El Nido

Did I mention in my last post that I was reluctant to leave Tucson? but we did, and were in the car for about 7 hours as we travelled to San Diego. Our campground is in Bonita, California, called Sweetwater. Another State Park and nice but not great. Of course the big thing being about the San Diego-area is the near perfect weather. At first I was not that excited about being in SoCal - I was not happy about the traffic and having the camper in 7-lanes of freeway traffic. But Harry has been fearless in his driving and he arranged our free day in San Diego (Dec. 9) so my spirits picked up.

We went to Balboa Park which is 1200 acres smack dab in the middle of San Diego that has the Zoo and 17 museums (dinosaurs, the study of humankind, photographs, and automobiles to name a few) so enormous and we were there on a Saturday. Pretty much everything we do is dictated by Jack and Sam (thus the name of this blog) because museums, for example, are not yet pet-friendly. We would have liked to see an exhibit about cannabilism but had to content ourselves with taking pictures of the gruesome poster (see below) and except doggie treats from the docent.

Saturday was also dictated by finding dog parks for Jack and Sam which we try to do often to compensate to them for their many hours of confinement in the car. We found an off leash park within Balboa but we had our real score when we drove up the coast 20 minutes to Del Mar and found a beach that allowed dogs. Del Mar is gorgeous, tony, and right on the Pacific. It also happens to be the very first place I ever visited in California way back when, so it was interesting to revisit.

Next morning we did our usual pulling up of stakes and headed further up the coast to LA. I have to admit, I was still out of sorts, and Harry and I experienced our first bout of snipy behavior. In some ways that is not bad after living in each other's pockets for three weeks, but just the same, unpleasant. And that is the mood in which we arrived at Kathy Glasscock's memorial service at 2:30 p.m. in "The Valley." Kathy had many accomplishments, her most recent being as a landscape designer. Her memorial was a Buddhist 49th day after death service and we got to chant. Bayliss had people over to his house after and it was lovely to hang out with some old friends and experience the peace Kathy created in her own backyard.

We spent this night at Hal and Ricki's back in LA, right next door to where Harry lived for many years. This was the first my mood started to lift because I did not have to pretend I was feeling anything but grumpy and I could solicit advice about how they dealt with being out of sorts with each other. Ricki seemed to think that I am a control freak which of course is not true, I just always know the best way to do something. There's a difference isn't there? What???

Anyway, enough of this soul searching, you've probably stopped reading anyway. I am all better now and on Monday we moved to an RV place in Malibu for the next three nights, 12/11 through 12/13. Yummy. Don't hate on us although without my knowledge Harry did send a picture of me in the sunshine on a day when Ashfield was getting more snow. That was a low blow.Read more