Sacramento, CA - Oct. 1 - Nov. 17, 2005
On September 30th, Bill headed for Montana to rip the lips of poor, unsuspecting trout. The next day Ken rushed Susan and Claire to the Boise Airport (who knew Idaho would have traffic?) for their flight to Sacramento. Susan's assignment while in Sacramento was to 1) catch up with her gal pals, 2) start the process of changing healthcare providers, and 3) take care of other miscellaneous business. She had an excellent grasp of the priorities and spent most of the time on assignment #1, which involved lots of hugging, chatting, wining and dining.
Staying at Claire's was a delight - like returning to those youthful college roommate days of late night talks and early morning jaunts for coffee.
Susan and Claire committed to returning an elderly Mercedes to Ken's cousin Dana, now living in Buhl, Idaho. The plan was to hitch a ride with Bill on his return trip from Montana. So, our first order of business was to revive the moribund beast.
After getting the battery jumped, we took a "recuperative, battery-charging" drive to join Natalie and Bob for lunch in Folsom. Upon returning to the Mercedes after lunch, we discovered the battery had lapsed again into its lifeless state. And once again roadside service provided resuscitation, so we took a longer drive to Placerville and the foothills - this time the procedure worked. Due to Susan's back injury, Claire ended up driving the cranky vehicle to Idaho by herself and flying back to Sacramento, and Bill drove back alone. You can guess who flaked out.
Claire, Susan and friend Sally took advantage of the wonderful fall weather to take a jaunt over to Pt. Reyes for a hike out to the bluffs overlooking the Pacific. It had been nearly a year since Susan had seen the ocean so it was a much needed salt-air fix.
Claire accompanied Susan to San Andreas to visit Winnie, her step-mom. We lunched in Sutter Creek and trolled our favorite art galleries. Speaking of art galleries, Claire and Susan participated in the "Second Saturday" Sacramento art event - visiting several galleries, sipping mediocre wine and enjoying the live music. The evening was really enhanced when Claire purchased a signed, limited edition reproduction of a Sacramento River scene, and met the artist Jeff Nichols - just a great evening.
During one of their daily phone calls between Sacramento and Montana, Susan told Bill how much her back hurt and how much she wanted to see him. Although fishing was great, Bill ended his trip early to return to Sacramento. He arrived in Sacramento on October 19th. Susan left the next day for a long Bodega Bay weekend with her buddies. Not the best timing, but what can one do - other than wine, dine, play cards and go shopping? It was great to be with the girls again.
While she was in Bodega, Bill ran up to Lake County to spend a day with his mother.
Once Bill and Susan were reunited we really got down to some serious visiting with friends and family we hadn't seen for seven months or more - including lunch and mexican dominoes at Kathy and Paul's, dinner at Joyce and ML's, dinner with Sue and Mickey to celebrate their retirement, and a wonderful brunch at Natalie and Bob's.
We joined Bill's sister Ginger and husband, Chris, at the Grand Marina in Alameda for a day of sailing in their new 36' boat. It was a sunny, warm day, however the winds were calm. Even so, we were able to sail (slowly) outside the Golden Gate - that was a first for us. Ginger tried to show Susan some of the sailing "ropes", gaining our respect for how Ginger can confidently scurry around on a boat under sail.
We were very fortunate in that Amanda, our niece from Denver, was in San Francisco attending an Adventure Travel Trade Show at the Moscone Center. She had secured three free passes to a Segway Tour of the Fisherman's Wharf area and a night tour of Alcatraz. The Segways were so much fun! At first we were rather tentative and were watching the road very carefully and not noticing City's beauty. Shortly, we became quite comfortable - at which point Susan nearly ran over Amanda.
The night tour of Alcatraz was interesting and the views spectacular. To the east a full moon glistening on the Bay and to the west the lights of San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge. Thank you Amanda, it was a magical day.
During this time in our old hometown some fine fellow helped himself to our bicycles. One of our neighbors at Cal Expo saw the guy hanging around our RV about 2:30 am and told him to take off. Apparently, he came back and relieved us of our old, somewhat rusty bikes. Since the RV Park has camera surveillance, is patrolled about every 30 minutes and is very well lighted, this guy had to be pretty bold. We figured it must have been an entomologist researcher because our bikes had collected bugs from California to Minnesota, and across Canada and back.
The last several days of our stay in Sacramento was largely taken up by replacing and outfitting our bikes, and dealing with our insurance company. Marty, owner of the "Bicycle Biz" on Freeport Blvd., helped us with selecting and ordering bikes, and gave us a good deal on some new Trek Hybrids. Marty's shop usually deals in high-end bikes, but he and his staff were more helpful and knowledgeable than the other bike shops we visited in our quest for new, "low-end" recreational rides. We were very grateful.
As our days in Sacramento drew to a close we had those old mixed feelings of sadness and eagerness. It was difficult to bid adieu to our friends knowing we won't see them for two years - (Claire and Sam, sorry about the mascara stains on your shoulders). At the same time we were eager to see new places and meet new people, so on November 18th (Susan's birthday) we hooked up and headed south for Lake Cachuma in sunny Santa Barbara County.
