Month: February 2022

Mt. Lemon and Quartzsite

No, they aren’t anywhere near each other, but I realized I didn’t post about our trip up the mountain to Mt. Lemon outside of Tucson. Nice ride with a variety of scenery and environments.

The road leaves town and quickly heads to an incredible saguaro forest.

Saguaro Forest on Mt. Lemon road

It then climbs through some interesting rocks.

View of the road
Lots of hoodoos
Had to zoom for this. Sorry for the fuzzy.
Lots and lots of hoodoos

Eventually we leave the desert for true mountain surroundings.

Vegetation changing
We reached snowline

It was a nice trip, well worth the 2 hours or so.

We moved to the Hi Jolly BLM area north of Quartzsite. We haven’t ever stayed here before. It is free camping for up to 14 days, but no access to water, dump station, or trash. It was much more crowded than the LTVA areas we stayed in before, and I am not overly fond of it. We did meet another Tiffin owner who came by to chat. Nice guy, and he had Kevin hit it off. He was quite excited by some of Kevin’s updates, especially the new printed door handle. Kevin also showed him the DC to DC charge system he has on the alternator. He was kind enough to take us on a side by side UTV ride to a couple of historic areas to the northwest of us.

The first place was called “Lead Well”, a not too auspicious name! It was an established watering spot for the pack trains from the local mines in the early 1900s, before the railways.

Old watering trough
Lead Well

We also visited a marble mine. It only closed a few years back, so it was in good shape with soolid fences, interior roads, and the office still standing.

Office at marble mine
Surroundings
Interesting window above the office

I have been careful to keep up with some of the local activities in town. We went to a Peter, Paul, and Mary tribute band concert at the Quartzsite Improvement Association. Not bad at all. I was surprised at the song selection. Here we are in heavy conservative grumpy old men Trump country, and they sang a lot of quite subversive Bob Dylan pieces. Interesting dynamics, and I quite enjoyed it.

“Mary” even had the right wig on!

Today we hunkered down most of the day with a heavy wind. Gusts were 40-50mph, and they really rocked the MH. We ended up pulling in the big living room slide because of the noise it made. There is a metal cover over the LR awning, and when the wind catches it right, it makes an awful racket. We also made a trip into Parker for groceries, and saw the wind storm just getting started. I only had my iPhone, but I think you get the idea.

Dust blowing as the front comes in

Toorrow we pack up and head somewhere towards Death Valley. We haven’t decided whether we will sleep there tomorrow night or whether we stop in a FHU campground along the way. It will depend on the wind and how early we get out. I am waiting for an Amazon package delivery that will be delivered tomorrow in Parker, so we will decide after we see how late it comes.

Death Valley has extremely limited cellular data, so I don’t know if I will post anything until we come out Monday or Tuesday. We are heading for the Dark Sky event they are putting on, and Kevin has the telescope and camera ready!

A trip to Tucson and back to Quartzsite

Kevin’s package did come in, and he is now ready to practice some astrophotography. It is a bit complicated due to the full moon tonight though! The High Chaparral RV park was definitely not the place to do it either, so he will be trying it in Quartzsite soon.

On our way to Tucson, we took a stop at the Pinal Airport, one of the big airplane graveyards. You can’t get right up to the planes, but you can get pretty close.

Small jets are obviously not in demand
There were lots and lots of these decommissioned American Airlines affiliate jets
Obviously the airport was a WW II facility with this tower
“Reduce, reuse, recycle” comes to mind seeing this fuselage repurposed into a shop
Some of the salvage has gone farther than others

While Kevin was impatiently waiting for his tracking board he was also keeping busy making a cool doohickey for the MH. Our model has a very inconvenient screen door latch. It is set quite low so I can’t reach it without going up (from the outside) or down (from the inside) a couple of steps. Awkward with lots of stuff in your hands. So he made a new latch that is higher but connects to the original. Ignore the dirt on the door – we had a windstorm!

The new latch applied to the door

Detail of how it fits on the door
How it is used
Spring loaded depressing the original latch

I am quite impressed! It works marvelously.

Yesterday we left Casa Grande to go back to Quartzsite for a week. We had made another Amazon order, setting the pickup for Parker, AZ. There was a dreadful windstorm forecast, so we left at 9:00, arriving at Hi Jolly BLM area at 1:00, just as the wind gusts were getting fierce. We basically just stayed put inside until the wind died down in the early evening. Then we opened the windows and let the cats enjoy the light breeze that remained. We haven’t ever stayed here before, since we normally stay in one of the Long Term Visitor Areas (LTVAs) that charge $40/2 weeks but provide access to water and a dump station. Since we are basically just marking time until we can get into Death Valley, we didn’t need that this time.

In general our boondocking setup is working great. We use a lot of electricity with a residential refrigerator, satellite TV system, and heater fan, but an hour of generator and the solar recharge it pretty well most days. Our fresh water (90 gallons) and waste tanks (50 gallons black, 70 gallons gray) can easily accommodate a full week. We hope to leave here on Monday, but we might need to stay until Tuesday for yet another Amazon delivery.

Yuma and Casa Grande

We left Quartzsite on Thursday, 3 February for Sun Ridge RV park in Yuma. There was a really bad wind storm on Wednesday, so we delayed while most of our friends left on Tuesday to get out in front of the storm. We always love the Quartzsite area after most people leave; it is wonderfully quiet and empty after the crowds of the previous week. One other couple stayed at our rally spot, and we all went to the Quartzsite Yacht Club for dinner. We had ribeyes that were remarkably good, and Paul joined us. Ann had fish and chips, and she said it was quite good too. Two or three days later, the Yacht Club owner abruptly closed the restaurant. The pains of running a seasonal restaurant and bar during a pandemic just made her too tired to continue. She said the final straw was a very poor review. Be kind folks!

The RV park was where we had three sets of friends stay, so it came well recommended. It was not really set up for short timers, with lots of Palo Verde trees far too close to the road. We definitely got some rub marks, but nothing more serious. The sites are roomy, but are all 100% gravel with a small concrete patio. There was a quilting group, but I didn’t know about it in time to attend. The folks were really nice, but they had a rule they didn’t put on their website – no personal washing machines! Since one of the main things we wanted to do was laundry, this was quite disappointing. One of our friends recommended a “Don’t ask, don’t tell” approach since we were only there a week, and that’s what we did. I really, really prefer using my own washer and dryer, though there’s looked fine.

One Monday we did the main task we came for – heading to Algodones for discounted glasses. It was remarkably easy, and we ordered fancy progressive glasses with frames, mine with heavy tint and polarizing. Sadly they don’t make those in their own lab, so it will be three weeks before we can pick them up.

One of the main streets in Algodones. Medical tourism is the thing here

The process was easy: pay $6 for parking in an Indian-owned lot, walk right into Mexico after a cursory look in my purse, look for glass frames we liked, see the eye doctor, order, and pay with a credit card. Kevin also picked up some anti-inflammatories at the pharmacy next door. We wandered around a while, and I did end up with a new purse! It is a knock-off I am sure, but it is just the size I have been looking for. Getting back into the US was more effort than leaving. We had to wait in a line (of course) for 40 minutes, showed our passports to the agent, and then walked back to the car. I highly recommend going as early as you can because the lines are much shorter.

I wish I had a better picture of this little boy playing his accordion for tips while we waited for Border Control to let us back into the US.

Walkway back to the US with plantings and an accordionist

We also did some of our standard Yuma things like shopping (both of us bought shoes) and lunch at Yuma Thai (I recommend the green curry!). I also went to Bingo for the first time at the RV park. It was fun! Now I know the basics, and I may play at other RV parks since it is a common activity at the 55+ parks common in snowbird country.

I also came down with some type of gastritis with a fever, headache, and just a generally unhappy belly. Being in the times we are in, I took a COVID test twice, 24 hours apart, both negative. The fever and headache finally went away yesterday, but the belly discomfort is still there. Hopefully that resolves soon.

I did finish my donation quilt top which was good. It is hard to do a good pressing job in the limited space I have, but I finally got everything lying fairly flat. I will show a picture when I get it quilted.

After Yuma, we decided to go to Casa Grande and High Chaparral RV Park. I wasn’t nearly as impressed with this one – smaller sites and no landscaping. They have a gorgeous laundry room though, and they have a nice pool and club room. They also could only take us for 5 nights, but that long enough. Kevin has ordered a new control board for the auto star tracking on his tripod, and it is scheduled to arrive in Tucson tomorrow.  We didn’t really want to stay in Tucson due to the crowds from the Gem Show, and I had been interested in the Casa Grande area for a future longer stay. It has gotten quite warm (low 80s), so having nice electricity and AC is pleasant. We will probably be heading back to dispersed boondocking, so I will use it while I can!

Big Tent show is over and we can relax

We are still in Quartzsite until tomorrow morning. We have reservations for a full-hookup RV park in Yuma where we have friends staying. Laundry will be first on the list!

Back to what we did in the last week. We did take a nice day trip to Lake Havasu City. Kevin had finally ordered a telescope and some accessories, and the only place we could find for Amazon to deliver it was LHC. Odd but true, due to the size of the package. He got excited, and when the app showed the package was out for delivery, we headed up. LHC is about an hour and a half north of Quartzsite, and we wanted to get dinner and do some sightseeing too, so we thought the timing would work. It didn’t, and the package didn’t get delivered until around 8:00 pm after we left! We did enjoy the trip though.

We saw this Osprey take off from the LHC airport! He flew right over us.
Sand dunes on the north end of the lake
The small community of Havasu Lake across the Colorado
Lake Havasu City from a peninsula into the lake
Another view
Looking kind of north-ish across the lake.

We also went looking for boondocking opportunities in the area. We had stayed before in Craggy Wash, a BLM dispersed camping spot, so we went there first. Way too crowded for me, and the spots suitable for bigger rigs were mostly taken. The rocks are cool though!

Pointy craggy
More rounded craggy

There were some promising sites closer to I-40 that we might use some other time. The advantage of these sites is that there is good cellular internet service, a big plus in my book.

Poor Kevin had to return for the telescope on another day, but we enjoyed the trip back to Quartzsite. These were taken from an overlook along the Colorado River north of Parker.

And the telescope did finally show up, though Kevin took another trip to get it. It works well, but a control board in his tracking system is having issues. He can do some pictures, but it requires more manual work than he wants to do. You can see how close we are parked to our friends in the fifth wheel. Just for the rally, we all parked 30’ or so apart, awfully close for dispersed camping. The sites allows for much wider distances most of the time.

The new toy

Speaking of cellular data, the reason I haven’t updated is because there has hardly been any until yesterday! When the hundred thousand or so people show up for the big RV show, service goes to hell. You can generally make calls and text, but internet access becomes almost nonexistent. Now that the show is over and the masses are gone, I have good service. I even streamed some television tonight. Our nearest neighbors, rally friends who also stayed put, are about 100’ away, just about the right distance LOL! I don’t like being right next to even friends if I can help it. One of the major advantages of dispersed camping is you can space yourself out.

Most of the folks left Monday or Tuesday morning ahead of the bad wind storm we had today. It had gusts of 50+ mph and sustained winds of 30 mph for a long time. We just hunkered down and brought in some of the slides. It wasn’t that they were in real danger, but the slide toppers were making a big racket! Before the storm we had some visitors nearby. Quail are my favorite desert bird.

There were actually 7 in the bunch

Another picture before the storm.

Moonrise

We also have a Gila Woodpecker making busy in a nearby saguaro, but I never did get a good picture of it.

I visited the Quartzsite Quilt Guild a couple of times on this trip. Nice group of women, and I got a lot done in their free-sewing time. I sewed 10 new microwave bowl cozies to use as presents, and I finished all the rows of my triangle donation quilt. The plan had been to finish it today, but there was t room with the slides in. In fact, my sewing table is turned upside down on the bed right now! I can get the top finished next week for sure. Oh, and I forgot to mention that I did Dutch Oven dishes for the rally potluck – layered green chili chicken enchiladas and peach cobbler. The cobbler was such a hit I made an apple version on Monday evening, but still no leftovers. Sigh. It all went over well though, and there wasn’t much scraping needed to clean the pots!