Here are some of the high lights of the summer:
Our folks, both Vaughn's Dad and Sharon's Mom are doing great and are in good health. Vaughn took his Dad to the Horse Races they had a wonderful time. They even won some money on the ponies. Sharon went with her Mom to the Filoli Mansion Museum and several other art museums. The ladies (Sharon, Mom and sisters Shelly and Sydney) got away for a weekend to see the Reno Hot Air Balloon Races.
Our daughters Shelly, Jennifer and their families joined us at our Tahoe cabin for a long weekend. We all had a wonderful visit. It's hard to believe how big the grandchildren are getting….even harder still to believe we are grandparent of four great kids. Shelly and Chris's kids, Jordan is 6, Chelsea is 2 and Jennifer and Randy's boys, Brady is 3, Ryan is 1. They are all doing fine. We spent one of the days picnicking in a small meadow with a lovely little stream. Chris and Randy had a wonderful time helping the kids build a rock dam to create a little swimming hole. Then Sharon helped the kids hunt down their Dad's with big water squirt guns. We played for hours running around hiding in the bushes ambushing each other with squirt guns. The kids all had a wonderful time….so did us old folk grandparents.
We joined our friends Mike and Janet for another outstanding week of backpacking in the high Sierras. This year we started out with a very aggressive first day hike of 9 miles into Lords Meadow on Cherry Creek. Nine miles in hiking boots blew our feet out, we had blisters everywhere We keep active enough that our bodies were in OK shape to handle the miles but after spending the last three years in Teva's our feet paid the price. Vaughn had the worst blisters and ended up walking the next 45 miles back in his Tevas. Sharon spent 20 minutes every morning bandaging her feet up. But, the scenery and beauty of the Sierras was well worth it! The tropics are beautiful but we need a good dose of the High Sierra granite to keep the mind at peace. There isn't anyplace more beautiful. We spent several days at Lake Huckleberry, one of our favorite lakes,. Huckleberry didn't disappoint us again and in addition to it's beauty we all caught lots and lots of huge rainbow trout. We made the loop from Huckleberry to Leotora Lake by Cow Meadow then down the North Fork of Cherry Creek. We had a great time visiting with Janet and Mike plus a gorgeous trip.
We went straight from backpacking to Yosemite, where we met our friends Neil and Barbara. The four of us took on the challenge of backpacking to the top of Half Dome. Yosemite is truly one of the beautiful wonders of the world. Its sheer granite walls are breath taking. We were amazed to see that Yosemite Falls had dried up…not a drop of water. Neil said California was having a bit of a drought. No kidding. We have been to Yosemite lots of times over the years and have never seen the falls totally dry. The hike to the top of Half Dome was outstanding. Anyone who has seen Half Domes knows how spectacular it is. Those that haven't try to image a solid granite mountain that raises straight five thousand feet off the valley floor and is cut by glaciers perfectly in half. From the top you can look straight down a vertical sheer granite cliff directly to the valley below. The hike is a tough one, up five thousand feet to look down five thousand feet. Not for the weak at heart! The last thousand feet are a combination of stairs cut into the rocks and then cables. This is where the rock is so steep you have to kind of pull yourself hand over hand up the cables to reach the top! The view is magnificent.
After the Sierra's we took a two-week road camping trip and headed up to Oregon and Washington. We enjoyed camping along the way. In Washington we visit our cruising friends Dee and Judy, then Jon and Debbie. It was great to catch up with each other and we had a lovely visit. Even more exciting Dee and Jon both agreed to join us and help us take Reality across the Atlantic next spring to the Azores and Europe! We had hope one of them would be interested because it's to long of a trip for just the two of us to make it safely. Three was going to be nice, four will be perfect! We look forward and are getting excited about making the passage together.
In August Vaughn's sister Joy and her husband Ken from Mississippi came to California to visit. It was great to see them. We spent several weekends with Sharon's whole family. The whole family met in Lake Tahoe one weekend for our annual Summer Fun Fest. Then we all got together to celebrate Olin's (Sharon's youngest brother) engagement announcement. The last of the gang is getting married! We enjoyed visits with our friends Sonni and Walt plus Maria and Jeff and Jim and Kim.
Like we said the summer was a whirlwind….trying to maximize every minute we could with all our family and friends. We cherish our time with them all. We love traveling on Reality….but sure hate being away from everyone we love. With a few tears we said our good-byes, shared lots of hugs and kisses and headed back to Reality. The vacation was over and it was work time!