Blue Collar Workers

I know its been a long time between blogs this month. It actually took us a lot longer to recover than we thought. But we made it to the City of Vallejo, California. We just haven't been doing a lot of up and down hill walking. Nor any biking or hiking. But manual labour? Yup, that we've done.

This is a picture of Vallejo (pronounced "vall-AY-ho"), just outside of San Francisco. Our sister lives in the hills behind the downtown. The roads up are steep, and most of the houses are built on slanted land. We were asked to help her build a retaining wall on the high side of her yard, as this will give a little more level area in the backyard and create a nice space for a garden. We hired a fellow to help with the trenching - this is all dried clay we are working in. Nephew has been a great help in moving the required topsoil, gravel and wall bricks. The weather has been cooperating too,staying dry and warm. And we are not necessarily in a big hurry to finish the work this time. No planes to catch at the end of this holiday!

As volunteer workers, we have been able to take the time to see the beautiful scenic views from these hilltops. We have been visiting nearby relatives, and having others come to visit us. We were grateful to have a sister from Halifax fly over to spend a week and feed us her famous meat buns. Energy food, indeed!

We decided to stay in our own home while we are here. So this is our trailer, parked in a mobile home park downtown. The residents are very friendly, and it is surprisingly quiet. I expect we are going to be here for most of February. Once the wall is done, there are places to enjoy nearby - Yosemite National Park and San Francisco await. We also have been invited to do a wine tour by a couple we met in Alaska. Who am I to say no to that?

W

Sick

We're sick. Not sick of travelling. Not sick of seeing new places or people. Just sick.

Do you think this will slow us down? Well, maybe just a little. We hadn't been fully taken down by this miserable cold before we stopped in the regional park just outside a prison - which we're pretty sure is a maximum security. So we had only planned on staying two nights before moving on up the coast.

We even took a short drive to the waterfront to pick up fresh seafood and the local WiFi (which usually means McDonalds) after we parked.

But then, the bug caught up to us. Our two nights turned into four. We did a lot of resting and hydrating, and enjoyed the warm temperatures and sunny weather outside.

Feeling capable of small activities, we took the tour of Hearst Castle, and watched the elephant seals up the coast in their birthing rookerie. At least I know why they are called elephant seals: they are HUGE, and the males have a long proboscus that hangs down in front of their mouth when they roar. Kinda ruins the whole effect, I thought.

Our 4 nights extended to 6. We discovered a big hill behind us with a walking trail up and back that we could do in two hours. It gave us a nice view of our neighbors behind the tall walls. We also strolled the botany garden that's next to our park. The bikes have stayed in the truck and the canoe has yet to come off the top. That takes just a little more energy than we have right now.

I suspect our 6 nights will be 7 before we feel ready to tackle the road again. At that point it will be a quick run to Vallejo outside of San Francisco where my sister-in-law is expecting us. We have already booked space in a mobile home park where we can set up for the month. It is within walking distance of the family - uphill. Hopefully that will get us back in fighting, and travelling, shape.

Those little cold germs sure take a lot out of a person.

W

Parking Places

When we were in Alaska, state parks seemed to be located near airports or on other unwanted land. It was the national parks that had the prime land locations. But for a place to stay, those state parks were fine, easily accessible, and cheap.

Down in Louisiana and Texas, state parks were put in interesting areas, like bayous or canyons and they were still relatively inexpensive, and very pretty places to stay.



In California, state parks seem to be on all the best beaches and forested areas, and they have priced themselves out of our market. But we have now discovered county parks. Again, these are not on prime land, but they are also not expensive. Where we stayed outside of Los Angeles, the stockyards were just over the hill. Usually downwind. But it was convenient to the places and people we wanted to visit.

Now that we are heading north along the California coast, we've targetted a county park just outside a little town called San Luis Obispo. Passing through town on the way to the park, we noticed an unusual number of bail bond companies. And then we passed a "Men's Colony". Wait a minute. Does that mean penal colony? Maybe the next stop will be at an RV resort.

W

The Parade

Our tour leaders were pleased that our group was loaded on the bus on time - VERY early in the morning. We drove off from the camping area just after 5am. The ride to Pasedena is normally about 45 minutes but traffic was getting heavier every mile. We got to Pasedena and had to stop with the bumper to bumper cars. We could look back at the freeway and see cars lining up for the offramp that we just took. All the stoplights were blinking red and traffic controllers were at each section, but it was still very dark and they just had these little red lights in their hands that were barely visible. I'm surprised they didn't get run over, as more than one vehicle just ignored them.

Our bus was able to get parked just before 7am and we were advised to use the on-board facilities before leaving. Good idea! The portable cubicles provided along the parade route already had long lineups as we walked to the grandstand. Many people had been camped out at the roadside for more than 24 hours. In fact, driving back after our tour the afternoon before, we had seen lawnchairs 4 deep in the better spots, and there were RVs and vans parked down each of the side streets that had been there a night or two.

We found our grandstand seats despite the incredible crush of people. It was curb to curb humanity. We had great seats placed on an overpass, so no buildings were around us to block the view. Also, we were facing west, so the rising sun was at our back, not in our eyes.

I took a peek over the top of the grandstand, and saw that the highway below us had been blocked off and was used as the unloading area for the parade horses. The logistics required to run this parade every year is just mindboggling.



The parade started right at 8am. The way they cleared the street of people was ingenious. They had a police motorcycle team doing drive pasts in fancy formations and doing drills like weaving back and forth across the road. It was sit down or be run down! As the pedestrians cleared off, the drills got faster until everyone was in their seat, and then the motorcycles moved on to the next section of road. Then they had a stealth bomber roar over the 5 miles of parade route.

We had seen the decorating a couple of days before the parade, and at that time we had some doubt that all that work could be finished in time, but the floats were beautiful when they came down that street.

One float had skateboarders that skated right off the float and onto the road. Another was very long and was filled with water that supposedly could create a wave that they could surf on, but that didn't happen in front of us. We did have a float have mechanical problems nearby. They gave it 3 minutes to be able to start up again, and when it couldn't, they just pushed it off to the side to keep the parade moving.



At 10:30 we were back to being in a moving crowd heading back to the buses and cars. Our driver was very tolerant of all the people walking on the roads in front of us as he was trying to make his way to the freeway. But as one guy stepped off the curb ahead of us, he called out, "Buddy, I'm 40,000 pounds ... it's gonna hurt!"

We were given a farewell lunch back at homebase. Some folks went back on the bus to see the floats close up in a display area, but hubby and I'd had enough of the crowds. We did something with a little more elbow room - we went shopping.

The next day we packed up and got back on the road. We didn't go far, just back to the Prado Park we were in earlier. It's a lovely park that is open, with walking and biking trails, and it is close enough to Los Angeles that we can visit with friends that live here and do other things in the city. We would like to see the La Brea Tar Pits, and we have tickets to the Cirque du Soleil at the Kodak theatre. The weather has been a dream come true, sunny and very warm every day so far. We've even taken out the shorts! Finally, we get summer.

W

The Rally

We didn't have to drive far to get to the Pomona Fairplex where our tour group was parked, we were less than half an hour away. In total, the group had 26 couples and 4 single travellers. Almost everyone was retired or about to retire. Eight of us were Canadians, the rest came from across the States. It was a good and friendly group. Two of the couples were our tour leaders and were well experienced with the Rose Bowl Parade, having led these tours for 8 years. They took very good care of us.

After our first group dinner, we got a sampling from the Pasedena City College Marching Band. The next day was a tour of Hollywood and the Kodak Theatre where the Oscars are held. Then we were taken to Lawry's Prime Rib Restaurant for a great meal.

New Years Eve started with a viewing of some parade floats as they were being decorated. It was amazing to see all the flowers, boxed according to shade of colour, spread out on the floor in preparation of the work involved in attaching them to the floats.

Each float required so much detail as every visible part of the float had to be covered in flowers or petals or vegetable matter of some kind. We got to talk to the decorators, too, and ask questions. They don't seem to be competitive, as we were told that if one float is finished, those decorators will move to help another one until parade time.

We then went to Bandfest to see a few of the marching bands doing their routines on a football field.

We were given barely enough time to get ready for our New Years Eve dinner. They had supplied a musical trio for dinner and dance music. These gentlemen must have been the age of the oldest of our group, but they were good! We had a great time dancing and were supplied with champagne for the New Years Eve toast. I was very pleased that they celebrated on Eastern Standard Time, 9pm where we were, so that I was able to stay up not only for New Years but even a little afterwards!


January 1st is usually the Rose Bowl Parade, but because it was a Sunday, it was moved to January 2nd. To fill in the spare time, our group was taken to a lovely place in Pasedena called the Huntington Library Estate. This is the house and grounds of an old railway baron in Los Angeles. The gardens were massive and included separate Japanese, Chinese, palm and desert gardens, to name a few. The library held many original documents and rare manuscripts, and the house had an art gallery that included the famous "Blue Boy".

Hubby and I spent the afternoon visiting old friends and making new ones. Bedtime was early, as the bus was loading at 4:45am for the main event: The Pasedena Rose Bowl Parade!

W