Serene Wandering

When I was teaching kindergarten, one of my favorite units was map skills.  One of my favorite books within the unit was Scrambled States of America by Laurie Keller.  The states had grown weary of their geographic places and neighbors and were ready for a change.  Idaho has a prominent role in the story and Nevada and Mississippi fall in love.   I’m not proposing full blown changes like that, but it would be great for us if Boise were in Kansas.

We have had such a great month in Boise and leaving is hard knowing we won’t be back for another six months.  If Boise were a little more centrally located  in the country, we could loop around and visit more often!

Given that Boise is where it is (and not likely to change) we visited our old lives with gusto!   Tops on the list was babysitting grandson Archer almost every chance we could.  We were usually exhausted by the end of the day but it was great to see him grow and change (and become a really good walker) right before our eyes.  I wish I could let you see what a cutie he is, but we are honoring his parents’ wishes of no pictures 😦

So the activities I can show you are….

We got back in town just in time for me to join the Easter Choir at our church.  What a joy it was to be able to be there, sing again, and see our friends, including Jonna and Bridget,  at Cole Community Church.

One day after church we even did our old Sunday pattern of going grocery shopping at Albertson’s, getting my mocha from the usual Starbucks barista and checking out, as always, with Jackie.

We also enjoyed seeing friends morning, noon and night!  We have only one vehicle so our friends often had to pick one of us up so the other could have the truck.  Thank you for the flexibility!   Randy enjoyed golfing and lunches.  I enjoyed visiting my old book club and I fully recommend the book Boys in the Boat. We so appreciate our friends taking us back into their lives after our absence!

We thoroughly enjoyed dinner at the Philps!

We loved our weekend with Kent and Pam Johnson at their cabin in Donnelly.

Part of the reason our month in Boise seemed so fast and furious was that we spent a week of it in Cabo!  We will only go somewhere without Elko when we know he will be loved and cared for in our absence.  Thanks to John and Deb for loving and taking care of him!

We had a really lazy week in Cabo since I was sick when we got there and then, as Randy says, incubated my illness to it’s most extreme form, and gave it to him.  But, as I say, since we’ve been to this resort before, and will likely go again, it wasn’t the end of the world to hang out at the pool, or sit on the balcony and read!

We did venture into town one day to see our “kinda” cousin, Zaida.

Zaida is Rosa’s (Randy’s dad’s wife) niece.  Sounds like a cousin to us!  Zaida manages a restaurant, Soloman’s Landing, in the Cabo Marina.  

Even Guy Ferrari, from the Food Network,  has eaten there.

We had easy flights down to Cabo, even getting benefit of TSA Precheck where screening is minimal and easy!  Coming back was a different story!   Randy got the dreaded SSSS on his boarding pass (who knows why?!) and was searched thoroughly out of Cabo even including swabbing his hands, shoes and backpack.

Thoroughly didn’t even begin to describe what happened in San Diego!  He said it was everything short of a cavity search.  They offered to take him to another room to be patted down everywhere but he declined.  I would have been quite worried if they’d of taken him away!

Once back in Boise we saw a few more friends, spent time with Natasha, Seth and Archer  and prepared to leave.   Last night we prepped the trailer as much as possible and  reviewed details for our new hitch.  It is called an Anderson Hitch and has a towing capacity of 20,000 lbs.  It also weighs only 40 lbs (instead of 200) helping Randy’s back and our truck/trailer weight issue.  As we are driving along, the ride is much smoother than the previous hitch!  So far so good!

Tonight will be spent in Burns, Oregon.  Tomorrow we go to Culver, Oregon to begin our volunteer gig at the Cove Palisades State Park.   We will be there for the month of May.

We are also scheduled to volunteer at Farragut State Park north of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho for the months of July and August.     September will find us at Chief Plenty Coupes State Park near Billings, Montana.  Come see us!

Some day we’ll want to leave the west and explore other parts of the country.  Then we will really wish that Boise was in Kansas!

Last night we had howling winds and the temperature plummeted.  We woke up to 34 degrees and Randy reluctantly put his shorts away.  The ability to wear shorts is Randy’s barometer of whether we are in appropriate weather zones. This morning we bundled up in three layers and gloves and took Elko out for his morning stroll.  We walked down to a large rock area with a placard we had noticed earlier – but had not yet visited. Interestingly enough, we finally got an explanation about Massacre Rocks – which is missing from the park information on the Idaho Parks website and other places I looked.  Maybe political correctness is at work. So, since I had given false information in the previous blog, we thought a correction was appropriate. The large rock on the left is Memorial Rock to commemorate those killed in this area on 3 separate occurrences between the Oregon Trail emigrants and the Shoshone Indians from 1851 to 1862. This posted sign talks about an incident on August 10, 1862 in which nine white men were killed and six wounded.  No mention of the number of Shoshone killed.  It was posted in 1927. And on a cheerier note, these pictures were taken with Randy’s phone camera.  The last month’s picture taking has been a collection of his phone, my phone and our broken camera.   The camera was dropped and the view screen has gradually gone away. The picture quality is better with the camera and our strategy has been to take a jillion pictures and hope some of them were capturing what we wanted it to capture.  It has been the ultimate “blind” point and shoot!   A new camera is on our to-do list in Boise. Signing off for now….

Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, we are on our way home.   We are looking forward to hanging out in our old life for most of the month of April.  We are especially looking forward to seeing Archer, Natasha and Seth and friends we left behind.

We left Arizona behind and had a brief stay in St. George, Utah.  Nothing of note to tell you about except that I drove part way.  For those keeping track, that is the second time!

We  didn’t see any lions and tigers and bears (oh, my!) on our trip but we did see bison!

We saw lots of bison (and even one lone antelope) at Antelope Island State Park.  Antelope Island sits in the Great Salt Lake and is accessed by a 7 mile causeway.   The services are limited in the campgrounds (none!) but the scenery and the animals were very interesting so we were glad to have a short stay.

We learned that using the name buffalo is incorrect for the North American bison.  Buffalo are their distant cousins, the cape buffalo in Africa and the water buffalo in Asia.

The bison herd on Antelope Island began with the introduction of  12 animals in 1893.  There was a huge hunt in 1926 but enough animals survived to re-establish the herd.  Currently the herd is maintained at approximately 550 animals.

I asked about beginning with such a small genetic pool, and was wondering if they brought in other animals to expand the DNA.  I was told that the herd is 99 percent pure and they are actually trying to increase the purity.  Every bison on the island has been genetically identified and there are two males that have a small amount of bovine DNA.  Those two males are not going to be allowed to breed during mating season.

Even though the island is named for the antelope, the bison are the stars.  They are everywhere.  They go where ever they want to go, even right through the campground.

Elko isn’t quite sure what these things are…

He also didn’t know what this funny sand was, and why dad wouldn’t let him go swimming in the lake.

Antelope Island is the largest island in the Great Salt Lake, which is the largest lake west of the Mississippi.  We enjoyed a nice sunset during our evening on Antelope Island.

At the south end of the island is the Fielding Garr Ranch,  currently a ranch museum operated by Utah Parks.   Garr was assigned to establish the ranch to manage the Mormon Church’s tithing herds.  It operated in this capacity from 1848 to the mid 1870’s.  At other times it was operated privately for cattle, bison and sheep.  There is a sheepherders wagon on display.  I like my RV better!

As much as we enjoyed the island, it was time to continue on down the yellow brick (lined) road towards home.  And we made it back to Idaho!

We are staying two nights at Massacre Rocks State Park – one of the few Idaho State parks we haven’t been to before.  As future Idaho camp-hosts, we are even getting to stay here for one night free!

The name came from Oregon Trail days when the narrow gap in the rock formations allowed only one wagon at a time to pass through.  Additional information on the next blog titled Massacre Rocks.

Nearby is Register Rock where emigrants carved their names and dates  as they passed this area.  The rock is now covered and protected and names are still visible.

We attempted disc golf.  They advertise that it is not your momma’s disk golf course, and we believe it.  It is really a hike where you get to rest once in a while to throw, or find a disc.

Elko came along and loved finding our errant throws – mostly mine!  By the time we got to the 14th tee, he was ready for a rest.

Randy had one impressive errant throw!   His blue disc is barely visible in the tree towards the top just left of center.  He had a really bad lie for his next shot!

Tomorrow we have the final stretch back to Boise.  To those of you there, we can’t wait to see you!   We have been blessed to go to some pretty amazing places but, as Dorothy knew,  there’s no place like home.

We were glad to have mom and dad join us for the week and go to three Mariner Spring Training Games.  Their record was 1-1-1.   The  Mariners won over the Oakland A’s, lost to the LA Dodgers and  tied the Chicago White Sox.  (Sox tied it in the bottom of the 9th and the game just ended…?)

There were quite a few scouts in the stands!

Two of the days were quite warm (90+) and we worried about Elko left back in the trailer. He had  both air conditioners going,  two 12 volt fans as back up, and we had confirmed that the park power was very stable – but it was still a relief to get back and see that he was fine.  Randy is researching monitoring systems so that we can be alerted if temperatures rise in the trailer while we are gone.

The heat did have an effect on our refrigerator.  It was not cooling well so I took out  fruits and  veggies to allow for better air flow and Randy and my dad worked on adjusting external fans.   All was well after modifications.  While they worked, mom and I enjoyed a canoe ride on Lake Pleasant.

Lake Pleasant Regional Park is about 20 miles north of Phoenix and has a nice desert landscape with the bonus of a dam inspired lake.  Our campsite was right on the lake and Elko enjoyed getting his legs and tummy wet several times each day.

Yet, it will not go down as one of our favorite parks.  There are swarms of some kind of gnat like insect every morning and evening.  It was impossible to keep them out of the trailer.  It became a nightly ritual to attract them to one or two lights and then vacuum them up.

Also the clientele was a little rougher than the snowbirds we have become use to.  Those playing loud music into the night and gun shooting campers aren’t our preferred mates.  We did, however,  meet a few nice people, including neighbors on one side who had come to AZ for Texas Rangers Spring Training and  the neighbors on the other side spending their very first night in their new motorhome.  They needed some help and Randy was glad to comply.

On our last afternoon we were treated to an air show!  We couldn’t figure out whether it was part of an actual show, or just practice, but it was still fun to watch the formations and the pretend dog fights.

We have spent the last week at the Escapees Escapade in Tucson. Although, we enjoyed our experience at the Good Sam Rally a couple weeks ago, we prefer this one in so many ways.

Escapees is an RV Club that supports the RV lifestyle. In addition to the national Escapade, it has a mail service, monthly magazine, and RV parks. The club monitors and impacts legislation effecting full time RVers and sponsors CARE, an RV community where people needing assistance can live in their RV while recovering, or aging.

We were able to meet one of the founders, Kay Peterson, now 88.

The week started with Boot Camp, which is RV101 and so much more. Even though we have owned an RV for 11 years, we still learned a lot. There were 3 days of classroom instruction and demonstrations. One day I assisted Mac the Fire Guy with a demonstration – although it was a set up because my fire extinguisher didn’t work.

We have already made several modifications based on things we learned in the classes.  We also learned about  the importance of weight and distribution on the axles. We had our truck and trailer “Smart Weighed” and found that we are in good shape regarding axles and right up at the limit for both truck weight and truck pulling weight.  We’ll be shedding a few more things just to be safe.

We learned that there are 1.5 million people out here living full time in their RVs including quite a few solo women. They were well represented here at the Boot Camp and Escapade.

Escapees is trying to branch out and give support to a growing population of younger full timers who are working and supporting themselves on the road.  Escapees is calling them Xcapers.   We met Cheri and Chris, one of the couples  leading that effort. Randy has utilized information from their mobile internet business, Technomadia, so he enjoyed meeting them.

Once the regular Escapade began, the place really filled up, and we had seminars, entertainment and activities – including daily line dancing 🙂 There was a vendor tent and an area to get information about some of the varied regional and interest groups under the Escapees umbrella.

Escapees are also friendly and social.  We enjoyed making new friends and having happy hours and meals with others.  We spent time with  couples from Oregon, New York, Pennsylvania (not pictured) and a solo from Atlanta. We also had two dogs in our group, Bear and Elko.

Elko enjoyed being able to go to Happy Hour!

Even Elko was more social this week!  He doesn’t usually care about going into dog parks and hanging out with the other dogs.  For some reason he loved this dog park and led us there whether it was our intention to take him or not.

We are tentatively planning to go to the 2016 Escapade in Vermont.  We see the next Escapade as a good prompt to go east and explore another part of the country.

Today we headed north of Phoenix to Lake Pleasant Regional Park.  We have a desert and lake view!  My parents are on their way to Arizona to meet us and take in a few Mariner’s Spring Training games.  More on that next time!

We recently stayed at Voyager RV Park, voted several times as the best in the nation for mega parks  – think huge!  There are multiple levels of camping and living accommodations, a hotel, a country club/golf course,  a full restaurant and bar and a Wednesday night concert series.  There are studios for wood working, stained glass, and ceramics  and services for dog grooming, massage and hairstyling.  There are classes for everything in the world including the two that most interested me, ukulele and line dancing.  And, this is a very incomplete list.  The place was amazing – and we did exactly none of it!!

Although we would like to return to Voyager and experience some of what they had to offer, we chose to spend our time with family.

We were able to spend an entire day with Rosa, Randy’s dad’s wife in his later years.  We have been happy to stay in contact with Rosa since Carl’s death in 2010, and were looking forward to getting together with her.  We were so glad our brief stay, corresponded with one of her days off!

We went on an in-depth tour of the main station of the Tucson Police Department.  Our nephew, Tim, is a veteran patrol, under-cover and detective police officer.  He works nights so we were able to see a lot.  It was a really interesting tour, made more special that our guide was our “little Tim.”

We were also able to spend a nice evening with Randy’s brother Mike and our sister-in-law, Sylvia.   We went to Pinnacle Peak Steak House, an event restaurant that Randy’s family has frequented since the mid 1970’s.  

We are so glad it worked out that we were able to spend time with our Tucson family!

We also saw a couple area attractions, including Saguaro National Park.

We have seen a LOT of saguaro cactus over the last month, but this one was the biggest mess we’ve seen!

We also saw some saguaro skeletons.

And of course, just some pretty desert landscapes.

We also visited the Titan II Missile Museum.

There were 54  Titan II Missiles designed as retaliatory, or deterrent weapons during the Cold War.  There were 18 each near Little Rock Arkansas, Wichita Kansas and Tucson Arizona.  All sites were eventually dismantled except this one near Tucson.  This one was left as a museum and is operated by volunteers, some of whom were stationed here as missile crew while they were in the Air Force.

Of course, this warhead has been removed, but while active this 9 megaton missile could have been deployed in 58 seconds, travel 6000 miles at 16,000 mph, in 30-35 minutes, and destroy 900 square miles.  There was no recall or self destruct mechanism.

The one hour tour was quite interesting, especially the control room where the launch sequence would be executed.

Some things we learned were that military operations always operate on Greenwich Mean Time so there is no confusion with time zones.

Also, those who would launch the missiles would be told Target 1, 2 or 3.  They did not, and by report still don’t, know the specific targets.

For you engineer types, there is a 5 hour tour where you actually get to visit each level of the missile silo.   You may also enjoy these more detailed placards – everyone else is excused until the next post!

We are at the Good Sam Rally (sponsored by Camping World) being held at Phoenix International Raceway. One of the activities was to try and break the world record (currently 1087 couples) for people getting “re-hitched.”  The counting and cross checking marriage license copies has not yet been completed so we don’t know, yet, if we are world record holders.

They had prizes for the best costumes (Elizabethan), newest married (6 days) and longest married (65 years!). There were several couples that had been married 60+ years! We are young’uns in this crowd at 55 and 56 and 34 years married!

Another activity here is Match-N-Win. In our registration packets we were assigned a 4 digit number. Four people in the rally (about 6000 people) have the same number. I connected with one of my other three people in the first 15 minutes – and then never found another.

People go all out to try to connect with one of their match people and that part has been pretty amusing. If you match up, you get a T-Shirt and then are entered for the grand prize drawings. There were about 2000 of us in the winners tent and they gave out over $20,000 worth of prizes – but not to me.

My “prize” of the trip was our new Splendide Washer Dryer combo. Randy had it set up to be installed the day we came onto the grounds.

Randy is smiling while the technician drills a hole in our trailer, but I’m not sure he really felt like smiling. Maybe he was just glad he wasn’t doing it. We haven’t been able to try it out since we don’t have water or sewer hookups here at the race track. They have brought in some monster generators to supply power and that has worked well.

Other activities at the rally include the vendor tent and viewing lots of trailers and motor homes for sale. If you were interested in buying you got to test drive around the track – with restrictions.

Although we didn’t spend a lot of time looking, we are glad to say we didn’t find a fifth wheel we liked better than the one we own.  Regarding motorhomes, I told Randy I liked the one for $279,000 much better than the one for $449,000 – on sale!  Many motorhomes are really over the top!

Most activities were held in the infield pit area but we did get  to walk three times around the NASCAR track itself while completing the 5K “Steps for Vets” fundraiser.

Other than getting up at 5:30 on Sunday morning, it was a blast. We walked with Cliff (a full-timer from New York that we met at our last campground and reconnected with here) and a couple from the Mississippi Gulf Coast. They lost 2 houses in Katrina which was an interesting conversation and then we found out he worked for the division of NASA that investigates accidents. We talked about the Columbia and Challenger accidents, something we still remember well.

After the 5K, Randy went to a seminar on Facebook and I went to a church service in one of the big tents. The pastor spoke on The Good Samaritan parable, as that is the backbone philosophy of the Good Sam Club – travelers helping others. During the singing I heard a beautiful descant and wonderful harmonies behind me. When I complimented the singer after the service, I found that they are also from Boise.  What a coincidence!

The grounds near the race track are huge! There are about 2800 RVs here this weekend and we barely make a dent in the stands or the parking areas.  Randy and I were guessing that the rigs here are 85% motorhomes, representing hundreds of millions of dollars. The NASCAR race in Phoenix is in 2 weeks and people are already starting to show up in the outer parking areas. There is even a huge Safeway Tent that revs up as a regular grocery store during the race weeks.

There has been entertainment. One night we enjoyed a Beatles tribute band and they were quite good. The Beatles were really most popular the decade before Randy and I got big into music, but of course, over the years, most Beatles’ songs have become familiar. The grandstands were rocking with the 60 – 80’s set really enjoying the music. It was fun to see all the cell phones waving with the music instead of the lighters. Cliff, mentioned above, had a great APP from Zippo on his phone and quite a few people downloaded it right away to be a little more authentic.

Another night the entertainment was a Neil Diamond based act – thinking of you Cindy Berg!

There have also been seminars – some very good and some just okay. One of our favorites was by a Rand McNally developer about GPS devices. If you have been reading for a while, you know that our GPS devices have sent us astray numerous times and have been quite aggravating. I was hoping to learn a few things to help (I did)  but it was really the history of GPS navigation that was the most interesting to me:

In 1985, a device (costing $2500 at Macy’s) would track your location, in San Francisco only, on a black screen with green lights
1990 – The first in-vehicle system was installed.
1997 – Datus system was developed, Cost was $2500 and $199 per city card.
2000 – GPS became more available for non-military uses.
2003 – Magellan Roadmate sold for $1300, the first full US navigation system.
2004 – Four companies were involved with mapping and GPS devices.
2007 – 247 companies were involved with mapping and GPS devices.
2014 – Back down to the core companies.

The  suggestion I will try to incorporate is to use “points of interest” already defined in the system whenever possible. Those have latitudes and longitudes already specified. If you enter an address (which is what we did most of the time) the location is extrapolated and accuracy is reduced for a variety of reasons.

Hopefully we won’t be led astray this afternoon. We are headed to one of Randy’s favorite places – Tucson!  We are looking forward to seeing some family and enjoying familiar places.

We have been staying at a 55+ snowbird park in Casa Grande, Arizona – Foothills West.  We first heard about this park from Darrell and Dona, camp hosts at Lake Cascade, an Idaho state park.   They told us we should come visit this park when we came south and they were right.  We have had a fun week meeting lots of people – most are here escaping Minnesota and Wisconsin winters – who come back year after year.  Darrell and Dona split their time between Cascade and Casa Grande.

Snowbirds seem to have a great time!  We could see that my cousin, Audrey, really enjoys her time at a snowbird park in Yuma.    Her park is much larger and has tons of activities.  This one is much smaller, about 180 sites, and has some activities, but it seems like the relationships are primary.   And, kindly, they have also been welcoming to us – and we are noticeable – as there are only 4 “transient” sites in the park.

One of the people we met, Ron,  invited us to go to Cowboy Church.  We almost always enjoy going to church, but this was a uniquely outstanding experience.  The band had two guitars, a bass guitar, a fiddle, a keyboard, drums and an accordion.  When they started singing “Ghost Riders in the Sky” we thought it was interesting, but that was just to make sure the melody was familiar.  Soon we were singing Amazing Grace to the tune of Ghost Riders In the Sky.

The pastor had a very good message that he delivered from behind this unique pulpit!

We also saw the Cowboy interpretation of the 10 commandments!

We visited the signature landmark in the area, The Casa Grande Ruins.

This site was discovered in 1694 by Spanish missionaries who named it Casa Grande, the Great House.   It was four stories tall and 60 feet long.

Openings corresponded with the summer solstice and other moon positions.  Wooden supports for the ceilings and floors came from 60 miles away.

Centuries of weather and neglect have taken a toll on the Great House. In 1892 it became our country’s first archeological reserve. The current roof has been in place since 1932. Additional steps are also being taken to preserve as much of the remaining building as possible.

A resident owl keeps watch!

The ancient peoples in this area (1100-1450) established hundreds of miles of irrigation ditches from the Gila and Salt Rivers and were able to live here year round. They had secure enough lives that they were able to spend time and effort beyond subsistence. They made pottery and jewelry for trading.  They also had a ball court (scooped oval area) similar to those used by the Aztecs.

We also visited the Caywood Cotton Farm, again entering a world we knew nothing about!   Prices have been down for cotton in recent years, (they blame a glut of Chinese cotton) and with reduced water due to the drought, it is definitely a balancing act to decide what to grow.   This small family farm is staying afloat by growing more alfalfa and less cotton (and dad is also a fireman).

We learned some interesting things about growing cotton.   It is state law that they use genetically enhanced seed to reduce the risk of insect infestation.   We have been in so many areas that are resisting GMOs that this was interesting to us.  They are also required to turn under their plants after harvest, again to reduce the risk of infestation.

Inside the cotton boll, the fibers grow and eventually split open and the cotton bursts out.

This immature boll was broken open to show the developing cotton.

There are two types of cotton grown in Arizona, upland and pima.   Pima is generally stronger, but most grow upland.  It was unclear why the area has moved more toward growing upland cotton.  They require separate gins, which seem to be run as cooperatives.

The term “fair to middling” has its roots in growing cotton.   Fair cotton is the best quality, middling is good, and low is ordinary.   How interesting that the term “fair to middling” generally means “not good, not bad”  when that isn’t what the cotton equivalent means at all.

Once processed, a bale of cotton weighs about 480 pounds.  A typical bale will make 325 pairs of jeans or 3000 diapers.

Beyond the cotton itself, the seed is also important.  It produces an oil that was the primary oil used for cooking until the 1940s.  Crisco (crystallized cottonseed oil) was one of the first products made using cotton seed oil.

The current uses for cotton seeds are very broad.   Just to name a very few…  kernels are used for fertilizer, feed, refined oils, soaps, cosmetics and insecticides.  The hulls are used in bran, rubbers and plastics.  The linters are used in food casings, dynamite, rocket propellant and currency.

Again, a world we knew nothing about!  We are delighted to be able to learn something new almost every day.

This may be the first time I’ve written a second blog post from the same campground – but two weeks is the longest we’ve stayed anywhere in the trailer (other than Boise).  We are still in northern Arizona and have spent some time on the landmark road, Route 66.

We enjoyed trying to make our way around Northern Arizona University. It has changed so much since we were a lumberjack and lumberjill from 1977 – 1981. We were able to find our old classroom buildings and our old dorms, but our first apartment in married housing didn’t look familiar. They have either remodeled or re-numbered the building since we lived there.

We visited the Riordan Mansion State Historical Park which surprised us by being right off campus.  We never knew it was there! When we were students at NAU some family members still lived there and it was not yet a historical park.

Two Riordan brothers married sisters and were part of the Flagstaff upper crust.  The families lived in a mansion that was two mirror image houses connected by an entertainment cabin in the middle.  It was designed by the same architect that designed the El Tovar Lodge on the south rim of the Grand Canyon.

We enjoyed spending time with college friends Connie and Nick.  Connie and I were dorm resident advisors together.  They are two of the few people from NAU that we are still in contact with 34 years later.

We enjoyed lunch at a Route 66 landmark restaurant, Miz Zip’s.  Arizona Highways magazine said it was famous for pies, and the pie was certainly good, but it was the bleu cheese dressing that was outstanding! They make it in-house and the owner shared the ingredients she uses – I just have to figure out how to modify it down as I don’t need a gallon at a time.

The Blazin’ M Ranch in Cottonwood was a great place for a cowboy show and dinner.

Yes, it is touristy, and cheesy – but also a real good time!

Another day we explored the Tuzigoot National Monument.  This is yet another site of dwellings occupied between 1100 and 1300. These ruins were unearthed in 1934 and are very exposed on the top of a hill. Unlike other ruins in the area, the park service is very actively trying to fortify the walls to maintain them.

We traveled a short distance to Jerome, Arizona. It is an old mining town, with a colorful past, that once boasted 15,000 people.  It is now an occupied “ghost town” with hotels, bed and breakfasts, restaurants etc.  Notice the J for Jerome on the mountain above and then on the picture below to orient yourself.

This 3D exhibit shows the town above ground and the very extensive mining underneath. The town was actually sliding down the mountain  bit by bit due to blasting.  Extensive mining stopped in 1954 and the town has been more stable since. I hope it isn’t on a fault line for earthquakes.  It seems like the mountain  would collapse like a house of cards.

There was so much copper pulled out of this area that, for 2 years, Arizona actually issued copper license plates.

While in Jerome we ate lunch in the building that held the oldest restaurant in Arizona – established in 1898.  The English Kitchen operated continuously from 1898 to 2007.  It also had an opium den in the basement, but no worries – the last remnants of the opium den were removed in the 1980s!  In 2011,  a BBQ restaurant moved into the historic space.

In Camp Verde, we went to Fort Verde Historical Park. It was built to protect area settlers during the Indian Wars. On the day we were there,  groups were doing reenactments. A physicians “assistant” showed us period medical tools and told us that during the civil war 87% of injured soldiers died from their wounds. In World War II that number was reduced to 4%. During Vietnam, 1% of injured soldiers died from their wounds.  Quite an improvement!

There were also Buffalo Soldier re-enactors. The name Buffalo Soldiers was coined by the Indians who saw men with dark skin and curly hair that fought as fiercely as a wounded buffalo. The Buffalo Soldiers were generally former slaves, who fought for the north, and remained in the army. By all accounts, the Buffalo Soldiers performed very well.   They surveyed and built a lot of the roads during western expansion. Buffalo soldiers also had responsibility for trying to guard and protect the early national parks. That was a difficult task because those who always had access to the lands objected to negro soldiers telling them they couldn’t hunt and graze on the lands as before.  That was years before the park service was established.

Other quick hits from our stay –

For the first time on the road, I ordered a Bountiful Baskets share. I did this frequently in Boise but had gotten out of the habit. I find that produce in these small towns is often very limited, marginal quality, and expensive so I was delighted with a produce haul.

Also for the first time, we ran into a couple at this park that we had camped next to in a previous campground.  Remember the “creepy place”?   They were the best thing about that campground!  People say that happens all the time in this lifestyle, but this was our first, very cool, experience.

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Randy had another engineering project – adding a component to our new truck radio so that the steering wheel controls would work again. I came out, took the picture, and went back in – too many wires and possibilities for it to never work again.  When he put it back together, the controls and the radio worked!

We sold the troublesome washer/dryer combo that just didn’t dry well enough anymore to keep me happy. We gave full disclosure about its shortcomings to the buyers but they thought it would be better than not having one at all. We have an appointment next week to get the Italian vented model installed and good riddance to the ventless one made in China.

We are experiencing another mail snafu – aargh! The mail was suppose to be sent on Saturday so we would get it on Tuesday or Wednesday – before we would leave on  Thursday.  When it didn’t come on Tuesday we called and they hadn’t sent it until that day.   Supposedly it should be here Thursday morning – the day we are scheduled to leave.   The UPS Store probably does a very good job at what its primary business is, but isn’t doing a good job at mail forwarding!  We’ll be looking for alternatives.

Next stop – Casa Grande – hopefully tomorrow…

Update:  No mail so  staying another night….Randy had a heart to heart with the UPS store manager.   Hopefully things will improve.