Raven Jake Dawes

Bodie

Raven Jake's Shack

Askin' me to pick a favorite ghost town is like askin' someone to pick their favorite kid. It just can't be done - you love 'em all too much. Now in spite of my "thing" for urban decay, this was the first time I'd been to the biggest, best-preserved ghost town in California (and possibly the whole West).

 

Mining Area

First off, take the whole day. Get there early. There's a whole lot to see and you'll need to do some walking. Admission is $7 per adult (well worth it) and the brochure/map is $2 (also well worth it). Special tours are held throughout the day and if you miss it, that's it. This is why we missed the stamp mill and I'm

Bodie Signs

still a little ticked off about it. If we'd done a little more research, we woulda

Old Bottles

known. The last 3 miles are an unpaved gravel road (well maintained) but really, once you're there the parking lot is paved, so it's time to do the whole damn thing.

The buildings are sealed off with strategically placed decrepitude visible from the windows. Several of them are in an intermediate state of being "restored," by which I mean more like "stabilized." Others, like my dope crib, pictured top left, really are falling over and step carefully least you fall through the porch or on an authentic square nail.

 

Raven Jake Behind the Shed

Anyway, I can't wait for my next trip to Bodie - it's vast and there is a whole lot to see and learn. There's a little museum/gift store that I'd sure like to see expanded with more educational exhibits. The do-it-yourself non-coded architecture is a testament to human ingenuity, and the town itself has a rich history of boom and bust, eccentric characters, crime and craziness. Now I heard a rumor that the funeral mariahs in the museum area that still have the coffins in the back of the hearse, also hold the mummified remains of one of Bodie's "soiled doves" and the other of a tubercular child, and I'm going to say for the record that I will not believe that nonsense 'til I see them with my own eyes!

 

http://www.bodie.com/ 

Bodie

 

 

 

 

 

The Black Mariah

Highway 395, Lake Tahoe and Markleeville

Tahoe

Raven Jake in Markleeville

Now after some debate as to whether we would suffer less with no air conditioning if we returned to LA County via the coast or going inland, we decided to go down the 395. It's been a while, and there's a whole lot to see and do along the way (and we barely scratched the surface; you could take a couple weeks going the whole route from the Sierra Nevada mountains all the way down to the Mojave Desert.)

So after we left the cabin, we headed straight for Lake Tahoe, then dipped down to the Eastern Sierras, starting with Markleeville, which is a cute little town with a number of gold rush era buildings. Had lunch at the Alpine Hotel, which was apparently a hard-core biker hangout back in the day, but it's pretty sedate now. Great chicken quesadilla, by the way.

Alpine Hotel Sign

 

 

 

 

 

More about Markleeville

 

The East side of California is just as varied and interesting as the West side. This is the route (approximately) taken by Raven Jake on his return to LA, with a few side trips thrown in. Blue spots were places we visited, yellow were ones we'd like to see next time. Most of this was reaadily accessible from Hwy 395, sometimes known as the Sierra Highway, and it has some of the most beautiful scenery in the world from the highest point in the continental US (Mt. Whitney) to the lowest (Death Valley) We only spent two days - a week or two would be much more appropriate.

 

View Eastern California 2010 in a larger map

Trip Map for August 2010 - Eastern CA

Tahoe Tom's Cabin

Tom and Jake

Y'all might remember our friend

Cabin

Tom Ver Hoef aka the Wizard of Tacopa. What isn't widely known about Tom is that Tacopa is but one of his residences. So when he invited us up for a visit at his cabin at an undisclosed lake somewhere in the vicinity of Lake Tahoe, we went for it.

Mountain

Now Tom didn't come up with the pledge of silence -

View through the trees

there are a number of other cabin owners up there who like their privacy, and who can blame them? So it's like Fight Club - you just don't talk about it. And not talkin' about it does nothing to

diminish the enjoyment of Lake Undisclosed.

Sam Goes for a Swim

Tom's Golden Retrievers, Sam and Pip, were in the water every chance they got and the weather was darned near perfect. So it was easy to spend a few days just chilling out, with some strollin' and canoeing to liven things up. Oh - Asclepias is the technical term for "Swamp Milkweed," for you butterfliers out there. 

 

Stream

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Asclepias incarnata

 

 

 

Lupine aka Fabaceae

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Screaming Cyclopse

 

Granite Formations

Drumming for Fakir in Guerneville

Raven Jake and Taiko Drum

Now at this point the "business" part of the trip set in. We drove up to Guerneville to drum and shoot video interviews for a retreat that our friend Fakir Musafar was havin'. Fakir turned 80 while we were up there, and from the look of things, I'll bet he's got another 80 years comin'. Not only that, but he's been takin' some drumming lessons himself and has really come along with the complex West African rhythms. Happy birthday Fakir, and many, many returns!

 

Raven Jake in Guerneville

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Drumming with Fakir Musafar

Lake Merritt, Oakland

Lake Merritt

Now while we were visitin' we had some call to go into Oakland, and found ourselves at Lake Merritt. I snoozed, Jane read, pelicans fished, and the geese walked around. Mighty good place for urban bird watching.

Here's what the city of Oakland website says about it: Lake Merritt is a focal point, it stands as the jewel of Oakland, even crowned with lights. A unique fresh and salt-water lake, the largest such lake located within an urban area consisting of 3.4 miles around the circumference of the lake, covering 155 acres of land. The depth of Lake Merritt varies upon how much water is allowed to filter in from the Estuary and upon rain water intake.

Road Trip!

 

Raven Jake and Juno Bergamasco

For the first time in a couple of summers, we made a trip up north (little business, lot of fun) and believe me, it was great to be back in the saddle. Even if that saddle was a Toyota Previa borrowed for the occasion. Fun. Now the business part dictated that we get up north as fast as possible for some drumming and some filming and that was a not-so-fun straight shot up the 5. S'all right, 'cause the company was great. Saw some old friends and some new friends. Our old friend was Spider, and he's a Devon Rex. Hasn't changed a bit. Loves to talk, real opinionated. Doesn't let anybody get away with anything. Our new friend is Juno. She's a Bergamasco (a sort of dredlocked Italian sheepdog) and still a teenager. Sweet as can be. Loves Spider and pretty much everybody else. And yes, she can see. Obviously, there are other members of the family so a big shout out to the Goudeys for their hospitality. They're some of the nicest people in the whole world and we are very, very lucky to count them as our friends.

 

Spider Rex

Presentation from the Hi-Desert Museum

Some of Jake's hard-core fans might remember that we had a 'do over at the Hi-Desert Museum last February. Basically, we were talking about the evolution of Raven Jake from his humble beginnings, the Way of the Blog and all that kinda thing. Our audience was the Morongo Basin Historical Society, who are expert in all things Desert, but not necessarily proficient bloggers. I think one or two mighta had a MySpace account. So the primary message is that you don't need to be a computer programmer to have fun with a blog, and the secondary message was that there are all kinds of ways of telling your story. We started out with a little quiz to break the ice, then went on to talk about some of our desert adventures. Good times.

Open publication - Free publishing - More yucca valley

Hi-Desert Museum Presentation

The Dry Gulch Chupacabra

This here is somethin' you don't see every day: a chupacabra. Unfortunately she is, literally, a mangy raccoon. This poor critter has been renamed Kojak and she's recuperating (and they're certain she'll make a full recovery) at a wildlife rescue in her home state of Oklahoma. They think there are some kittens on the way, so who says pretty girls have all the fun? (The audio on this is pretty bad, and no, "researchers" aka volunteers at Wild Heart Ranch, did not feed her goat's blood "just to make sure.")

 

The Dry Gulch Chupacabra