Digital Nomad Summer - Part 3

Here's Part 2.

Zelda's all set up in NoCal!

In the last blog installment, we closed out our first week of digital nomad life at Canyon RV Park in Orange County, California.  We set the alarm for 5am on Saturday, since our next destination, Sacramento, was a 8.5 hour drive away and we needed to make it there by late afternoon; although our second full week's camping spot was in Bodega Bay, CA, we wanted to stop over in the City of Trees for one night, so we could see Chris' Mom and her husband, Andy.  A few months ago, we booked one overnight, pull-thru spot at the RV park inside the Cal Expo fairgrounds; while it wasn't the most scenic spot, it had full hookups, and it was close to Susan and Andy's place, both of which were major bonuses.  As it turns out, the normally reasonable early July Sacramento temperatures spiked up due to a regional heat wave, and it was cresting 106 when we arrived.  We certainly made good use of our electricity hookup, as we ran the AC all night long - the first time we'd had to do that in the RV!

Welcome home, Chris!

Chris remembers petting these bears every time he went to the state fair growing up.

I bet he doesn't remember the great cannabis deals...

After a quick shower, Chris headed to see his Mom and Andy, and he had a wonderful time visiting with them, enjoying pizza and awesome gourmet desserts.  Since we're still working on getting the girls comfortable around folks they don't know, and Susan and Andy's apartment isn't equipped to handle our two maniacs, I stayed at the rig with the monsters; although I missed seeing family, we still had a nice time, luxuriating in the cold air, eating grocery store tikka masala, and catching up with RuPaul's Drag Race: All Stars on Paramount Plus.

"Mom, why is it so hot outside?"

In contrast to our extremely early start on Saturday, on Sunday, we had plenty of time to lounge around.  Our campground in Bodega Bay, Bodega Dunes Campground inside Sonoma Coast State Park, was only about 120 miles away, and since check in didn't start until 2pm, we couldn't leave too early.  We took the kiddos to the RV's dog park, we watched both Stage 2 of the Tour de France and the F1 Austrian Grand Prix, and I did a load of laundry (the closest laundry facility to Bodega Dunes is 20 miles away, so I wanted to start out the week with as many clean clothes as possible).

Bea would like to know where her breakfast is, thanks

Killing time at the laundry room

Checking out the bench at the dog park - 

it even has the Cal Expo name etched on the side

Eventually, check-out time rolled around, so we packed up and got underway.  We made a quick stop at a Camping World en route; although they didn't have anything we needed (a fan for the bedroom, window lube, and a replacement water inlet valve for the toilet), it was an easy, quiet spot to eat our lunch, and after that, it was back on the road toward the coast.  As we navigated the holiday weekend traffic (it was the Sunday before the 4th of July), we watched the temperature drop and took in the sights.  The route from Sacramento to Bodega Bay goes right through the southern part of Napa/Sonoma wine country, and that part of the drive was quite lovely.

All packed up and ready to roll at Cal Expo RV park

Just one of the many vineyards you can visit in the area

This isn't it, but we passed a field of grapes that belonged to Mumm Napa,

one of my favorite makers of sparkling wine

At least the scenery was lovely!

We drove through the town of Bodega Bay, full of cute little shops and fish markets (which in turn were full of weekenders and tourists) and eventually made it to our campground around 3pm.  Check-in was easy, and after filling our fresh water tank, we navigated to site 80, our home for the next week.  The normal setup process began, and we got everything up and running before enjoying grilled sausages and corn on the cob for dinner.

Zoe says the lower temperatures are awesome!

It was in the mid 60s when we arrived.

Making the internet go

All settled in!

While Chris had Monday the 3rd off, I worked; since Bodega Bay was our first campsite on the trip without "shore power" (meaning we didn't have an AC power connection, which runs the air conditioning, the fridge at full blast, and the normal outlets in the rig), we spent a bit of time figuring out how to run the Starlink and my laptop off the different battery boxes we'd brought along for the voyage.  While we have a generator for just this very reason, the campground restrictions only allowed us to run it from 10am-8pm each day; we ended up turning it on for about an hour from 10-11am each day to recharge our laptops and the EcoFlow power bank, into which the Starlink was plugged.  That gave us enough juice to last the rest of the afternoon, and we'd run the generator for another hour each day, either from 3-4 or 7-8, depending on whether we were adventuring out for the evening or were staying at home, watching tv.

While we do have solar panels atop the rig and one is plugged into the EcoFlow,

they don't generate much of a charge when the sky looks like this all the time.

Between my work tasks, we walked the girls around the campground a few times, exploring the area on our first full day here.  While our campsite is surrounded by lush foliage, several others really live up to the "Dunes" part of the campground name, and we took advantage of them to wear out the kiddos (and us):

So many new things to smell!

Bea and I doing hill repeats - on the road fitness!

We made it!

While Phoenix has been experiencing a massive heatwave (115 over 4th of July is a bit excessive, even by Valley of the Sun standards), we've been enjoying the temps up here - in the 50's day and night - and the overcast weather.  It mists a little bit each morning, which makes the girls want to sleep in (pro), but it does lead to some muddy paws (con):

Wipe those feets!

Zoe says it's time for a snoozle

After finishing my work day, we relocated outside; since we'd both have the 4th of July off (hooray, freedom!), we figured Monday was the perfect night to do a big campfire.  As we've been moving northward, the days are getting longer and longer, so the night of the 3rd would likely be the best one to stay up late enough for sunset.

Making good use of my camping fan to blow the smoke out of my eyes

Bob posing atop the storage box

Important camper repairs taking place here - the bottom of one of the 

drawers was dragging, so Chris repaired it with silicone

(we had it on hand from the toilet adventures)

In upcoming blog posts, we finish out our week in Bodega Bay and celebrate the 4th on a really neat beach!

Later!

Amy