And sooooo......

After just under 3000 miles and 3 weeks, we have finally made our way back to our non-rolling and slightly larger house.  At least it was a much shorter and non-eventful drive today.  :)

We stopped in OKC to get a new tire for the fifth wheel.  The place wasn't much to look at but it was huge!  And they got right on it so we ended up with a detour of less than an hour.  Finally made it back to ICT about 5:30 this evening. 

And while it was a shorter drive, we were all pretty darned glad to get outta that truck!  And the girls were pretty happy to have grass (albeit brown) for doing their business.  The downside of traveling to the Southwest is that their idea of a yard is gravel.  Thankfully the girls are used to it!

We brought back a bit of warm weather with us as it was nearly 80 degrees here today.  I understand that will change tomorrow as a cold front moves through.  I realized how quickly I had become accustomed to the warmer days and nights because of the last couple of days.  While the days were warm in New Mexico and Oklahoma, the nights were COLD!  I counted our furnace kicking on about 5 times last night.  

So now all that's left is to unload the trailer (ugh) and winterize it again. 

Oh and plan the next adventure!  :)

Another long day.....

I missed posting last nite 'cause, yes, it was another long day!

We were hoping that we would be able to get a new tire in Albuquerque at the Camping World.  They have a huge superstore there.  Unfortuntately, they didn't have any in stock.  Sigh.  The guy called around for us, but apparently tire stores in Albuquerque aren't open on Sundays.  And of course, the other places he checked didn't have any in stock either.

So, we headed out from Albuquerque for our next stop....  Canute, OK.  :)  Kept our fingers crossed the whole way that we wouldn't have any more tire problems and thankfully, we didn't!

But, since we had to wait for the Camping World to open on Sunday, we didn't get away from there until much later than we normally would.  And since we had about 450 or so miles to go, that meant that we didn't get into Canute until about 9pm last nite.  We were all VERY tired of sitting in the truck by then!

We are actually staying at a KOA about halfway between Clinton and Elk City, OK.  It is located next to Clinton State Lake.  This morning I can see that it is a pretty little campground.  And the folks in the office are awesome.  They actually serve breakfast.  So we stopped by and had yummy biscuits and gravy, scrambled eggs, bacon, well.... the works!  All for $6 each.  A very good deal.

While I was in the office, they were baking a pumpkin/cranberry loaf.  She told me to stop by on our way out and she would give us some for the road.  Nice!

We were hoping that we could stop in OKC at the Camping World to get a new tire.  But when Max called, the guy said they didn't even carry tires and would have to order it.  However, he did recomment a local tire store and, yay!, they have one.  So we'll be making a small detour about halfway home today to get some peace of mind and a new tire.

Then, by this afternoon, we'll be back in Wichita.  What a trip!

Looooong day on the road!

It started out as just another normal day on the road.  We left Tucson about 9:30, knowing that we had a longer drive than we normally liked because we wanted to get to Albuquerque.  We stopped in Hatch NM for a little lunch and then cut across on a state highway to meet up with I-25 north.  

About 3 or 4 miles out of Hatch on I-25 we heard a big pop and I saw bits of tire flying up in the side mirror.  Ack!

Max got us safely to the side and this is what we saw on the trailer.

Fortunately, I had signed us up for Good Sam Roadside Assistance right before this trip.  Yay!!

Unfortunately, our AT&T cell phones had no service.  :(

Fortunately, I remembered that I had Skype on my Verizon-powered iPad, so I fired it up.  About 50 minutes after I called, the service guy showed up and changed the tire.  Nice!

In about 1 1/2 hours, we were back on the road.

But that means we weren't into Albuquerque until about 8:30 last night.  I know, that isn't late..... but I really hate setting up in the cold and dark.  :/

But we got setup and I went into the trailer only to find shattered glass all over the kitchen floor.  Seriously.  Apparently sometime during the day, the microwave came open and the glass turntable came flying out.  So then we spend the next 30 or 45 minutes cleaning up glass.  It was a LOT of glass.

Oh, and while we were doing that, Miss Gabi went over and threw up on the carpet in the living room.

As I said...... it was a very LOOOOOONG day!

And today, we get to find a tire place that can handle RVs before we get on the road for another long day.  

And on top of all that?  It is COLD here -- 29 degrees this morning.  

Okay, I'm done complaining.  Grin.

On the road again

All this riding in the truck makes Gabi exhausted! :)

Another day of golf in paradise

We managed to squeeze in one more round of golf on this trip.  We played the sister course to the one last week.  Right in the middle of Tucson, they've created Randolf Park.... the park itself is a huge place.  As part of the park, they have two golf courses.  The one we played last week is the newer of the two.  Today we played the original Randolph Golf Course.  We actually like it a little better, despite the fact that it has narrower fairways and WAAAAY more trees!

It also had a bit more water and these turtles were making the most of a toasty day.  It was in the low 80s, high clouds, and light winds.  I actually found myself looking for shade as I would wait for Max to take a shot.  Grin.  

At any rate, there were a herd of 25 or so turtles lining this lake bank.  A good day for basking, I guess.

And here is one bit of wildlife that I never expected to see in the middle of town -- a coyote!  Ack!

He actually came sauntering across the fairway in front of us.  He was moving very slow (we asked to play through.  Grin).  But it was clear that he was stalking something in the trees on the opposite site of the fairway.  Every time he looked over at us, I got the heebie jeebies.  My next shot wasn't that great.  :)

This was a beautiful, albeit difficult hole.  I really wanted to capture a pic with the fountain in the foreground, the green in the center, and the cactus garden in the back.  But apparently the fountain is on a sensor because as we approached, it shut off.  I looked back as we went to the next tee box and it popped back on!

That is certainly golfer-friendly!

Yep, Max made the putt!  We both played a tiny bit better than we did last week.  Altho' I didn't score as well.  Drat.  Ah well, it's still early in the season and like every golfer in the world, I am eternally optimistic that THIS will be the year that my game significantly improves.

Oh, one final wildlife pic.....

As we approached the 18th green, there were several of these little guys chirping around.  I wish that I couldn've gotten closer because this pic doesn't do justice to the brilliant red of his head and chest feathers.  And this guy was tiny!!

And as with last week, we were treated to another air show.  As I mentioned, the golf course is in the flight path for Davis-Monthan AFB landings, fly-bys, as well as touch and gos.  There wasn't quite the variety today, but we did see formations of A10 Warthogs as well as many different sized cargo/transport aircraft.  

Tonite is all about kicking back.....  Max is grilling steaks and I'm making salad.  Dang, I'm hungry!  :)

Side trip to Scottsdale

We made a side trip to Phoenix (Scottsdale, actually) to meet up with some friends today.  We haven't seen Bob and Yvonne since they moved to Prescott, AZ last summer.  So we spent a couple of hours having some yummy Mexican food (from Carlos O'Briens) and catching up.  They are both retired Spirit/Boeing folks and decided to land in the southwest.  Prescott is about 2 hours north of Phoenix and we are about 2 hours south of Phoenix, so we decided to meet in the middle.  

It was great to catch up..... and to realize that, just like us, they are busy, busy, busy in retirement!  :)  Hopefully we'll get up their way this fall and get to spend a little time in Prescott.

Some sights/observations along the drive today......

I know that we have smog in Wichita.  I remember driving to work from El Dorado and on some days I could identify exactly where downtown Wichita was from quite aways out.... simply because of the brown cloud hanging over it.  But most days the wind sweeps our smog away before we even notice it.  Not so here.  Tucson is clearly in a valley and with a half million people here, they have a real smog problem.  Their winds this time of year are mostly light to calm so it is very noticeable -- particularly on our drive today.

Along the way (we were on I-10), we ran across what must have been an old car road rally.  They were running on an old highway parallel to us.  We saw an original restored Mini Cooper, an old restored Triumph, and a beautifully restored MG, as well as a few others.  I had to drool a bit over the MG as I've always wanted one -- and it was in the beautiful British racing green!

We also noticed, about halfway between Tucson and Phoenix, what appeared to be an airplane boneyard.  So of course, I Googled it.  (Max always says that I'm the Google queen.  Grin.)  Turns out that it is the Pinal Airpark airplane boneyard.  They say that it has a bunch of planes from Northwest Airlines, but also have "representatives" from most of the other airlines. 

Of course it wasn't nearly as big as the boneyard in California.  Nor is it nearly as big as the military boneyard here at Davis-Monthan AFB.  Both of those are, frankly, mindboggling in their scope.  But it was kinda cool to see all those planes lined up.

The other thing we figured out on the drive to/from Phoenix is that we now know how they fund the marvelous maintenance they do on the interstate highways here in Arizona.  We saw more cops in that four hour drive than we saw in the entire 16-17 hour drive out here.  Seriously.  And they were all mostly ticketing people.  Now really, the speed limit was 75 MPH.  Is it really necessary to drive enough over that to get a ticket?!?  Sheesh!

And finally, along the way we saw Picacho Peak.  This one is from a ways out.  Sorry about the quality -- we were in the truck tooling along at, I'm sure, 75 MPH.  :) 

And this one is right as we passed the peak.  

So why include pics?  Well, just 'cause I like how the name sounds.  Peek-A-Choo!  Kept wanting to say "bless you"!  LOL

A little bit of shopping

We did our bit to further the Tucson economy today..... with a little bit of shopping!  :)  (My hubby is so very patient about that sometimes.)

We headed for the 4th Avenue area -- it is billed as a historic shopping district featuring over 100 restaurants and shops.  They have everything from kitschy tourist places, to head shops, to tattoo parlors, to low- and high-end restaurants.  It covers about 6 or 7 blocks along 4th Avenue.  And it was a beautiful day for a stroll.  High clouds and mid-70s.  

One of the bars was called The Hut and it featured this guy.....

Yep, he was huge!  And located on the corner in the bar's patio area.

We found a shop that carried Mexican pottery and snagged a couple of awesome brightly colored bowls.  And I found a "day of the dead" painted skull for my garden.  I know, weird, right??  Oh well, I think they are cool.  I really wanted one of the 3 foot tall "day of the dead" bride skeletons, but Max frowned on that.  :/

After so much shopping, we decided that pizza was in order.  One of the shop clerks recommended this place....  Magpies.  We ended up sitting outside, watching the world go by, having awesome pizza.  It was VERY yummy!

While at the restaurant, I notice this tiny van parked out front.

Who knew that you could get Barking Squirrel beer?!?!  Grin.  We didn't try it, but probably should have.

Instead, we made one more trip to Camping World.  Dang, that place is dangerous since we always spend too much money.  (Kinda like going to Sam's or Costco!)  Anyway, we've been wishing that we had brough our bikes along on the trip.  But it is kind of a hassle with attaching the bike rack, hauling the bikes on/off, etc.  So we decided to get these......

We are the proud owners of new folding bikes!  They will ge hauled everywhere since we can fold them up and stow them in the bed of the truck.

We actually worked pretty hard to get these bikes.  We bought them on our first trip to Camping World.  Got them home and opened one box -- realized that we had the wrong bikes.  Argh!  So back to the store the next day.  They didn't have the ones we wanted in stock, so they ordered them for us.  The truck with our new toys came today, finally!  :)  We've already taken them out for a test ride in the resort.  I was a bit wobbly at first, but it came back to me.  Even tho' they are smaller that a regular bike, they are a joy to ride.

Old Tucson

We were back to our touristing ways today and headed out to Old Tucson.  It is basically an old west town that was built for the movies and tv.  They've had over 300 film and tv productions there, starting in 1939.  You might recognize some the of films such as Rio Bravo, The Outlaw Josey Wales, and Tombstone.  

It was pretty interesting (if a bit kitschy) to tour.

Shortly after we arrived, they were having a gun fight re-enactment......

This was  scene from the 1969 move, Heaven with a Gun.  It was a bit campy, but fun to watch.

One of the tv shows had its own area within the park for shooting.....

Remember this one?  I kinda do.  They also had memorabilia from Little House on the Prairie and The Big Valley, which both shot here.  I used to love Barbara Stanwyck!

They had an old time indian village and my fav part of it was this lovely grotto and waterfall area.

This is their re-creation of a Southwestern mission.  Notice the hot set sign.  I don't think they were filming at that time, unless it was inside.  We couldn't get close enough to peek in the door.  Drat! 

As I stopped to take a pic of this, another tourist commented that it would be a more interesting pic with "his" neck in the noose (meaning Max).  That made us both laugh out loud.  :)

By the end of our tour, this is definitely what I was ready for!  It was warm and sunny here again today, so a stiff drink would have been welcome!

Oh, on our way back to the truck we saw this.......

Not only was that motorcycle loaded with baggage, it had Alf as its tailgunner!  Note that Alf is wearing a studded leather vest.  :)

We've gotten into the habit of taking the girls on twice daily walks around the doggy section of the park.  They seem to really enjoy it.  This afternoon, after our second walk, Ginger was all done in.  Guess that's what happens for a nearly 15 year old puppy.  The gravel around our trailer was nice and warm, I guess, so she just flopped down.  Never mind that there were comfy area rugs not two yards away........

Okay, I was wrong.......

There IS something better than 30 - 0..... how about 31 - 0 AND a perfect regular season?!?!?!

(Credit to Steve Wilson for the photo)

Rain in paradise .... And a craft fair!

I participated in my first (and probably last) craft fair today!

Last week I noticed an announcement that they would be having a craft fair here at the resort.  So I decided, what the heck, I'll give it a shot!  My table fee was only 3 bucks, so it wasn't much of an investment.  And I always travel with my jewelry in case I get an online order.  So it was a matter of finding some price tags and a tablecloth to setup.

Most craft fairs are two or three days with 10 or so hours each day.  This one was only 3 hours.  I figure that I can do anything for 3 hours.  :)  

I was actually surprised at the number of people that came out.  Must have been the weather.  However, for my three hours time, I managed to sell 2 pairs of earrings and get an order for one more pair.  My hourly rate for this one was pretty low.  :)  It did give me plenty of time to make a couple of chainmaille bracelets.

I think I'll stick to online sales.  Don't forget to look at my handmade jewelry at:

www.drjdesigns.etsy.com

The weather here took quite a turn for the worse today.  We've been having 80 degree temps during the day and nighttime temps in the upper 50s/low 60s during the past week.  The storms that have been pounding Califoria the last few days moved in this morning.  We had rain and big winds most of the day.  It DOES actually rain sideways in places other than Kansas.  :)  I don't want to complain, but I actually had to wear long pants today.  Grin.  Okay, so I'm REALLY glad that we aren't at home where they are getting sleet and snow right now and where the temps will be sub-zero tonite.

On our drive to dinner tonite, the sun was just starting to peak through as it set.  The mountains were lit up so that it looked like they had snow!  It was just beautiful.  We drove up into the foothills a bit for dinner and as we rounded one corner, this peak loomed.  You can see that we were still getting some rain and I caught the pic between wiper sweeps.

Dinner tonite was at a hole-in-the-wall Mexican place.  Really.

It was recommended by one of the winter locals today.  It truly is a very small family place, closing at 7:30 in the evening.  There were probably only 10 or 12 tables in the whole place.  The food was good, not the best we've every had, but a very long way from the worst!  And it's always good when I don't have to cook.  :)