Last Day on the Road – Part 2

May 19, 2014  –  Monday (continued)

The cold date shake felt good on my increasingly sore throat. We snap a few more pictures before the long uphill Hwy 74 that takes us up over the mountain.

The above picture shows two of the many switch back roads we came up. In the distance, top right of photo, shows where I started the climb. I put the RV in 3rd gear and it climbed the road really good.

It was nice to see the first sign that says how far Aguanga is! Getting really close now.

Aguanga has an elementary school, this tiny general store, a tiny post office just to the right of it and a real estate office to the left. Our mail is delivered to the post office, since they won’t deliver to our house, one mile up a dirt road. We do all our shopping in Temecula, a nice good size town, 18 miles away. Minutes from the post office and our home, is Jojoba Hills SKP Resort. We have a membership to this SKP park, and is where our RV lives. We have never taken either of our RVs home, due to our steep, rocky dirt road.

Once we got back to Jojoba Hills SKP Resort, where all my trips start from, I called my son and asked him to come and get us. We left our cars at our home, so he could drive them and keep the batteries up.  While waiting for Rick to pick us up, we gathered just the necessities to take home, like our iPads, chargers, medication, etc.  I usually go back the next day to bring home clothes, dirty laundry, dog related stuff, etc

I asked the dogs if they wanted to go home while waiting for Rick. They look pretty happy! Bella only makes this face when she is really happy. Chica loved everything about the trip so she would be just as happy to keep going. She is a great traveler. Unfortunately, Bella hates being in a moving vehicle. She never stops panting until the motor is turned off, then she is really happy! I’ve tried various calming products on Bella, but none of them worked. The only option is to leave her with someone when I travel, but I can’t bear that option. Who would take care of her as good as her momma?

Rick pulled up in my car shortly. It was good to see him and know we were close to being home! Both dogs seem to realize we were close to home when they felt the rough dirt road going up the hill to our house. Daisy, our pitbull/shepherd mix greeted us happily when we good home. I tried to take photos, but they were all so blurry! Once we got into the house, Bella ran and got on my bed, her favorite place in the world.

Chica and Daisy played like this for a long time. Daisy has always played so gently with my small dogs. These two have a very close relationship. Chica was a young puppy and Daisy mothered her from day one. Bella was full grown when we got Daisy as a puppy, and Bella doesn’t really like to play as much as Chica and Daisy.

Thanks for following our 49 day RV trip!

 

Patty, Bill, and the stroller dogs, Bella and Chica

 

New Orleans Day 2 – Final Pictures!

April 23, 2014 –  Wednesday (continued)

Bill’s ankle has been giving him problems again. We pass a foot massage place where the lady and I talk Bill into having a 20 minute foot massage. The dogs and I wait around and visit a few other stores. We make our way back to the RV, rest up, then just Bill and I go back to Bourbon St at 6:30 without the dogs. They stay in the RV this time.

My strawberry booze to go cup

Street band

Skyline lights we see from our RV resort

Good night New Orleans

So that’s all the photos of our New Orleans trip. We leave here in the morning.  I think Bill enjoyed his first time in New Orleans. I know the dogs and I had a good time.

New Orleans Visit 2nd Day – Part 2

We continue our walk on Decatur St towards the Farmers Market and Flea Market. 

Sign in Farmers Market and Flea Market says no bikes, skates, smoking or dogs. The dogs were part of the attraction in there to the tourist. Nobody told us to leave. I think the sign is to prevent dogs walking on a leash, not stroller dogs! 🙂

more photos in next post

New Orleans Visit 2nd Day

I had reserved our site for only one night originally. I used Passport America to get it at half price, which was $49.44. They only offered the discount for one night, so I planned on going to another resort in New Orleans that also had a half price deal. Bill really liked this resort, and suggested we just stay here instead of moving, so we paid almost full price, but with a 10% Good Sam discount which still came to $88.99. The most I’ve ever spent for a resort.

Today I wanted to check out more places we hadn’t gone to yet. Got the dogs in the stroller and put their beads on them again. Left the resort at 9 am looking for adventure.

Dogs wearing Mardi Gras beads

As we are walking to Bourbon Street a man wearing a Vietnam Nam Veteran  hat strikes up a conversation with Bill. Turns out they are also staying at the RV resort and our from northern CA.

Bill and another Veteran

Alligator heads

Continued on next post

New Orleans – Part 4

April 22, 2014  –  Tuesday (continued)

The tour was good, but it didn’t really cover Bourbon Street, and I want to show it to Bill, who has never been to New Orleans. It takes us, walking slow, fifteen minutes from the RV resort to get to Bourbon Street where all the action and crazies are. Since it’s a Tues and still daytime at 6 pm, I’m not sure what to expect.

Kids in stroller petting the dogs

People throwing beads from the balcony

Stroller dogs wearing Mardi Gras beads

Drunk sleeping it off

Visitor center near RV park

The dogs sure did get a lot of attention on Bourbon St, and they had a lot of competition! It was fun taking them. People are always asking if they can take pictures of the dogs and stroller. The dogs were great, I didn’t even zip them in the stroller, so people could photograph them better.

We got back to the RV at 7:15. I worked on deleting and cropping photos till 11 pm, walked the dogs again to potty and called it a night.

 

New Orleans – Part 2

April 22, 2014  – Tuesday (continued)

The tour is interesting and our driver/guide is great. She explains things really good and with humor. It’s hard to take pictures thru the window from where I’m sitting. Bill who has the best seat, takes only a few pictures. 😦

Our first stop is the St Louis Cemetery #3

Next stop is at Morning Cafe for a fifteen minute break. I get an order of Beignets and a coffee. Still not thrilled with the French “donut” but I eat them anyway, then we rush next door to the Statue Garden to snap some pictures before getting back in the van.

See Part 3 for the rest of the tour photos.

 

 

New Orleans at the French Quarter RV Resort – Part 1

April 22, 2014  –  Tuesday

Didn’t get much sleep last night. Spent the evening fighting with my blog, trying to get all the photos loaded. Lost a long post some how and had to re-type it. I’m still not sure the last two post were complete with all text and photos. I think I included too many large pictures, so will do smaller ones today.

We left Bayou Segnette State Park at 10:00 am and made the short drive to a nearby visitor center for maps of New Orleans. I talked Bill into going to the Mardi Gras World place in New Orleans, so we set the GPS to it and left the visitor center at 10:30. Our check in time at the French Quarter RV Resort is at 12:00, so we have some time to kill.

Arriving at Mardi Gras World in New Orleans

We pull up to the place and see a sign saying Parking $10. Ouch, it was already kinda pricy to go in. We ask if the dogs can go in if they are in the stroller and he says he doesn’t know. It’s a big gravel parking lot, and he says oversize vehicles like ours cost $20 to park, so we decide to turn around and leave.

We go over the Mississippi River Bridge and Bill snaps some pictures of the skyline with the Super Dome in it.

 

New Orleans skyline and Super Dome 

We cross the Mississippi River Bridge and got on the I-10 west instead of east, so we got off the freeway and the GPS routed us on surface streets since we were so close. There was a lot of traffic and big rigs were even having problems making some of the tight turns, having to back up. Needless to say, it was “exciting” and Bill was nervous. I got us thru it and we checked into French Quarter RV Resort 45 minutes early. We used our Passport America half price membership to get one night for $49.44.

French Quarter RV Resort map

In front of the French Quarter RV Resort

The resort is high class and pretty, behind a walled and locking gate for security. We park in site 41 which is in the center row, third from the office complex. We are surrounded by big expensive class A motorhomes. We walk the dogs and check out the facilities.

On the left are large restrooms and laundry room , center door leads to the office, doors on right lead to the exercise room. The upstairs is a private suite that can be rented.

Patio by pool, TV room, office waiting area, and our RV with the I-10 freeway in the background.

We have a 2:00 tour already reserved, so we walk the dogs good and hope they sleep while we are gone for three hours. The van will pick us up here at the resort, after picking up more people at nearby hotels. We wait in the office waiting area and meet another couple from our resort also going on the tour. They are from Ventura, CA. The van pulls up and it’s smaller than we expected. It only seats 10 plus the driver. The only empty seats left are WAY in the back and difficult to get to. Me and the other couple squeeze into them while Bill sits up front with the driver in the best seat of the van. Lucky him. Here is a photo of our van taken at our first stop.

Since I have so many photos, I will create a Part 2 of this post with the photos from the tour.