As we set off from Taft with the donkeys nodding us goodbye we noticed just of the Highway a rather unusual one made of wood. We pulled over and were amazed to find this piece of USA history abandoned.
If anyone reading this are wondering what we are talking about then 'nodding donkeys' is the name for the old fashioned way of extracting oil. It is in essence a beam engine that sucks the oil up from the ground. The more modern ones have a head that was said to resemble the head of a donkey. I could have spent the whole day photographing it.
Once tanked up with petrol we headed of North East via Bakersville up the Greenhorn Mountain Pass, following the Kern River, very narrow at times with sheer rock and overhangs, that had to be avoided toward the Sequoia. We stopped at Lake Isabella and tried our luck fishing for trout, without success. Perhaps we weren't doing it in the right spirit as we parked the RV 2 metres from the lake side and sat inside waiting for a bite. (See Photographs) (See Map)
