After Hamilton, MO we drove to northeastern Oklahoma and Copan Lake, a relatively small Corps of Engineers lake just at the OK/KS border. Site was fairly unlevel but lovely.
Copan Lake at sunset. Lots of trees in the water.
I set up the sewing machine since we would be here a few days. This is my current setup. I got a bunch of appliqué done, but it was so slow!
My sewing setup at Copan
I also experimented with our newish Air Fryer from Gourma. I took a “just add water” muffin mix and added some gorgeous blueberries. I reduced the recommended temp by 25 degrees and the time by 15%. It worked!
Muffins made in the Air Fryer
We found this grumpy snapper trying to cross the road. He was big; his shell was close to 12” long.
Moved this very irritated snapping turtle across the road
We were primarily here to visit some places neither of us had been to since we were kids. The first spot was Woolaroc Animal Preserve and Museum near Bartlesville, OK. It was the retreat of Frank Phillips of Phillips Oil Company (Phillips 66 fame). There is a LOT of old oil money in this part of the state, and they spent lavishly. Frank decided he wanted a large ranch with exotic animals, space for his friends to come out and play cowboy, and to show off the early American artifacts he had. As you enter the attraction (now owned by a foundation), you drive through a series of large animal pens.
Water Buffalo in Oklahoma?Not worried about us at allLake at WoolarocDecorative waterfallLichen encrusted rocksEastern Oklahoma is known as “Green Country” for a reason. The small building is the Phillips family mausoleum.
This year they had a fur trader’s encampment set up with two re-enactors. We are close to the Arkansas River, and fur traders travelled up the river to the mountains.
The older re-enactor was voluble and knowledgeable. He even let Kevin fire his muzzle loader! Kevin didn’t hit the target, but he did get close!
Kevin firing a flintlock rifle.
We finally got to the museum. The entry is definitely old school “Noble Savage” style, and much of the interpretation inside is similar. The artifacts make up for it though!
The entry to the museumSo so many items in a small spaceA tiny piece of the outstanding pottery collection at WoolarocHand made birchbark canoe made by an Ojibway woman in Minnesota. They didn’t think she was worthy of identifying by name 🙁
My normally very sore back let me walk through the entire thing, though I didn’t get to dawdle much. All the physical therapy I have been doing seems to be (finally!) working.
Not everything was old. There is a scale model of an oil field and a lot of equipment. The airplane was one of many built by small companies in the heyday of early aircraft. The company that built it no longer exists.
Some modern items too
A few miscellaneous things to note:
The restaurant is just a concession stand in these COVID times, but the BBQ bison burger was pretty good. We at dinner at a local diner, the Cohan Restaurant which just happens to be the only one in the very small town. Mediocre, but edible.
Next post will be about the Gilcrease Museum, another incredible place we visited on this trip.
We had the motorhome on the road Tuesday morning by 9:00 am. Yup, we were anxious to be traveling again! We had packed, vacuumed, and brought the slides in on Monday, so all we had to do was finish picking up the house a bit and packing toiletries. Oh, and there was a stop to pick up a McMuffin and a McGriddle. Luna responded ok to the traveling, finally coming out after a few hours on the road, but Minnie wasn’t seen until we parked.
We stayed two nights at Country Charm RV Park in Hamilton, MO. It is a pretty place but the interior roads were a bit tight with the Jeep hooked on. I did like the view though! We were on the outside loop, and summer is well underway here.
The view from my chair outside the motorhome
Hamilton is the home to Missouri Star Quilt Company, a sort of Mecca for quilters. They own a large number of shops in the small town, each one with a different style of fabric. For example, one shop was full of only batiks, while another was filled seasonal fabrics. I ended up buying some novelty fabric that will become a gift for someone when I get back.
The town also has a number of murals.
As you can see, it is also the boyhood home of J. C. Penny. We didn’t stop by the little museum that the house is now though. You can just barely see it through the trees.
Hidden by trees is the J. C. Penny home
It turns out that Sisters on the Fly, a women-only fishing group that has small vintage trailers, was having a gathering in town. They allow tours of their cute rigs occasionally, but we didn’t stay around for one. I am guessing they were the ones who planted a flock of flamingos on the grass nearby.
We also went to an Amish grocery in Jamesport, MO. They had all the wonderful bulk food items I usually get in Kalona, IA. We ate lunch at The Country Cupboard in Jamesport. Nice chicken friend steak! I think only southerners are really good at making this, and I certainly can’t fry anything well. We then came back to the campground, relaxed, and enjoyed the absolutely gorgeous weather – high of 75, puffy clouds, no wind, moderate humidity.
I also cooked some strawberry muffins using the bake setting on my Gourma brand Air Fryer. Tomorrow we head to northern Oklahoma. They were wonderful! I lowered the temperature 25 degrees and decreased the time by about 15% since the air fryer is basically just a small convection oven. I have an oven in the motorhome, but it takes a long time (and lots of power) to heat and cook. The air fryer should be very useful for baking when we aren’t connected to electricity.
Oh, and a bonus video of Minnie discovering another cat in the mirror. Watch the photobomb at the end.
My husband is an engineer in his soul, and he discovered 3D printing during COVID. I have been meaning to show the goodies he has printed for the motorhome. He has printed even more for the house, but those are more standard. These are almost all unique and built from custom computer aided design models he created. He uses FreeCAD now, but he previously used TinkerCAD. Note he uses PETG fiber for the items in the motorhomes. During storage on a hot day the more common PLA deforms from heat. He started with an Ender 3 printer, but he also has GEEETech 3 color printer.
Starting from the front of the motorhome, driver side.
On the driver’s side one of the first things he made was a holder for my phone and a pen. Then he added the eye glass holder. Recently he added an on/off switch and holder for the USB items around the dash such as the dash cam and the driver GPS. He added the screw holes to match the purchased switch. Note the passenger does the real navigation in our rig so the driver GPS is just for situational awareness and is an older model.
Combo phone and pen holder next to a switch to turn off USB devices. An eyeglass holder has my reading glasses in it.
Here is the charger and some cord wraps. Note everything is custom sized to fit the commercial hardware. All the items stay put by sliding a small attached “blade” between the wall and the dash.
Holder for USB and miscellaneous chargersA better view of the two cord wraps
A cup holder with straight sides replaced the ridiculously short one that came with our Tiffin. We like straight instead of shaped cup holders because they fit more of our travel mugs.
Cup holder with straight sides
Moving to the passenger side, the first item made was, again, a phone holder. Then he added a sunglasses holder and a chapstick/floss holder.
Holder for passenger phone, glasses, and lip balm
This gives a top view of the GPS holder on the passenger side. It is based on a commercial screw on base. Note it sits in the window groove for stability.
Holder for passenger GPS (Garmin 890)
The TPMS has its own holder of course. It also sits in the window groove.
Holds TPMS control head
Our rig has a small drawer that is pretty useless by itself. Kevin printed this little insert to hold a travel mug, his wallet, a couple of checkbooks, and some miscellaneous documents.
Insert for small cockpit drawer to hold cup and papers
We have now moved out of the cockpit and to the living quarters. Kevin’s watch was always getting bumped off the charger by the cat, so he made a little holder to keep it more stable.
Holds watch for charging
i love Janet Sadlack’ss RV microwave/convection cookbooks, but they are small and we’re always getting misplaced. Here is a spot for those plus a few other small cookbooks. It is glued to a holder for a power distribution center.
Holder for small cookbooks and USB outlet
The wall here is rather cool in cold weather, so I wanted a quilted wall hanging to block some of the cold. I had quilted this wonderful Stonehenge Fabrics panel a few years back, and I think it fits well. While the wood is attached with screws to the backside of the cabinet, the quilt is mounted on a rod made removable with the printed black end cap.
Holds wall quilt to keep cold out
Here is the end cap close up. The quilt holder rod is made removable by the screw.
End of the quilt holder
Moving more to the kitchen is this magnetic cover to go over the ridiculously bright microwave control panel. It was the test item on Kevin’s 3 color printer when he bought it.
Cover for microwave control panel
I am generally happy with my utensil caddy, but there wasn’t much room for tall items like the spatula. Kevin printed the side car and glued it to the purchased caddy.
An add-on for my utensil caddy to support tall items
There is only one item in the bathroom, a small holder for the translucent box. The holder has clips that slide on the purchased soap dish attached with command adhesive strips. You can also see the wonderful soap my friend makes at Wild Waters Soapery in Salt Lake City.
Holder in bathroom
Back to the bedroom. The electronic control panel made by Spyder is distracting in the night, so Kevin made a cover that slips over it at night.
Cover for Spyder panel in bedroom
Remember I mentioned earlier the cat knocks things off? It happens in the bedroom too, so Kevin made a holder for his phone charger that positions the phone for contact charging.
Holds iPhone securely on charger
While we don’t watch the bedroom TV often, we needed a way to control the controls. This holds the one for the Dish and the TV itself.
Holds bedroom controls
I think that is everything! He’s been busy, and the Ender 3 printer is ready to go with us on our trips. It lives in the cabinets underneath the table in the kitchen area while traveling. When in use it sits on the bathroom dresser.
We finally went camping again! On Wednesday we went to a local park that is a whopping 7 miles away – Big Woods County Park. It is a lovely place with long sites. Most are wide, but they have two rows of “buddy sites” where if you pull in correctly you will face the folks next door. Luckily we found a site that backed up on the bike route and lake. We were hoping to dewinterize the motorhome, but the water wasn’t going to be turned on u til Thursday. Whoops! We stayed at home for the night and went back on Thursday to dewinterize. We got everything set up except the water softener which we forgot at home.
We were doing this to have the three oldest grandchildren out – twin girls, 11, and a boy, 7. We picked them up at lunch after a soccer game on Saturday, ate some take out pizza, then went to the camper. It was much colder than the forecast had shown when we set it up, so I felt bad we couldn’t do the bike riding we wanted to do. A windchill of low 40s just didn’t appeal to me. We left the kittens at home, thinking an introduction to both the motorhome and three children would be a bit much! We did have a lot of fun even in the cold temps. There was a nice playground, a sand spot at the edge of the lake to build sand castles, and a nice fire pit. We made layered green chili chicken enchiladas in a Dutch oven and campfire biscuits on Saturday night. Sunday morning had monkey bread in the motorhome oven along with eggs and fruit. They said they wanted to do it again, so I call that a success!
We picked up the kittens after we dropped off the kids, and they adjusted faster than I expected. Luna was thrilled we could open up the screen door. Don’t worry; behind the grill is a screen!
I didn’t get a picture of Minnie because she was either running around like crazy or hiding out, her two favorite things to do.
The weather was so absolutely gorgeous while we were packing up on Monday that we decided to stay an extra day. We road our bikes around the lake and some of the nearby trails, soaked up sun, and generally had a wonderful start to the camping season.
See how pretty our “backyards was?
Once we finally got packed up, we decided to drive to Cedar Rapids to get the motorhome washed. It hasn’t had a bath since July, and it was in dire need! We just don’t have a place to wash it ourselves, so we went to a newer truck wash, AFCS Truck Wash. Astonishingly no one was in line in front of us! They did a good job, and it was well worth the $75 it cost. As we drove out, there were 2 motorhomes and a semi truck in line behind us, so we really were lucky.
Next trip might be Mother’s Day, or it might be a warmer weather overnight with grandkids at a different campground. Time will tell. We take off for the summer right after Memorial Day – YEAH!
Warning – this has a lot of time and variety in it!
To catch up on Death Valley and surroundings, we stayed at Sunset until the morning of 20 February. Since the cellular data service ixps extremely limited there, we were pleased to make full use of the monthly WiFi pass at the resort. $60 gives you 30 days of high speed Internet on up to two devices! I tried to get some pictures from Kevin’s fancy camera of the Funeral Mountains to the east of us, but I wasn’t terribly successful. The mountains are made up of rocks so old and confused they are called “Funeral Chaos”. Twisted, faulted, squeezed, faulted again – they show amazing patterns. I just couldn’t get a good picture though, so I guess I will try again next time.
Searching for phone service and a place to hunker down to care for Lily, we ended up at the Needles KOA. We have stayed there a few times before. The sites are big enough, and there is a resident group of quail that I find adorable. I tried to get a picture of the 20 or so who ran across the road as we were checking in, but they were too fast for me. You can hear them clicking away in the mornings if no one has taken their dogs out yet.
As I said in the previous post, we headed back to Iowa as soon as we knew about Lily’s condition. We stayed at Lavaland RV Park in Grants, NM the first night after we left Needles KOA, Tuesday 23 February. They had a nice brewery that concentrated on porters and stouts, my favorites. Sadly their kitchen was closed, but we did order some pizza delivered to the brewery. Nice to eat pizza and beer inside an almost empty place. Our next stop was Big Texan RV Park in Amarillo. It is a mile or so away from the famously advertised restaurant, but it was an easy in and out spot. We made it to the Wellington KOA on Thursday, much nicer than the dreadful place we stayed heading to Arizona in December. We then headed to the Lakeside Casino RV Park in Osceola, IA for our last night. It isn’t very suitable for big rigs since the turns are tight and the sites pretty short, but we found a spot we could fit into. It wasn’t the one the check in folks had us in initially, but with only 5-6 other rigs we had our choice. It is close enough to home to make it a good spot to winterize the rig, and thanks what we did on Saturday morning before heading out. We are pretty good at it these days, and it too, less than an hour. The ice maker is always the hardest!
We had gotten COVID vaccination appointments on Sunday, 28 February, and we had our follow up vaccination yesterday (Pfizer). I am anxiously awaiting my 2 week time for feeling comfortable again! We are having two of the kids and their families over for Easter (another son heads to his cabin every Easter), and I am soooooo wanting to hug them all!
Kevin’s big job this time was installing new LiFePO4 batteries. He chose three 200 amp hour LifeBlue batteries with their integrated heater. Lithium’s don’t charge below 35 degrees or so, and we stay in those temps too often to not get the more expensive heater version. He needed a new solar controller, and luckily this one has Bluetooth so it is much easier to see what is happening. They see to work fine, and I am anxious to try them out on a real trip, not just sitting outside the storage unit. Our solar system will be able to punch more power into the batteries because it won’t be throttled by the lead acid charging curve.
We have been doing work on the house too. We bought a pergola to go on our very hot west side deck. It has a nice adjustable shade cover that will help with keeping the house cooler too. We even bought a propane fire pit to put under it!
Plenty of room for twoIgnore the straps scattered around
i also finished the three quilt tops I sewed while we were out. I got them quilted pretty quickly, but I procrastinated on the binding because it is the task I like least. I got them into the wash yesterday though.
The first two were made from a layer cake I bought on sale. I love the water lilies and dragonfly theme.
Bound and backed with a green Grunge fabricBound and backed with a light turquoise fabric with yellow dots
This one was way outside my comfort zone! I just don’t “do” scrappy well. It will make a fun ”I Spy” quilt for some child though.
Mostly mask left overs – very scrappy!
Enough for now. More going on at home, but I will leave that for later.
After a long convalescence from my horrific attack of sinusitis, I am almost well again. It took prednisone and lots of OTC meds plus lots of sleep, a humidifier, and personal steamer, but I am probably as well as I ever will be in this climate. I love the desert, but the dust is a major irritant to me, so something bad happens most years we are out here. I put up,with it because I love this place so much. We spend at least a week in DV every year, and most years 2-3 weeks, so we have visited pretty much all the standard tourist spots. It is hard to come up with pictures I haven’t posted before, but I think I have a couple of unique ones this time!
A fearsome Jawa in Golden CanyonNeed to keep your distance from a Storm Trooper!
Yup, Kevin found a father and son doing cosplay in Golden Canyon, site of some memorable scenes from the Star Wars movies. Isn’t the little Jawa adorable? He was more than willing to put on his mask for a picture of his fierce side.
It just isn’t DV without Artists Palette, is it?
ColorsAnd layers
And then there are just more layers, this time close to our campsite.
It is really hard to grasp just how vast the landscapes are out here unless I throw a few people in the pictures for scale.
There is a guided horseback ride from the Furnace Creek stables every morning. They are headed down from Texas Spring hereBadwater Salt Flats are awesome and huge
We are camped at the far eastern edge of Sunset campground. You can’t beat $7/night (senior pass rate) looking east. The sun warms us early, and the bulk of the motorhome shields out “porch” on the hot afternoons. We also have a nice view of the Oasis at Furnace Creek Inn, a very upscale resort. I keep saying I will get lunch here some day (dinner requires dressier clothes than I prefer), but I haven’t done it yet. The winter sun and temperatures in the 70s in the day make just hanging around an awful nice idea.
We left Quartzsite on Sunday to drive the short way to Needles, KOA. It is a nice enough park, and a good spot to use for laundry and tank cleaning. However we didn’t do either! I was feeling truly horrid with massive sinusitis, something I am sadly too familiar with. Fever, chills, massive drainage, cough – uggh. In these times, we looked to find a drive-through COVID test site, just because, and we found a rapid test one in Las Vegas. So off to Las a Vegas we went! It is not really out of the way to Death Valley, and we go through it quite a bit. I got the test sample submitted, and we headed to Pahrump, NV, our traditional rinse waste tanks, fill fresh tank, check up on propane and fuel spot. We reserved 3 nights at Preferred RV Resort which is, not surprisingly, not a resort at all but filled with working folks and long term snowbirds. Not bad for the price, but not as nice as Lakeside. But we are just hanging here quarantining until I got my test results Tuesday (negative, as expected). My lovely ENT back home sent me a prescription for a prednisone 6 day dose pack, and I am feeling much better (but not well) here on the morning of day 4.
The drive to Vegas and then to Pahrump was awfully pretty with snow on the mountains. Sadly the pictures I asked Kevin to take out the window of the motorhome didn’t work for some reason. Highway 160 from Vegas is an interesting road crossing the mountains on a deceptively steep and very long grade. Luckily the 9% doesn’t last very long, but there are miles of 5-6%. This is where I end up appreciating the diesel, its exhaust brake, and the Allison transmission that does a lot of the hard work for me.
Kevin and I may not like the RV park over much, but Lily thought it was wonderful! There are pine trees on either side of us with doves in residence cooing. She has been enthralled.
There is a bird on the other side of the window.
We leave this morning for Sunset Campground in Death Valley. I know there won’t be enough cell data service to post, but I will buy WiFi access at the resort occasionally. The weather for forecast to be spectacular (highs in the upper 60s to upper 70s), and the weather at home is abysmal (lows well into negative numbers for 10 days) so we aren’t in any hurry to leave.
It rained like crazy here on Monday, so we decided to go to Phoenix to do some shopping. Wow, did it rain! And snow! And sleet! There were quite a few cars in the ditches, and I pulled off the road for about 15 minutes to let the sleet/snow pass me by. We have had light rain a few times since too, but a good desert dweller never complains about rain. It has given me time to get some other things done. For example, I made an Instant Pot cheesecake using the famous “Cheesecake #17” you can find online. As usual, it came out great.
Instant pot “Cheesecake #17”
I also finished the third tumbler baby/lap quilt. The first picture is the teal/aqua one I did before that I didn’t take a picture of, and the second is with a dark blue contrast fabric. The patterned blocks came from a wonderful layer cake (10” squares) I bought on sale a while back. There are deep flowers, dragonflies in lots of colors, and some blenders, all with shimmery gold highlights. Sadly the gold doesn’t show very well, but it is much prettier in person. I have bought backing and 505 spray to sandwich at least two of the quilt tops I made on this trip, and I will start quilting them soon.
Teal background tumblerDark blue background tumbler
On Thursday we went to the Cibola National Wildlife Refuge, driving on the dirt roads in the Yuma Proving Grounds to get there. Oddly enough the Army has been very good for the desert with the restrictions on activities along the roads, so it is a lovely section of “natural” desert.
Yuma Proving Grounds desert
Going through the Proving Grounds can be a bit interesting. We got to see an equipment drop by parachute, though we didn’t notice the aircraft that must have dropped them. There are 5-6 parachutes on the big item, and 2 on the small one. There is definitely a lot of training and/or testing going on. We have heard quite a few loud “booms” in the evenings, two of which had such a concussive force my motorhome swayed! The cloud ceiling was quite low, and that makes the shocks greater.
One big item and one much smaller
Another thing the Provong Grounds has is an urban combat practice zone set up similar to towns and villages in Western Asia, especially Iraq and Afghanistan.
“Little Baghdad”
There are small clusters around the area away from the larger “town.”
For Western Asia training
Just outside the western edge of the YPG is the Colorado River. It is mostly a slow moving irrigation canal here. You can see the heavily irrigated fields up west of the river in the picture below. They grow lots of alfalfa, some cotton, and even some produce from the cabbage family, though we didn’t stop to investigate.
The Colorado River isn’t too impressive here
We finally got to Cibola, and it did not disappoint. There are hundreds of Sandhill cranes, though this shows only a few of them.
Sandhill Cranes
There are a few other types of birds including this white heron of some type. This is zoomed in an awful lot, and I can’t tell exactly what species it is.
Some type of white heron
The best part of Cibola is sitting by the large pond that has hundreds and hundreds of waterfowl of all types. Click on the link below to watch a video, and make sure you turn your sound up!
We are in Lake Havasu right now, picking up some Amazon packages and applying for our passport renewals. Mine expires in March, and I almost forgot about it! We plan on staying at Quartzsite until Monday, then heading to a private campground somewhere we can do laundry, clean the tanks, and shop. After that, we are off to Death Valley for a week or two. COVID vaccinations are still to hard to come by in Iowa to worry about, so we will just enjoy the warmth a while longer.
Kevin is actively looking at getting some lithium ion batteries for the motorhome, and that lets him have all kinds of fun. The plan is to put them in at home before our next summer trip.
We finally got our T-Mobile/Sprint hot spot, and it works soooooo much better than our Verizon hot spot here. I can post again! So be prepared for a LOT of pictures.
Monday we rode our bikes to the Big Tent for a funnel cake. I am addicted to good funnel cakes, and one of the vendors outside the tent has very good ones. I am a purist – cinnamon sugar only. This is the stand that is always set up on the west side of the tent.
A lovely funnel cake
The area around the Big Tent was remarkably uncrowded. There were numerous parking spots in the lots nearest to the tent at 10:30 in the morning, something unheard of in regular times. Pretty much everyone was wearing masks, and almost everyone was walking the correct direction on the one way aisles. Kevin went in to take a look around, but we didn’t stay long. My e-bike was all messed up, and it took a while to get the battery monitor reset. Otherwise it was a lovely ride from our spot in La Posa Tyson Wash into town, about 3 miles.
We have done a lot of just hanging around in absolutely gorgeous weather – warm and sunny. We also reveled in some rain on Wednesday and Thursday. It out a damper on our evening campfires, but it sure cut the dust which had been pretty overwhelming. Lily decided she had enough of life during one significant shower.
Lily saying life is too rough for her
We went to Lake Havasu on Thursday to do our laundry (such excitement), and to go to a couple of quilt stores there. Sadly I couldn’t find the adhesive 505 spray I use to sandwich quilts, so I will just have to keep sewing tops until we get to Yuma next week. We also picked up some groceries since the shops are better than closer to Quartzsite.
Today was a much more enjoyable day. Terry and Betty Brewer took us on a 4WD trip along with Bill and Pam. We went northeast of Quartzsite on BLM “roads”. We took off on Paloma Road and followed some combination of 80, 82, 90, and 92 before we came to Hwy 72 and headed back. The trip was somewhere between 25-30 miles of back country, and it was a workout for our Grand Cherokee Trail Hawk. It was fully Class 2, with a couple of sections that were marginal, but Kevin and the Jeep made it fine. I admit I don’t want to do roads much higher rated than this one though. As a passenger, I really got thrown around. The country was beautiful though, and the scenery made it worthwhile. Here comes the photo overload:
Vistas were dry due to no monsoon this yearA great example of the Palo Verde tree and Saguaro shading and helping each other hold waterGlorious clouds and trailsPart of the ride was near the hills with great viewsThis is an impressive pair of saguaros!An old volcanic cone?Looking into the valley where US 95 runsThe ocotillos were turning the tiniest bit of green tint.Bill and Pam looking at a mine shaftClose up of one of the shaftsComing close to the end with fearless Terry and Better in the lead
Probably enough now with the pictures. I will post some more sewing stuff next time.
We got happily settled into our regular spot at Tyson awash LTVA. Not as many people here as usual, but the data service is still as bad as usual! This will be really short because of that.
We really haven’t done much but relax in the sunshine. Kevin has been printing a number of little things to help organize, and I sewed a small quilt top, 40×48”. Pictures of those later when I have better service.
I did get a morning shot. See Venus?
A nice evening shot. I know the focus isn’t great, but this photo had the most accurate colors. It was beautiful.
Evening looking east
We will eventually go into Parker or Lake Havasu, and I will put up some other photos then. Now to “publish” before the data service goes out completely!
