Since Steve had both Monday and Tuesday off we decided that we could make the drive up north to visit with my grandparents at my Great Aunt Mandy's place in Fort Jones, CA. That's about 15 miles west of Yreka in northern California near the Oregon border. We were warned that there was snow so we took my car. (Steve's car has 3 season tires.) Luckily it was just a wee bit overcast driving the mountains near Mt. Shasta and snow was only on the sides of the road a little bit. It was cold!!! We had a great time. My grandparents treated us to a banana split at the soda fountain at the old pharmacy in Etna, a near by town. The safe door shown above is for the gold nuggets vault that was installed sometime in the 1880s.
Here's grandma at the soda fountain. Near the window is a display of little red boxes. They were filled with sheet music for the player piano - it still works and the pharmacy owner played it for us.
Steve and grandpa were engrossed in pictures of our travels as well as Steve's racing adventures. When not talking about that, they started in on airplanes. Both of them are pilots and love flying. I love that they get along so well!
I asked grandpa to make his famous polenta for dinner. He's dishing it out for my Great Aunt Mandy to put on the spaghetti sauce and parmesan cheese. Both of them were born in Italy. My grandpa was 15 when they arrived in the states. I'm not sure how much younger Mandy is, but you can definitely tell that they're siblings. Lots of little snapping back and forth, with lots of jesting too. All in all it was a very nice visit.
