Southern CA (Day 11) - El Monte

12/31/11 (Sat.)

We woke up at the Wal-Mart (Anaheim) parking lot. Tom felt pain in the foot. I gave him 2 pieces of  aspirin to kill the pain.  We walked around the parking lot around 9:00 a.m. in the morning.  There was a big Forever 21 sign in front of us, it was a big store, and then I saw a Happy Dragon was also open, but no customer yet.  I took a few pictures then we went to McDonald for breakfast.  We had 2 sausage muffins, hash brown and small coffee for $5, after that I went into Wal-Mart. After that we drove to city of El Monte and exit Rosemead Blvd. We parked our trailer on the street.  We started walking around the area and looking for a good place to stay overnight. 

  We found one at the end of the road, street name Chico Ave.  It was a nice place to stay overnight, because it was enclosed and have water and dumpster nearby.  While we pulled over to the space, there was a Chinese man stood next to the building looking at us.  After we unhooked our trailer, we decided to stay little bit long to see if he would call somebody over.  We guessed since it was New Year Eve, the company next door would close half day, but we were wrong and we waited until 3:00 p.m. in the afternoon to see that they are still open. So we decided to leave and went to Yum Cha Café in San Gabriel Blvd.  We ordered 7 dim sum to eat and only able to buy 3 order (each order only 2/pcs) of Preserved Egg Pie for $1.49/ea .  We shopped at the same market where the cafe took up one corner. We bought salmon for $3.99/lb and cooked shrimp for $3.99/ea and other stuff.  Since we had fish and shrimp we needed to go back to the trailer. On the way back we saw a propane station. I stopped by and checked for the price.  The Mexican man told me that from 1 to 5 gallon of propane, it cost $14.99.  Tom drove me back to the trailer and check we still have some propane left , so we waited for the next day to fill it up. But we forgot the next day was New Year.  Then we went to the Hawaiian Market, we spent $66 for all kind of food. We went to the new Sam Woo and saw they had a lot of people waiting, so Tom wanted to go to the old Sam Woo. We saw they changed name to (Deep Well).  The food is “OK”, we had one chow mien and one rice noodle, they both was $8/ea.  The rice noodle is good, but the chow mien was not what I expected.  (I wanted deep fry chow mien, but they only have dry chow mien).  After dinner, we went over to the front door of 99 markets to get 2 gallons water and walked  back to our trailer.  We watched New Year Eve program until 2:30 a.m. in the morning before we went to bed.

Southern CA (Day 10) - San Diego and Anaheim

12/30/11 (Fri)

We woke up in the morning and have bacon and eggs for breakfast.  Tom went to the hot spring again. After I cleaned up the trailer I went to join Tom. I left around 11:00 and took a quick shower before I went back to the trailer. After I finished all my packing, I went back and looked for Tom. He was just walking to the shower. 

When we started leaving the no. 10 sites, there was a couple said to us, they have no. 10 site too.  Tom told them we are about to leave right now, as we pull out the site, they were pulling into the same space.  Then we went to the dump. While Tom was dumping water, I was inside the trailer and bathing Odie.  We all finished at the same time, then we continue to San Diego.

 Before we entered the entrance of interstate highway 8, we drove into a dead end road. So we turned around and exit again.  When we arrived at El Cajon, we set Wal-Mart on our GPS, but it sent us to downtown of El Cajon.

  Then Tom searched again and found another Wal-mart nearby.  Before we went, Tom stopped by for the gas.  It was cash only, Tom told me to fill up at $65, but it was full at $60 for the truck. Tom added $2 more to the small tank, I went back for $3 change.

We headed to the Wal-Mart, we were surprise that it was inside the Westfield Mall. 

 I took a picture from the outside, it was a 2 storied Wal-mart, we only stayed for a short little bit.  Then we look for food court.  We have Arby, for dinner, I spent over $10. Then we went to McDonald for Sundae ($1/ea).  I saw some handbag that was made of a leopard fur, cost $14.99, it was 50% off.  But Tom said no.  I walked in the Big Boy restaurant to check out the price, it was very expensive hamburger; it cost about $10 dollars for burger and fries.  Back to our trailer and drove over the across a street to Chase bank and got more cash.  We planned to camp at a Wal-Mart next to Interstate 15, but we missed the exit and ended up into Interstate 5, which ended up a better choice.  Before we reached the city of Anaheim, I saw a Wal-Mart next to Interstate 5, but we missed the exit and end up in Food for Less, we went inside to shop, I picked up an ad.  I saw small Avocado 6 for a dollars, Tom bought a Mexican style chip.  This store was not 24 hours, only allowed 2 hours parking.  We found a Wal-mart at the GPS, so we were able to get there.  When we pull up into the Wal-mart parking lot, we saw several RV and Class B parked inside the lot.  So we knew that this place will let us stay overnight.  We found out it open 24 hours.  We walked inside, Tom checked the Cole Slaw he liked, but it was a difference kind.  I saw cookies for $2 and donuts 6-pack for $2.50, but Tom suggested we should buy the sesame bread instead, but it did not look good to me.  I picked up a parmesan Italy bread, but Tom takes a look and said it looked like mole to him.  So we end up buying nothing and walked back to our trailer and slept.

Southern CA (Day 9) - Agua Cliente State Park

12/29/11 (Thur)

In the morning we started cleaning up our trailer and I made pork steak and eggs for breakfast. Then I started writing this journal while Tom was loading up the trailer for the next camp site.

We headed on to Agua Cliente campground.  It was 43 miles from Peg Leg campground, by the time we got to the campground it was about 4:00 p.m.  We decided to stay at the partial hook up which cost $24 a night, but you didn’t need to pay for the hot spring.  But if you day use only, you needed to pay $5 (good for 4 person).  At first we were at the No. 9 camp site, we were hurried inside the hot spring and stayed there for an hour.  Then we came out for a quick shower, and then we found out the No. 9 site was too close to the hot spring entry.  We moved to the No. 10 camp site, it was still very close to the hot spring and bathroom but better.  While Tom was unhooking the trailer, I prepare for dinner.  We had beef and pork steak, can soup and potatoes for dinner. 

Southern CA (Day 8) - Borrego Springs

12/28/11 (Wed)

We had macaroni with ham for breakfast.  We put the laundry in the truck and went to the laundry. But the store we needed were still closed (wash cost $1.25 a load), so we stopped by the library.

When I was inside the library I asked one of the lady where else can we wash our clothes, she told me you could go up this road and there was a RV park which you can wash your clothes.  But I was too busy watching the DVD movies from the library.  I remembered I needed to go to the market to buy some more Russet potatoes. While there Tom told me to put in $20 gas. While I was inside the store I bought some Pepsi Cola too.  Then I went back to the library and continued watching my DVD movie.  While I was watching the movie, I also download the Chinese movies.  We did not leave the library until 7:30 p.m.

(On Wed. library hours was from 9-8…Mon, Tues, Thur, Sat were from 9:00-6:30)

  I remembered we had not take our laundry to wash.  So we went home to take the laundry to town and got water for our trailer too. We have the left over 2 pieces chicken, pork and corn for dinner.

Southern CA (Day 7) - Ghost Mountain & Julian

12/27/11  (Tues)

I started cooking breakfast (bacon and eggs) and  make instance coffee.  Also I prepared for lunch (pork chop with hamburger buns) one bottle of water, and orange juice and an apple.  I put all these food in my red

Bag.   We were heading to Home of Marshal South ( family live in the mountain for 16 years), it was

25 miles from our trailer (Peg Leg campground).

The entrance is a dirt road, you needed a high clearance to drive inside(but saw a lot of low clearance cars too), because the road had deep pocket and in some section one car wide.  When we arrived at the dirt road parking lot, there were already several trucks.  I took a couple of picture in the entrance before we start hiking.

 

The road was a very narrow rocky road and some area were steep.  After I was hiking for few minute I felt like I ran out of oxygen.  On the way up we took a lot of pictures, we needed water and resting before we can reach the top of the rocky mountain (it is about 1 mile one way).  We saw the house right in front of our eyes, most walls were collapsed.

Only few stone were still attached to the base, there was an area look like a small pool (Tom said that the family use it for watering the plant).  I guess this area was a kitchen with a water pipe near by.  We found a big flat rock, so we can have lunch on top of it.  After lunch we were walking around the area and took more pictures.

This was the little den where Marshal South was doing his writing.

  Before we headed back down the road, I saw there was a round cactus. Tom uses the dry stick to dig it out and he puts it in the lunch bag.  But he had thorn inside the thumb when he put the cactus inside the back. While I was waiting for Tom, I try to put the cactus in a better position; I ended up had a thorn in my left four finger too.  We both could not pull out the thorn; we just left it in our finger.  We headed back down to our truck and drove back to the entry. I went to use the bathroom (with no water).

  After we drove to Julian (small town famous with apple pie) there were a lot of winding road for about 12 miles.  We walked around a little bit then I waited in line in front of Mom’s Pie House which was the most famous for apple pie.

  I was in line for about 15 minutes (the distance of two store front).  I also picked up a honey which costed $16.95; I decided not to buy it because it was too expensive.  We had an apple crumb pie (whole pie cost $14.95) there was another apple pie store across the street cost $13.95.  One grocery store have apple pie for $11.99 which we didn’t know how long it had been sitting outside.  After I got the pie we were eating inside the store.  It was a cold pie, we though it would be warm. 

After we finished eating, we walked along the street and saw a candy store named Julian Cider Mill. I bought honey for $7.65 for 16 fl oz bottle, four stack candy, sour dog bones totals of $15.35.  On the way to our trailer, I told Tom we should go get some water for our trailer since I want to take a shower.  We found a place and fill up two water bucket and head on home. We have chicken and beef for dinner.