Oroville, California

Good early morning, my friends. It's almost always early morning here in the Traveling Three Cats Ranch. That's because we are awakened by the pitter patter (read that: "thundering herd") of little feet. Lots of little feet. They can only last so long, and then they decide it's time for the household to wake up and get with the program. The "program" being the dispensing of morning treats. Generally, this means a return to bed at some point, but for now, we're up and at 'em.

It was a driving day yesterday. There was some time for slow stitching in the morning, and I filled my hoop.

Now, I've moved to the next position. I can't quite fit the remainder of the design into my hoop, but you can see that it's close to being finished. It'll probably be another couple of days, and Basket #1 will be finished.

So we had some sunshine for most of the day yesterday. We ran into rain again about an hour from our final destination. Nevertheless, it was nice to drive on mostly dry pavement for most of the day.

We passed over and back across the South Fork of the Eel River several times. At one point, we crossed this bridge. You can see the old highway bridge below.

And then, we were back into the redwoods. Use that car for scale to judge the size of these trees. It makes the drive dark when we're in among them like this.

We were still on US 101 until we were about 25 miles north of Ukiah. We were to head east on CA 20, and right away we started seeing these signs. And, let me just tell you, this was worrisome. We did have chains with us, and so we boldly went where the Traveling Three Cats Ranch has never gone before. 

And I'm not kidding about that "never gone before" part. Mike lived his whole childhood in California. We are both natives, although I moved around with my military family, and didn't return to my home state until I was 12. Still, we drove through a part of California here that neither of us had ever seen. It was lovely. This is Lake County, California. (We have a Lake County in Oregon too.)

We did run into some snow, but none on the road. We also passed by several dry snow plows.

There were plenty of barns to see along the way.

Also some run-down and abandoned structures. There was one abandoned structure with beveled glass in the windows, and I wondered why someone hadn't taken those windows out before leaving the place to fall in on itself. Here's another rundown structure. I believe someone is living here, however.

At one of the higher elevations we traveled yesterday, we saw Mendocino Lake. This was small potatoes compared to the lake we were about to see.

Eventually, we came to Clear Lake. My friend, Marei, tells me that Clear Lake is the largest natural lake fully in California.

There were a number of small communities ringing its shores, and lots of boat hoists with boats raised out of the water for the season.

We stopped at a tiny rest stop to allow traffic to pass our pig of an RV...scourge of the highway...and noticed a Porta-Potty there. And, you know...any port in the storm; or, in this case, any Porta-Potty in the storm. It was clean! With seat covers! And two unwrapped rolls of TP! These are the things that get us all excited on a long drive. While I waited for Mike, I zoomed in on this little community.

As we turned away from the lake, we came across this burned area. There is lots of green returning, but the trees are all toast.

Some of these places were idyllic, with isolated farms and ranches.

There was a little dusting of snow on the hillsides. I like how these trees left little uncovered circles of grass beneath them when the snow fell.

It was a diverse landscape we drove through yesterday, beginning with big trees, lakes, and finally fruit and nut trees lining both sides of the road. We also happened upon some vineyards.

We passed through a portion of the Colusa National Wildlife Refuge, where we were treated to lots of birds. We saw many egrets standing alone, and this big flight of birds off in the distance. 

Since we were seeing so many egrets, we thought these must be the same bird. My friend, Judy, the birder and entomologist, doubts these are egrets. She guessed swans. There were some seagulls in the mix too. We'll be seeing Judy at our next stop and spending some time bird watching with her. I'm excited to see her again.

We also saw lots of hawks. It's almost impossible to get a good picture as we're speeding by. This was my best attempt from yesterday's drive.

And then, this one. I believe these are crows...you know...a "murder" of crows. There was another one that didn't make it into the picture, and they looked kind of sinister sitting there.

We were nearly to our spot for the night by then. When we checked into the RV park, they gave us two goodie bags for the kitties. Whoa! Kitties hardly ever get goodie bags. Those are usually reserved for stupid woofies, and so this was quite a treat.

Inside, some of our favorite cat toys and little bags of Temptations...their favorite treat!

The kitties immediately got on Yelp and gave this place a two paws up review.

Okay, so it's another day of killing time, and then we'll be back on our original reservation schedule. Our next stop will be in Delhi, California, where we'll meet up with my friend Judy. We're still trying to see the flight of the sandhill cranes. You might remember our visit with Judy back in January of 2020, when COVID was only a threat, and not yet a reality (we thought). We had such a wonderful day of birding that day, but I was in the throes of the worst asthma attack of my life. It had me visiting an urgent care clinic that evening. We missed the sandhill cranes on that visit, so we're back to try again. Despite the crummy weather we've been experiencing, the weekend New Year weather is looking promising.

We have no plans for the day. We'll just hang out and rest up. If the weather cooperates, we may get out for a walk around.