Day 5 - Bakersfield

10:30 am to 1:15 pm

15.4 miles

River Run RV Park

Well, our perception of Bakersfield has undergone a dramatic change.  We’ve only been here twice but all we’ve seen is sand, industrial buildings and materials, oil drills – very beige.  Today we decided to do some grocery shopping and find a BevMo for Norm’s special tonic.  We went into neighborhoods that were beautiful – green grass, trees, flowers, wide streets.  We had no idea that these neighborhoods existed here.  We found a large park beside the Kern River and had our lunch there as well as a walk along the river.

The pond at The Park at River Walk

The Park at River Walk

Bridge across the Kern River

Kern River

Don’t know for sure if we will get rain here now.  The winds have whipped up quite a bit but so far the rain has held off.  Oh well, it was nice to have a nothing to do day.  We're now settled in for the afternoon and evening but did manage a short walk along the river which is beside the campground, although not much water here.

Our campsite - the Kern River is the other side of the fence

A pretty dry Kern River behind the campground

We were talking yesterday about a campground we remembered that had a creek running behind our site and how lovely it was.  I remembered doing a Skype call from there with John & Diane and Norm remembered sitting under the awning as it rained.  I discovered the name of the campground going through a blog in May 2016.  Turns out that campground is 76 miles from here so we may just check it out tomorrow.