On The Move Again

On The Move Again

As my sister reminded me, I’ve been neglecting this blog.  So it’s time to catch up on the last month or so. 

We started in Tucson at Catalina State Park; a wonderful place nestled in a valley on the north end of town.  The sites were big and level, the scenery lovely, the sunsets spectacular, and a shopping center right across the road.  It was the week before Christmas after all.  The Navigator got a new Windows 10 computer.  She hates it.  Some attitude adjustment may be necessary on the machine’s or the Navigator’s part.  We’ll see.

Scenery at Catalina State Park

After three nights in the wilderness across from the mall we moved to our favorite little urban RV park on the west side of Tucson.  It was as likeable as we remembered and convenient for seeing our friends who were nice enough to include us in their holiday plans.  We had a great Christmas dinner with Theresa, Lori and Theresa’s mom.  We got into the Santa spirit by shopping for the kids in the family the RV park adopted for the holiday.  Amazon delivered my Christmas present – new slippers. 

Merry Christmas Katie.  See the greyhound?

Then we got company!  Our friend Kathy and her little dog Plato came from Santa Rosa to stay in a nearby hotel and join us for New Years and other fun stuff.  We rode the light rail, went to the Sonora Desert Museum, visited the mission San Xavier Del Bac, ate and drank.  She left and a couple of days later our friend Dawn came, rented an RV in Tucson and joined us at Sentinel Peak.  We ate, drank, visited the Sonora Desert Museum, visited the mission San Xavier Del Bac and rode the light rail.  Guess what we’ll do if you visit us in Tucson?

Raptor show at the Desert Museum

San Xavier del Bac

We moved with Dawn and her RV back to Catalina State Park for one night where she took moonlight horse ride into the hills and then got her on her way back to Kenosha as we planned out next stops. 

Dawn's ride in the Catalina Mountains

  Southern California was the destination.  Family awaited us, possibly not with bated breath.  The first night’s stop was Tacna, AZ, a bare bump in the road but home to a very good Basque restaurant.  The finest Basque food I’ve had.  Yes, the only Basque food, but still good.  

Then on to Borrego Springs, CA for a few days to visit Anzo Borrego State Park.  The town of Borrego Springs is not only home to the park, but is also famous for a variety of metal sculptures scattered around town.  The work of one man since 2009, they were sponsored by a local resident and most reside on his estate but are open to the public and you can drive or walk up to them.  Spectacular.  The park is pretty special also.  600,000 acres of desert and interesting geology.  We did suffer somewhat due to there being no cell service and NO wifi!  Incommunicado for 3 days.  We could have died!

Getting from Borrego Springs to our next stop, San Clemente, CA was going to be routing challenge.  On the map the shortest route was very squiggly and led through Julian, CA.  We decided to try in the car first and took ride to the charming, historic town of Julian.  Yes, too squiggly for the RV but the apple pie was lovely.  So the next day we skirted around the squiggly for an extra 60 miles but got ourselves to a beachside state park in San Clemente, CA.  No, we didn't visit the Nixon Library.  The park was very nice and close for visiting friends and family.  It was also very wet.  Record rains and flash floods rolled in and out over the 3 days.  The Navigator has taken to calling us the “Drought Busters”. 

After San Clemente we drove and settled here in Indio, CA, near Palm Springs.  The timing worked out pretty well when my iPhone stopped charging and there was an Apple store nearby. Sometimes you just need to camp in the high-rent district.  Also nearby is Joshua Tree National Park, another spectacular entry in our National Park portfolio.  We spent the day there hiking and touring.

Hidden Valley in Joshua Tree National Park

Now you’re up to date.  I hate to say “stay tuned” since I don’t know when I’ll be back, but check in occasionally just in case.

Catching Up

So it’s been a while since I’ve posted.  Time to catch you all up to date.  From Carlsbad we drove to Huachuca City, AZ, best known probably for Ft. Huachuca, an Army base.  For us it was the proximity to Tombstone and Bisbee, two places in Arizona we wanted to revisit after just passing through on a previous trip.

There’s a lot of history in Tombstone, and it is real history, not the Hollywood version of the fight at the OK Corral (which actually took place in the street and not in the corral.  We started at Boothill Cemetery, full of stories of all the miserable and/or violent ways to die in the old days.  

From there we toured the old city hall which is now a very nice museum and should be the starting point for visitors. 

The next day we went to Bisbee, AZ, home for many years to productive copper mines and now a historic town with artists, shops and a very cool mine tour.  

We tried to tour the mine several years ago but it was so crowded that we couldn’t get on the train.  This time we were 2 of only 6 on the tour and had a great guide, a former miner.  Once again it was a lesson in the many ways one can die, among other lessons.  

Riding the train into the mine

The "facilities" down in the mine.  Yes, it's a two-seater

Also in Bisbee is a great mining museum.  As I get older, I appreciate these historical lessons more.

From Huachuca City we moved Chuck to Catalina Mountain State Park on the northwest side of Tucson.  It was a beautiful place, surrounded by rugged mountains and very remote feeling.  And just outside the park and across the road was a wonderful shopping center with some of our favorite stores.  Yes, even we are touched by the Christmas spirit as we bought the Navigator a new laptop at Best Buy and more wine at World Market.  The best of all worlds?

After 3 nights in the park we moved 16 miles to one of our favorite RV parks, Sentinel Peak RV park in Tucson.  This small (23 sites) urban park in on the western edge of Tucson in the old Mexican barrio neighborhood.  I wrote a fair amount about it last year so I won’t repeat myself.  You can see that post here:  http://chucklewagon.blogspot.com/2016/01/farewell-tucson.html

We’re here for over 3 weeks.  Beanie and I are thrilled.  We’ve already had dinner with our friends who live here, we’ve had our mail delivered, we have Amazon packages coming and more friends are joining us here before we leave.  We’re so friggin' happy that we’ve signed up to attend the RV park’s holiday potluck tomorrow.  For a couple of screaming introverts that’s holiday spirit.

So wherever you are, enjoy the spirit of the holiday(s) you celebrate.  Goodwill towards men and women and stay warm, safe and contented.

On the Move

So we waited one whole day for a RV service guy to show up and when he didn’t show up or call, we tried again.  This time Joshua did show up, crawled under the rig, removed some pieces, ordered parts from Dallas and returned 2 days later and put some pieces back in all in the coldest 3 days of the year.  Viola – it worked.  We were good to go.

In the meantime we decided to go see some Christmas lights in Carlsbad.  In most cities you drive around in your warm car and gawk.  Not here.  In Carlsbad they do Christmas on the Pecos River.  You wait until dark and get onto a pontoon boat with a bunch of other people and ride 2 miles downriver and back looking at displays done by businesses and homes along the river.  It was our last night in town and it just happened to be the coldest night of the year.  Yes, 31 desert-freezing degrees and we were on a boat on the river.  

I don't know what Intrepid Potash is but they had a nice display

One lovely home on the Pecos River

We survived and even enjoyed getting a taste of yet another Christmas tradition in yet another town.  But, as I said to the Navigator, we wouldn’t even do this in Wisconsin!

From Carlsbad we drove to Las Cruces, NM, which requires going to El Paso, TX and then back up to New Mexico.  It’s a lovely drive over the Guadalupe Mountains and we had plenty of time to enjoy the view as low clouds and hoar frost at high elevations made the driving slow and interesting. 

The road ahead in the Guadalupe Mountains

Beautiful but scary hoarfrost

In Las Cruces we enjoyed wine tasting, especially at Rio Grande Winery.  Every once in a while we luck into a wine tasting where the owner/winemaker is behind the counter and we get treated to a discussion with the expert and a specially curated tasting.  This was one of the best we ever had and we left with half a case of wine, which is now stored under the bed since the wine case in the storage bay is also full of wine.  The challenge begins – can we drink enough to stay ahead of our collecting and storage limitations.

From Las Cruces we moved to our current location is Huachucha City, AZ, chosen for its proximity to Tombstone, Bisbee and other AZ attractions.  We’ll have 4 nights here and then on to Tucson.  

All photo credits to the Navigator.

Lemonade, Synapses and More

The good news is that we’re in one of our favorite RV parks, Escapees Ranch in Carlsbad, NM.  Yes, we’re still here.  The bad news is that the part is in Dallas and it will take at least 2 days to get here.  The good news is that the diesel mechanic came out yesterday and diagnosed the problem and ordered the part.  The bad news is that we spent all day Monday waiting for Vince, a different mechanic, who assured us all day that he’d get to us before the end of the day and then never showed up.  The good news is that we have several lazy days to just hang out while we’re waiting.  That’s the lemonade.

Such is life RVing.  Things break.  In this case a valve on the air system that powers our air brakes, fills the air bags we ride on, and powers the jacks.  We packed up Monday morning, thwarted the Lord of Rig (Beanie), got him in his carrier and headed out the gate, only to realize that we were not aired up like we should be.  Our butt was literally dragging.  Luckily the Escapees had room for us to return to our site and settle in to find help. Turns out that there is a desiccant/dryer as part of the air system that needs maintenance every 2 years or so.  Oops, guess we missed that day at boot camp.  Apparently we got condensation in our air system and then it froze and split a brass valve.  It gets cold in the desert you know.  That’s the synapse part – we keep learning.

But, we like Carlsbad.  The people here in the park are great and have been helpful with advice and hugs.  The Carlsbad Cavern was amazing, and best of all, it was practically empty.  We wandered through like we owned the place, marveling at the formations.  It’s hard to capture the enormity in photos. 

The Great Room - total floor space equivalent to 14 football fields.

60 ft. tall stalagmite

We also toured a nice state park that is half botanic garden (for the Navigator) and half zoo (for me).  I like good zoos.  Maybe because I grew up going to the Milwaukee County Zoo, one of the best in the country.  Maybe because I believe that once we see live animals, we can better appreciate their counterparts in the wild that we don’t see, and hopefully that inspires us to consider them as we impact the world.  This Living Desert Zoo and Gardens is worth a visit.  Oh yeah, they did a good job with the plants also, in case you care.   http://www.emnrd.state.nm.us/spd/livingdesertstatepark.html

Young bobcats acting like cats everywhere

Native female elk

Vulture sculpture at the zoo

Another Carlsbad attraction is the Flume.  A large, 100 year old aqueduct used to divert water from the Pecos River to farm land for irrigation.  It is an impressive edifice.

Back at the RV park the local animals were hanging out on the road.  In addition to the cattle we regularly see roadrunners and other birds.  

So here we are, still in Carlsbad.  The cats are content and the rig is warm.  Life is good.

Wichita Mountains

Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge is 60,000 acres of rocky hills and pristine prairie just over the border of Texas in OK.  In the early days (pre-white settlers) it was home to millions of bison, elk and lots of other wildlife.  Following a pattern seen across the west, the elk and bison were wiped out by hunters and the land was empty of large fauna.  Teddy Roosevelt came along and made a deal to bring bison from New York to repopulate the prairie.  Then came elk from Wyoming.  Someone else thought it would be nice to have some longhorn cattle so they came from Mexico.  Quite the diverse population, eh?  The bison re-population has been so successful that every year surplus are auctioned off, hopefully to find happy homes elsewhere.  You can read more here https://www.fws.gov/refuge/Wichita_Mountains/

We went to view the massive herds of bison and elk.  Below is our bison:   This lone male was happy to represent the species.  

Our bison herd

We also found longhorn cattle.  Again the lone representative.  No elk were spotted.  Actually, it makes me happy to know that the animals have enough room to disappear from our view.  I’ll take the ranger’s word for it that they are out there.

Our cattle herd

Prairie dogs however were abundant and very entertaining.  These communal tunnel dwellers chitter, chat and pop up like a game of Whack-A-Mole. 

We left Wichita Falls heading to Colorado City, TX and nice state park intending it to be a one-night stand on our way to Carlsbad, NM.  Beanie however had other ideas.  Despite our most diligent efforts, he disappeared under the slide as we got ready to go.  Time passed and finally it was best to concede that another night in the lovely state park was the best option.  We love Texas state parks and this one was virtually empty of other campers and a very nice stop over.  Yesterday we managed to foil the Lord of the Rig (Beanie) and made the drive to Carlsbad, NM.  We’re about 17 miles north of Carlsbad in a park owned and operated by the Escapees, an RV club we belong to.  We stayed here last year also and are planning 4 nights this time.  I wrote about it here:  http://chucklewagon.blogspot.com/2015/12/cocoon.html

The price is right, the WiFi is good, the site is very pleasant and the people lovely.  Today we head to Carlsbad Caverns.  Last year the elevator down 800 feet to the cave was broken so we contented ourselves with staying on the surface.  Word has it that it got fixed for President Obama’s visit earlier this year so we’re hoping to benefit.  Stay tuned!

Surprising Wichita Falls

RVing is full of unexpected events.  Things like, “what do you mean the jacks won’t go down” to “is that red light on the dashboard a bad thing?”  Fortunately most of the surprises are good things, which is probably why we keep doing this.  Case in point, Wichita Falls, TX.

We planned a 2 night stop here to be close for a visit to the Wichita Falls Wildlife Refuge.  The RV Park looked good on paper and the manager was lovely on the phone as we made reservations.  Then we pulled in, greeted by colorful 10’ flamingos and a rainbow of fire hydrants.  This could be fun.  

Welcome to Wichita Falls RV Park

The check-in lady enthused about the sites to see and we soon had a map with highlights marked.  Wichita Falls???  Who knew?  The next good omen, the rig next our site was a twin of Chuck.  Yes, another 36QSH Phaeton, only one year newer.  If we came home drunk we could be in trouble.  And the frosting on the cake?  Outstanding free WiFi – a rare occurrence in most RV parks.  Turns out we are parked under the repeater.

We got set up and started touring.  World’s littlest skyscraper – check.  Funny story that.  http://www.texascooppower.com/texas-stories/history/legend-of-the-worlds-littlest-skyscraper

Museum of North Texas History – closed for the day, but interesting.

A downtown full of resale and vintage clothing stores – fun.  After dinner at a great barbecue place we decided an extra day in Wichita Falls would be worth it.

The next day we devoted to the town.  First stop - WEE-CHI-TAH.  To quote from the website: 

This marvelous life-sized sculpture features a Comanche family crossing the Wichita River. The actual legend of their crossing defines where Wichita got its name. This multi-part piece of art is of a Comanche woman, her child, two braves, their horses and a colt set in the natural beauty of rock & flowing water. The woman is testing the river's depth, as the legend tells, and describes it is ""waist-deep"", which is how ""Wee-chi-tah"" is translated. I hope that everyone who looks upon this sculpture will see a people who loved their own, the land, the horses, things that The Great Creator gave, not to be sold or owned, but a way of life, free, free to enjoy, free to live. Jack Stevens, Artist

It was very cool.  The gloomy day added to the atmosphere and the figures looked alive.  The expression on the child’s face is so gleeful.

  And, immediately adjacent is the best reuse of an old grain elevator imaginable – a climbing gym.  How smart is that.  An old trestle bridge is part of a nearby hiking trail along the river.

Climbing gym in an old grain elevator

The Navigator leading the way off the bridge

Next stop was the Riverbend Nature Center devoted to bringing city residents in touch with the river and the outdoors in the city.  It was a quiet day and we got a guided tour of the prairie dog colony (former pets that outgrew their pet life), butterfly house and other attractions.  

Prairie dog

Orange Juliet (not Orange Julius) butterfly

From there I insisted we find the “falls” that give Wichita Falls its name.  Sadly the original falls were wiped out in some natural disaster in the 18^th century and the current falls are a man-made re-creation built in the 1990s.  Nevertheless, it makes for an attractive park.

Wichita Falls

Back home to Chuck for lunch and a break and a wait for darkness.  Darkness because the biggest attraction in Wichita Falls at this time of year comes alive as darkness falls – The Fantasy of Lights!  My pictures don't do it justice and the story is interesting so check out the website:  https://fol.mwsu.edu/story/

It was pretty spectacular and the surrounding neighborhood was well – lit also (with lights silly). 

Part of the Fantasy of Lights

Today we might actually head for the Wildlife Refuge – our original plan for Wichita Falls.

Ruling the Rig

Our very first trip in Chuck was to a state park 15 miles from home to test out our abilities and our rig.  We had only one cat at the time, Beanie, and of course he went with us.  What we didn’t realize at the time was the variety of nooks and crannies built into the interior of Chuck.  We woke up that first morning and couldn’t find Beanie.  We called and opened every cupboard and closet and door.  We searched outside, sure he had is some mysterious way escaped and been eaten by a coyote.  We were frantic and hysterical for a good half hour when we heard a soft “meow” from a cavity below the closet that he somehow found.  We spent the next 45 minutes cajoling, begging and bribing him out of that cavity, popped him in the car and drove him home to spent the 2^nd night alone at home while we continued to camp.  Once the weekend was over our friend Simon cut a board to cover the opening to the cavity and we felt safe.  Unknown to us, that was just the beginning of the “Where’s Beanie” saga. 

Our next trip was to Door County and Beanie made the trip in his cat carrier strapped with one of the seat belts to one of the couches.  He seemed OK when we arrived at the campground and the Navigator and I went in to register.  We came out to find that he had managed to escape his carrier and was nowhere in sight.  We were sure he was in the rig so we went ahead and set up and starting calling for him with no response.  Worried, but not yet panicking, we opened some wine and sat with a friend until, all of a sudden, a tiny paw was seen pushing through an air vent behind the kitchen cabinets.  Yes, yet another cavity, apparently accessed behind a couch.  This time a bribe of cheese lured him over the back of the cabinet, through the cabinet and back into living space.  We stuffed a couple of pillows behind the couch to block the opening and the game was on. 

By far his favorite hiding place is under the bed in the slide mechanism.  Over the years we’ve added 5 body pillows and a bed pillow, all of which are jammed into the openings around the bed.  Additionally a pool noodle is wedged into place to hold the pillows.  We also make sure that the cabinet over the bed where we store extra towels is open and it is an alternative hiding place for him, but one we can reach.  99% of the time all of this preparation works, keeping him within reach.  But every once in a while the system breaks down and our preparations for departure sends him into hiding.  Hiding in the slide ensures that we can’t leave since bringing in the slide would crush him.  Not that we’ve ever considered that, even at our most frustrated….which was just the other day.

We try not to telegraph that we’re getting ready to pack up but there’s a certain tension in the air on moving day and on Wednesday Beanie disappeared.  We searched all the easy-to-reach hiding spots and concluded he was under the bed.  We started the waiting game.  “Act casual”.   After 20 minutes we were on the floor cajoling.  Then we put out wet food and treats trying to appeal to appetite.  No sign.  Alternatives were considered.  Should we push the vacuum cleaner hose under there?  We agreed that scaring him was counter-productive.  How patient could we be?  We had reservations for the next campground but if we had to we could stay another night in the parking lot of the RV service place and spend Thanksgiving in Big Cabin, OK.  It was now pushing noon, way past our hoped-for departure time of 10:30.  We told the campground managers that we had a mechanical issue delaying our departure – a cat in the slide.  They didn’t laugh in our faces but we heard snickers as we left the office.  Finally we decided to go into town and do a little grocery shopping figuring our absence would lure him out.  Yes, we returned and he was casually peering out the window, all departure fears gone.

Rig Monarch

With a swoop he was tucked into his carrier and we finished our preparations and departed.  Score:  Cat-25,  Humans – still behind.