A Holiday Gathering

Last night was the first night of Hanukkah and we spent the evening with friends and family.

We were all hosted by Dana's sister Jill for latkes and fun.

It was quite the gathering; Dana's father and his wife Mary, sister Jill and her husband Will, brother Jess and his wife Judy, their good friend (and ours) Paul who is visiting from England, and Julie, Jill's best friend.

Dreidles at the ready

Paul, Jim, Julie, Jill, Mary, Dad, Will, Judy, Dana, Jess

The menorrah lit for the first night

Ready to play!!

TSK says Happy Hanukkah to all!

To view the full album of the nights festivities:  Hanukkah Album 

What ever your holiday is, we hope it finds you happy and healthy!

Highway 395 to home..

We spent a very chilly night at Topaz Lake after a long but lovey drive up highway 395.

We thought about spending another night there but after the hose froze (connecting the RV site water to the RV) overnight and then broke we thought it best to just get back home.

Continuing down 395 through the Carson Valley was lovely as well.

Topaz Lake

Topaz Lake

tsk snoozing on the dash

Carson Valley

Bikes back on the car... ready to head home.

We had a really good time on this trip. We like the Class A RV better than the Class C. But next time we do this it will be in warm weather. The recurring theme of this trip was 'Closed for the Season'. There wasn't much snow on the ground anywhere but it was cold, and freezing overnight. 

We had a lovely time meeting our friends Les, Ody, Cindy, Bruce, Pierre, And Laci.

To view all the photos from the trip 

Album

TweetUp

Lumbering thru the lakes

Today we left Death Valley behind. After breakfast at the Panamint Springs Cafe (no beer) we broke camp and headed towards Hwy 395. Heading towards a list of RV parks that we would stop at depending on our arrival time. Want to be there before dark.

So on our travels out of the park, and up 395 we saw quite a number of lakes, with varying water levels.

Owens Lake, a dry lake bed

Crowley Lake

June Lake

Ice falls near June Lake (ok, not a lake but still water!)

Grant Lake

Mono Lake, with the tufas visible.

Topaz Lake

We are spending the night at Topaz Lake. It is the only other lake (beside lake Tahoe) that is in both California and Nevada. It is very cold here, darn. Was hoping for a mountain bike ride tomorrow. But we'll see what the weather brings..... till then...

Through the Valley of Death...

.... We shall fear no evil. Though there do seem to be many things named for the devil in these parts.

Drove from Laughlin NV to Panamint CA today. Pretty much across Death Valley.

Stopped at Furnace Creek, quite the landscape there!

After driving 250 miles, and 7 hours later (with a stop for gas and groceries) a well deserved beer at the Panamint Springs Cafe was in order. They claim to have 170 kinds, tho we only tried one each.

Jim is trying his luck with the wifi on his iPad in the above photo. Very spotty here. So I am posting this via email on the iPhone. Hoping for better wifi up the road.

More later....

A meeting of the anipals

Today in Laughlin we met up with Pierre and Laci (with their mom and dad, Cindy and Bruce) and Ody and his dad Les. Ody and Les came to meet TSK first here at the RV. Ody had never met a kitty before but both did great, and had 'nose taps' even!

Then we went to see the rest of the gang at their hotel. All of the doggies met for the first time and had a good time sniffing and getting to know each other. The humans went out to get a bite and left the dogs to have a pawty in the room.

Pix from the tweet up: Anipal Tweet Up

Cindy's pix here

It was really great meeting everyone!

Dana with Petie, Bruce with Laci, Cindy with Pierre, Les with Ody

Later in the afternoon Jim and I walked along the Colorado River Walk.

Jim at the Colorado, Bullhead City, Arizona across the river

Tomorrow we pull up stakes and head back towards home. We are taking a different route, this time going through Death Valley. If there is wifi, we will update you on our whereabouts.

Until then.....

Part ll....

ahhhhh... the joy of wifi. Or not.

Here at the Riverside Casino RV Park, wifi isn't free. You have to pay for it, but they tell you that even if you pay for it there is no guarantee that you will have any connection where you are. 

Geez.... well, we can get on it on the MacBook, but not on the iPads.

And even then, on the Macbook, it's very slow. Took 30 minutes to upload one photo.

Anyway.... where was I in our journey....ah yes, on our way to Las Vegas to meet Les.

Yikes!

Dana and Les

Laughlin, NV and BullHead City AZ

Kitty waiting for Jim to check in....

Multi-tiered RV park

Laughlin Strip

Now, for today. Woke up to gale force winds, so strong that it was shaking the RV! Not the best conditions for a bike ride, but we brought them with us and needed some exercise so off we went. Our final destination was the Big Bend Colorado River state park. 

Came across an Off Road Race course

The Colorado River

The Windy Winding road....

Tomorrow we will be meeting Les and Ody (they will be driving from LV) and Cindy and Bruce, with their dogs Pierre and Laci (who came from New Mexico today). We are really looking forward to it and hope to post lots of pix!

Stay tuned!

On the road again...

A couple weeks ago we found out that some friends of ours were going to be coming through Nevada on their way from Illinois to Palm Springs CA. @PierrethePoodle and his family
 AND
Another friend, who lives in Las Vegas was going to meet them in Laughlin, Nevada. @LBonser and his doggie @OdyMaltese
So we thought this would be a good opportunity to do another RV trip.
We wanted to try a Class A RV this time.

So we rented a 26' Winnebago Vista, the smallest Class A they make.

We packed up the cat and the bikes, and left from Reno on Wednesday.

Drove down 95 to Tonopah, NV as our first leg.

Much of the scenery looked like this

Jim driving the 'rig' looking pretty pro!

Our rental rig, 2009 Winnebago Vista

Kitty is such a good navigator, loves the big dash.

Our first stop was Tonopah, Nevada.

Back on the open road, next stop las Vegas

Due to very spotty wifi we are having trouble updating the blog... but stay tuned, we will post more pix when we can.
Have lots more to share with you!

Of Snow and Crocs

Woke up this morning to snow... which is ok, but the weather forecaster dude on the tv said nothing about snow last night. It's lovely nonetheless.

Here are a couple short videos taken from different windows.

While we were deciding what snow activity we should do today, tsk amused us with his morning activity 'Bite the Shoe'. He bites the heels of our running shoes (I'm sure it makes us faster!) and these old orange Crocs.

And a short video of tsk in action.

So after all that excitement we decided to head out. There wasn't quite enough snow to ski so we got the snow shoes out and took a walk about our neighborhood. Here are some photos from our outing.

Mr & Mrs Goober, bundled up.

running, and kicking up the snow

snowy creek

hippity hoppity! many critter tracks in the snow

a snowy vista

Dana in the snow

another vista

The aspen grove, sans the golden leaves

Another nice day in the mountains, and the best part was our kitty greeting us at the door.

Baking on a Stormy Winter's Day

A short time ago I was chatting with my friend on twitter...not sure how the conversation came around to it, but I had mentioned that I was 'yeast challenged' when it came to baking. And I do love to bake but when perusing recipes if it calls for yeast it gets tossed out. So my friend sent a link to a recipe of theirs which sounded really good. 

I gathered up all my courage and thought today with it's howling winds and blowing snow was a good day to attempt to 'conquer the yeast'. Of course, with the added difficulties of baking in high altitude.

Here is the link to the recipe: Pull Apart Sweet Potato Pie Cinnamon Roll with Orange Liqueur Icing

There are many good recipes there so I hope you take a look.

Ok, here we go......

Ingredients have been gathered

 

Sweet potatoes peeled, cubed, steamed... ready for mashing.

 

 

Ready to add ingredients together

Jim helping out with the kneading. It's hard work for sure!

Ready for the first proofing

Holy Cow! It worked! It doubled in size!

Dough rolled out, filling added to top

Rolled up and sliced

Ready for second proofing!

After second proofing, has risen more! ready for baking!

Hot out of the oven! Smells so good, now for some icing.

Iced with some chopped almonds on top.

A warm piece of Sweet Potato Cinnamon Roll..... Bon Appetit

So all in all I would say that this recipe was a success! In the difficult conditions of high altitude with yeast it turned out really well. You can taste the spices and the orange and it's not an overwhelming sweet kind of roll either. I'd make it again!

Since it is just the two of us we cut it in half and wrapped it up. Jim bundled up and in the howling blowing storm ran it over to our neighbors the Sherpas. Hope they like it as much as we do.

Thanks @yassysgdk for sharing your recipe!