Llywindatravels 2026

California State Parks are the place to go.

California is full of state parks, something I did not know. Between Mendocino and Ft. Bragg are a string of parks that provide access to the coast. Some charge $8.00 to park. If you park elsewhere and walk in there’s no charge, but sometimes there is no alternative. We’ve started looking for cars parked by the side of the road in random locations. This usually means there is a trail to the shore, through a park. We’re also considering purchasing a season pass for the state park system. Over 3 months, it would be worth it. I have to check tomorrow, but I believe it costs the same as a fishing license.

We’ve spent two days exploring and fishing at one end of the park that surrounds our neighborhood. It doesn’t seem to have a name, and we could go back over and over, but there are so many parks……so little time. Birds, fish, wild flowers, beachcombing–I’m so busy!

A chiton from the beach. Beautiful, but they're a bit tough, like clam strips. — A chiton from the beach. Beautiful, but they’re a bit tough, like clam strips.

Massive driftwood. Can people take home driftwood from the beach if they can lift it?

Fishing.

The Bahamas Effect and second homes

We are in a gorgeous gated neighborhood, where each house has a view of the ocean, the spectacular Mendocino coast. Tonight as we walked down the street we realized that about 75% of the homes are unoccupied. Yes, it’s Sunday night and people may have gone back to the Bay Area for work, but we didn’t notice an influx of vehicles over the weekend. Where is everyone?

I call this the Bahamas Effect after our boating trip around the Sea of Abaco when all the lovely beach homes appeared to be empty–their owners were somewhere else working to pay for their lovely but unoccupied houses. People who actually live in the area full time tend to be packed together in tiny houses in tiny communities. It’s probably true to some extent for the Mendocino area, too. All those fabulous views have a high cost.

Mendocino at last! June 9, 2015

It wasn’t exactly the drive from Chicago to Mendocino that made us so happy to arrive. After all, we had wonderful stops along the way and saw all kinds of things. It was the unsettled nature of travel. Both of us enjoy new places, but we do not enjoy being on the road indefinitely. I think we would agree that 10 days of constant travel is about as much as we like. Yes, we were on the road for six weeks starting in January, and the trip we’ve just completed was under 2 weeks. We are happy to NOT be on the road for a while, and to enjoy being in a new place, but settled, for a while.

And what a place!

We bought a Dungeness crab on the road to Mendocino. Jonathan sat on the deck and cracked it.

We had crab salad. Mmmm.

Today’s adventure was visiting beaches south of our house.

The sand is speckled with abalone fragments.

Rural California

Reading the newspaper you wouldn’t think there were any small farmers or ranchers left in California–it’s all sprawling cities or thousand-acre farms. Driving from Petaluma to Mendocino, we passed through, and were surprised by, rural California alive and well. Small farms and ranches extended from Petaluma to the coast.

California means wine.

We had a free day before moving into our house in Mendocino, so we did what all visitors do in California–taste wine! We drove to Sonoma, visiting the Robledo Winery on the way there, and then we visited the Walt tasting room off the Sonoma plaza. What lovely wine, and enjoyable conversation. It was a great way to spend a very hot afternoon.

Idaho–Reno–California!

We left Twin Falls, Idaho, crossed that beautiful country and stayed overnight at the Nugget Casino in Reno, NV (June 6). The Casino was not particularly inviting, especially considering I don’t ordinarily gamble. Too much smoke.

We had a nice dinner at the oyster bar, however, and the room was a bargain compared to anything else in the area. In the morning we headed out, stopping to look out over the landscape. It was shocking to see that Washoe Lake is empty. It still appears blue, a regular lake, on the map, yet it is a black blot, not even marshy. Anyone who thinks the decrease in water in California isn’t serious should drive out and have a look.

We continued on to Lake Tahoe to see some of the shore that once belonged to the Haas family. It is too bad that the land was sold long ago–the shore of the lake is very beautiful. The area is popular in the summer and reminds me a lot of Lake George when we visited in the summer. Lots of motels, watersports, and traffic.

We stopped at the museum in Tahoe City to see the basket collection. There were some wonderful items. Some of the baskets were decorated with tiny black feathers, quail topknots. There used to be a lot…..of quail, considering the number of these tiny feathers around all those baskets. We ate our picnic lunch outside the museum.

By the end of the day we made it as far as Petaluma.

Where to see wildlife in the Rockies

By the end of our visit to the cabin in Bailey, CO we had seen a remarkable list of birds and animals. We’d been on a hike in the nearby Pike National Forest, visited a quarry to hunt for amazonite crystals and eaten everything from elk to quail. What we discovered is that the best wildlife viewing may be in your own backyard. As our friend Mark pointed out, when you walk the trails in the National Forest, the animals and birds are often hiding. You may here a few twittering birds in the distance but you don’t ordinarily see birds and animals.

Sitting on the deck of their cabin, we saw an AMAZING range of birds and animals. The birds are all habituated to the people on the deck by the bird feeders.

The broad-tailed hummingbirds visit their feeder, while chickadees, nuthatches, black-headed grosbeak, and red-wing blackbird visit for the seeds. Stellar’s jay and nutcrackers come by for the peanuts wedged in the branches and perched on top of the fence posts. Bluebirds were building a nest in a dead tree down the road. We watched a red-tailed hawk harried by a raven and a red-winged blackbird.

Animals are protected by the prohibition against hunting near houses and roads. As a result, they roam more freely among the houses than you would imagine. In four days we fed the ground squirrels, squirrels and chipmunks, saw mule deer wading across the shallows of the lake and browsing their way across the hill below us, male and female red fox and their four kits (one of the adults is a black morph with a fluffy white-tipped tail. On the drive from the cabin to dinner at The Fort, in Morrison, CO, we watched a coyote raid a red-winged blackbird’s nest, pounce, and eat a baby bird. By the time we left the cabin we were only waiting on the extremes: elk, moose, mountain sheep, and bear. Today, after we left, this is what Jonathan got on his cell phone:

3 hrs after you left!!!

Young moose wading in the lake. Mark and Marcy’s cabin in the background…….

Who knows how much longer it would be before we saw the others!

The moral of the story is that sitting on the deck looking at the gorgeous surroundings may be a more effective way to see wildlife than hiking through the National Forest.

Who knew? And the views…

I recommend a week in the mountains to cure…..everything.

Animals of the mountain cabin

In addition to all the birds and other wildlife outdoors, when you look around a cabin constructed of pine planks you might see:

A brown bird sitting on a brown egg?

Or you might see a sad bird:

You might even imagine yourself lying on the bottom of a lake watching a fox swim by overhead:

Bailey, Colorado; May 31-June 1, 2015

We arrived at Mark and Marcy’s cabin in Bailey, CO, overlooking a small lake. On the way in we saw a herd of mule deer:

The setting of the cabin is idyllic, the porch stretches from east to west and you can move your chair from one sunny (or shady) spot to the next all day long.

There are birds coming to the feeder that ignore us, and their chipmunk (ground squirrel) named Scar, will take peanuts from my fingers.

Alliance, Nebraska

The goal of our route through Nebraska was to see Carhenge, in Alliance, NE, which we did. We stayed overnight at to Grandma Lala’s B&B, a lot more memorable than the Red Roof Inn we stayed at in Council Bluffs, IA last night. Our room had a cherub theme: