We spent majority of the day in the vehicle.  Leaving at 8:30 from Medford, Oregon we drove to an almond farm.  The farm was located in California and we drove along a beautiful highway with mountains.  We learned that in order to use bathrooms in California you have to buy something from that business.  Finally, we arrived in Arbuckle to tour Henderson Farms.  We drove through their almond orchard and to a little pond and camping area, where one of the daughter and her kids prepared lunch for us.  Several members of the group even went out canoeing on their pond.  It was a very pretty area and our hosts served burgers for dinner.  The weather was in the 90’s all day.  After we ate we went to look at all the harvesting equipment used in the almond and walnut industries.  There are several different varieties of almonds that need to be planted in alternating rows in order to cross pollinate to grow the almonds.  The different varieties are all ready to harvest at different times to keep the varieties separate.  Harvesting almonds starts with shaking the trees to get the nuts on the ground so they can ripen.  Next step is to use the windrow blowers and hand rakes to put the almonds in single rows.  They are then picked up using special machines that can fit through the rows of trees.  Then we went and toured the nut processing plant.  The processing plant is a series of shakers and grates that filter the rocks, sticks, dirt and other inert material.  The plant also filters them by size, shape, and weight.  The farm employs roughly 50-100 people.  Several full-time employees and several seasonal employees come from Mexico and are here for 3- 6 months out of the year.  After our tours were done we drove further south to Modesto to stay the night.  We traveled roughly 400 miles today and spent around 6-8 hours in the vehicle today.