A Month in Yuma, Part II

We closed our last episode on February 14^th, roughly in the middle of a month long stay in Yuma, Arizona. We are staying at the Caravan Oasis RV Resort in the Foothills area of Yuma, east of the main part of the city.

Saturday, February 15^th, we went out for lunch with the Bullocks and the Babcocks to one of the little taco stands that are scattered around the Foothills area. Since this whole area is in the county jurisdiction, they only have to meet the basic health and safety regulations so there are all kinds of little businesses that spring up on vacant lots along the main streets. This particular street taco place had excellent reviews, better than most Mexican restaurants, so we decided to go there. They had carne, fish, shrimp and chicken tacos, all rolled street style, and they were relatively inexpensive. I had a couple of carne (beef) tacos that were out of this world. I had one of the fish tacos that was good, but I liked the beef better. Jackie had fish and some of the others of our group had the shrimp. Nobody had a complaint, and a couple of us even got seconds.

While we were eating a young family came into the stand and one of the kids, a boy of maybe eight or nine, had two bottles of water with lemons taped to them.  Jackie asked him what they were and he said he was starting a new business, a modern version of the lemonade stand,  He said they were do it yourself lemonade kits.  We all thought this was funny as hell and Jackie asked him how much they were.  He said they were a dollar, so Jackie bought one and Suzie bought the other.  The kid sold out his entire inventory in less than a minute.  If I live long enough I expect to see this kid on TV one day as the next big entrapaouner.  

After our lunch we went back to the coach and I started getting set up for our “jam session” music party tonight. Last week we attended an impromptu jam session by a bunch of the Canadian folks who are staying here at the resort, all guitar players and singers. I told them that I would set up my sound equipment on Saturday and they could come, sing some karaoke, play some music and just have fun. I got everything set up and we finally started the music about 4:00. It was pretty warm, high 80's, but we

still had a big group show up to play and watch. We had four musicians and a couple others who didn't play, but did sing. We played and sang until about 8:00 with a mix of karaoke, guitar playing, guitar with karaoke, and every combination in between. It was a really fun night and everyone seemed to have a great time.

Sunday, February 16^th, we were up and out of the house at 8:00 a.m, to do some geocaching. We were finally going to get out on the Barry Goldwater Military Range south of the foothills to do some desert caching. We took our Jeep with Ray and Suzie, since their car wouldn't do well in the desert, and Peggy and Vernon followed in their Jeep. We probably drove about twenty miles out into the range, stopping at caches along the way. We started to drive to the Fortuna Mine, an old abandoned turn of the century gold mine which is in the middle of the range, but about a mile or two from the mine the “road” got a little too rough for our Jeep, so we turned around. We had been there about five years ago when we had an older Jeep, but none of the rest of our group had been.

We had a great caching day, getting 23 finds before noon, even with the side trip to the mine. We finally decided that we had enough, and headed out of the range area back to civilization. On the way out we spotted a rattlesnake crossing the dirt road and stopped to take some pictures.  From the safety of the car, I might add.  He wasn't real big, maybe four foot or so, but he was plenty big enough to put the hurt on you.  Surprisingly, despite doing a lot of caching in the desert and in wooded areas, this is the first time since we started caching that we have seen a snake of any kind.  Does sort of reinforce our desire to keep in the lookout though.  

We stopped for lunch at a chicken restaurant where Jackie and Ray both had chicken livers. I am not a big fan of that, but I had a great hamburger. Susie just had chicken tenders. The food was very good and very reasonable. The place is called Chicken on the Run and is on the south frontage road of I-8, between Fortuna Road and Foothills Boulevard.

After lunch we went back to the coach and Jackie started cooking for the big group dinner we planned for tonight. She made both chicken enchiladas and her relleno casserole, and Judi made another taquito dish. We had us, the Babcocks, Bullocks and McKays, as well as Peggy's grandson Troy and his new wife Makayla. Troy is the Marine stationed at Yuma Marine Corps Air Station. We had cocktails first and then a wonderful dinner. The night stayed very comfortable until about 8:00 when we finally cleared everything out and everybody went back to their own places. A very nice day and evening with friends, but tiring.

Monday, February 17^th, President's Day, yet another February holiday. We went out after lunch to do our laundry, it had been nearly three weeks since the last time. It took the bulk of the afternoon after which we returned to the coach. We had cocktails with the group at 5:00 and then had another nice group dinner with the eight of us, enjoying another spectacular Arizona evening. Judi and Peggy did most of the cooking tonight, with Peggy making Jackie's recipe for crunchy Chinese casserole. Peggy's version tasted just like Jackie's and was very good. Judi also had a Chinese themed dish and we had a great dinner. Again the night was so nice we stayed outside and talked until a little after 8:00 when everyone went back to their own places.

Tuesday was a stay at home day. Jackie and the other women spent a couple hours in the afternoon doing some crafts out on the patio. I did some chores around the coach, including doing our income taxes for last year. At about 5:00 our little gang of eight met for cocktai

ls and then partook of an excellent meal – again! This time we had spaghetti and meatballs. Ray cooked the sauce, we provided the meatballs, Peggy did the pasta and salad. We had an excellent time and stayed out enjoying the nice evening and the company until around 8:00 when everyone went back to their own coaches for the rest of the night.  The picture is just one of the many great Arizona sunsets we enjoyed during this stay.

Wednesday, February 19^th, we left the coach about 10:30 or so and drove back down to Algodones, Mexico. As soon as we got across the border I went to our eye doctor and got my examination and ordered new lenses for my glasses. Once we had that done we did a little shopping and then met Ray and Suzie and Judi and Clark at one of the Mexican restaurants in town. We had a great lunch and listened to a pretty decent entertainer while we ate.

After lunch Ray and Clark went back across the border to do some stuff at home. I headed out to find the one geocache in Algodones that we hadn't yet found and the girls went shopping. I picked up my glasses around 2:00 and then shopped for a little while myself. We got back into line about 3:00 and it took just over an hour to get back into the States. It was a pretty busy day in Algodones. Once we got back home we met with the group for cocktails around 5:00. We stayed out and talked until about 7:00 when everyone went back to their own coaches for the night.

Thursday, February 20^th, we left the coach around 10:00 or so with the Bullocks to do some geocaching. We stayed in the general area of the Foothills and managed to get thirteen new finds, along with one DNF, in the course of a few hours. I am sad to say that the DNF was one we had DNFed last year about this same time. This time eight eyes couldn't locate it, although someone else had found it just a few days earlier. Curses! After caching we stopped at the same little outdoor taco stand that we ate at a few days back. Again, the tacos were wonderful!

The group met for cocktails about 5:00 and again had a great evening meal outside. Tonight everyone cooked up some chicken. I did ours on the BBQ and it was great. A couple of people cooked up some of the asparagus we had bought in Mexico on Wednesday and Peggy made some great specialty rice that had cranberries and orange peel in it. Yum! I have to say this group does know how to eat well. We went in a little earlier tonight, around 7:30, because it was a little cooler tonight.

Friday, February 21^st, Jackie, Peggy and Judi left the coach about 9:30 or so for another morning of shopping in Mexico. I stayed at home and did some more chores around the coach. They returned mid afternoon and we relaxed for the rest of the afternoon. About 5:00 we, the Babcocks and the McKays left the RV park and drove into town to the Yuma Elks Lodge for dinner. We have been so busy this trip that this was our first visit to the lodge and we are just about ready to leave town. Peggy and Vernon stayed home because their grandkids Troy and Makayla were coming over to visit.

We had to wait about 20 minutes for a table so we had some cocktails in the bar. This will be the last time we visit this lodge in this building. The big Yuma Regional Medical Center across the street has bought the lodge land and building and will be tearing it down soon. The lodge has bought another building a mile or so south of the current lodge and will be moving into it sometime in April.

We finally got our table and had dinner. Tonight was their all you can eat fish fry, but they also have a full menu and no one ate the buffet. I had a ground round steak, Clark had a rib eye, Suzie had chicken and the other three all had liver. I tasted the liver and it was excellent, I wish I had got it, although my steak was good too. After dinner we stopped in the cocktail lounge for a little bit because they had karaoke going. I did two songs in a fairly short rotation and then we headed back to the RV park, getting home around 9:00. We watched TV for a little while then went off to bed.

Saturday, February 22^nd, we left the coach about 10:30 and drove downtown for a street fair that was supposed to be going on this weekend. There wasn't anything going on when we got there, so we must have misread the article in the paper. We had Ray and Suzie with us and Peggy and Vernon had followed in their car. When we found there was nothing going on downtown we drove over to the Elks lodge to look at their annual parking lot sale. We spent about 20 minutes there, but found nothing but junk, so no one bought anything. We all decided to go to lunch at Chicken on the Run again, so we drove back out to the foothills for lunch. As with the last time, the food was all pretty good.

After lunch Jackie and I drove to Walmart while Ray and Suzie went back to the RV park with the Bullocks. We got back home from shopping about 3:00 and I started making up a big pot of chili for dinner. I was making enough to feed our group, plus the Bullock's grandkids, so that made ten to feed. About 5:00 we had cocktails and about 6:30 dinner was served. Vernon made some cornbread to go with the chili and we had a great meal. After dinner we had some drinks and chatted until about 8:30 when everyone headed in for the night.

Sunday we relaxed with the Sunday paper and decided this would be a stay at home day. Mostly I wanted to watch the Daytona 500, the first NASCAR race of the season. I actually ended up watching the 2013 race during the afternoon because the race in Daytona was delayed by rain after only eighty some laps. We had cocktails with the group at 5:00 and dinner around 6:30 or so. Judi did the cooking tonight, making a goulash that was pretty good. We also had a salad and some garlic bread. This group does pretty well at keeping everyone fed.

We stayed out and talked until about 7:30 or so before going in our coach. By the time we got inside today's race had finally restarted after a six hour delay so I got to watch most of this year's race too. The race finally ended at 9:00 and we watched a little regular TV before heading off to bed.

Monday, February 24^th, Jackie and I left the coach after lunch to go do some geocaching. We were by ourselves as everyone else had other things to do today. We stayed out about three and a half hours or so and ended up with sixteen new finds, along with one DNF and one cache we found but couldn't get the container open, so we couldn't sign the log. That one was really tricky with a big PVC container with a hole in the bottom and you had to shake it around to try and get the key for the top of the container to fall out the hole. I shook and jerked it around for 15 minutes and finally said the Hell with it.

After caching we went back to the coach and had happy hour with the group. We also had dinner outside with everyone again, this time finishing up all the leftovers from the various meals we have had the last few days. Everyone is leaving in a couple days, so we were trying to clean out the fridges. We stayed out until about 7:30, then went in and watched TV until bedtime.

Tuesday, February 25^th, I spent several hours today putting things away and cleaning up around the outside of the coach, all in preparation for moving day tomorrow. I finally got everything put away about 3:00 and I relaxed for a while. About 5:00 we left the RV park with our entire group and headed into Yuma to the Texas Roadhouse for Ray's birthday. We were going to go back to the Outback for Ray's birthday like we did for mine a few weeks back, but yesterday the Outback suddenly closed up. No explanation and, according to the local paper, a complete surprise to even the employees.

There were ten of us for dinner, Peggy's grandkids came too, and we got seated right away. The food at Texas is OK, but not nearly as good as what the Outback used to serve. Not sure why they folded up. We had a good dinner and left the restaurant a little before seven. We went home and spent the rest of the evening relaxed with the TV.

Wednesday, February 26^th, moving day again. Today is the day our big group is breaking up after a month together here in Yuma. Clark and Judi headed out this morning for home in Ventura County. At first it looked like they might be delayed because their slide would not come in. Clark, ever the engineer, broke out the schematics and found the electrical problem and was able to get the slide to come in. We and Peggy and Vernon are heading for Casa Grande, Arizona, about 170 miles east. The Babcocks are staying at Caravan Oasis one more night, then moving west about 20 miles to the Pilot Knob RV Resort, just across the border in California. They want to stay in the area for at least two more weeks because they are doing some chelation therapy down in Mexico and they want at least two more weeks of treatment.

We got out about 9:30 and started east on Interstate 8 towards Casa Grande. Since our Jeep is still not fixed and towable, Jackie had to drive the car behind me. The trip was pretty uneventful and we arrived in Casa Grande just before 1:00 p.m., just a couple minutes behind the Bullocks. We got settled into our spot and I spent an hour or two getting set up. We are not right next door to Peggy and Vernon, but there is only one spot between us, so pretty close. We will both be here for two weeks before moving on to Camp Verde, Arizona.

We had cocktails with Peggy and Vernon about 5:00 and then Peggy made dinner in their coach. It was just the four of us, so it was less hectic than when eight or ten of us are trying to put together a dinner. She made beef and potatoes, and broccoli and we had a very nice dinner. We finally went back to our place about 8:30 and watched TV until bedtime.

Although it has not been quite two weeks since our last posting, this move seems like a good point to close this chapter and get it published. We will probably publish next in two weeks when we make the next move. Until the next episode remember the words of the Greek philosopher, Epictetus. “He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has.” See ya soon.