Fiddletown

Just four days after returning from my trip to the northwest, I was off on a roadtrip with friends to gold country in California, east of Sacramento. Our objective was to visit with our friends there and attend a cowboy concert and barbecue. Our route took us through Fresno, so naturally we had to stop off and check the progress on my Sportsmobile.

Michael and Brenda are two of my dearest friends. I began running into Michael at conferences 25 years ago, and then, 15 years ago, we had the opportunity to work together at first one, and then another, startup company during the telecom boom. Out of the demise of those companies sprung a weekly lunch meeting of friends in the tech sector, which includes Michael and me. That meeting has endured for well over a decade now - it's one of the things I'll miss most when I begin my travels. Michael married Brenda in 2011; the smartest thing he's ever done. Since then, we've done more and more together socially.

Michael has known Wade Hurst for longer than he's known me, and I became acquainted with Wade when he did some work for one of those startups I mentioned. Wade and I took to each other right away, first because he's one of the nicest people you could ever meet, and second because we share an appreciation of our Scottish heritage (Michael's part of that club, too.) Wade has been nationally ranked in tossing the caber. Here's an appreciation gift from his caber-tossing days that Wade received:

We're convinced his great strength (and God's grace) allowed him to recover from a life-threatening illness a few years ago. Wade's wife, Cheryl, is just as nice as he is, and one of those amazing people that's in continuous motion, always doing something useful.

All this is preamble to explaining the reason for our trip. Among Wade's many talents is playing the washtub bass, through which he's become associated with the Scofield Cowboy Campfires, a series of cowboy-themed concerts and barbecues put on each summer near Fiddletown, California. Yes, Fiddletown is a real place, one of a cluster of small towns in the California gold mining area east of Sacramento. Michael, Brenda, and I had definite plans to attend one of the concerts last summer, but then last minute difficulties got in the way. This summer we were determined to go, and our respective schedules permitted exactly one date that would work, the next-to-last concert of the season.

Since neither of us owned a vehicle that was suitable for the trip, we rented a big comfortable SUV and hit the road north on Friday morning. As an aside, we got the Ford Explorer through Hotwire for the unbelievable price of $35/day. If I occasionally need a vehicle smaller than my RV, you can bet I'll be checking Hotwire. As a bonus on this trip, our route took us through Fresno where my Sportsmobile (SMB) motorhome is in the conversion process. Michael and Brenda have heard plenty about my RVing plans, so they were happy to stop off with me to check the progress.

Here's Michael in the driver's seat of my Sportsmobile, which he declared to be quite comfortable:

This photo shows that the awning has been installed:

I'm surprised at how unobtrusive it is. This is the first visit I've had when some of the interior furnishings have been installed, so I was quite anxious to see how things look. This is the cabinet that will house the stove and sink:

The large hole is where a swing-down table will be mounted for use out the side door of the van, also allowing outdoor access to the contents of the cabinet. Notice how high the back panel (nearest us) of the cabinet goes. This is so it can run up behind the solid surface backsplash. I had read in forums that the backsplash, a separate glued-on piece of counter material, could break loose when people inevitably used it as a handhold while entering the van. I think having it reinforced with the cabinet panel will fix that problem. Another thing I noticed is that the floor extends a few inches forward of the end of the cabinet. This is different than previous SMB builds I've seen where the floor ends even with the end of the cabinet. I don't know if this is a change in policy or a bit of mismeasurement, but I don't mind, though it did give me concern about the width of the entrance when all I had to go by was the floor. In the finished construction, there will be a support board closing off the outside edge of the floor but leaving access to a long narrow storage compartment from the step.

Here's a view into that same cabinet from above:

My surprise here is the thick central partition; I expected it to be one large open space. Again, I don't particularly mind, I'm sure it's done for structural integrity. I do like all the angle brackets that are used to hold the cabinets together, and the beefy braces that anchor it to the floor. The tilted boards you see in both bays are just temporary spacers.

Michael says he likes that if the passenger gets on your nerves you can swing them around to face the other way; Brenda greets such comments with tolerant skepticism:

You can see the frame for the dinette (couch) in this image; it will fold out the width of the aisle to provide a second bed. The big bundle of black cables in the base of the dinette is evidence that the inverter will be installed there.

At the rear of the van, this is the way that SMB has chosen to implement my shower pan:

This is an area where I just have to trust in their experience. It's not exactly as I specified it, using the wheelwell itself as part of the enclosure. What they've done is not inferior - if it works - so I'll wait and see. And, yes, there will be a drain in the shower pan when it's finished.

Here's a view in from the rear of the van:

So far, there's only an empty space where the bed will be on the right. The mesh shelves are items I provided that will be installed at the rear of the galley cabinet. I didn't really anticipate how much the walls of the van curve in at the top. This makes the partition at the front of the shower much narrower than I expected. SMB says that for structural reasons, they'll probably have to replace that with a wider piece. I'm definitely liking that I went with white walls; it offsets the darkness of the cherry wood.

A place where the curves of the van work in my favor is in the little space above  the microwave:

In my plans, this looked like it would be a dark, constricted space that I'd need some sort of slide out shelf to make useful. Here, you can see that it's relatively bright and open. I'll have no trouble storing all sorts of cookware in that space as it is (after taking precautions against things sliding out, of course).

Because of our schedule, it was a whirlwind tour of the van, but I saw everything I needed to, and liked everything I saw. We continued north on Hwy 99 as far as Stockton, then switched to Hwy 88 headed east. Wade and Cheryl drove over to meet us in Lockeford to help us navigate the rest of the way to Plymouth, where our hotel, the Shenandoah Inn, was located. I thought this was a really nice place:

reasonably priced, and the view out the window was fantastic:

That evening, Wade and Cheryl joined us in Brenda and Michael's room for a simple dinner of wine and melon that Brenda had brought along.

We got a relaxed start the next morning with Wade and Cheryl rejoining us for breakfast at Speed's, just a short walk from the hotel. Then we all piled into our Explorer for a winding but beautiful trip into Folsom, where Cheryl does most of her shopping. It's also where Wade introduced us to Lindsey and Bunnie, proprietors of his favorite cigar shop and lovely people. I've never smoked and usually find the odor of cigars annoying, but the quality of the products in this store was evident from the aroma of the cigars customers smoked around a communal table.

Next on the agenda was a visit to Wade and Cheryl's home. They're retired, but help out with chores on a ranch near Jackson, and live in one of the several cabins on the property. It doesn't look like much from the outside:

but it's cozy and quite nice on the inside. It also has a lovely back porch, which Brenda and Michael were quick to enjoy:

There's a babbling creek nearby, and the views are idyllic:

A few yards from the cabin, there's a stone that was used by Native Americans for grinding grain:

and no backcountry field would be complete without a rusted antique:

We all had a simple lunch of deli meats, cheese, and fruit on the porch, and then took a tour around the cabin. There's a hutch with bunnies:

but the star of the show was Alice, the 3-week old goat:

Then it was time to head back to the hotel to rest up and dress up for the evening's concert. The organizers ask that you dress in western wear to help foster the right atmosphere. I managed to pull together a decent outfit from things I already had:

Brenda gave me the defining piece, the kerchief. It's about a half hour drive from Plymouth to the the concert venue on a hill outside of Fiddletown. We passed through Fiddletown too quickly to get a real impression, but it's worth returning to when I've got more time to explore, as are all the little towns in the area.

Ron Scofield and his wife Marie run the Cowboy Campfire. I've got to say, I'm in awe of Ron. He's known in the area as a wheelwright for wagons, but he not only built the wheels, but the wagons, and all the buildings on the grounds:

He's also a talented singer with a strong voice:

 an artist:

(This is just a small portion - I don't want to undercut his business - of a piece of his art that I bought), and he looks awfully good for a fella of 83:

The first item on the evening's agenda was a delicious meal of barbecue beef and chicken, with salad, beans, and a piece of pie for dessert:

That's Cheryl, Wade, Brenda, and Michael chowing down. For some concerts, Wade backs up Ron Scofield by playing his one-string bass, but that wasn't on the bill this night. Oh well, just another reason to come back next year. Lindsey and Bunnie from the cigar store joined at our table, too. With our appetites sated, the wild turkeys that snuck up behind us were safe:

Helping out with the barbecue and making the rounds at the tables was a lady in a very impressive costume:

She entertained us with stories about living in Alaska with 5 kids without indoor plumbing. Brenda was so impressed, she's writing a song to memorialize the tale.

Before long, the Old West Trio took to the stage:

That's Leslie and Steve Idle, and Steve Johnson. They have a repertoire of classic western songs such as "Ghost Riders in the Sky", "Cool Clear Water", and really know how to entertain the crowd. They're regulars at the campfires. Between their sets, Pat Richardson, a comedian and cowboy poet took the stage:

He had us belly laughing with some really original material. For the finale, Ron Scofield joined the Old West Trio for several numbers:

The next morning, we got an early start and had an uneventful drive back to San Diego. All in all it was a wonderful trip.

If you've been tracking this blog for a while, you know the completion of my RV is expected any time now. My next post will be an update on that.