Weekly Recap: Shawn In Sacramento (CA)

Bryn spent the majority of this week back in Boston for a work trip, so Shawn focused less on tourist activities and more on work and camper maintenance.

The Monday following the San Francisco outing was Martin Luther King Day, so Shawn had off from work. The plan had been to drive up from the Bay Area, through Sacramento, and stay at timeshare RV park partway between Sacramento and Tahoe. They offer a 5 day stay for free to try to entice you into joining their membership. However, a snow storm rolled in just as Shawn started getting close and then the highway was closed down about 10 miles before the park. They refused to move the reservation date, and also had an issue with the fact that Bryn wasn't going to be there. With the unexpected stop in Placerville, Shawn brought the RV to a mobile RV repair man to look into the propane heater/fridge issue. After taking the unit out and testing it, he confirmed that the unit's motherboard had died and needed to be replaced. While he was working on that, Shawn parked the camper in a nearby Walmart and got a haircut. Eventually the repairman came by to reinstall the working unit, and it fixed the issue (but cost almost $500). While he was working on it, a man walked up talking about how great the camper looked and how "he hasn't seen one like this in years!" It has been serving our needs well, but this is not a luxury camper or even relatively new so it was very strange to hear such praise. The guy weirded out both Shawn and the repairman enough that instead of boondocking there for the night, he moved about an hour closer to Sacramento and spent the night in a Sam's Club parking lot instead.

The next morning he walked over to a nearby Starbucks to work through morning meetings until it was close enough to check-in time at the next campsite. After the timeshare place fell through, he found a backup location right in Sacramento at the fairgrounds. The Cal Expo RV Park is on the ground of the Cal Expo and State Fair location, but open all year. The price was very cheap, particularly for being so close to town. The spot was also surprisingly level and all were very large pull-thrus. However, they were much stricter than any campground we've stayed at before (they inspected the trailer for age, took copies of the registration and insurance, no refunds if you shorten your stay, need a physical key for the bathrooms, etc.).

After working from the camper for the rest of the day, it was errands time. The truck needed an oil change, as we last did it in Rapid City and have put on a lot of miles since then. After getting that taken care of, Shawn added on a car wash/vacuum and grocery run. This was the first sunny day in a long while.

The next day was again mostly just working from the camper and doing trip planning at night, but a bike path runs right next to the campground so Shawn went for an evening run on it. There were a lot of closed sections/detours from flooding due to the unrelenting heavy rain, but it was still the best running route in weeks. It has been a bit of a surprise how unfriendly the west has been to running outside. Percy took advantage of Bryn being away to claim her chair for himself.

Percy loving boys week

Thursday was another busy work day, but added the first disc golf outing in months. The John Mackey Disc Golf Course is in a city park only a few miles away from the campground. It was pretty well maintained course, though again the recent flooding had some of it closed off. Shawn's game has definitely deteriorated in the long break since the fall. 

John Mackey DGC

On the way back from the course, Shawn stopped at Home Depot to pick up some supplies for more camper repair. First was refastening the side panel that had been torn off by the wind back in Orick. This was a pretty easy fix with longer screws than we had on hand, and was instantly so much firmer mounted than our previous temporary fix. The next job was significantly more involved. The grey tank (waste waster from sinks and the shower, but not toilet) had developed a small drip near the beginning of the trip. We managed to stop it with some steel epoxy, but that fix failed when the grey tank pipe froze sometime during our Idaho or Nevada cold snaps. The expansion caused a crack to form in the epoxy, and now further attempts to epoxy the leak failed. So we went with a full replacement of the PVC elbow. At home this would be a pretty minor job, but on the road out here we don't have a saw or PVC cement on hand. Additionally, campgrounds pretty much all have policies against doing repair work on your campers (let alone a campground this strict). Shawn purchased the supplies needed to do this, including a small hacksaw, and then did it under the camper after the office had left for the day. At one point he did have to turn off his flashlight and wait, as a security truck does regular patrols of the campground at night. But it was still a reasonable sized job, although a pair of couplings were unfortunately needed to go only about an inch each.

Repaired grey tank

Friday was another work from the camper day and run along the nearby bike path. Heading in the opposite direction proved to have fewer detours. The grey tank fix was confirmed to be holding! At the end of the day, Bryn returned from her business trip. We caught an Uber into the downtown portion of Sacramento, which was only about a 10 minute drive away.

Urban Roots Brewery

Our first stop was Urban Roots, a brewery with barbecue offerings. It was some of the better barbecue we have had outside of the south. After dinner we walked to the nearby dive bar B Side. We got a couple of seats at the bar and accidently got sucked into watching all of Mars Attacks, which they had put on just as we walked in. The ridiculously stacked cast sucked us in, and was a huge juxtaposition to the quality of the film. We kept saying "How did this come out the same year as Independence Day?!" 

When the B movie ended, we moved onto a recommendation from one of the bartenders, the nearby Shady Lady. This was a much more swanky bar, and made some excellent cocktails.

Very pretty and delicious cocktails from the Shady Lady