Prado Regional Park, Chino, CA

We continued our trek south, on hwy. 15 through Cajon Pass. This is a very familiar route, as when we lived in SoCal we drove this frequently to get to our place out in the Mojave Desert. 'Good thing we weren't too concerned with taking photos. The relatively clear desert air suddenly looked like a fog bank, except it wasn't fog - it's the world famous Southern California smog. Now I remember...... that's one of the reasons we moved away from here 30 years ago!

We're stopping briefly at Prado Regional Park. It's a huge park, with everything from golf and hiking trails to a shooting range and banquet facilities, and it has a nice little lake right in the middle.
We had originally planned to arrive a day earlier but were preempted by a Boy Scout Jamboree. The park staff estimated there were over 9,000 attendees at the event - that gives you an idea as to how big the facility is.

The RV camp sites are really nice though at $30 they're a bit more than we usually like to pay. Pull-through style, full services with paved seating areas so even if it was rainy there wouldn't be a problem with mud, they are definitely a step above most parks of this type. There's a small laundry facility attached to the meeting room nearby, which is a bonus as most campgrounds don't offer that. The lake attracts a variety of birds and other wildlife, and there's a trail surrounding it, which makes for a nice leisurely walk. Just past our campsite is a ground squirrel village and Molly has had a great time sniffing every hole and attempting to ignore their shrill scolding every time we pass by their neighborhood.

We spent most of the day on Wednesday shopping for groceries and other necessities and catching upon chores. This park is well situated, (with the help of Google maps) to shop for just about anything you need. We took stock of the neighborhoods we drove through, noting many of the dairy farms (those few that haven't already been built over by housing tracts) look rather "long in the tooth". When we lived in the area dairy farms were always tidy and really well maintained. Looking at the building going on, housing tracts as well as commercial centers (though with repos as extensive as they are we can't figure out why they are still building), we came to the conclusion most farm owners are just waiting for the right price to come along, and don't plan on the farm existing for much longer.

It's been an interesting stop. Though we used to live only a few miles away we never knew this park was here. And the changes to the area are interesting as well. For a few more shots of the campground check the album.

We'll be moving on to a more rustic location in Orange County to meet up with some friends. It remains to be seen what the changes have been in that area since we were last there, about 30 years ago.