Scott Valley, Part 1

Next, as I mentioned last time, we moved to Scott Valley. We camped along Sugar Creek for about a month on BLM land. That was interesting. I mean, you know, anything can be interesting with the right attitude. It was here that Cocoa was almost lost. When we were finally moving into Monte's house in Greenview, I walked up and down the creek and along the road calling his name. It seemed like forever but was probably only 20 to 30 minutes. Finally I heard him and he came running. Still makes me sad because living in Greenview was not good for him. We also had Tanna and Nita at the time and for some reason, they were fine. I'm not sure why or how things worked out the way they did.

 

Here we have the  bustling metropolis of Greenview. It had a population of 201 in 2010.

More up close and personal. The house is in the middle. There is a garage of sorts right beside it. In the back is a barn where we had goats, chickens and turkeys. Between that and the fence for the yard we had a garden. It was here that Laura was born and we experienced cattle drives on Main Street. It was also while living in this house that Alisha was taken from me and put in the protective custody of her father. I guess enough time has gone by that my blood doesn't boil when I think about it. That's a good thing. It was also in this house that something happened to Cocoa. Tanna and Nita were fine. I don't know if it is just that they spent more time in the house or that they didn't fight or what but something terrible happened to Cocoa. He disappeared one day and didn't come back. Then one day, a cat that looked like him but was blind in one eye, was missing part of an ear, and no longer trusted me showed up. He would eat the food that I left out and he would look in my direction when I called his name and talked to him, but he didn't trust me and never let me touch him again. That memory is still painful.

From Greenview we moved to Nasus Ranch. You can see the light colored field just about in the center of the picture portion of the image.

You can see it better here. We would walk from the house, which is just to the bottom left of that field, to Kidder Creek, which is the snaky line in the middle of the right side of the picture to explore.

It looks like the shed that was up on the hill behind the house is gone. The house is the building more or less in the center. We had a garden on the hill in front of the shed and the goats and chickens lived in the shed. The goats had a pen behind and to the north of it and the chickens had a run to the south. While living here, Dan's ex-wife, Lyn, died and his daughter, Sydney came to live with us. Alisha would come for visitation and those days that my mom, sisters, Grandma and Papa all came were the best.

Our next move was up Duzel Creek. As you can see, very much in the mountains.

Although there are valleys, too. Or gulches.

We lived in the cabin in the center. What was that like? Crazy. Little tiny cabin with no real bedroom. There was a loft that had been mostly closed off and a little alcove around the corner from the living area. It was an A-frame cabin that was meant to be part of a dude ranch, what else can I say? It is a nice area, and I wouldn't mind living there again, but I would have to have a much larger house.

And that is that. We lived in Greenview for a little more than a year and at Nasus Ranch for maybe six months. I'm honestly not entirely sure why we moved from there up Duzel Creek other than Dan knew the guy who owned the cabins and had lived there before. We didn't last there for too long because it was so small and George was a nice guy but not really a good landlord.

I'm thinking about how long we were up Duzel Creek and I don't really remember. It wasn't long. I don't even remember if we were up there during a winter or not. We were at Nasus Ranch. For certain I can tell you that Laura was born in Greenview and then we moved to Nasus Ranch which is where Sydney came to live with us. Then, before Laura was 18 months old, we were up Duzel Creek. By the time we were making trips to Mt. Shasta to see Andrea, we were in Etna. So, I guess we could have been up Duzel Creek for a winter but we must have left in the spring because we had a garden in Etna.

So, another short period of time (about two and a half years) and too much moving (three houses). Next up is the second half of our time in Scott Valley.