May, 2024
During the entire week that I was here, I never left the small town of Pacific Beach (except maybe to walk on that US Navy property right next door). Usually I’m off exploring in the big white truck most days. This week, I stayed put and just walked. And I loved it.
Here are a few photos from today, including a nice little sunset.
First off, very late morning … here’s a photo of my pickup truck and trailer in the campground (I’m looking north as I took the photo). Where is everyone?! Ok, I’m not complaining, but the weather was really nice and there was almost no one in sight, or in site. 🙂 Just me and that other van/RV rig. About half of the campsites in the photo do not have an electrical hookup, but the other half do have one, including some of the campsites that back right onto the Pacific Ocean beach, like mine did.
As a comparison, I walked up past my rig, past my campsite, and then turned around and took a photo of the campground as I was facing south. Keep in mind, this is not a large campground. But here’s the view looking south …
That southern half of the campground was packed! Side by side, cheek by jowl. Why? Here we were, we two campers (that van/RV and me) up here in the northern half of the campground all by ourselves. Well, I won’t complain, it was so quiet here. But gosh I sure wondered why.
Just the two rigs, pretty much all week, just us.
That van/RV rig had two women in it. I met them the first day. They are sisters-in-law … their husbands are brothers of each other. Over the years, the two women have become close, good friends. Their husbands have absolutely no interest in camping even in a rig that nice. The women purchased this van/RV rig about five years ago and the two of them go camping with their two dogs. They go all over Washington and love it.
The three of us chatted 2-3 times a day, when we ran across each other out and about. And we took a couple of short walks together too. They are really nice people.
At one point in the week, the women couldn’t get their water pump to work. They had checked the fuse, it seemed ok … and the pump did make pumping noise. They checked the tank, yep full of water, but no water would come out of any of the faucets in the RV. They had called a mechanic in the closest town (30-40 minutes away) and they were going to unhook the rig from the campsite and then drive the rig there. But they happened to mention it to me first. As a retired mechanic I couldn’t hardly wait to help them!
It turned out to be a loose connection in the line between the tank and the water pump (at the water pump), such that the pump was just sucking air. Tightening the connection fixed the problem in just a few minutes. They loved me! 🙂 They tried to pay me. I said, “please donate to women who are working their way through automotive schools or other trades.” And I told them of women in the gasoline and diesel technology programs that I have been in and how badly they/we were treated at times. One of them emailed me after the trip and said she had set up a monthly payment into a fund that is for women students in an automotive gasoline technology program near where she lives.
After my little mechanic job for my neighbors, I walked back to my trailer, pulled out my comfy chair and put it right up on the berm behind my trailer.
And I sat there and ate my lunch and watched the Pacific Ocean do its thing.
Oh, those are the two women out there on the beach with their two dogs in the photo above.
After I finished my late lunch, I had an unplanned nap right there in that comfy chair. 🙂 And then I headed out onto the beach too … and, more than once, very much on purpose, I walked right out into the Pacific Ocean. Yep, my shoes were soaked and full of saltwater and sand. 🙂
Whoa, that last wave was kind of scary. It was huge!
Then I just walked up and down the beach, just wandering, watching the sky, and everything else. And then I walked through the campground and chatted with a few people. Camping folks are really nice folks.
Back at my trailer I fixed my dinner and then went back outside to sit behind my trailer again on that berm to watch the evening light.
Gorgeous. And then off to the left (below) was this additional little present from the universe.
How can there be so many perfect days? This sure was one of them.
More adventures coming, stay tuned! 🙂