Spring in Ukiah 5-5-07

We had a lovely drive out of Genessee on Thursday. We left Vickie’s at 9:30 and stopped in Taylorsville to dump the tanks, which took about 15 minutes. We took 89 south out of Taylorsville to Highway 70 down the Feather River Canyon to Oroville. We didn’t hit Oroville until 12:30! If you have never been on that road it is so beautiful and never more so than in the Spring and the Fall. We kept stopping so I could take pictures; I ended up taking a couple hundred.

There are so many different shades of green with all the oaks and many other deciduous trees and bushes leafing out. Near the beginning there were the Dogwoods, they are such stunning white beacons amongst the shadows and greens of the forest, they are like spotlights. There were Lupines and Poppies and lots of this peachy flower I had never seen before. The rocky hills and river banks were covered with them; we saw wild lilac and this other white teardrop flowered shrub everywhere too. I was in flower heaven the whole day. The river was beautiful as always, I love all the rocks. There are interesting steel bridges and 3 tunnels to go through. A lot of people like to watch the trains traverse this canyon. Larry’s least favorite is going under/through this power plant. As you start down out of the mountains you get stunning views of the valley (to hazy for pictures) and then you go over an arm of Lake Oroville.

We hit 99 south until we picked up 20 west out of Marysville. Yuba City is growing on the west side, new housing and shopping. We fueled up in Williams and entertained the idea of a Big Mac, but a bus was just unloading a bunch of students so we kept on going. Highway 20 west of I-5 was getting brown already. The oaks were leafed out, but not much in the way of wildflowers. The flowers in people’s yards as we went through the various towns on the north side of Clear Lake were happy and colorful. We stopped along the way and made some lunch, but we didn’t want to dawdle, it was cloudy and we could see that we were heading into rain.

By the time we got to the Ukiah Fairgrounds it was 4:30 and we had traveled 238 miles and it was raining, but as rains went it was a soft rain and it wasn’t very cold. We got ourselves situated and then headed down to Andrea’s. There isn’t anything more special than hearing a little voice holler as he runs for the door, “Grandma, Grandpa!” Ian threw open the door and gave us both big hugs…aahhhh.

So we hung out there for an hour and met Andrea’s new man Will. They seem very happy together and Ian loves him too, always a plus.

Yesterday, Friday, we did shopping after our walk. We noticed right away that there has been an attitude adjustment in this town concerning pedestrians. In the past we just felt like targets…it didn’t matter if we were in a crosswalk or not, you had to run for your life. This time we noticed signs in the crosswalks through the town center reminding drivers of the law. We actually had people stop and give us the right of way! Andrea told us the police had cracked down and had plainclothes officers lurking around and ticketing drivers, so the message was received! This is a town where people walk a lot and it doesn’t bode well for tourism if we always feel like we were putting our lives on the line just by taking a walk, kudos to Ukiah for doing something about the problem.

Last night we had a short, little, guest for dinner and overnight. We had a great time! Ian has a nice sense of humor and has nice manners and we thoroughly enjoyed having him. Being a typical four year old he was watching cartoons this morning and during every commercial we got to hear about how he wants this, he wants that and we heard “why” every time we told why he didn’t need everything he saw. So I finally told him to get a job and he could buy whatever he wanted…it stopped him in his tracks and he turned and said “Graaannddmaaaa”. It was pretty funny. Larry and Ian took a walk and then after breakfast we loaded him and his paraphernalia up in the truck and we went to the park.

The park has new, large, fun playground equipment so Ian ran off quite a bit of energy there, while we soaked up the sun. So many yards are full of stunning flowers right now! I finally realized why all the flowers are standing out for me this year…last year we were in New Mexico and the May in ’05 we were at Goose Lake where we got snowed on and had flooding rains so it has been a couple years since I have been anywhere for the full Spring show!

Tonight at the Ukiah Fairgrounds are the car races, bye-bye peace and quiet!!! What a change from where we were a few nights ago! Life is Great!