Focht Family Blog

Saturday we left Bakersfield and drove to Desert Hot Springs. Since the whole reason you come to Desert Hot Springs is for the mineral pools we took the kids for a dip before it started getting dark. Here are a couple of pictures of the kids in the pool…

The kids had a lot of fun and Timmy is practicing a lot on swimming without his jacket. He is doing a great job. He is getting good at swimming under water and treading water long enough to get a breath and go back under. Samantha’s swimming skills are improving at each pool. The water comes out of the wells at 115 degrees so even the swimming pool is warm. However, when the sun goes down it gets cold fast so we have been bundling up to get to the pool and back.

Here is a picture of sites #794 & #795. The sites are not real big and you are in a park that is full of park models. They just rent out the sites that haven’t been bought.

Things I like: Full hookup with cable, first time guests get $100 gas card. There are lots of activities and best of all are all of the mineral pools of varying temperatures.

Things I don’t like: Sandy sites so lots of dirt coming in. The trash is inconvenient to get to. Worst of all is NO cell service! They said that they told us when I made reservations but they didn’t. Their sister camp, Caliente Springs, is up the road and has service but it is only for 55+. They are supposed to have a cell tower put in by summer. The wi-fi is slow as well.

Yesterday we checked in to a RV park that is in an orange grove in Bakersfield. As soon as we checked in we went and picked up an orange picker and took Misty for a walk in the grove…

We soon figured out that it is better to get an orange picker early in the morning because our picker didn’t have any prongs on it to grab the oranges with. The next morning Nathan picked up a picker with prongs and we went back out today as well to pick more oranges. Here is a picture of Nathan grabbing an orange…

We had a system going that the kids found the oranges, Nathan picked them out of the trees, and Joshua caught them…

Or DIDN’T catch them as is the case for that orange. :)

When one of the oranges fell on the other side of the fence, Timmy decided to see if he could find a way to get it…

We told him to leave it on the other side and not worry about it. Here are all of the kids posing with their treasures…

And one last picture of Samantha today…

Tomorrow we check out and head to Desert Hot Springs for the week.

Here is a picture of sites #163 & #164. Note the orange trees separating the sites. We have been doing seasonal lights on the RV. The ones that are up now are for Valentine’s Day. :)

Things I like: $35/night for full hook-up with cable and all of the oranges you can eat. That is the most reasonable price we have had in California. Large, clean restroom with great showers. Orange pickers for you to use for free. Laundry was also priced reasonably. $1.25 for washers and $1.00 for dryers.

Things I don’t like: The sites are dirt and the grove has a lot of mud so there has been a lot of dirt tracked in.

On our way down to the wharf we decided to drive some of San Francisco’s famous streets. We just had to drive Lombard. It looks like a tight zig zag on the GPS. :) Here are some pictures that I took overlooking the city from the top of the hill and one of the zig zag road as we were on it…

As you get to the start of the zig zags it has a sign saying that vans and buses are not allowed. I think if you had anything bigger than the truck you would not have been able to make the turns. After driving the streets and looking at Pier 39 we decided to walk along the wharf and take a trolley to the end of the line and back. Here is the trolley as it was being turned around before we got on.

Here is a picture of my mom and the family sitting on the trolley…

My mom tried to get a picture of the family and me but just as she snapped it the conductor went by and we had to get back off the trolley. Nathan took a picture of me with the kids with the trolley behind us…

And one of my favorites of the day.. the boys were complaining about having to walk so Nathan decided to give them both a lift…

Tomorrow we leave here early and head to get the hitch replaced and then it will be on to Bakersfield where we will be staying for a couple of days in an orange grove. :)