 1960's and 1970's and his home for twenty years was there in Keene County.  The site was closed for a private party but we managed to drive by and see some of it.

That's all from the Roadrunner Chronicles this time -- thanks for joining us!