Bay Area Cat Adventure Club Meetups

In early 2019, Meowmy found out about a local adventure cat meetup through Instagram.  We went to our first “cat hike” with the Bay Area Cat Adventure Club on January 21, 2019.  We met up at Tilden Regional Park in Berkeley at the Vollmer Peak Trail.  I got to meet 5 other cats that like to go on adventures with their humans!  Let’s just say we didn’t all get along, but we all hung out together at this cool tree while our humans bonded. Check out some more of the photos of the group!

For 30 minutes we had no issues.  Dogs on leashes passed us by without problems.  But then came a human with three dogs off leash.  Our humans saw him coming and warned him that there were a bunch of cats hanging out by the tree and he said not to worry, that his dogs are well trained.  I was closest to the trail and Meowmy instantly blocked me from the dogs, but then two of them decided to flank me from both sides.  Meowmy did her best to keep them away, but as you can imagine, I freaked out!  I couldn’t run away because I was on leash, so the whole situation was terrifying.  The dog owner finally grabbed his dogs away and Meowmy had grabbed me as well to calm me down, but I did accidentally claw up her hand real good and she was bleeding.  When the dogs were gone, Meowmy let go of my leash so she could tend to her wounds, at which point I ran up the tree really high and decided to stay there.  Can you blame me?!?

Meowmy coaxed me for an hour to come down, but I was not moving.  She finally called a tree service to come get me out of the tree.  When I saw the man climb up the tree next to me, I decided to come down on my own and Meowmy was so happy when I was finally in her arms.  Let’s just say that dog owners that don’t follow leash laws ruin it for others!

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On June 1, 2019, the Bay Area Cat Adventure Club had another meetup for Give Your Cat The World Week, sponsored by CatExplorer.  This time we all met at Calicraft Brewing Co in Walnut Creek.  We were at a table furthest away from the brewery with a nice grass field next to us, which made it easier for the cats and owners to hang out in peace.  There was a total of 9 cats (including me) and our humans were getting to know one another and all the cats for a few hours.  I chilled in my cat backpack the whole time and got a lot of attention from the humans.  At the end, everyone decided to take a group photo, which was hilarious because the cats were not that excited about the idea.  There are so many photos to check out from that afternoon!

Vanlife App Meetup & Superbloom

As always, my human is very late posting. I’m a cat, so I don’t really understand how time works for humans, plus I spend a lot of time sleeping, as cats do. I hope you bear with me as I catch you up on our 2019 adventures!

In late March, Meowmy took me and my favorite cat sitter Devin to Santa Barbara County on a beautiful stretch of land near New Cuyama for a vanlife meetup. The ride down was a bit nerving due to all the wind, but once we arrived, it was a haven of vans, skoolies, and various other types of vehicles! Everyone was in great spirits, ready to bond with one another and enjoy time together as a community with a variety of events lined up. There was a swap meet, a raffle, a potluck dinner, sunrise meditation, pancake breakfast, and various panels about vanlife, sustainability, and more! Turns out the meetup was The Vanlife App Launch Party, which is a cool new app that vanlife humans can use to find one another, build community, and share tips and places. Every night there was a big bonfire with live music by Moxi & Loon, two vanlifers that met and started a band. Meowmy and Devin kept talking about how good the duo was, but to me all human music sounds weird. There were a lot of dogs around (many not on leash despite the rules), so I stayed in the RV a lot, but we did go for some nice walk into the fields away from chaos.  There was even a white kitty named Cash that hung out in a cage outside a van! I know that Meowmy and Devin had a great time, but I would have preferred a place with less dogs. Why is it that many dog owners don’t feel the need to follow leash laws? Dogs aren’t the only pets that humans have in vans and we should all get equal time outside!

We could see some of the spring wildflower bloom  in the mountains, but heard from the land owners that it was even more spectacular on the other side and that we should take the detour home, which we did.  We drove through the Carrizo Plain National Monument to see all the stunning yellow flowers EVERYWHERE! I got to play in the pretty flowers and do a photoshoot with my brand new Fat Cat Backpack. Let’s just say that I look good with yellow flowers surrounding me! Meowmy said that the superbloom was so incredible, one could see it from space; can you imagine that? On a side note, space sounds so empty and scary but I’m sure the view of our Earth-ball would be cool. The detour turned out to be 4 extra hours of driving with a good stretch of bumpy dirt road, but we also stopped the see the San Andreas fault, which was quite interesting for the humans for some reason.

Meowmy sold the Majestic RV back in May and bought a new Sprinter van which is getting custom built up for us. I can’t wait to see how it turns out!  Meowmy will be posting about the build on her Instagram, so I recommend you follow her if that interests you.

I hope you enjoy our pictures and continue to read about our travels despite my sporadic posting.  It would be great it you followed my blog to get notified when I do post so you don’t miss anything.

SoCal Trip & San Diego Van Meetup

At the end of January, Meowmy and I took a lovely trip down to Southern California for a week.  We headed down Highway 101 towards Santa Barbara, stopping for the night at Arroyo Hondo Vista Point between Gaviota and Goleta.  It’s a perfect overnight spot on the cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean, where we watched a beautiful sunset and met a local van dweller who stays there often.

After a nice stroll down to the beach, we continued South with quick stops in Santa Barbara and Emma Wood State Beach, just North of Ventura.  We saw a lot of beach front RV campgrounds between Carpinteria and Faria Beach too, something to note for future trips.  Then we headed to Aliso Creek Rest Area, a popular overnight stop a few miles after San Onofre State Beach and ten miles North of Oceanside.  Meowmy highly recommends getting there before 8pm because it’s fill up quickly, despite being a fairly large rest area with a lot of parking.  Meowmy took me for a long walk around the big park, I even climbed some trees and made some new human fans that took photos of me.  Due to it’s busy nature, this rest stop can be quite noisy at night with all the traffic coming through, especially the big rig trucks.

The next morning we headed to Fiesta Island for the San Diego Vanlife Connections Meetup.  We were one of the first ones there so we got a nice spot with a view of Mission Bay.  Over 100 vans and RV’s showed up that day for a fun and successful meetup!  Meowmy made a lot of new friends and many people liked our turn-key solution rig.  There were a lot of great van builds to see and the night ended with a bon fire.  A bunch of vanners decided to overnight outside the Fiesta Island gates, but it was pretty busy that night, so we didn’t stay there.  We heard that you could overnight at Ocean Beach Park as it’s only closed from 2-4am but Meowmy thought it looked a bit shady, so we headed to the San Diego Zoo, where we heard you can overnight in the parking lot without any trouble.  What a peaceful place to spend the night!

Our fourth day consisted of driving back North to Westlake Village where Meowmy visited with her best friend from college.  Lisa took us on her pontoon on Westlake Lake and I enjoyed watching all the ducks and birds.  We spent the night in Agoura Hills, then took off to visit Kyna, the lead singer of the band The Go Ahead that Meowmy manages.  They went out bar hopping in the historic Montrose downtown area where some movies have been filmed while I lounged in the RV.

We took off for Grover Beach the next morning to visit JC and Carly who just had a baby, then headed to Paso Robles where Meowmy went cider tasting with her friend Heather and we spent the night watching the amazing Super Blue Moon.  The next morning we headed home.  What a great week!

RV Meetup At Baywinds Park

This past Sunday, Meowmy drove us to Baywinds Park in Foster City for an SF Vanabonds & SF Bay Area RVLife Mobile Chapter Meetup.  From what I understand, this area is well-known for windsurfing and it’s right along the Mariners Point Golf Center.  It was cool to see so many people that live in their vans and truck campers!  There was a few dogs there on leashes, so I mainly stayed in the grassy area and in a bush while Meowmy chatted with everyone.  I got to look inside a few of the vehicles and it was pretty neat to see them all lined up in a row with everyone checking out everyone else’s rig.  We made a lot of new friends, including Dan, a former wrestler from Michigan living in a van, and Anastacia and Trevor, who make awesome grilled cheese sandwiches at Burning Man, plus there was talk about meeting up monthly, which is pretty exciting.

RV Meetup At Oyster Point

On Friday my human took me to Oyster Point in South San Francisco for a small RV meetup. This was my first trip in the Majestic and I was a little scared at first, but I got pretty comfortable on Meowmy’s lap while she drove the RV.  I was a little weary when we arrived, hiding in the corner of the above cab queen-sized bed, but then my Meowmy took me outside and I was really excited once I saw the beautiful view of the bay! At first I was on a leash, which I really hate, so I was limited to the picnic table area where the RV folks were cooking. Then finally Meowmy let me off the leash and I went to explore the rocks along the shore. I had the best time checking all the crevices while seagulls flew around. It was pretty chilly out so the humans went inside the Majestic to eat.  I joined them inside, curling into the soft blanket while listening to the RV talk. It got really dark out but Meowmy took me for another walk on my leash until I started shivering. Meowmy bundled me up in her jacket so I could get warm, where I ended up taking a nap along her midriff as she and the other humans walked along the pier. On our way home we picked up our roommate Lucas from the airport and I got to enjoy the comfort of his lap and petting the rest of the way home. What a great first RV adventure!