Gayle's World

Who's Gayle?  I am a 78 year old lady who has been blessed with seeing much of our beautiful planet by various means.  I now live on the lovely island of Kauai, when I'm not traveling, with my husband, Mike and our orange cat, Chuck.  It's an absolutely perfect place to live.  But when the travel bug bites....

I started my major traveling in 1996, when a partner and I sailed our Hylas 42 to Mexico for several seasons.  Ultimately, we sailed to Hawaii in 2000.  There is much to tell about our Mexico experience.  The shipwreck we had during Hurricane Nora is a tale worth hearing. I've actually written a book with the help of my cat at the time, Chalchi.  We'll get to all of that.

For now, this blog starts in 2009, after the boating years and at the start of the nine years we owned our truck camper, where we spent half of those years traveling the US, Canada and Mexico.  That is when I began sending emails of my trips to my friends and family.  I love photo documenting and the pictures are probably the best part of my efforts.  So many say they love my emails and have encouraged me to do a blog for years.  I finally am taking their advice.    

In the more recent years, most of my traveling has been on cruise ships.  I've spent the equivalent of over two years on board and am still cruising.  

So I invite you to get to know me and see what I've been up to for the last 30 years or so.  Perhaps it will inspire you to travel.  I believe there's nothing better than to see this wonderous planet and meet it's people.   And I can be funny and we all know that laughter is the best medicine.  

Come on....let's go!

   Subject: Start of Long Trip Oct. 2009

We've been gone a month from Kauai already.  Hardly seems possible.  And when people ask how we can possibly be gone for a whole year - well if it all goes as fast as this last month it will be over before we know it!

We spent a few days in Vegas getting our camper back together after it sat for a long while.  Thanks to my cousin, Carolyn, and her husband, Harvey...all was well.  We did need to buy new batteries but they were old anyway.  Thanks again to you two for all your help.

We spent a few days in the Vegas area at Mt. Charleston and in Red Rock Canyon.  There are photos attached from Red Rock and a hike we did there.  It was hot but fun.  We then passed thru Death Valley (and we thought it was hot in Red Rock!!) and up to Whitney Portal for our famous hike up the Mt. Whitney Trail.  Lots of the photos are from that area. 

It was breathtakingly beautiful, and we were blessed for sure.  We got as far as Mirror Lake which meant that we hiked ten miles and climbed 2,600 feet of elevation.  That was plenty but we envied the folks who were backpacking up and spending the night under the stars.  The weather was stellar!

We spent a few nights at Convict Lake and also went to Devil's Postpile.  You'll know what it is when you see the photos!  The campground near there had a hot springs shower that is my all time favorite shower in the world.  And I've taken some interesting showers in my time!!  They had piped the perfect temperature water into these little bath houses and you could run it for as long as you wished - all FREE.

We headed up Tioga Pass toward Yosemite with a stop at a wonderful place called Saddlebag Lake.  Unfortunately, the campground was full and we had to leave before being able to explore.  So we went through (yawn) Yosemite once again!  We'd been there twice last year so didn't really do much except camp one night.  Then on through Sonora and up towards the pass to camp for a few nights before heading to Mike's brother's place in Sonora.  We had a great place to camp right by a river but I didn't snap any photos there - just video. 

Then we went down and spent a week with Mike's brother, Roger and Cheryl and all their kitties.  I love spending time with the kitties.  There were even some kittens to play with.  Mike and Roger had their usual fun - mostly doing projects for our camper!  Neice Jennifer and her boyfriend, Mika, came up from Sacramento and we all went winetasting.  Another one of my favorite things!  All in all it was a nice visit.  Thanks again, Roger and Cheryl for your hospitality once again.

We're now camped at Bass Lake and trying to figure out just exactly what to do next.  Mike waxed the truck and I've been fooling around with pictures so I could get this out.  I'm going to attach a bunch and I hope it works. 

 

 

Gotta go as I'm gettin' nervous about our battery running out 

Aloha, Gayle