Captive in Yreka, California

Our last two weeks in the US are even more stressful than our first week was upon arrival.  Then it was the problem of insurance.  Now it is an administrative stuff-up of which we were unaware until the prospective buyer of our RV asked where the Title Certificate was.  We did not know about such a document as it does not exist in Australia where we just transfer the registration on the back of the registration certificate – that is all the documentation one needs when selling and buying a vehicle.  But here this document, known as the “pink slip” gets mailed out about a fortnight after the registration process.

Last year we asked friends in California where we purchased the vehicle if we could use their address for the registration and we checked if it was OK for them to receive some mail for us.  They cheerfully agreed, but when mail arrived for Andrew and they did not recognise the surname (different from mine), it did not click that this was their friend Andrew and they returned all mail to sender.  We found this out when we later arrived at their house with our new RV and as they remembered a letter from the AAA we arranged for a duplicate membership card to replace the original.  But as we did not know about the existence of the “pink slip” we did not miss it.  We had plenty of opportunities during our time in California to get a duplicate but we were blissfully unaware that we did not have this vital document until now, the point of sale, and we desperately need it.  Dealing with the California Department of Motor Vehicles is only slightly less difficult than communicating with God and they are more rigid and inflexible in their requirements.

We are currently sitting in a small Californian town, Yreka, which has a DMV office where the small staff are helpful but ultimately powerless as the Rush Request for a Duplicate Title needs to be posted to the Sacramento Office by express mail.  We are now waiting for something good to happen and for the DMV in Sacramento to send the duplicate pink slip to us here by express post.  Things are looking a little hopeful as someone from God’s office actually called us this morning to ask that we go into the local DMV office so they could verify that Andrew is who he claims to be.  They photocopied and faxed his passport to Sacramento.  Now it is all in the lap of the Gods.

The organisation against whom we would like to throw darts

While we still don’t have the vital document in our hot little hands, we think/hope we are winning.  All this has been incredibly stressful and we need to remember not these awful last two weeks but the wonderful year we have had on this road trip.  We have experienced kindness, wonderful hospitality and friendship and seen amazing scenery, sights and landscapes.  

This restful image belies the great stress we are experiencing while waiting for the post at Yreka. This is Greenhorn Park in town where Canadian geese mingle with deer grazing on the lush grass.  It is a little haven to escape to in the Californian heat that we are not so used to these days after spending our time in the Washington mountains.

And looking down on Greenhorn Park from the hill above.  You can see how dry it is in California. There are some terrible bushfires burning out there, just as it often happens in Australia.  In the town of Weed, not far from here, 100 houses were destroyed yesterday.

Close of business Friday there was no action by Sacramento DMV according to the US express delivery service tracking mechanism, so we decided to go to Kangaroo Lake some 40 miles from Yreka up in the mountains.  The weekend away from our troubles was very therapeutic.  We did not spend as much time angsting about pink slips as we did back in the town.  And it was a lot cooler.

We had a really relaxing time at Kangaroo Lake.  It reminded us of another lovely place back in Western Australia near a mining town Newman, called Kalgan Pool.  It too was a popular swimming hole for locals and we were lucky to be told about it by someone.  Much smaller than this place but the ambiance was not dissimilar.

The campground is a delightful one and there were campers and day picnickers there all weekend.  Here we are doing a little housekeeping.

Two ladies chatting at the picnic table while a deer grazes nearby.  How delightful is that?

We met a lovely family who were camping out with their teenage children - all avid card players and we whiled away a couple of hours playing rummy with them.  Raoul the father supervised, Ana the mother gave us delicious Mexican rice and barbecued chicken and the young card sharps, Claudia and Raoul Junior played cards with us..

Another highlight was Bear the labrador in the kayak with his owner.  It was a scream watching Bear's majestic demeanor while he was being ferried across the water.









Awful reality hit when we returned to Yreka on Monday and the USP tracking service still showed no document in transit.  The nightmare continues.

In the pink at last!  Above is our card out of jail.  Arrived today and we can now drive approximately 250 miles to Reno in Nevada to complete the sale of our Tiger the Tioga.  We have now been able to book our flights home for the following day.  Returning to OZ on Monday 22 September.  We are SOoooooooo happy.