Month: January 2022

Quartzsite, visit #7

We arrived at our campsite in Quartzsite, AZ after a 4 hour drive from Organ Pipe. We stay with a group of friends from an online forum, RVForum.net. As our seventh trip here with them, we don’t go running around as much as we did the first few years. There is a lot more just relaxing, talking by the fire, and doing hobbies. I have the sewing machine out, and I am trying to work on a Drunkard’s Path quilt made with 4” blocks. I am finding it much, much harder than the 7” block version I did a few months back! I also go my sewing machine adjusted so the needle bar was exactly in the hole of the needle plate, but the tiny adjustment has thrown off some of my measurements. I will get used to it, but it is a bit of a struggle. I did cut a bunch of triangles, and I sewed those without a problem. It is always nice to have “mindless sewing” available, something I can just enjoy instead of fussing around.

Kevin discovered why our generator wasn’t charging the new LiFePO4 batteries very quickly. Turns out there was a switch that limited it to 30 amps, and once that was updated we started getting 90 amps charging. That makes the entire process so much faster. We have had quite a few cloudy days here, and the solar just can’t keep up between the clouds, low sun angle, and shorter days. Our 900 watts of panels are flat mounted, and they don’t get more than 300 watts some of the time, and mostly less than that this time of year. That only gets us 18-20 amps from the solar.

Kevin put up our weather station, and I just love knowing the outside temp and humidity. We will eventually get the wind sensor working, but right now the mounting pole moves in the bracket. Kevin is 3D printing a clamp for it now. Hopefully that will correct the pole rotation.

I don’t have many pictures right now, but here is the last picture from Organ Pipe showing the motorhome and our campsite.

Note the generator access panel open on the front. We heard rumors of pack rats, so we kept all the hoods open to discourage them.

I also have a beautiful sunset picture from Quartzsite.

This shows not only the pretty colors, but also how people spread out here in the BLM area. We are in the southwestern Long Term Visitor Area (LTVA) at La Posa Tyson Wash. It is the least crowded of the four LTVAs, being about 3 miles from town. It is still an easy bike ride though, and I prefer the space. Kevin went to town twice, searching for bolts and a new sunscreen for the awning since he somehow managed to crush the zipper pull on the old one. I am staying at the camper, away from the crowds. He is good about wearing a KN95 mask, so he is as safe as a triple vaxed person can be.

Organ Pipe part 2

The sunrise this morning was spectacular!

Sunrise from the campsite

Today we took another scenic drive, the Puerto Bueno road. It is labeled as needing high clearance, but I think most passenger cars could do it. Certainly a basic SUV could manage it. I didn’t take as many pictures as yesterday of the plants, because I did so many yesterday, but I still got some nice shots to remind me of the area. Might as well get to it!

The front plant is a teddy bear cholla while the back on is a chain cholla.
The organ pipes live right on the rocks
Top and bottom of hill is solidified slow moving magma called “ryolite.” Middle is “tuff” or solidified ash
We found one cholla blooming
Close up of bloom
Bonita Well was a popular way stop in years past
Corrals at Bonita Well
Pretty much the perfect saguaro at Bonita Well
Surveillance equipment for the border

This is the first time I had see “The Wall” in person. It is just as ugly and intrusive as I had heard. I know we need to keep people from crossing illegally into the most inhospitable part of Arizona (they DIE!), but having a big area literally plowed clear in a National Monument seems wrong.

Note the person-sized gates on this section.

Climbing over the hills

After we finished the road, we headed to the historic town of Ajo for some ice cream. The town originally was a company town founded to support a huge open pit copper mine, the New Cornelia, now closed. Some of the by-products of the original mine are still being sold for other purposes.

The dry containment ponds from Ajo copper mine. They stretch much longer than my camera could photograph
The mine overlook

The town itself has a very pretty historic district including this lovely town square. Surprisingly the town still looks pretty prosperous in contrast with other mining towns after a closure.

The historic square of Ajo

We are packing up today to head to Quartzsite tomorrow. Going to camp in the desert with friends for a while. It will probably be difficult to post due to data issues with the hundreds of thousands of people who show up for the winter, but we will get to some other towns off and on.

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, part 1

Warning: picture heavy!

We left Willcox to head to Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. Like Joshua Tree, Organ Pipe was protected specifically for one type of cacti. Organ Pipes grow mostly in Mexico, but the almost all of the US ones are protected in the monument. As we drove into the Sonoran Desert, I noted again just how lush this desert is compared to the Mohave or the Great Basin deserts I am more familiar with. We drove through some lovely mountainous country and reached the campground about 3:00. While I had reserved a nice long site, we had the devil of a time getting into it. The entry road is only one lane and the pad was only one lane, but my motorhome take 2 1/2 – 3 lanes to turn right! We ended up going to the other side of the pull through site and backing in. The resulting location is wonderful though with decent screening by native plants all around us. We have saguaro, organ pipes, mesquite, teddy bear cholla, and brittle bush just outside the door.

Organ pipe at the edge of our campsite. I didn’t it it, but someone did.

We generally just got set up and relaxed. We had shopped in Willcox, so Kevin made smash burgers on the Blackstone grill for dinner. Yum.

Today we drove a wonderful interpretive nature trail – the Ajo Mountain Loop. It is just over 20 miles, and we took a leisurely 3 hours, stopping a lot for pictures and to read the information about each numbered stop. I am just going to drop lots and lots of pictures with captions.

There were windows/arches. These two had a trail to them.
This little window was more hidden
You know I love rocks, this is Ajo Mountain
Baby organ pipes use other plants to protect them
Baby saguaros also nestle in other plants for protection
This shows all the spikes on a mature organ pipe
There are other plants. These yellow flowers are blooming next to a brittle bush
A dead saguaro showing the substructure
A dead cholla showing its structure. Interesting shapes!

There were a few birds out and about.

The nest of a cactus wren
Some kind of hawk
Another hawk
A small bird that visited the campsite. Great camouflage!

We got gas at Lukeville, 5 miles away right on the Mexican border. The gas station was actually closer to Mexico than the entry to the border crossing! We had fajitas made on the Blackstone, and generally just relaxed until we’ll after the sun went down. Tomorrow is another scenic drive, so I hope to post more pictures then. We head to Quartzsite the day after.

Monahan Sandhills, Deming, and Willcox areas

After we left Abilene, we decided to head to Monahans Sandhills State Park in Texas. It was just an overnight, but it was a relaxing stop. We got there in plenty of time to sit outside in the warm temps. The campsites are pullouts on the side of the road, and ours was listed as 40’. However it was plenty long enough for both the 40’ motorhome and the Jeep. Even better, it was deep enough that I didn’t worry about someone hitting the slide outs, something g that has worried me about other pullout spots! Here is a bit of a sample.

And the sunset was gorgeous!

We next drove the short trip to Willcox, AZ. We stayed at Lifestyle RV Resort. It wasn’t bad with level sites, but I wouldn’t call it a resort even with an indoor hot tub. The sites were crowded on a gravel parking lot. The good thing was it was relatively inexpensive, level, and all the utilities worked just fine. We managed to get all our laundry done, some shopping accomplished, and we enjoyed a few short trips.

Chiriacahua National Monument was our primary place to visit. It is a pretty small place with only one scenic drive, but it was lovely. The rock columns are the draw here, and readers should know by now I like rocks!

Columns were all along the road
Rocks are definitely the draw
My favorite view
This green lichen was on one side of a lot of the rocks
Columns were all along the road

We saw lots of interesting birds including hummingbirds (no pictures), Mexican Jays, and another one I don’t recognize. We also caught a glimpse of some type of weasel, but I didn’t see enough to identify it.

Mexican jays were abundant
Here’s looking at you kid
Wish I knew what this robin-sized bird is

The day after Chiricahua we went to Cochise Stronghold in the Coronado National Forest. Cochise and his band were able to hold out here for long enough to convince the US to let him stay after making the area an Apache reservation. More rocks!

This shows a part of homestead that is now available for rent through the NFS.
There are a number of inholdings in the area

Wilcox also has a nice apple business where Kevin bought a great apple crumble pie. Nice supper treat.

We leave tomorrow for Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. I expect poor or no service, so it will probably be a few days before another post.

On the road again

I said last time I have been in a blogging funk, so nothing has been written. I have been slowly recovering from my shoulder surgery, but it has been slow. I think the soreness is one of the reasons I haven’t been doing as much. We have been doing a few things though! We had Thanksgiving dinner with three of our kids and all six of the grandkids, something that hasn’t happened before! We went a bit non-traditional with a smoked turkey and sous vide sirloin. It was a much more relaxing approach, and I think I will repeat it in the future. We also had Christmas with all four kids, spouses, a girlfriend, and five of the grandkids. Even nicer was the meal was mostly made by my oldest son and his wife, both great cooks. It is time to start transferring host duties.

I have also been in a quilting funk. I have only finished one quilt for my daughter. I was lucky to get time with each of the older two granddaughters, 12, to do some sewing. They each got to pick out fabric for a pillowcase, and then they sewed it by themselves. They were appropriately pretty proud of themselves.

We couldn’t leave right after Christmas because I needed to get a laser treatment on my eye. Nothing critical, just clearing out some film behind the cataract lens. Then we had snow and ice, so we didn’t leave until 30 December. We made it only to Lakeside Casino Campground in Osceola, IA to get the rig dewinterized and filled up with water. The campground has definitely had better days, but it is open all year and in a convenient location for getting things set for the trip.

Bad weather was dogging us, so instead of the two days we planned on to Oklahoma City, we pushed through the 500+ miles in one day. We decided we would much rather be stuck two or three days there rather than somewhere along the road. Good thing because we made it just before very cold weather with sleet and ice! And guess what else we found wrong with the rig? The thermostatically controlled outlet for the wet bay stopped working, and we didn’t have good luck with temps going to mid single digits. Kevin tried some other options like an incandescent trouble light and a heating pad, but we had frozen water by the morning of 2 January. Sigh. I looked at Kevin and said “I want to go south!” So we did. We chose to leave OKC and headed to Abilene, TX. By noon we had water again, and by 3:00 or so we were set up at the KOA. Nice place. While we aren’t far off I-20, I don’t hear the traffic.

We decided to stay 2 nights in Abilene to throughly warm ourselves up. Today we went to the Frontier Texas Museum, and it was fabulous! It has multi-media interpretive displays showing the viewpoints and experiences of the natives and the Anglos. Lots of fascinating immersive exhibits, and I highly, highly recommend it. I also got a bunch of equilateral triangles cut with my Accuquilt for use as what I call “mindless sewing”, an easy way to sew while traveling. I also have a 4” Drunkard’s Path die along with a bunch of fat quarters of fabric to cut. I will use the scraps from that to make more triangles later. The DP definitely isn’t mindless, but I do really like the design. Hopefully I can get two lap quilts done by the time we get to the FMCA rally at the end of the March. They always collect quilts for a local charity in the area of the rally.

Tomorrow we are heading farther down the road, but only 200 miles so we stop ahead of some heavy winds. I promise to post more!