Before we head off the mountain, I wanted to share some of our more interesting neighbors. You’ve already met the deer

And Gary caught this family of wild turkeys crossing the parking lot early one morning.

I had my first spotting of an Oregon Junco – though they seem to be as common here as the chipping sparrow is back East.

This is a Western Scrub Jay spotted at our favorite vista office space.

One of the more intriguing natural sightings here are the countless fir trees that were literally riddled with acorns.

We were quite puzzled until we spotted the culprit…

A woodpecker!
And the common name of this woodpecker? The Acorn Woodpecker. They must have really put their thinkin’ caps on for that!

---

This will probably be my last post from our mountain top. Did I tell you that for the first time Gary and I will be driving separately for the first leg of the trip? Apparently he feels that the almost 20 miles of 7% grade and countless hairpin turns would be less stressful if there wasn’t someone in the passenger seat gasping and gripping the edge of her chair. It’s probably a wise decision, and at least he trusts me to drive the truck down! Hopefully we’ll be reunited at the bottom of the mountain.

I’ll leave you with one last sunset picture.

This I will miss.

This was our Monday morning wake-up view -

Yikes!
Today dawned bright and sunny, but our pipes were frozen, so you know we’re not out of the winter woods yet! Our first two weeks here were unseasonably warm (but how were we to know?), and apparently this is a little more typical for winter here on the mountain.

---

We finally made it to The Palomar Observatory on Sunday. While it’s open to the public, they don’t give tours during the winter months so we had to be content to just look around and visit their small museum. It was very interesting, and if it hadn’t been so cold we might have wandered around the grounds a little more. We had viewed a special on PBS – The Journey to Palomar in November, so it was very interesting to get up close and personal – and to drive on the roads that that massive (and fragile) 200 inch mirror had to travel to get up the mountain.

---

This is our last week here at Palomar Christian Conference Center as we are pulling out on Friday and heading north to the San Francisco area. On the way we are planning on connecting with friends we haven’t seen in almost 30 years (and who actually have the same phone number!). We’re looking forward to seeing them, plus some additional sights along our route north.

The project we are heading for – Mission Springs Conference Center – is right near where Lara lived for the last four years. So while we’ve never worked there before, we have visited the site. And while we won’t have Lara nearby to act as a local tour guide, I imagine we’ll still have a great month!

(This was written on Sunday the 18th- but I am just now getting an opportunity to post it. Thanks for stopping back!)
Did you have a good week? We certainly did! We’ve settled in nicely here on our mountain top. First of all, the weather has been OUTSTANDING! We were a little afraid that we might be sloughing through snow, but so far the days have been crystal clear, highs in the 60’s and lows at night only in the 40’s. The guys have been working on some staff housing (conveniently located right by our rigs) while Nancy and I have been working at the office (conveniently located near the internet!) scanning retreat info into the computer. Since the camp feeds its staff lunch each day (and they graciously include us), we’ve been hanging around after lunch for our daily internet-fix. Ah……
This area was hard hit by a massive forest fire in 2007. While the retreat center was largely spared, there is evidence of the fire’s fury all around. Yesterday we drove up the Boucher Overlook to watch the sunset – and marvel at the view – we could see some of the damage. Since we could see Lizzie through the trees (not in this picture, but honest, we could!) it made me realize just how close the fire was to the retreat center.

It was so clear that from our overlook not only could we see Catalina Island, but could also see the San Diego skyline.

(This picture is really to show off my new (thank you very much, Abigail) funky tripod! You can’t actually see the skyline in this shot. )
The sun was setting almost behind Catalina Island (which is almost 30 miles off shore) and was spectacular in its blazing glory.

from Start

To Finish
It was beautiful. And even when we returned to our neighborhood, the sky was still in sunset glory mode –

Other high points of our weekend included a trip down the mountain where we managed to fit in stops at Home Depot, Camping World, Walmart, a delightful quilt shop, and In and Out Burger, walk along the beach in Oceanside to stick our toes in the Pacific Ocean,


and enjoy a piece of pie at Julian’s Pie Shop.

More “Day off the Mountain” pictures here -

The internet road is still a little bumpy, but we’re making do.
Have a good weekend! I think we’re headed to Temecula tomorrow (mostly for the guys to get a Home Depot fix, but I think we’ll manage a little sightseeing. And there is always that exciting drive down off the mountain!)

So, even though I have a post all ready to go (with lots of pictures of our adventure), I haven’t had a good enough internet access to actually upload the pictures. So, I’ll keep writing off-line and do an official update when I have both internet AND time together!

But for right now – We are having a lovely time here in California. The work has been interesting, the conference center has been feeding us most meals (and yummy ones at that), the scenery beautiful and our time off has been profitable.

Signing off from our Vista Office!

We’re not in the desert anymore!
We have made it safely to our January project – Palomar Christian Conference Center. It is located on the same mountain as the Palomar Observatory, but unfortunately the Observatory is closed for tours during January and February. I’m pretty bummed about that, but there are lots of other Points of Interest not too far away. The conference center is located on the top of the mountain so ANYTHING we need is a good 30-40 miles away (down a mountain road) so we’ll need to be careful planners.
We’re still getting a feel for the lay of the land but this much I have figured out. Almost zero phone reception and that means no internet in our rig. Another bummer. They do offer a wireless connection, but I can only get it down at the dining hall. Even that connection has been troublesome so my co-worker and I have been driving part way down the mountain to try to get some internet signal using our trusty Verizon aircards. And while that was working ok, for some reason I wasn’t able to sign on to this website so I couldn’t update. It has surprised me how much I have missed being able to look-up things on-line, stay up to date with my email, and generally have that “instant gratification” that we Americans are so used to! So it just means I’ll need to be more organized during my internet time. And it also means I’ll probably get more stuff done around the house!

But I must tell you, this place is amazing! Here is our parking spot -

I’ve posted our view from behind our rig as the header on this page – and across the parking lot we watch the deer come down from the mountaintop in the mornings…..

And while it was a bit of a nuisance driving down the mountain to get phone and internet signal,

the view made up for the frustration!

(see that shimmer over on the upper left? That, my friends, is the Pacific Ocean!)
But so far my favorite part has been the sunsets. I feel as though God has set his easel right up behind our rig.

Last Night –wide angle….

And then zoomed in….

(there’s that ocean again – can you see it?)

So – if it seems a little quiet on this end, just keep checkin’ back . I promise I’ll be back!