California Here We Come

The best part of the trip had to be Wyoming. First Jackson Hole with it's arch of deer Moose and elk antlers stretched out over the road into town. Next up was Cody. I think Robin, Don and I had our most fun on this trip in Cody, Then Yellowstone the next day.

  A week earlier we had been in Avon Lake, Ohio with our soon to be step dad Johnny living in the basement of the house we shared with Grampa and Gramma Semple. Johnny seemed like a nice guy. he had been in a motorcycle accident the year before and spent almost the full year in the hospital fixing the multiple broken bones and the burns he suffered to his legs. He had also spent some time racing dirt track which for a nine year old seemed like an exciting life.

   Mom and Johnny got married late in July 1963 the first wedding I remember attending. We left Avon Lake heading for California where Johnny had a job waiting. Somehow in a year old Chevy II the 3 kids, Don Robin and I packed in the back seat along with coolers, blankets and other things I don't recall. Westward across Ohio and Indiana, a huge thunderstorm while going through Chicago. These I are things I remember along with Johnny turning from nice guy living in the basement to A-hole "Dad" slapping me for the noise in the backseat where 3 bored little kids were hanging out. Our first night out we started out camping somewhere in Iowa where we were attacked by mosquitoes from hell. I think we ended up in a motel for the night.

 The next thing I remember was Mt Rushmore, seeing those huge heads of dead presidents up close and personal gave me a sense of history that I don't think I appreciated up to then. Our trip across Iowa and South Dakota was a boring passage of corn and cows until we reached the badlands. Home to the fierce Souix warriors I had read of and seen on TV. My 9 year old brain had not encountered the idea that everything had been taken away from the natives creating a shadow culture we didn't see on our trip through the area.

  Finally arriving in Cody in the afternoon of the third day, we went over to the Buffalo Bill museum. Johnny bought the three of us cowboy hats. On our way back to the motel we got picked up by a fire truck and taken out to a rodeo. The first any of us had ever seen, I think we all thoroughly enjoyed it. I did. There was something special about Cody that still sticks in my head. Once again that sense of living history the museum brought back. But more so was the friendliness and excitement of the people at the rodeo. This was an alien feel, not that the people of Avon Lake were unfriendly but there was little interaction with each other that I remember outside of the day to day activity.

  The next day met by bears, nuzzling at the windows for a treat, the family entered Yellowstone for a day of adventure and natural beauty. Somewhere in the park on a scenic overlook we ran into the actor Van Heflin filming a documentary. The three of us kids in our cowboy hats were invited to particpate as extras in the scene they were filming. Several months later we saw ourselves on TV. Great fun.. A full day there then westward through Wyoming and into Idaho. The beautiful scenery of the Rockies kept us all enthralled and mostly quiet. Along the road we were driving dropoffs of hundreds feet just outside the car windows had us scared and in awe of the landscape surrounding us. I think this was the most beatiful part of our trip as we turned southwest into Utah and to the Great Salt Lake.

  Early the following day we headed into  the high desert of Nevada to Reno to make a sunset trip skirting the north end of Tahoe. Finally morning brought us into the Sierra Nevadas of eastern California. The excitement level in the car rose as we headed to San Francisco to visit my mother's oldest sister Betty, who we didn't often see in Ohio. Of course San Francisco was a treat. We visited Chinatown and toured the city with our cousin Polly. After a nice day there we started south to Los Angeles, ending up in Gardena where Johnny's dad had an apartment waiting for us. Sort of an anticlimactic ending to a wonderful trip. Unfortunately, parts of the story are lost to time. I see it in bits and pieces of old half memories, some bright and clear as if they happened yesterday, other memories are gone. The nice guy in our basement, after 5 days trapped in a little Chevy II with 3 kids had turned into a jerk, which he never outgrew during the time he and my Mom were married. I wasn't happy in Gardena, fortunately that didn't last. A story for another day.