Ripley, Surgery, Alturas, CA

We arrived on time at the veterinary office in Alturas on Monday at 4pm. I dropped off my little boy Ripley for his pre-op. The surgery on Tuesday morning. On our way up from Clearlake to Alturas, we drove by Hat Creek, had to try my luck (fishing)at the “Bridge” on Hwy 89. Pulled into the parking lot and couldn’t get my pole and bait on quick enough and got that line in the water.. Ripley was on a leash anxiously looking into the creek waiting for me to get that fish, that never came..   Rip just loves to “get” that fish when you reel one in!! We tried our luck in different places along the creek, no bites and no fish.. however did loose a few hooks.. Hey you know what I always say.. “The worst day fishing is better than the best day working”! And that’s my story and I am sticking to it!!
I found it quite unique while fishing there at the “Bridge”.. There were all WOMEN fishing and only one man.. How often do you see that? There were about 10 or so women fishing.. pretty cool I thought. Time was short so I could only fish for about hour and half or so.. needed to get going still had about a 2 hour drive in front of me to get to the veterinary clinic.. After dropping Ripley off I went to try my “luck” at another “chance” game.. The Casino!! Well lets just say this was NOT my lucky day!! Lost my $5 bucks and down the road I went to the Mill Creek Lodge (bed & breakfast) in Likely, CA.
What a wonderful place this Mill Creek Lodge is! It is like “coming home”. See my review below.. You will love it!
For now I will say that Dixie & Duane are wonderful hosts!

Tuesday morning wanted to see Ripley before leaving town and heading to our friends Stan & Glorianne (just love these guys) who live in McArthur about 75 miles west of Alturas. I called the vet office and they said I would see Rip after 3pm.. aww well gave it some thought and thought and decided to go a head and head to S & G’s place.. I am sure Ripley was resting comfortably and if I came by he would get all excited and wanna come with me.. and then I might start “blubbering” and didn’t want that..
Always feel so welcome coming to S & G’s place.. When I got to their place, couldn’t find them and needed a bite to eat, had some snacks in the back of the suv.. had a picnic on the back lawn.. Was sitting on the nice cool green lawn under the shade of a lovely tree, just relaxing.. When S & G came out and said why didn’t you come in? I said I yelled in the door, no answer so that was the perfect time to sit on the lawn..   Glorianne had dinner ready to go.. she is always so organized! Stan was working on his different projects that he has going, always has something going.. “G” just makes dinner like there is no effort at all..and dinner was delicious.. Glorianne is such a incredible, warm and caring woman. She gives so much, her reward is giving.. Stan is her total support system. Stan gets his satisfaction from seeing her happy. They are like a hand and glove always working together. I was fortunate to have been able to stay with them during this trying time with Ripley.
I called the vet office on Wednesday morning and good news! Ripley was doing GREAT and they said you can pick him up!! woo hooo!! Glorianne and I drove over to Alturas (about 75 miles one way) and picked up our “little boy”.. He was so alert and soooo happy to see his “mom”.. poor boy..What a trooper.. Great patient so far.. He has a blue & white vet taped splint.. pretty cool..  What a boy!!

When we got back to S & G’s .. there was some things that needed to be done at the Museum, so we put Rippy Boy in the kennel and off we went.. Moved a display case, “G” decorated it with some very old hats and then we were off again.. Ripley was resting nicely when we got back..
My turn to cook dinner.. Seems like every time I cook them dinner the meat comes out “tuff”.. think I might have to rethink what I cook for them..? Had a lovely dinner with lovely friends.. Ripley slept with  me.. he was a bit restless all night.. so not much sleep.. was up early this morning.. Got ready to go and Glorianne (bless her heart) got breakfast already.. I always eat well when I am up there..  
Left there about 8am got home about 1pm.. long day and I am tired.. View of Mt. Shasta from S& G’s back deck.. beautiful..

Mill Creek Lodge (bed & breakfast)

Here is my review of this great place>> Mill Creek Lodge

If you think you would like to “come home”, then the Mill Creek Lodge is where you need to be. Dixie & Duane McGarva are so warm & welcoming. I felt like I had “come home” in the first 5 minutes I was there. Felt as though I had known them both forever! They had a couple of other lady guests that were also long time friends of the McGarva’s. One guest asked me how long I had know them? I said about 15 minutes! She chuckled and said the way you all act, seems like you have known each other forever! Our hosts were like family in minutes. Dixie cooked us up a marvelous/delicious tortilla turkey roll up that you could die for! OMG, it was the best! this was our dinner with home grown sliced tomatoes and cucumbers. Dessert was a light yogurt and cream cheese pie with topped with fresh fruit! Perfect light dinner for a warm summer evening! Breakfast was Greek yogurt, granola, honey, with some scrambled eggs and bacon, fresh fruit and home made blueberry muffins! Dixie is a  wonderful “chef”!
Before dinner we all got to know one another out on the porch over looking Jess Valley.. Gorgeous! There were big puffy white and grey clouds with blue skies behind casting shadow patches throughout the valley. Lush green pastures with cut hay, beef cattle, sheep and a few horses. Very peaceful. Duane shared some of his fabulous photographs he had taken over the years and still is working hard at taking even more photos!! Just lovely!
The accommodations were outstanding! Comfort is the what you get in this lovely home.
I wanna “come home” again sometime soon...
Mill Creek Lodge 

Mill Creek Lodge & Jess Valley VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Alturas, CA bound

On Monday 7/23/12, Ripley and I will drive up to Alturas to the veterinary there. Ripley our little Yorkie is in need of a “knee replacement”. The veterinary here in Clearlake is so much more costly and we have chosen to take him to this vet in Alturas. We visited the vet last week while we were in Alturas and had Ripley’s teeth cleaned.. Again the price and the way they treated Ripley was wonderful! So we decided to make an appointment with this vet for the surgery. We are so grateful to Stan & Glorianne for their recommendation..
So now S & G get me as a guest for a couple of days!! I can’t think of two more fun people to spend it with.
I will stay my first night at a b&b in “Likely”, it is a small place about 20 miles south of Alturas, then about 10 miles east toward the Warner Mountains, Mill Creek Lodge. Check out the link below. I need to drop Ripley off on Monday afternoon at 4pm. So on Tuesday before heading over to S & G’s place I will make sure my little boy is doing ok.. I hope to be able to pick him up on Wednesday? They say it might be Thursday? Just have to play it by ear and make sure he is healthy enough to come home with.

Mill Creek Lodge
http://www.millcreeklodge.com/index.html

Hat Creek with Lindsy/Chris/Colin

We left Ballard early on Wednesday morning. It was going to be another really HOT day! I was driving the truck with the trailer in tow and Ev was driving the Toyota with 4 wheelers in tow. We stopped off at Stan & Glorianne’s to wash up the vehicles after all the dirt and dust from Ballard! Took us about an hour then stopped off at the mechanics in Fall River Mills to drop off the the blue quad for some axle repair.. As it turned out we didn’t get it fixed because the part would take till the following week to get.. So had to go back and pick the 4 wheeler up on Friday.. oh well..
We went over to Hereford to set up camp and then I went back into Burney to do some shopping for the kids would arrive here. The kids arrived at camp before I got back from the store.. We all enjoyed a couple of cocktails before dinner and talked about their ride up.. Long drive and HOT!
Hat Creek Hereford Ranch campground is a bit cooler but still very HOT about 95 everyday..
Ev and I have fished the last couple of mornings, did good one day, then skunked the next day.. I believe because it is so hot that fish are eating much! good excuse so I will keep using it..
During the day we have spending time down here at the pond at the campground. Nice swimming area for Colin and all of us to sit up on a lawn area.
We all went to the “Subway Cave” (lava tube) on Friday morning over by Old Station. Colin wasn’t too thrilled with it, but the rest of us thought it was pretty cool.
We had planned to go to the Burney Falls, but we ended up going to town and was too late and tooo hot to be doing any hiking… Chris & Lindsy cooked two nights in a row.. Thursday night some totally awesome ribs!!! and Friday night some nice moist chicken.. They are great hosts..
Today (Saturday) Chris’ buddies from work are camped at the Hat Creek campground over in Old Station and are invited over for a pot luck and drink tasting.. Sounds fun! Sure it will be plenty HOT!
Today is our final day of our fabulous vacation.. We head home on Sunday…7/15

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Ballard Res. /Blue Lakes/Brown Pond/Rainbow Pond

Our day started in kind of a rush today. We wanted to get to the Alturas Veterinary to see what the cost of cleaning Ripley’s teeth would be and also get hopefully get an appointment ASAP, as we are leaving on Wednesday morning or maybe we will have to leave later in the day on Wednesday? However, the veterinary could take Ripley on Tuesday morning!!  
We also had some errands and some laundry, do internet business, etc.. When all the “business” was done we bought a sandwich at Quisno’s and off we went. We were actually headed for CAL PINES.. but we missed the turn, by 18 miles and ended up in a small little place “Likely”.. from which at this time we decided we would drive up to “Blue Lake” of Modoc County..

As we drove there was a lovely rushing creek and decided to try our luck with fishing and have our lunch.
No luck fishing but a nice lunch. We then continued our journey to Blue Lake.. We drove many miles from “Likely” to Blue Lake and as we drove you can see that there was a wild fire many years ago that left a scared and desolate mark on these mountains. Even as we came upon the lake the surrounding mountains bare the scares of the fire.. We did do some fishing and again no luck.. However, “The worst day fishing is better than the best day working”..

Again we took to driving back down the mountain in search for the road to CAL PINE.. Everett asked some kayaker’s if they knew of the road that would take us to CAL PINE and they gladly gave us the information we needed.. Apparently the road that we needed to take was back in Alturas.. we really missed it!
We did finally find the road and we drove up through CAL PINE up to Brown’s Pond where we would try our luck fishing once again.. It was quite a little drive but well worth the drive!
Between Ev and I we caught about 7 trout. Ripley is so fascinated with the fish that he would stand on a rock where the fish were on a stringer trying to get them and would fall into the lake.. he is sooo intense! Really quite funny to watch.. While all the time Kaylee is digging in the ground after some ground squirrel! Both are so entertaining..
We had quite a little drive to come back to camp and most was on cinder red dirt roads.
We took Rip into get his teeth cleaned at the vet there on Tuesday morning. We went fishing at Rainbow Pond up in Cal Pines. Ev caught a few  and I caught “0” I was trying my hand with the fly pole.. obviously I was using the wrong fly or maybe I was just not lucky that day! However it was a great day! Weather is HOT! We did pack a lunch and had it before our 2pm pick time for Ripley.
Ripley of course was so happy to see us when we arrived at the vet.. We asked for an xray of his knee and an estimate of what it would cost.. for his “knee replacement” is $750..
So much better than the cost we can get at Clearlake at the “rip off vet”!
Tuesday evening we met a couple of fly fishing people that were out on the lake till nearly 10;30pm .. We asked them if they would like to come in and have a glass of wine and they accepted. Don & Elaine whom were from Ukiah. They were fly fishing in float tubes out on Ballard, catching and releasing lots of trout! They left about midnight..
We packed up early on Wednesday morning to head for Hat Creek, the final leg of our journey of this latest adventure..
On the road by 10am..

Ballard Res. /Blue Lakes/Brown Pond/Rainbow Pond VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Stan & Glorianne’s/Ballard Res 7/5/2012

Ev and I have lots of wonderful friends! Stan & Glorianne’s are our newest friends. However, we feel as though we have known them our WHOLE LIFE! You ever meet someone and feel like you have known them forever? There was an instant bond with all of us. Don’t know why really other than it just “clicked”. Their life style is so completely opposite of what Ev and I have done our whole lives. Stan & Glorianne had the 101 Cattle Ranch in Adin, CA for 40 years! They are both real Cowboy and Cowgirl! Glorianne has her hand in every “fire” imaginable! She is a published writer, the manager of the Ft Crook Museum in Fall River Mills, along with Stan as her right hand man, a great cook, a great daughter, wife, mother and grandmother and Great grandmother and our new friend! Stan, has a vast knowledge of more things that you can even imagine! Stan was a real bronc rider, an excellent roper, farmer, etc.. and just a real laid back nice cowboy! He is also a wonderful, husband, Father, Grandfather, and Great Grandfather and our new friend!
Both Stan & Glorianne have the most interesting stories, both are wonderful at telling stories of their life as well as stories about some of the families and friends that they have had all their lives! Ev &  I love listening to both of them! Wish I had really known these wonderful people 20 years ago!
We always have fun with them as we do with all of our friends..
Truly we are blessed to have all the greatest friends that we do have!!! You are all so awesome!

We arrived at Stan & Glorianne’s on Thursday afternoon about 530pm.. They had made reservations at the Mexican food restaurant in McArthur. Great setting overlooking the valley below with a nice little stream in the middle of the field.. Caught them up on all our travels since we had scene them a few weeks before.
We had an appointment to take the 4-wheelers in to have the oil changed on Friday morning at 10am.. Ev took them dropped them off and later in the day picked them up. Had a service done to our small generator as we are selling Lindsy & Chris our smaller generator yamaha 2800i (65 pounds).. great little generator! Our new one is a yamaha 3000i, used (200 pounds!! YICKS!)..good thing it came with ‘RAMPS’..
Saturday morning we (all 4 of us) packed up from Stan & Glorianne’s and headed for Ballard Res here at Canby.. Apparently, their son, Doug is married to the woman’s who’s great grandfather was “Ballard”, the reservoir is named after him as he had mill here back in the early 1900’s. Really cool to know the history of the area where we love to come!
Stan & Glorianne have lived in this area their whole lives, however were too busy with ranching to take “vacations”??…Now that they are retired, they have more free time.. not much.. but some.. This was their first visit here to Ballard.. and then after we got here, they knew the rancher at the end of the lake! “Pinky Anklin” (sp?) small world.. we took a       4-wheeler ride after we arrived on Saturday.. Glorianne and I took a kayak ride on the lake.. OMG.. the edge of the lake is “gooey”.. like a suction cup gooey! My flip flops got sucked in..then had to go bare footed!! you know that slurpping suction feeling/sound!!  YUCKYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!! but I survived.. once in the kayak everything was so much better!! <<laughing.. rinsed my feet and was good to go.. 
We barb-q’ed some steaks for dinner. Ev & Stan cut up logs with the chainsaw Ev hauled in with the quad.. Had a wonderful bonfire.. However it is sooooo dang HOT here!
Our guests had to leave today (Sunday) and head home .. They had to clean up the their trailer (after all this DUST) so they could get ready for their trip to Elko on Wednesday..On Wednesday we will meet up with Lindsy/Chris/Colin at Hat Creek on Wednesday!! wooo hooo can’t wait! The last leg of our great adventure! Colin is turning 6 yrs old next week!! We will do a celebration for him!
We are here at Ballard till Wednesday morning.. Hope to get packed up and out of here early..? providing our slide out works?? we had some issues with it when we were leaving       S & G’s.. keep your fingers crossed that it all works.. We need to also drop the blue 4-wheeler off at the shop to have a new?? something put on?? not exactly sure what it is.. but it is by the wheel and they called it a “boot”.. have to pick up the generator, needed a special spark plug and find a “car” wash to get all this dust off! Then head over to Hat Creek Hereford Campground..

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Gail & Don’s in Roseburg, OR

We arrived here on Monday 7/2.. Don & Gail had snacks and dinner awaiting us.. An unexpected surprise was Gail’s daughter Pam and son in law Ron were here. We all had dinner and did a lot of catching up and visiting.. A little wine and a whole lot of talking..
Tuesday we did some shopping around town. They have Macy’s here!! woo hooo.. got new clothes/shoes.. We went to Ross, found some great “treasures” there!! Hello??
Don & Gail treated us to dinner at the Country Club that evening…
Today is the 4th of July.. Been talking with Don about some fly fishing.. He worked getting my line on my pole so it didn’t have too much on it!! dahh?? He also gave me some good pointers for fly fishing.. I can’t learn too much too fast, won’t remember noth’in >> LOL Don’t know if that is cause I am getting old?? or just cause.. Don also make beautiful flies for fly fishing! He gave me some for my fishing that I plan on doing at Hat Creek next week when we meet up with Lindsy & Chris. The grand finale of our trip!!

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I had decided to take a little walk around the neighborhood to just get some exercise instead of sitting around and just eating, if I don’t watch it I will gain all the weight I lost before  we left on vacation. As I walked there was this older man sitting in his garage having a garage sale.. He didn’t look to have much, but as I looked around he had some stuff for camping for sale. Generator, carrier rack and some other odds and ends. We bought the generator, carrier rack and some other stuff.. We would  need to go the bank in the morning to get the cash to pay him before heading back to McArthur, CA to Stan & Glorianne’s place.
For dinner Gail and I did most of the cooking. Don did par boil the pork ribs and Gail made potato salad.. I made up the salad and helped get the ribs browned up in the oven. Gail and I talked and it had been just a year since we've gotten to visit in person. Gee how time flies! We did a lot of catching up and enjoyed each others company so much!

After dinner Don, Gail, Ev and I packed the car with chairs and blankets to head over to Winston, OR for the fireworks show. The community park where the fireworks were being held had other entertainment as well. We arrive about 7pm there was a couple of different bands that played, a belly dancer that did some “belly dancing”. There were a few food vendors and a whole lot of people.. Did quite a little people watching.. The fireworks display got started a little past 10pm. This area of Roseburg/Winston, OR doesn’t get dark as fast as at home. The display was fabulous.. Love watching the fireworks! Always lots of “ooww’s and aww’s”.. Of course leaving the park was a traffic nightmare, but we managed to make it back to Don & Gail’s safely.. Not long after we got back we all hit the sack. It was going to be an early day the next day.
Ev and I got up early, got showered, packed up what we could and Don took Ev down to the bank so we could get our generator, etc.… before heading out.
As we were hooking up Don noticed a couple of things that needed fixing about the trailer.. He fixed the scissor jack, as well as tightened our trailer hitch, so that it wasn’t slopping down.. So now we refer to Don as “Don’s Garage”.. Guess we need to get him a sign for his garage door..  
We headed out about 11am, not quite as early as we had hoped, but it’s always hard to say good bye and just get on the road sometimes.

July 4th 2012 Don & Gail’s VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We did arrive at Stan & Glorianne’s about 5:30pm that afternoon, McArthur, CA.

Boyd/Reardon Family Reunion June 30,2012

Our family reunion actually started about a couple of weeks ago.. When I mentioned to Rick about getting everyone together, he thought that would be great! From there Rick called our Janelle (his daughter) and asked her to get it all organized, she’s great at this kind of thing! So now the ball was rolling.. We planned the get together for June 30, 2012 at 2pm.. kind of impromptu in away, but seems that was the way to do it. We all made phone calls to tried to get everyone to commit!  
Seemed like the “kids” from some of the families had jobs so couldn’t make it..
Everyone started arriving on time..  before you knew it we had a whole
bunch of people! Everyone started visiting and just catching up on what everyone had been doing for the  past 20, 10, 5, and some even 25-30 years since they had seen each other!
Everyone pitched in bring a side dish or snack of some kind. We had barb-q hamburgers and hot dogs.. perfect for the day.. I would venture to say the WEATHER was the worst problem.. at least for Ev & I.. we are from CA and we have sunshine, not so much rain.. and it did rain on Saturday.. However the Washingtonians are used to that weather..

 

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I am going to go through and try and name all the families starting with me..

Linda Boyd Swesey, husband Everett, Children:
Lindsy Moyles Jacob, husband Chris, Children Colin 
Jamie Moyles Goodwin, husband Ryan, children, Gianna, Gillian, Gemma
(none of  my children or grandchildren attended)

Rick Boyd wife Lynn. Children
Jessie wife Teresa, children Melina, Ali and Tai
Phillip Boyd, wife Kristy, children, Max
Janelle Boyd, children Cadence
Derek Boyd (deceased) Children: Maddi Boyd (attended)
Lynn Boyd’s parents Deanna & Gene also attended

Ron Boyd wife Suzi, Children:
Meghan, daughter Mckenzie, (didn’t make it)
Angie Boyd partner Season
Ronnie Boyd children Mason (only Mason was here
Johnnie Boyd (didn’t make it)

Rod Boyd (no children)
Kim Boyd Cavanagh husband John, Children:
Michelle and Nick (none of this family made it)

Greg Boyd (deceased) children:
Timothy Boyd Children (2) (didn’t make it)

Dawn Reardon Woods, husband Bob, (did not attend) Children
Erin Woods (no children didn’t attend)
Tony Woods (3 children didn’t attend)

Randy Reardon wife Lisa, Children
Jordon Reardon
Jake Reardon (did not attend)
Taylor Reardon (did not attend)

Stephen Reardon wife Leah, Children: none

Colleen Reardon Russo husband Jim, Children
Brandy Russo husband? Children:
Taylor Russo
Tyson Russo

Travis Russo wife? Children:
Dominic Russo
plus 2 other children (didn’t attend)