3/19/06 Hello from Park Sierra. We returned to our lot here last Saturday night and had quite a surprise when we arrived. There was LOTS of SNOW here! All day long on our drive from Las Vegas, we had been expecting snow in the Tehachapi Mountains but were pleasantly surprised that there wasn't much there, and none on the road. Then, when we arrived at Park Sierra just after dark, we found the snow accumulation to be quite sizeable. The next day we walked around to take some pictures and realized that there was quite a bit of damage from the heavy and wet snow - many trees had limbs that had broken off or even entire trees had fallen down. Luckily, there wasn't much damage to RV's or cars. A few people had their car covers smashed, and one lady lost her golf cart to a direct hit, but other than that, the biggest problem was that limbs were down everywhere. A work crew got out quickly and cut up the trees that had fallen across roads and fed them into the chipper. That took 2 days of hard work. Then they started to clear limbs that had fallen on lots and driveways. Elaine and I spent two full days helping out on this crew and it was a lot of work. We were glad that it rained Friday and prevented working outside because we needed a rest! Probably this work will take the better part of a month or two because there are trees and/or limbs down on nearly every lot, and there are 254 lots in the park.
As usual at this time of year, we are working on our taxes and cleaning up our paperwork. We are also trying to get ready for our upcoming trip. This has caused us to drive into Fresno twice already, to buy things we need, such as a new ultracompact camera, travel books, etc. There have also been several social events which we have enjoyed. There was a Happy Hour for the park with good munchies, and a chance for us to catch up on some of the doings of our friends here. Friday night we drove into Oakhurst with 7 friends and enjoyed a corned beef and cabbage dinner at the Elks Club to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. There was also a dinner here at the park, but they served hamburgers!
The rain and cold continues, with clearing skies scheduled for Wednesday and we hope that will be the end of the cold, wet weather for this year.