Lost a Friend

A friend of ours passed on today
We feel the loss severely
She graced our life with joy and love.

She never earned a show award
Nor fought the fiercest bear
Instead she won our hearts and minds.
We walked the woods and climbed the hills
She'd look for squirrels and rabbits
The home again to watch our door.

When young, she'd wander miles away
Seeking kinship and adventure
Usually to come home again, tired and muddy.

We took her to obedience school
So she could teach us how it's done
We learned a lot from her

She'd jump, and dance, and shake both paws
But couldn't do roll-over
And then she tell us that she loved us.

Fourteen years makes a dog quite old
The last were not so nimble
Her legs gave out, she'd not complain

We took her to her ancestral home
In Alaska, then around the west
She loved the snow, the desert, the woods.

Thumper, we knew the end was near
We held you in our hearts
We will go on, never the same, missing you... loving you.

NOW we're over the hill

Before we left Provo, we got tickets to the BYU Ballroom Dance exhibition held in the Marriott Center on the university campus. This program has produces internationally acclaimed ballroom dancers, having won competitions in Europe many times. And we now know why. They are terrific, and we were amazed at the presentation of various dance steps with up to some 80 dancers on the stage at one time. Really impressive.

The Rim in Moab

We left Provo and headed southeast to Moab, an small tourist town situated between Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. Our campground was at the south end of town, situated under the cliff hundreds of feet high called "The Rim". Remnants of the active mining history around Moab lie scattered at this end of town, not the prettiest part. But we had views of not only the Rim, but also the 11,000 foot La Sal Mountains.

Lizard in Canyonlands

But the jewels in the region are Canyonlands and Arches. We decided to go to Canyonlands first, given that we had maybe one and a half days of good weather, and there was farther to travel up to Canyonlands. This huge park was created in the 1960s, is divided into 3 parts: Island in the Sky, the northern part where we went, the Needles, some 65 miles south of Moab, and the Maze, across the Colorado from the other parts, and inaccessible to mere mortals. Island in the Sky is a large mesa, about 12 miles across. The canyons are some 600-2000 feet below the edge. Jeep roads provide access to the lower canyon, following the White Rim Trail around the lower mesa above the Green and Colorado Rivers, which join in the park.

South Window Arch

The next morning, I cruised up to Arches, much older and more developed for tourism (more signs, parking, sites, etc. Arches is home to some 2000 natural arches, formed by unique geological processes. Some of the standing rock formations are just as impressive as the arches. I spent 3 hours and several rolls of film (just kidding) wandering around in the park. By the time I got to Delicate Arch, the icon on the other Utah license plate (the one that doesn't say, "Best Snow on Earth"), the sky was overcast and the light was completely flat and the rocks were more or less one dimensional. So I skipped the 1-1/2 mile hike up to Delicate Arch and took the long shot from the lower (read: Far Away) viewpoint, where a ranger intern was trying to impress us with facts about kangaroo rats (they drink no water...). I took one last drive inward to "Fiery Furnace", but given the opaque sky, the fire had gone out, so I went home.

Balanced Rock in Arches

We considered staying another day in Moab, but the weather forecast was not kind, so we decided to pack it in and head for Colorado. We tangled with a balky slide awning, which is still attached but not playing nice, requiring a manual roll up and down whenever we want to put our main slide in or out.

We decided to take Utah 128, know to the Moab locals as "The River Road" and to the state as a Scenic Byway. And it was very scenic, following the Colorado River for some 40 miles surrounded by towering red rock cliff walls, canyons of infinite depth, and angry rapids here and there. We began to understand how awed Powell must have been when he made the first boat trip down through these waters some 150 years ago.

In the ghost town of Cisco, we turned right onto a road marked "Not State Maintained" for a 10 mile trip up to I70. The road was OK, but I did have second thoughts, and though it would turn to dirt around the next bend. We stopped at the I70 interchange for lunch, then headed into the Colorado hills.

White Rim Trail and the Green River, Canyonlands

Coming in from the west, I70 is relatively flat until Glenwood Springs. Then the speed limit drops to 50 mph as the road winds through Glenwood Canyon for some 15 miles. After that, it works its way up along the Colorado River, then ascends up to 10,600 feet at Vail Pass. Our 360 HP Cat diesel took this in stride, if slowly.

Now we've been doing this RV thing for well over 5 years, and we've never been shut out at finding someplace to stay for the night. Consuelo uses Delorme Street Atlas, and we have several add on files with locations of Walmarts, Elks Clubs, Flying J Truck Stops, repair shops and the like. We had looked up a couple Walmarts which we figured would be OK for the night. The first one was in Vail. We looked, and looked, and looked, but there was no (visible) Walmart in Vail. The next one was at Copper Mountain, and likewise, invisible. Darkness was falling along with the temperatures. We were getting desperate. We finally cruised through downtown Frisco, and noted a Public Parking lot, which even had a sign stating "Over Night Parking Permitted". To soothe our worried souls, we had a great dinned in a good restaurant, Vinny's, and slept well that night, though our little furnace ran for much of the night keeping us warm. Due to our slide awning problem, we kept the big slide in, which reduce the heat loss. The morning low was 19 degrees.

We rolled back onto I70, climbing to the entrance of the Eisenhower Tunnel at 11,150 feet, admiring the snow covered peaks above us and the snow covered hemlocks below us on the hillsides.We then started the 60 mile descent into Denver. Down, down, down. We are definitely over the hill now.

Sunset at the Flying J in North Platte

After the red cliffs in Moab, Glenwood Canyons, the foamy Colorado, the white peaks of the Colorado 14s, getting out onto the prairie east of Denver to North Platte, Nebraska was, ummm, boring. But it was warmer, and the fuel economy was much better. We stopped the night at a Flying J truck stop there, then rolled today to Lincoln, NE for a few nights.

The bad news as of the moment, our constant companion for 14 years, our faithful puppy Thumper, is in serious pain an almost unable to walk, and not eating fresh cooked chicken and rice. We're concerned.

Utah!

Us and Rich and Shana Robb at Temple Square

We finally left Arizona on April 3rd, bound for Utah. The plan included spending a couple nights at Bryce Canyon National Park, but the weatherman was forecasting snow, so we skipped southern Utah and headed straight into American Fork, where we (thought) we had reservations for a few days. When we called the campground from I15, not only did they not have our reservation, but they said that they don't allow RVs over 36 feet. They suggested another park in Provo, which was nearly full, but found us a space. Other RVers who might be reading this blog should stay away from American Campground in American Fork.

Lakeside RV in Provo is just a hop skip and jump away from Utah Lake State Park, which was not really open when we got there. Utah Lake is the largest freshwater lake in Utah, receiving mountain runoff from the Provo River, American Fork and Spanish Fork rivers.

The Mormon Temple on a snowy day

We woke un Sunday morning to an inch of snow on everything. Normally we would just stay out of snow's way, but we had made arrangements to meet up with my former boss from Mayo, Dr. Richard Robb and his wife Shana, as they have a second home here, and would show us around Utah. They only had Monday and Tuesday available, and the weather again turned foul, with a smattering of rain and hail pelting us on Monday. But we did get to see the Mormon Temple Square and had lunch high above the Mormon Temple. The Tabernacle, home of the famous choir, had unusually excellent acoustics, and a very impressive pipe organ. Rich and Shana also shared details about the church and their beliefs with us. On Tuesday, we went to their house in Highland, where Consuelo taught SHana and their daughter Rachelle to knit, and Rich and I played pool and watched the Red Sox. Turns out that Rachelle's husband Kevin is a rabid Red Sox fan.

On Wednesday, the weather cleared. We got some house work done, did a little walking around the campground.

On Thursday, I took off for the hills while Consuelo stayed home to work on her marketing project. I ventured into historic Provo, then up US 189 into the Wasatch Mountains. Fishermen were out testing the streams and Deer Creek Reservoir to see if the fish had thawed out enough to be hungry. Of those that I spoke with, only one had caught anything.

Park City skiers enjoying a fine spring day

After, I drove into Park City, a tourist trap at 7100 feet elevation. Park City was the home to the Nordic events for the 2002 Winter Olympics. I stopped to watch the skiers and snowboarders having their fun on the slopes. The same storm that kept us housebound on Tuesday had dropped two to four feet of fine powder on the slopes, and the valley folks had come up for some fine spring skiing.

Downtown Park City

After the slopes, I found the shopping district on historic Main Street, built in the style of a mining town, which it was, but far more colorful now. Art galleries, jewelry shops and clothing boutiques lined the narrow sidewalks. A few interesting sculptures brightened up the town. One sculpture of two boys sliding on their tubes, had snow piled up around it so it almost looked like they were in their design environment.

The Utah State Capitol in Salt Lake City

I left Park City, wandered down to I80, and thence down the hill into the valley in Salt Lake City. I located the Utah State Capitol building and took an hour or so to wander around it and explore the inside. The government was not in session, so only me and a few other tourists occupied the building. I was impressed with the grandiose design and execution of the capitol building. And it sat high on a hill offering a view of Salt Lake City.

Canyoneering

On the edge of the Grand Canyon

Another long span has developed since I last posted, and a lot of water passed over the dam. We got Bill and Pat moved into their new house in Mesa, with relatively few incidents. The moving company dis most of the work, but we helped some. They're having a great time finishing the move, putting up photos, fixing odds and ends. Just like newlyweds!

We cruised back to Tucson once we finished our time in Tempe. Our Pincher Creek friends Art and Sharon had moved there, and we wanted to visit, play golf, and eat some more. Art and I got our 3 times to play golf. Two of the courses were tough, but we kept under 100. The third course was a par 3, which I finally got into the hang of by about the 15th hole. We also worked on finishing their shed update.

Hummingbird in Saguaro National Park, Tucson

On our last night there, Consuelo and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary, a few days ahead of schedule, but we wanted to dine with friends. We had a great meal at Olive Garden, topped off with Asti Spumante.

We then left for northern Arizona, with a fast oil change for our motor home on the way out of town. We slipped through Phoenix and made our way to a casino in Camp Verde, AZ for an overnight stop.

Montezuma Castle National Monument

The next morning we explored Montezuma Castle, one of the Sinagua cliff dwellings along the Verde River. The site was misnamed by early settlers who thought that Montezuma had a summer home here in the hills, but history assures us that Montezuma never got this far north.

Leaving there, we rolled up through Flagstaff, headed NW to Tusayan, AZ, just outside the Grand Canyon National Park. We spent 3 nights there, wandering around the park, taking the free shuttle buses to and fro. I went out one night to try for sunset photos, but the sunset was blah. We tried to celebrate our real anniversary at El Tovar Lodge, but they were booked up.

Grand Canyon

The Grand Canyon is quite a place. My photos are but a suggestion of the immense size of the canyon, and the beautiful colors of the canyon walls. The canyon width is about 8-10 miles from the south rim area. It's about 4500 feet down to the river from Hopi Point (elevation 7008) on the south rim. The mules were making their journeys down to the river, but we didn't even consider trying it.

It was cold there, especially compared to Phoenix and points south. Overnight lows were down to the low 20s. We had all of our heating devices running, and we were cozy.

Red Rock mountain on US 89

On Tuesday, 3/30, we hooked up our bug and traveled out the East entrance to the Canyon, connecting with US 89 up to Page, AZ. This route traveled through wonderful scenery, close up views of the various layers that appeared in the Canyon, reds, pinks, greens, tans. There is so much of this stuff out here. I suppose that the locals don't notice it anymore, but it's quite a change from Maine!

We passed by Page, crossed the Glen Canyon Bridge and found our reserved campsite in the Wahweap Campground, inside the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. We have a great view of Lake Powell to the north from our campsite, just a mile or so south of the Utah border.

Glen Canyon Bridge and Dam

Today we visited the Visitor Center, located at the dam. Currently the water in Lake Powell is down about 80 feet, somewhat lower than normal for this time of year. Also, the snowpack is somewhat less than average, meaning that the lake won't be filling this year. Unusual, considering all the rain that fell in Arizona this winter (but not here).

We were surprised by the warmth when we arrived here. I knew that the temperatures at the Colorado River were higher at the Grand Canyon (by 20-30 degrees!) but that was conceptual. When we left the south rim, it was a relatively warm day, with temps around 60 degrees. But when we arrived in Page, it was 82, with an overnight low last night of 57. Back to shorts!

Today has been quite windy, with gusts up into the 45 mph range. Sand and dust have been blowing into everything... our car, my camera, our hair and Thumper's fur. Rain and perhaps snow are coming this way, and cooler temperatures. Such is the environment for travelers like us.

The Ides of March

Us and the Canadians in Yuma

Consuelo and I search all through our motor home for our togas to celebrate the Ides, but alas, they were not to be found. Instead, we'll wear our jeans and shorts to celebrate this famous Roman feast day. Not that we need another feast day. We've feasted enough of late. It always seems that when we get together with our rowdy friends, we add a few pounds onto the frame. It seems that we've been doing so since the first of January.

Arts and Crafts in Tubac

February was a short month. It usually is, but our faster than ever activities cut it to what seemed 12 days. We spent the first week in Yuma, playing some golf and wrapping up our activities there. Our campsite benefactors, Rusty and Mary Ann returned from Mexico, and we partied with them a bit. Then we cruised over to Tucson for a very brief week playing with Curt and Beth Kraft, who escape Rochester every year to SE Arizona. Curt and I played golf for 3 days, we tripped to Tubac for the Art Festival, and we had a wonderful Valentines day dinner with other friends of theirs.

The sewing sisters

We then journeyed up to Fountain Hills where Consuelo and the sewing sisters had their annual sewing camp in Arizona. Lots of cutting, stitching, patterning, and fitting was done, along with comfy food. The ladies did an outing to the Art Museum to celebrate Deb Wilkinson's birthday (how many years is that, Deb?) and Denny Robertson and I hiked out to the Dixie Mine, a round trip of some 6 miles. One night everybody came to our little house for dinner, where I served up salmon stuffed with bleu cheese, bacon and pears, and Ming's pork fried rice.

Consuelo selling garlic graters

After the sewing camp ended, we walked through "The Great Fair", another art event in Fountain Hills with Denny and Andrea. At one point, Denny decided to buy some garlic graters from a man who was alone in his booth. While the man wrote up Denny's order, Consuelo took over pitching the product to the folks walking by. She was pretty good at it, too.

Four Peaks from McDowell Mountain Park

We parked our house in McDowell Mountain Regional Park while we visited Fountain Hills. This large Maricopa County park (actually in Scottsdale) hosts about 95 large wonderful campsites, miles of trails for hikers, trail bikes, or horses. Coyote bands roam the area, yelling to each other at night. We might have extended our stay there, but they have a 2 week limit unless they are full, and they had folks waiting in overflow every night soon after we arrived.

Bill and Pat's new house

Soon after we arrived in Fountain Hills, my brother Bill began moving from their modular home in Apache Junction to a real house in Mesa. He and Pat have decided to abandon Massachusetts as a summer retreat and spend full time in Arizona. Prior to the move, after they got the keys to the new house, I helped them get some things ready to move and packed a load of things over to the new house. Logistics required scheduling, as they needed to have the ceilings painted and tile laid in the kitchen before they could completely move in. I helped some by rehanging the ceiling fans, installing a new stove and oven, repairing one miswired outlet, and odds and ends that I could help with. The final move was completed on March 10th, the evening of which we celebrated with pizza in the new house. I think they'll be very happy there, except perhaps for the days when they need to vacuum and realize how much more square footage they have.
We had departed McDowell Park on March 1st, arriving at the Elks Lodge in Tempe. It is a handy location to get to places in the city. For example, one of our sling chairs broke and it was a short haul over to Phoenix to get it repaired. Shopping is all around us.

In the midst of this, we've been refinancing our house in Maine, a long distance event that is proceeding quite nicely. Consuelo has been doing marketing for Oregon Woodworkers online, also proceeding quite nicely. And lately I've been fighting with a nasty bug my computer has of just hanging in the middle of a project, with no clear success yet. Very annoying.

We've started to fill in the blank spaces in the calendar between now and when we arrive back in Maine in mid May. Stops along the way include Tucson for another week, Grand Canyon, Salt Lake City, Arches National Park, Rochester, Croton Point NY, and Ipswich. And of course, a bunch of gas stations and Walmarts.

Cruising through January

Consuelo's Gourd Project

January has been a busy month for us in Yuma. Our friends from Pincher Creek Canada arrived, and that alone added to our calendar, including occasional bike rides, some golf, dinners out with a movie (It's Complicated), happy hours, progressive dinners, Mary's good cookin', and various projects.

The friends are Ken and Mary Clinton and Art and Sharon Bonertz. Sharon and Mary are sisters. We've also gotten to know some other Pincher Cretians who are staying here, Leslie and Gerry Musa, and met folks from all over.

Consuelo, Sharon and Mary participated in a gourd decorating project. Consuelo's is shown above. It came out pretty nice, I think.

The bicycle rack that Art built in Canada for Consuelo's bike developed a list, and Art wanted to correct it. We pulled the trailer hitch off the motorhome, got some heavier bolts and reattached it. It's now straight. That took most of a day.

Art Bonertz strumming

Music has been touched as a topic. Art Bonertz brought his guitar along, and Ken Clinton is practicing steadily on his new electric guitar. I got my old buzzing ukulele out and rediscovered a few standard chords, but my memory is a sieve with regard to song lyrics. None of us has felt comfortable enough to get together and play at the same time, so maybe we'll skate by some bad music. Consuelo was encourage to enter the Karaoke Contest (with a $1000 prize to the winner) but the contest ends long after we depart Yuma, so that was sufficient for her to say no.

Classy slippers

Besides, Consuelo has been busy enough with other projects. She generated a slipper knitting class with 9 students, and they all made their way through to the felting process. Some students only managed to get one slipper made, and they are now out searching for Cinderella, or hopping around on cold mornings.

Speaking of cold mornings, the weather has been pretty good here. We did have a couple days of rain and hefty winds, highly unusual for this area. Record rainfalls were recorded, close to 2 inches on one day, which is 1/2 of Yuma's average annual amount. Many folks reported minor leaks, including us, and a slide awning or two was damaged, and some lighter than air plastic lawn chairs departed for places unknown. We're now waiting to see if the desert blossoms, as often occurs after a rain.

Tissues and Bananas Still Life

Meanwhile, I've been pursuing my photographic hobby. I acquired a new strobe flash for my camera, and have been experimenting (or, studying) its use and operation. Various objects have found themselves exposed on our tabletop, then subjected to bright lights. Some of the pictures, like the red gourd, look pretty nice. Bananas and a tissue box weren't so pleasing, but they were well lit. I'll be moving into portrait work next.

Flashy golf tees

I've also been leading two meetings a week for other campers in the park. One is a computer group, where we mostly help newbies learn how to use email and web browsers. The second is a photo discussion group, which led to a request for a presentation from a neighboring RV park. I expect this can develop into a photo seminar for amateurs in the future.

Does a Ford moo?

Ken Clinton's truck got horny one morning, as Art decorated his hood with some real Texas flair. Ken declined to take up the spurs, though, and de-horned the big hauler.

On to February!

Happy Holidays to all!

OK, here's a test for those of you that read this blog:

Which one is the real picture of where we're parked for Christmas?


















OK, I know, that was too easy. Anybody that know us also knows that we think snow is a 4 letter word.

The snow picture was given to me by our neighbor Doug Spriggs. He specializes in such photos, as he and his wife usually work a T-shirt booth at car shows, where they photoshop pictures of peoples cars into nice backgrounds and print them up on transfers and put them on T-shirts. I've seen some of his work, and it's very nice.

So we're parked in Yuma, AZ, where it never (never say never) snows. More likely is a weather event such as we had yesterday, 40-50 mph winds laden with sand and dust, blowing up almost instantly as a cold front passes across the desert. Awnings were flapping, loose objects like do0r mats and wash buckets were blowing around the park, and any whirlygigs were zooming along or scurrying along the desert between the RV sites. Waves splashed in the swimming pool, and we nearly got out our surfboards!

But today it has calmed down, temp at 8:00 AM is a cool 46, and the sun is coming up over my right shoulder. Time for us to get our last minute stuff done for Christmas. Only one package remains to be shipped east, one that includes some sewing, probably won't make it out until next week.

We got volunteered to decorate the table for Christmas dinner here in the RV park. Consulo has been exercising her creative muscles, and we found some pretty cheap markdowns yesterday to do the job. I'm making photo place cards with pictures of folks RVs to put on the table, and those are nearly done. We still have some cooking to do, as the park is providing ham and turkey, and the rest is pot luck. I'll be making a cherry pie, Consuleo is making flan.

We've been busy since my last post. We got ourselves organized to show photos and slippers at a couple craft shows/flea markets here. I think our display looked pretty god, but we only sold 2 pair of slippers. We're booked for one more show in January so far.

I also offered to coordinate a "Computer Club" in the park, basically a get together to chat about problems and issues around computers. We've solved a couple problems for people, and we'll continue that into January. I've also volunteered to do a photo club in January, as many of the computer issues surround photo topics.

I got word yesterday that an article & photos I submitted to Escapees Magazine have been accepted into their publication mix for 2010.

On Monday 12/28 we're going to Apache Junction, AZ, some 4 hours away, by car (only) to visit my brother for a few days. We're also scheduled to have lunch with Andrea Mackie and Denny Robertson on Wednesday, as we return.