Not a National Park

After waiting out a few days of rainy and/or cloudy weather at the Escapees park, we moved to another COE campground at New Hogan lake 35 miles east of Stockton. Since we arrived on a Monday, we almost had the whole place to ourselves. Nice.

We were expecting a phone call from the insurance adjuster the next morning and since the gate person said the phone reception was spotty, I walked around with my phone in addition to my compass for satellite TV reception. It's tough roughing it.


Success! This was the view out our front window.


It wasn't long before we had company.


And then we had a big surprise when a California Grey fox and her three kits appeared.
We think the den was in the drainage pipe under the site across the way. It was such fun to watch the kits leaping and playing. What a thrill!

Soon the youngsters disappeared, but we saw a lot of momma while we were there.


Then we moved to the Yuba City Moose lodge. They had electric and water hookups for $12 a night. We almost elected to bookdock in their lot for $5, but it was pretty hot, so we went for it. Until Yuba City, which has an elevation of 56 feet, we had been very lucky with lower than normal temperatures.

We enjoyed their roast beef dinner and homemade pie ($7, plus $1.50 for pie) and met a nice local couple who used to RV.

The next day we visited Gray Lodge Wildlife area, but didn't see much at this time of the year. We discovered it's really a winter spot. It's pretty, though, with Sutter Buttes in the background - sometimes called the smallest mountain range in the world (according to the AAA book.)


We did see this anemic-looking jack rabbit.

So we met the insurance adjuster, but will wait until we return to Mesa in the fall to get the car fixed. Meanwhile we just have a few battle scars.