Kastle's Journey: Quartzsite, Week #2 - Recovery Week - Jan 9

With the storms in California we are getting lots of pretty sunrises and sunsets before it clouds over a bit during the days. This was sunset a few days ago back in BC, Cowichan Bay. These "Atmospheric River storms are showing a lot of sunrise/sunset colours up and down the coast.

From Google, CHEK News.

Monday morning another gorgeous start to the morning. Unfortunately Ray had a rotten night so he's not better yet. After usual morning chores, he laid down for an hour snooze. After he woke we decided to go into town and walk the Tyson Wells Vendors. Not much new and less quality jeweller stalls compared to 3 years ago when we were here. Ray did find some carpet treds for our stairs which are an odd size and hard to find. When our new stairs get installed, we can put them on then.

After walking around for an hour and a half we came back home for lunch. By 1 pm Ray's back in bed again. Hopefully all this sleeping will help him get better. Very cloudy outside and the wind has come up again so he might as well rest. :) By bedtime I'm the one doing all the coughing and had a rough night. I guess I'm now into Part 2 of this nasty virus.

Tuesday morning, another cloudy start to the day. We are lucky we are only getting the clouds from the storms hitting the California coast right now. It has been devasting to the people there around Santa Barbara, CA

The reservoirs in Northern California, like Lake Oroville are filling but these storms do not have any impact on Lake Mead or Lake Powell that are filled from the Colorado River unfortunately.

Jan 10 2023

Oakland, California - The heavy rains and abundant snowfall in California in recent weeks have many people wondering what impact the storms have had on the state's reservoirs and severe drought.

The Marin Municipal Water District has had California's best luck with its water supply so far. Marin's only concern now is making sure it doesn't get more water than it can handle.

"We have seven reservoirs, including five on Mt. Tam and every one of them is at capacity as of this morning and spilling water through their spillways," Marin Water Information Officer Tyler Silvy.

The state's big six mega reservoirs are doing much, much better. Since the end of last year, they've gone from an average of 34% full to 42% full at a time when 68% full is considered normal.

Individually, mega reservoir Don Pedro is 97% of normal, Oroville is 85% of normal, Shasta is at 67%, New Melones is 59% of normal and Trinity 42% of normal.

In this period these six reservoirs have picked up enough water to cover San Francisco's 49-square-mile footprint with water 49 feet deep. This is great news for water importers such as the South Bay's Valley Water which might have to import less.

"We have 10 reservoirs and we currently have three reservoirs spilling and potentially a fourth that is getting close to the top and it's expected to spill today as well," said Matt Keller, a Valley Water spokesperson.

We head west to California February 9th, hopefully these Atmospheric Rivers are done or other plans will have to be made.

The next couple of days were pretty quiet. Wednesday Ray got our propane tanks filled. I made homemade pasta and prawn fettucini for dinner and a loaf of rustic bread. It turned out delicious.

Wedneday night is my worst night with coughing all night. I'm certainly tired when I got up on Thursday, so a much quieter day for me. Ray managed to go next door, to Dianne and Steve's for core crash and just stayed home and sat quietly.

Friday morning I'm feeling much better so did a trip to Blythe to pick up a few things at the Smart and Final and Albertson's. Definitely not as busy there as it is in Parker. Back home after groceries put away we were able to sit outside for awhile, a gorgeous day today.

Steve came by and told us that Jerry had his telescope set up to look at the solar flares on the sun. Ray headed over to have a look.

Dianne and Steve, Jerry and Debbie #3

At 4 pm it was time for Colibaba's happy hour. I sat away from everyone but it was nice to see them. Debbie (Deb and Jerry) had made us all some chocolate chip cookies. Yummm.

Jerry's feet and Debbie, Greg and Debbie, Steve, Dianne, Ray and Marilyn. Missing Colan and Jim.

Friday morning another gorgeous start, looks like it will be a lovely day. Supposed to get to 70F (21F). Today Ray will take the MH over and dump, it's been 11 days so we are full lol. Then Colan is coming over to install our new stairs on the coach. YEAH!

First up is the stairs and of course they did not line up with the holes so a lot of measuring but they are in. Unforunately the door magnets/switches are working backwards ... apparently they were changed to be reversed several years after 2011, so now our stairs go in when you open the door instead of out!. New switch on order.

Next up was the caulking on the roof. We had some water come in last winter when the coach was not level ... now all fixed.

With that taken care of, he got our rear furnace working, loose wire and a fuse ... who knew. We didn't even think about a fuse. Lesson learned. He also installed a new solar panel control panel Ray picked up as I zapped ours earlier this week with a spark from my finger! That's it for today and he will be back next week to install new door magnet/control for the stairs and a few other repairs on my list :)

Although cloudy out. it's warm and there's no wind. Time for a Happy Hour here at 4 with bean bag and ladder ball. Nice to use the stuff we brought down with us. lol I just watched and kept score for a bit as I did not want to start coughing. :)

Dianne with the halo and Debbie #3

Dianne labelled us Debbies in order of meeting us. I am Debbie #1, Debbie and Greg is Debbie # 2 and Jerry and Debbie, is Debbie #3. lol

Debbie #3

Jerry and Steve

Debbie #2 and Marilyn

Jerry and Colan

Saturday we woke to the predicted clouds. A good day to play in my kitchen. My fridge is so overloaded I need to start using stuff. Being under the weather, there's not been much cooking going on. :) A firery sunrise this morning.

Had bananas to use up so Banana bread with nuts and chocolate chips first up, followed by my rustic french bread. Lastly a roast chicken and vegetables. This chicken definitely took up a bunch of room in the fridge, unfortunately no takers to come and help eat it as I've been so sick. No one wants this grunge, can't say I blame them. As it stayed cloudy and cool all day it was nice to have the oven on. Ray says that's OK, more for him!

The finished product. Turned out great in the microwave convection oven.

I turned on the gas oven and again, there's that smell that it's not burning correctly. I sent a message to Dometic who installed my range at the show in 2020. Telling them this oven hasn't worked properly since it installation and it took months to get a valve replacement so our RV tech could fix it. Now it smells like the same problem is happening. There was a recall on the valve our tech replaced. The girl making appointments for Dometic remembers us! and is booking an appointment to take the coach in at the show to be fixed, we hope. The whole idea of replacing our stove top with a range/oven is so we did not have to use the generator when boondocking. The original install was done pretty shoddy with our cabinetry. Fortunately Ray had some old cupboard doors that came with the coach he cut up to trim out the oven appropriately.

After Dometic's install

Here is the picture they took of Freya back then to use as advertising while we waited for the stove install.

Last night the rain began lightly tapping on the roof. Woke up this morning to clouds and a blustery day. We set out to do our laundy at 8am in town but I guess a bunch of others thought the same. We came back home and tried again at 10:15 and managed to get it all done without waiting for machines. Finished by noon and it's considerably less busy then.

Spent the afternoon inside, not a nice day. Ray headed out at 4 with Debbie #3 and Jerry to meet up with the crew at the Yacht Club to celebrate Greg's birthday with Debbie #2', Dianne and Steve, Colan and Marilyn. They originally planned Silly Al's, but a 2 hour line up at 4:15 deterred that! Their Beef Dip apparently was a hit with the group.