Fun in the Desert

Things are still windy out here in the desert! We’ve had some 50 mph+ winds which have made it really hard to play golf. What am I talking about – it’s really hard just to stay on your feet! McKenzie found that it was easiest to just ride on the carpet that we use to smooth over the sand greens after we've hit that little yellow, pink or orange ball into the cup. Hope all of you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and Christmas! We went to my aunt’s in San Diego and spent about a week with her. Had a great time shopping and McKenzie enjoyed playing with her dog, Peanuts. Although it took them five days to determine that they weren’t enemies, the last two, they spent running throughout the house chasing each other. We went back for Christmas and gave them a chance to play again.
We’ve had quite a time with our solar out here. Seems a couple of our batteries died and we ended up having to order four new ones. George had always said that we didn’t have enough solar panels on the top of the fifthwheel, so we ordered a new one which should hopefully give us enough power to do the things we want. If not, we are going to have to start dragging them behind us because we have no more roof room for the panels. We’ve added Dish Network and an electric coffee pot since we were out here five years ago and they both draw quite a bit of amps. Gave up the coffee pot and saved the amps for something else. We had to install a new circuit board on the furnace and replace a part on the toilet. Oh yes, the refrigerator door panel dried, cracked, warped and fell out. So--- we had to find a carpenter who could build us a new one! Okay, the fifthwheel is almost 13 years old!!! And it’s a lot cheaper to replace all these parts than it is to buy a new fifthwheel!!!!! Besides, if we continue having to replace all these parts, we’ll soon know how to build our own fifthwheel! Once everything was fixed, we began enjoying our visit.

Our friends, Cal and Nancy arrived and we’ve been spending time with them, playing games, going into town, and having a beer and dinner at DaBoyz in Yuma. (They have wonderful pizzas and Italian food.) Close to Christmas, we all went to one of the churches in the foothills and listened to the dancing lights Christmas tree chorus. It was quite interesting. They set up chairs in the parking lot and we took lots of blankets and some hot chocolate and sat out under the stars in the 49 degree weather and listened to the choir sing Christmas songs. The stage was a giant Christmas tree with 22,000 colored lights on it. The 70 people in the choir stood on a rows of the Christmas tree and the lights were generated by a computerized program to blink off an on in various segments. It was kind of neat and doesn’t take much to amuse us on a Saturday night.

It’s kind of a custom out here for everyone to make, bake, or buy some little something as a Christmas gift for everyone who’s camped out here. Sometimes, it is hand made bags, potholders, cranberry loaves, honey, cookies, candies, etc. I decided to bake cookies again this year. Once ready, I learned that my new, super-duper Cuisinart electronic hand mixer does not work on the inverter! What a job having to cream the butter, flour and sugar by hand. I have a whole new respect for those pioneer women! I am building up some nice muscles in my “stirring” arm though! However, once I was finished, George figured out how to make the mixer work, so looks like I'll be able to save my arms and shoulders after all.

McKenzie is finally learning to walk on the rocks and in the wind. She doesn’t like it, but she’s learning to do it! We took her to the Arizona market and she bought herself a new visor so now she doesn’t have the excuse that the sun is in her eyes. Now if we could just figure out how to keep her sunglasses on!
We found out when we arrived here that the Yuma Proving Ground had erected a new cell phone tower. Yippee!!! Better Coverage! Then we found out we had “no coverage”. The tower was a Verizon and we have AT&T! Okay another trip into town to talk to the cell phone people. We finally decided if we wanted to be able to be in touch by phone, that we’d have to buy a Verizon phone. So we bought one and now should be fully covered anywhere we go. George has a Verizon and I have an AT&T. Thank you Yuma Proving Grounds!!!

The desert sunsets have been really beautiful lately. Though the wind has been very strong , we have still had some beautiful sunny days and the nights are spectacular with the stars filling the sky like diamonds. Wish you each could be here to enjoy this with us. Jack, the resident donkey, has been making his rounds every day around happy hour time to see if anyone has any leftover bread, apples or carrots. He and McKenzie have a "hate" relationship going on so we try to keep her safely away from him. He did attend one of our campfires but he stayed on the outer perimeter and McKenzie stayed on my lap but watched his every move out of the corner of her eye! What a protector!!!!

Most of the people who are coming here for the winter have now arrived and things are getting busier. Several of us decided to take the 4 wheel vehicles and head over to the Castle Dome silver mine museum. We had a great time there and the gentlemen who owns the property, Allen Armstrong, has done a fantastic job of restoring many of the old buildings to look just as they were in the mid to late 1800's. Allen took all of us on a walking tour of the old silver mines and shafts and imparted some very wonderful knowledge to us about the old miners of that time. Colonel Jacob Snively, after serving as Secretary to President Sam Houston began the first mining venture here in 1862. In 1864, the Castle Dome City's population was 12. In the 1880's, it exceeded that of Yuma. It was a meca for those wanting to get rich quick and for desperados hiding from the law and seeking an easy opportunity. The lonely, the misfits, the dreamers, the fools and the notorious women all came to Castle Dome. There were shootouts, brawls, murders and untimely deaths. Fortunes were made and fortunes were lost! That time and life is gone but Allen and his wife did a superb job of restoring it. While walking thru the midst of this city he has created, we listened to the echoes of the past and marveled at how life could have been abundant at all in the harsh but beautiful landscape.

We have had one set of the Coyote Races here so far. There are six to eight people who are assigned a coyote (a golf club with a cardboard cutout of a coyote head on it). They line up and as three dice are thrown, the three coyotes with those numbers move forward one square. Whoever gets to the finish line first wins! Bets are made and winners of each race compete in the final race to see who is the "fastest coyote on the ridge".

We've also had one of our waffle bakes. Several of the guys have waffle irons that sit on pipes filled with charcoal. Each of them gets a hat and an apron and they are named after the seven dwarfs - I especially liked "Grumpy"! Everyone brings a topping or something that will complement the waffles and what a feast it becomes! This first waffle bake fed aroung 40-50 of us. A second one will take place later in February. Yes siree!!! We sure eat good out here!!

Cal, Nancy, George and I took a day trip into Quartzite. The big white tents are expanding every year and there are hundreds of vendors trying to separate you from your money! The RV show is the beginning of Quartzite's really busy time and there are usually close to half a million RVers there. We've noticed that there aren't as many people as usual out here this year. I'm sure the price of fuel has something to do with that. Anyway, we spent the day there and found that there wasn't much that we just couldn't live without. So, we left the hustle and bustle of Quartzite and headed back to our peaceful, beautiful ridge.

We have about six more weeks here and then we'll be heading toward Washington State. We have sure enjoyed the winter thus far and are looking forward to the next few weeks. Wish all of you could be here to experience this with us. Hope you are enjoying Coyote Ridge as much as we are!

P.S. Somebody had her 6th birthday this month. Can you guess who?

Catch-Up

No, we haven't dropped off the face of the earth, I've just been having so much fun, I couldn't find a good time to update the blog. Sorry to all you folks who have been wondering and worrying about us and I'll try to get you updated as soon as possible.

When we last updated the blog, we were heading from Illinois and our son's family toward Texas by way of Kansas to look at some custom-made fifthwheels. We took our time and scouted out some very lovely campsites where we spent a night or two before getting into Kansas and the first custom trailer maker which was Spacecraft. We spent approximately 1/2 a day there visiting with the folks and looking at the current fifthwheel they were building. We must say that Spacecraft is truly a custom made rig from the bottom up. You draw up the plans and select every detail. Then the plans are given to their engineers to make sure that the finished product will be safe and roadworthy. Once that approval is given, you choose every single thing you want- just as you would in building a house. We were impressed with them, but aren't sure we really want to get into that much detail. So, on we drove to New Horizons. They also make a custom fifthwheel, but they do it differently. They have several floor plans to choose from and you can add or subtract, within reason. We had initially been very impressed with this factory when we saw them about three years ago, but we decided this wasn’t really the way we wanted to go either. The prices would certainly make you think that there should be a lot of quality there, but the fact is, there isn’t. Our old fifthwheel is looking better and better.

After roaming around the trailer manufacturers, we decided to head over to Hutchinson, Kansas and spend a week just resting up. After a few days of getting chores done and getting in some good reading, we decided to take a trip to the Kansas Underground Salt Museum. The adventure began aboard a double decked elevator that took us to the mine carved from salt deposits formed 275 million years ago. While going down, you are surrounded by total, black, black darkness. (I know that is repetitive, but I mean to tell you, it was really, really dark!) When the doors open 650 feet below, we were surrounded by walls that stretched for miles in a calm, exotic subterranean world where it is always 69 degrees. We boarded a tram and were given a very detailed ride and description of the salt deposit. From 1923 to 1965, the Carey Salt Company mined salt from this huge deposit. It also is a storage facility for many important documents, tapes, and materials.

Once we left Kansas, we headed to Huntsville, Texas to visit with Jan’s parents. We parked our rig at the Elks Lodge in Huntsville and spent three great weeks visiting with George’s sister and brother-in-law and Jan’s parents. They were having a sun porch built on to their home and it is really going to be nice. We know it will give them many, many hours of enjoyment. Though we hated to leave there, we felt we’d better move on if we wanted to make it to the desert before the winter was over. However, on the way, we definitely wanted to stop to visit with our dearest friend, Nancy, in New Braunfels. We had a great five days with her, shopping and spending evening hours sitting in front of the fire with a good glass of wine and her favorite, furry companions, Nell and Willow. Then gradually we made our way back over to Yuma, Arizona where we would spend the better part of the winter.

We arrived in Coyote Ridge (which is about 20 miles outside Yuma and about 4 miles from the Yuma Proving Grounds) around November 11th. Several of our Canadian friends were here already and we began settling in. We quickly adopted somewhat of a routine in that we’d watch the sunrise come over the mountains, have breakfast and then step outside our door to the golf course and play “sand golf”. For those of you who have never played, let me explain. First of all, you don’t have to have any ability for golf in order to play “sand golf”. You tee your ball up on a small rubber tee that looks somewhat like a small funnel. Then you hit the ball and watch closely. Once it hits the rocks, it may continue on toward the green (which is really very fine sand), or it may bounce all the way back to you. We normally play on teams and use the best ball for each shot. At any rate, it can make the most experienced golfer very humble! We normally play 9 holes in the morning and 9 holes in the afternoon. Along about the middle of February, we will have a golf tournament which will consist of about 100 golfers, a potluck, and who know what else!

Now, if you don’t want to golf, there are lots of other things to do. Happy hours are most days at 4:00 p.m. and you can really learn lots of interesting and exciting things at those times – such as who got locked in their bathroom the night before when the door handle got stuck and who’s going to be heading up the public works department out here to ensure that water and waste tanks are emptied? Anyway, as you can see, it is a worthwhile event even if you didn’t want to have a glass of wine and cheese and crackers. Okay, so if that is not your cup of tea, how about a trip to Algodones, Mexico. We always go to get our teeth cleaned and pick up thyroid medication (a year’s supply costs $10.00) – usually avoiding the hawkers with all the junk for sale. If Mexico is not your bag, we can always go to the Arizona market where booths are set up to sell all sorts of things that snowbirds and rvers can’t do without.

As if this is not enough, we also have campfires at night, play games, participate in horseshoe tournaments, and cheer on the homemade boats that race in a children’s swimming pool. There’s hiking and animal watching also. For as many years as I can remember, there has been a donkey, named Jack, who has always visited the many rvers out here. He normally comes around about 4:00 p.m. (as someone always has some stale bread to feed him at happy hour). Jack also loves to have people scratch his back with a yard rake, but he has no great love for dogs! Of course, the feeling is mutual with McKenzie now that she knows that he’s not an overgrown, furry, dog! We were walking in the wash one day and met Jack. He started to come over to us and McKenzie immediately took the “attack stance” and barked, growled and howled at him. Jack did a “Mr. Ed” with his lips and “hee-hawed” as loud as he could. This went on about two minutes between Jack “hee-hawing” and McKenzie barking and then finally everyone decided to just go on their way. McKenzie was sure she could have “taken” Jack and once he turned tail and began to amble away, she tugged on the leash and wanted to chase him down. I figured we were blessed enough to have him leave us alone and refused to let her have her way. We also have coyotes (not good for McKenzie – we watch her very closely when she is outside the trailer) and small red kit foxes that like to join the campfires. I’m sure there are lots of other creepy, crawling things that are currently under the ground and as far as I am concerned, they can stay there!

We are fortunate this year to have one of the Canadians who has lots of power and has set up a Wifi for everyone to use. Imagine, we are out in the middle of the desert, but can still send e-mails and update the blog! What a deal!! I’ll sign off for now but will try to keep a regular update going while we are out here. Stay tuned and we’ll join you again soon.