The Alventure continues

This morning at 0645 we pulled out of South San Francisco and pointed Tom Dually toward Oregon.  Our first time hauling Homer over the Bay Bridge.  See it coming up there in front of us?

The lower deck, heading East, with very light traffic going out of the city.

Can you see a tiny piece of my heart way over there on Telegraph Hill,
 at the very far right beyond the Ferry Building?
 
The still-under-construction new section of the Bay Bridge.  This is to replace what was damaged in the 1989 earthquake.  A fella wouldn't want to rush into any big projects.

U-crane-ia

Unknown orchards in bloom.

Snow in them thar hills.

 

 

Pulling into a nice RV park in Phoenix, Oregon, which is between Ashland and Medford. 

Happy New Year

 

 

 

 

 Saturday was the San Francisco Chinese New Year Parade, celebrating the Lunar year of the snake, which is from Feb 10, 2013 until Jan 30, 2014.  If you were born in 1930, 41, 53, 65, 77, 89, or 2001, you are a snake.  You have a good temper, skill at communicating, gracious morality, great wisdom, and are financially secure.  Let's leave the weakness list unmentioned.

The San Francisco celebration was established in the 1860's and is now the largest Asian event in North America.  I didn't attend the parade but happened upon it as they were lining up to begin the festivities.  Do you want to be in charge of a bunch of keyed-up  6-year olds who will march/straggle through city streets for a couple of hours?  The Golden Dragon (I didn't get a shot of it, darn) is over 200 feet long, is always at the end of the parade, and takes 100 men and women to carry the 29 segments.  Accompanied by over 600,000 firecrackers.  BANG!

We're still in San Francisco but now are planning to go to Ashland on Thursday to see a couple of plays, then Portland for a day or two before moving on to Sequim for three months to see if we like it.  I'll be back next week with all that news.

Man at Work

Just so you know that I haven't been fibbing about Al doing lots of work around the restaurant.
It's not just about looking snappy at the front desk, ya know.

Cruise catch up

 

 

We're still in San Francisco, busy with lots of extra work at the restaurant, helping the kid get things done, lots of painting (Al) and office work and more.  Lots of shopping (me) and socializing, none of which made the blog.  Our friends are all wonderful, but too many are camera shy.
Here are more shots of the big Euroventure which I couldn't post from the tablet.  The Brilliance of the Seas (Royal Caribbean) through the Norwegian fjords was a spectacular trip.
See those teeny portholes right above the water line?  That's ours.  Really.  Al decided that being low would be less turbulent. (Do you think $$ might have influenced his decision?)  He was right - one night the upper portholes had to be locked because of the waves, but ours wasn't big enough to be of concern.  When we approached the ship he assured me that our porthole would be the larger ones above, but that deck turned out to be the dining room and other public areas.  So we told people we lived in the basement.  At least it was easy to get on and off the ship when we chose to go into port.  A couple of the little towns were best viewed from the all glass top deck lounge with pleasant music in the background. And knitting.  And a glass of wine. 
So I've been told.