Headed over the Donner Pass on Father’s Day just at the time Becca called to wish me a happy day. Imagine my delight at being able to tell a Dad Joke about going into restaurants around that area and we give the name of our party as ‘Donner’. Then we remind them that we are very hungry. Look it up if you don’t know about the Donner Party – kind of a happy ending (for some).

Out of Truckee I picked up Hwy 89, which runs up the Feather River Canyon. This is one of the prettiest drives around and it will take me straight into Lake Almanor 115 miles later.

Here is where Indian Creek joins the Feather River. It is a stunningly beautiful scene and there’s a lucky kid fishing it!

Found a great campground on Lake Almanor. Woman in the office said it was a lake view spot but if I didn’t like it because of the kayaks stacked up, I could move. I think I made the right decision to stay.

Sat out till near 10PM and hardly a mosquito.

Mount Lassen can be seen on the horizon.

Now, don’t expect the reverse angle to be as nice! Very nice family shows up and backs in like they should. Then they decide to have a fire, but instead of in front of their camper, they put it right behind my bus and it took them 30 minutes to get the frickin thing lit – it simply smoked away while they were doing something else.

Woke up on Monday ready to see who or what I might find in Westwood. It’s about 12 miles east of Lake Almanor and after Westwood, Susanville is another 21 miles east. The goal is to find someone in town that lived here when I did.

Not so sure this claim is accurate as I thought Minnesota claimed this fellow. Now, to be fair, Westwood was a lumber town and during its heyday, the mill ran 3 shifts and you shared housing accordingly. The homes were built by the mill and I don’t think ownership was possible.

I lived in the house below in ’71 or ’72 – rent was $75/mo for the whole house. Heated by a wood stove in the kitchen, which you also cooked on. Around that time, a house like this could be had for $2,000 to $4,000.

The house below, Dennis, Anastasia and I lived in before I got booted out after they had a baby. Dennis reminded me a couple weeks ago about the delivery room scene where there were 3 guys (father + 2) and the nurse asked why so many men. I told her we were waiting to find out who it looks like.

So, I’m taking photos around town and all these memories are coming back to me and this woman pulls up and says ‘Nice bus!’. I thank her and see that she might be a gatekeeper to others in this town.

Meet Rhonda! She’s been part of Westwood since 1976 – close enough for a town this size (that actually fits here!). We start chatting and sure enough, she knew some folks I did. Offered to have some coffee with her and chat, but she said that she had a play date with her dog. Fair enough. Then she offered to call Marsha James for me, but got no answer.

Marsha James

Marsha was one of the James girls in Westwood. Anyone coming to town that was ‘Good People’ as we used to call it, would know they needed to stop at the James home. You knew through someone who heard that if you ever go through there, you would have a safe place to land.

I think Marsha is the one in front in blue. The dark haired girl directly behind her is a cousin and don’t know how she got in there! There were 7 James girls – Alyssa and Matt, bet you could have bested this record the way you were going!

Mother James, Connie, but as everyone knew her, Ma James, was a wonderful, caring and freewheeling spirit. Her house was open to all and it was a central headquarters for whatever was going on in the, dare I say it, the hippy community.

Here’s a photo taken by Marsha and it includes two other James girls – Melody (behind Marsha in the photo above and below fellow standing below) and Margaret (Robin), the baby in the photo above and squished below on the right. This would have been 1970 and I was either 18 or 19 at the time, not looking like I just had my Bar Mitzvah!

My goal was to connect with Robin, but to see Marsha is extra nice!

Then all of a sudden, Marsha drives by and Rhonda flags her down. She has me wait back by my bus while she tells Marsha my story (small town protecting one another maybe?) Marsha gets out and she says ‘Gary Hendlin, with the hair?’, and we hug and start to get caught up. Rhonda can now leave for the play date!

We have the nicest time getting the shimmy and lowdown on lots of people. Marsha was my age, and for a while she was the oldest of the James girls living in the house. Older ones would stay, but my memory of them is a little foggy. I knew the three younger ones and Marsha was one that like to keep order as I remember.

In a conversation with Rob the day before, he told me that HepC took a bunch of people from up there. Susanville and Westwood certainly had a bit of pot and acid problems (opportunities?) in the early 70’s, but bad drugs would also come up from the Bay Area or LA with some not so ‘Good People’ and there was an interested audience with a bunch of GI’s coming home from Vietnam and the counterculture folks willing to try most anything. I was no angel, but needles scared me.

Back to Marsha. She and husband Steve raised their family in Westwood and are set there for the long term. One of their sons, Quinn, got his degree in Geology at UC Davis and spends his time mining by hand all around the mountains. Marsha and Steve help and also prepare the finds for sale on eBay. Check out one of their listings for Rainbow Obsidian

https://www.ebay.com/itm/4-RAINBOW-OBSIDIAN-ROUGH-STONES-Combined-Weight-12-lbs-/163699281979

They sell around the world and have given me a few stones to bring home, and they are beautiful!

Here’s a photo of Marsha and Steve. They are a really sweet couple. I am so glad I got to see them.

So now Robin know’s I’m headed her way to see she and Randy, her husband of a billion years or so. They live in Eagleville, next to Cedarville, way up from Susanville. Out of the Sierra Nevada mountain range and I’ll go north along the eastern side of the mountains, in the upper desert.

More shortly!