Going to China Part 1

We have a nephew, Ben, who lives and teaches in Shenyang, China.  He has been there several years now.  While there he met a woman, fell in love and is getting married on June 27th.  She is Chinese and her name is Fanny.  We met her in Midlothian when she came with Ben for Christmas in 2013.  She is wonderful and she and Ben are great together.  I've never figured out how Beatty men seem to find beautiful women who are way out of our class, myself included.  We are going to the wedding, but not taking the RV!  Imagine that.

Now the original plan for the summer of '15 was to take a ferry from Bellingham, Washington to Wittier, Alaska, spent 3 months touring Alaska then drive back to the lower 48 thru British Columbia and Alberta Canada.  A great plan that we are happy to postpone.  Rather than take time out of the Alaska trip we have decided to take a tour of China, then go to the wedding, then hang out with my (Bob's) brother and his family.  'll be gone about just under 4 weeks.

There are some logistic items that need to be addressed for anyone going to China.  First you need a Visa.  But before you can get a visa you need an invitation to go to China and a detail itinerary including cities, hotels, and airline info.  This took some work.  The invitation was easy as Ben emailed us one.  Diana worked long and hard to determine what tour, if any, we wanted.  There were spread sheets, emails and phone calls among several possibilities.  She work hard on this while I sat back and just agreed to do whatever she decided.

Once that was figured out came time for the visa application.  Based on our mailing address in South Dakota, we were expected to appear in person at the Chinese embassy in Washington D.C.  What, What!?  But we found thru our tour company that they use a company that will do this for us.  Nice!  One issue is that once we filled out the forms we had to mail our passports and all the documents to this company.  Once they get the visas, they FedEx it all back to us.  Even though we have a mail service in SD it takes a long time for us to get mail.  The current arrangement is that when the documents are ready to ship the company will call us and we will give them an address so it can be shipped directly to us.  No problem except we are not sure when the documents will be ready or where we will be at that time.  Fun stuff.

Now another item that needs to be addressed is different than for most people traveling.  When most folks go on a trip they leave their house and then come back to it.  We have to figure out what to do with our home, the RV.  It would also be convenient if the RV were in the same city we fly from and back to.  Huh!  We are flying from Seattle for a variety of reasons.  After some work, (not as much as Diana's work) I found a place near the Seattle airport for a great price.  We will be able to leave the RV at the campground and plugged into electrical power.  This means we don't have to empty the refrigerator and shut the RV down completely.  A big help.  Additionally we can leave the Jeep with the RV and take a cab to and from the airport.  This saves a boat load of $ on parking fees.  Happy time!

We'll try to keep you updated  with addition posts as needed.

Snow day

We got back from Yosemite on Wednesday evening after a great day.  The weather indicated that there was a good chance of snow beginning Thursday afternoon and in to Friday.  Lee Vining was expected to get 1 - 2 inches.  This was no problem as we had plenty of food and we had full hookups, so no worries.  Thursday afternoon it started snowing...hard.

By the time it was done we got 15.5 inches!  There were lots of broken tree branches, some across our RV.  But luckily they were small and we had no damage.

We had a fun day getting snow off the RV and just enjoying the beauty.  By the next day we were on the road again with no issues.

Yosemite NP revisited

The fall of 2014 we spent about  week in Yosemite National Park.  It was beautiful but being late in the season we saw no water coming over the many falls.  So we figured if we went back in the spring the snow melt would allow us to see actual water!  But once again there was very little snow and while there was water, locals said it was very little.  We still thought it was great.

We stayed in Lee Vining which is a small town on the eastern side of the park.  Rout 120 goes thru the park and is closed during the winter.  We arrive in Lee Vining on May 6th, a Monday, and 120 had just opened that day.  We spent Monday and Tuesday getting settled and catching up on laundry, bills and cleaning.  Wednesday was beautiful and we drove into the park.  From Lee Vining it is about an hour and 45 minutes along 120, a beautiful drive.

 Ice still on the lakes.  And frost on the information signs.

Bridal Veil falls was very interesting because the wind was blowing the stream of water back and forth.

Yosemite Falls was cool.  Last time we were there there was a stream of water about the size of a pencil.  A little more this time.

Upper Yosemite Falls.















Lower Yosemite Falls

One of our first selfies!!  We are so cool.










Not sure if we will ever get back to Yosemite but it sure is grand!

Death valley National Park

We had been to Death Valley several years earlier.  We had gone to Las Vegas, rented a car and drove over for part of a day.  This time we were there for a week. We had forgotten how beautiful it is.  The rocks have so many colors and variations that are amazing.  While we were there the daily temperature was between 103 and 107.  So the strategy was to get up early, get out and do some hiking and maybe some site seeing but the be back home in the early afternoon when the temps were already in the upper 90s.  We'd stay inside most of the rest of the day.  Thank goodness the RV has AC!!

This is a land of contrast.  While it is one of the driest places on earth we saw several springs and vast areas of green bushes.  The entire valley is below sea level with Bad Water being the lowest spot in the western hemisphere.

 One dive in particular shows multicolored formations.

 There was just so much that I can't/won't show it all.  But one place of special interest was Scotty's Castle.

This place was built by a very wealthy man as a vacation home to escape Chicago winters.  The engineering and design are amazing for that era.  It was never finished, but the history and story of Scotty are fascinating.  FYI, Scotty is not the owner or builder!

There are several small herds of wild mules in the area.  We found some one day while exploring a lesser traveled road up out of the valley but still within the park.  Many years ago, these guys either ran away from their prospector or the prospector gave up looking for gold and just released the mule.  Now they are wild residents of the park.

Finally, here are some miscellaneous tidbits.
The town of Beatty, Nevada is about 30 miles outside the valley.  Several times we were on Beatty Road.  We'd been to Beatty before so there was no real need to go back

.

Yes it was hot.  107 even as a dry heat is still hot.

London Bridge, Split Rock Lighthouse and Lake Havasu City

We had heard a number of people talk about Lake Havasu City in Arizona.  So we decided to stop and check it out.  We stayed at Lake Havasu State Park in lake Havasu City.  Lake Havasu is simply a very wide area along the Colorado River.  The State Park is very nice and we had a large site with a nice view of the lake.  The city was established as a planned community in the late 1960's.

Part of the claim to fame for this small town is that it is home to the London Bridge.  Yep, the real London bridge that was "falling down, falling down, my fair lady".  When the bridge was crossing over the Thames in London it was determined that it was actually falling down.  Not falling apart, but sinking into the river.  The bridge was purchased by the guy planning Lake Havasu City in 1968.  The bridge was dismantled, moved over 5,000 miles and rebuilt here in LHC.

It now connects the main land to an island.  Very nice area.

As a community they decided to place small replicas of various lighthouses from around the country around the island and the river.  The real Split Rock Lighthouse is on the north shore of Lake Superior north of Duluth Minnesota.  Diana's sister Marge and her husband, David, were married at Split Rock and we have been there many times.

We are actual size, the light house, not so much.

Toilet pump Messy messy!

As we got into Mesa after our trip the see Daniel we noticed a sewer gas smell in the RV.  We may get this odor in certain situations, like when we empty the tanks, someone near by empties their tanks or if it hot.  None of these things fit so we figured we had a problem.  Another indicator was that the toilet pump just kept running so little or no vacuum was being created.  I found a service that would come out to the RV and check it out.  They found that the pump was not only bad but also leaking.  This meant we had raw sewage spilling out into the belly of the RV.  As an aside I have never understood the term "raw sewage",  like cooked sewage is better!?  Anyway, after the guys figured out the problem the situation got much worse.  We have an extended warranty plan for the RV and checked into that.  Our service tech had worked with these before and said there would some coverage but not full coverage.  OK , fine let's just get this fixed.  Well the warranty company wanted to inspect the problem.  So add 2 days for that guy to show up.  In the mean time our service tech was reluctant to order the pump until he knew the warranty covered it.  I told him order the part, we have to get this fixed and if we have to pay for it we will.  Part ordered.  Add 2 days for shipping plus 2 more for the weekend.

The smell is getting worse by the day as more sewage leaks and is left in the belly of the RV. We open windows with fans but that was not very effective.  So imagine trying to get to sleep with your head in a sewer.  Not pleasant at all.

Finally, the part comes in, the warranty approves the work and the workers show up.  Now I have failed to mention that the space where this pump is located is so tight that you can get only one hand in to work.  We did find and additional service entry but it too was very tight.  So one guy worked from one side of one bay with one hand while the other guy worked from the other bay opening with one hand.  It was interesting watching them try to work and communicate what to do especially since they really could not see what the other was doing.  An hour later the old pump is out.  I asked if I could clean out the area because I wanted to be sure it was really clean plus I'm a little strange like that.  That took awhile.  Then the guys started installing the new pump.  Again one hand working each end of the pump.

So they get done, we test the system and all is well.  It took another 2 days of airing out the pump area with a fan forcing air through the area but the smell was gone and the toilet work.  Happy day!!

Yuma

We spent time at a Fleetwood rally in Yuma.  Fleetwood is the manufacturer of our RV.  While in Yuma we took some time to check out the Yuma Territorial Prison.

The Dark cell was like solitary except there might several others in there with you.  No light, no toilet, one meal a day of bread and water.

We also checked out the Quartermaster grounds near by.

This building is the oldest adobe structure in Arizona.