Chandler rides, we follow

Chandler has had an incredible summer of riding horses and helping out at a horse outfitter as tourists flocked to this mountain get-away.  Down the road, at Cardinal Village, TessAnne heads up a horse riding concession and she heartily welcomed Chandler's assistance.   Toward the end of the season Doug, Henry, and I joined Chandler as she led the way on horseback through the desert up to an abandoned mine. 

Chandler heads down the mountain to Cardinal Village where she helps out with horse rides most days

C helping Doug with his stirrups

Heading toward the mine

C giving us the history of the mine and it's many owners

TessAnne, Chandler's wonderful mentor

Our happy and capable leader

Clean Clothes

When we lived on the boat in Mexico doing laundry meant lugging sacks of dirty clothes to an unknown laundromat wherever we dropped the hook.  Arriving back into the States, I assumed laundry would always be readily available, until I arrived at the campsite.  At first I had to lug our dirty clothes down the mountain to town and pay outrageous amounts at a laundromat to get my family's clothes clean.  Thank goodness a laundry angel appeared and I gained access to a washer/dryer, albeit in a cinder block building, only a few miles down the mountain.  Everything being relative, I was thrilled to use these machines on a weekly basis evidenced by the genuine smile on my face in the picture below.

Mobile Office

At 9,000 feet altitude we don't get internet at the camp site so I typically head to Bishop a couple of days each week to check emails and stay in touch with the outside world.  Periodically I need to print a document off the web.  Since that's not possible without a web connection I ended up sitting in our car in Starbuck's parking lot, connecting to the web via their free WiFi, running the car engine to power the printer via our car adapter, and making sure the car was parked in any available shade since the outside temperature was near or above 100 degrees.  The things we do to make life work!?!

Shower Power

Living in the great outdoors has its perks and pitfalls.  Showering includes both ends of the equation.  Follow along as this perk went from perk to pitfall and back to perk.

Perk: private shower in the RV...nice!

Pitfall: tiny, postage stamp-sized shower stall.  I can hardly turn around in it, never mind bend down to pick up the soap I will inevitably drop!  Plus there were holding tank issues...4 people showering in the RV means dumping lots of grey water and for various reasons that wasn't going to work for this RV.

Ann to Mark, (the RV owner): "OK, so if showering in the RV isn't going to happen, what's the next option?" 

Mark: "Doug and I will build you one outdoors?"

Ann:  "Really?  You're kidding, right?  You do know we're here for 5 whole months, right?"

Mark (with a playful smile): "Trust me."

To myself: "Do I have a choice?"

I'm glad to report this story has a very happy ending.

Mark and Doug did indeed construct an outdoor shower and I became its biggest fan.  Sure, we had to walk about 20 feet from the RV to get to where the shower sat at the back of our campsite but it was private, as private as an outdoor shower can be, and quite luxurious. That's right, luxurious.  I felt like I was showering in something built for Outdoor Living.  In my mind I had joined the ranks of that ultra-cool outdoorsy group of people who only shop at REI and Whole Foods.

Mark and Doug built a shower stall with a rugged, wooden shelf for shampoo and soap, there was a hand-held shower head with hot and cold running water (fueled by a propane and water heater), a heavy duty tarp that provided complete privacy and a slatted board floor that allowed water to run through so we wouldn't have to stand in a puddle, and there was a stump for sitting (?) or simply to add to the ambiance of the outdoor living we were experiencing.  The best part was the open-air shower was no ceiling.  The surrounding mountains and Aspen trees were our ceiling and their color changed throughout the months, adding to the beauty of each shower.  Now that I think of it, the truly best part of showering was the decor Doug added.  He would fill empty uniquely-shaped liquor bottles, left behind by campers, with fresh flowers and put them in the shower stall.  Sweet!  Showering indoors will never feel like this so I'm enjoying every moment.

Although the pictures don't do it justice, take a gander...

Wish I had taken a photo when the trees were more vibrant but this gives you an idea of the view from my shower stall!

The boat floats!

Doug and Henry Wyatt took the newly completed sailboat, christened "Pison," up to Lake Sabrina and set sail while Chandler and I scooted alongside in a friend's fishing boat.  It was such fun to see the boat float after all the hard work it took to get it to this point.  The summer will now be filled with smooth sailing under the Sabrina Lake mountain peaks.  Take a look...

Chandler, Ann, Doug, and Henry Wyatt just prior to launching

Catching a pretty good breeze!

Pulling up the center board as they make their first landing

As for those mountain peaks I mentioned...

That's Doug and Henry Wyatt in the lower left part of the lake

No boat in this pic...just peaks and the glow of the sunset

Long Lake hike

Periodically friends visit us up here and we love that!  Ric, from San Jose, decided to join us one weekend while George and Monica decided to drive up from LA on the same weekend.  It made for a perfect mix of friends and hikes.

We ventured out to Long Lake, a fairly leisurely hike up to 9,800 feet from our camp site at 9,000.

George and Monica

George, Henry, Ric, Chandler, Doug, Monica, and Ann

The next day Ric, George, and Doug hiked a much longer, higher hike to Piute Pass.  Peaking at 12,700 and hiking a total of 3,500 feet from the camp site, they had some great stories to share when they returned to the camp site that evening.

George and Ric

The goal is to get to the pass at the center of this pic

Looking back toward where the guys started

Victory!!

Old friends, new experiences

One of the coincidences of being in the eastern Sierras is that it sits above the dusty western town of Bishop, CA.  Cheri and Randy, friends from Doug's early SoCal days live in Bishop and have been overly generous in showing us around, inviting us to use their home in town where there is internet connectivity and a pool!  We haven't been shy to take them up on their offer to invade their home even when they aren't there.  It's been a gift...really.

Randy's brother, Will and his wife, Jane, are friends of both Doug's and mine from my LA days so when W & J, along with their twin sons, visited Randy & Cheri for two weeks we commandeered some of their days (and one overnight!) and enjoyed the hiking, tenting, and campfires that Sabrina Camp site offers.

The Fendon & Brown clans

Drivin' around the campsite.  We've got wheels!

Fresh trout from the nearby lake for dinner

S'mores

More s'mores

Even squeezed in some home schooling

Perfect day for a hike

Clean-up crew (yes we make guests clean too!?!)

...well, Doug does the real heavy lifting

Cleanest site in the canyon...camper comment cards confirmed it!

Home school during the summer???

That's right. With home schooling we don't take a break for the summer months but instead view everyday as filled with learning possibilities.  Sometimes the kids buy into that and sometimes they don't.  As soon as we arrived at the campsite both Henry Wyatt and Chandler found natural or should I say, "nature-filled" places to read and learn around the campsite.

Although not home schooling in this moment, Chandler (shown with a friend) and Henry found this tree's root system a perfect place to read or write.

Henry enjoyed the trickle of the stream while reading a favorite book.

Camp Hosts

Doug and I have long thought it would be fun for our family to be camp hosts and this summer it worked out to do just that.  We applied online and less than 24 hours later we were signed up.  Sabrina Camp Site in the Inyo National Forest became our home as of May 16, 2012 when Doug set up camp.  Two weeks later Chandler, Henry Wyatt and I joined him and we haven't looked back.  Our dear friends, Gail and Mark, whose home we house-sat all winter/spring, let us use their RV and voila...we've made it home.

The children enjoy the freedom of being able to fish and play along the stream that runs through the camp site as well as meeting campers who come and go each week.  Join us if you can!

Where we hang our hats these days

Uniforms and everything!
Cleanest bathrooms this side of the Rockies.  Weekly comment cards confirm it.  :)

S'mores, fishing, and sleeping in tents...what's not to like?

Chandler helps out at a nearby horse outfitter most days...

...while Henry Wyatt enjoys fishing, hiking, and literally hanging out in trees.

Yosemite

Gail & Mark, our forever friends, drove us to Yosemite and Lake Sabrina to check out the camp site we would be hosts all summer.  The two-day trip was a fantastic journey into the wilderness and gave us a glimpse of the stunning beauty we would live within for five months.  Yosemite pics below...

Granite, granite, and more granite

Gail & Mark, bookends to mi familia

Tree lover

Half Dome

Double falls

Dining Room at the Ahwahnee Lodge in Yosemite

Chandler and me relaxing in the Ahwahnee Lodge