Hello again, welcome back. Our last
chapter concluded on April 5th, Easter Sunday, the third
day of our two week stay in Goodyear, Arizona visiting family.
Monday, I was up early, again taking the car to the local Jeep dealer
to have the A/C looked. After a three hour wait the service writer
told me that the problem was the condenser, again! This makes the
seventh time since 2009 that the condenser has gone out in this car.
They will order the part and I have to come back on Thursday to get
it fixed.
After I got home we drove over to my
brother Ken's house, just a half mile away, to visit. We went out
with them, in their air conditioned truck, to visit the site of a new
home they are having built. The new place is only a half mile from
the old, but they are going in on a deal with Ken's wife Susan's
mother on a big, multi-generational house. They took us through the
model and it is quite unique. One side of the downstairs has a huge
kitchen, dining and family room, which is the “common area” of
the house. On the other side is an apartment with a full bath,
bedroom and living room. The apartment has it's own outside
entrance, and entrance from the garage, as well as a door into the
common area. The upstairs is the second living area, also with a
huge master bedroom and bath, another sitting room, and two smaller
bedrooms, with a smaller bath for the two little bedrooms. Ken and
Susan are going to live upstairs, her mom in the apartment and they
will share the common area. It is quite an interesting concept.
This way they can take care of her mom, who is getting older and has
some health issues, but still have a pretty much private living area.
After we looked at the model we looked at their house under
construction, which is currently just a fresh concrete slab. They
figure it will be done by mid summer. They are selling their current
house and so is Susan's mom, then they will share the costs of the
new place.
After looking at their house we went
out and did a few geocaches. We got Ken and Susan started in caching
about five years ago and they really took to the hobby. We got three
caches before going to the Texas Roadhouse for dinner. We had a very
nice dinner and then went back to our coach and sat and talked until
about 9:30 when Ken and Susan headed back home.
Tuesday, April 7th, I was up
early and on my way to an “old timers” breakfast with guys from
the Sheriff's Office. I have been reading about the monthly old
farts breakfasts for retired MCSO guys for years, but this was the
first time we were actually in the area when one of them was
scheduled. They have several, one for east side guys, one for west
side, one for downtown, and several out of town for guys who have
retired to the mountains. Today's was the downtown group. I worked
downtown, at the main Sheriff's Office, for most of the last half of
my career, so it was also the most appropriate.
The breakfast was at 35th
and Northern, about 15 miles northeast of the RV park, in north
central Phoenix, and I allowed myself 45 minutes to get there. I
misjudged rush hour traffic and it took me 55 minutes to get there.
I was a little disappointed that there were only three other guys at
this morning gathering. One was Dick Edwards, who was a captain at
the same time I was. We never worked together, but I knew him well
because we were in the same peer group. He retired about five years
before I did. Also there was Harry Steckler, a retired sergeant who
worked in the jail most of his career. Most of the time I knew him
he was in charge of transportation, that is, the moving of prisoners
from the jail to court. When I was a detective working downtown we
were frequently called on to help with court transport when they had
a busy court schedule, so I worked a lot with Harry. The third
person was Dick's son, a retired Department of Public Safety officer
who I only knew slightly.
We had a good breakfast, although not
surprisingly, I had to tell the guys my name since I hadn't seen any
of them in over twenty years. We had a lot of fun stories and I can
see how these monthly breakfasts could be a lot of fun. I wish we
were around for more. After breakfast I went back to the RV park,
the trip back only taking 30 minutes.
After lunch we went out to run some
errands. Jackie got a haircut and we stopped at Walmart for some
supplies before heading back to the coach. We spent the rest of the
day working and playing around the coach.
Wednesday, April 8th, before
we even had coffee I took Jackie to a LabCorp location in Goodyear so
she could get a blood test. Back in January our doctor in Indio
ordered another test in three months to check Jackie's elevated
cholesterol numbers. Hopefully they will have fallen back to closer
to normal range now. We had our morning coffee after we got back and
left the coach about 11:30 for a day of exploring. We drove into
Phoenix and had lunch at Garcia's Mexican restaurant on 35th
Avenue, not too far from downtown. Back when I was working in
Downtown Phoenix I used to come here a lot for lunch. The food was
very good and the place hasn't changed a bit in twenty years.
After lunch we drove to the State
Fairgrounds to go to the Maricopa County Fair. As long as I lived in
Phoenix I never went to the County Fair. We used to go to the State
Fair all the time, held at the same location, but the State Fair is
much bigger. Although parking was eight dollars, there was no
admission charge for the fair today, the opening day. We spent the
next three hours walking around, looking at exhibits and the various
animals. We spent a lot of time with the sheep, goats, chickens and
bunnies. Most of the animals are shown by kids in 4-H or FFA
programs and they really get into the animal husbandry vibe. We had
a great time, and the weather was perfect for an afternoon at the
fair.
Thursday, April 9th, I took
the car back to the Jeep dealer at 7:30 to get the A/C fixed. Since
they were going to have the car for most of the day I had the
dealer's shuttle bring me back to the coach. After lunch I did some
of the chores I needed to do, including the biggie, fixing the front
stairs. It actually took me less time to put the new motor on than
it did to take the old one off. I got everything put into place and
plugged in the motor, and it worked right the first time. It is also
a lot quieter now than it had been. Yea, big job done. I also did a
couple of other chores around the house, as did Jackie since we are
stranded with no wheels.
I got a call from the dealer about 3:30
that they haven't been able to start on the car yet because the
extended warranty people had not yet authorized the repair. The
service guy told me that he was told that the engine size shown on
the contract was not the same as my actual engine. He said that the
contract said 5.9 when it was actually a 3.0. He said that the
contract agent had to contact Good Sam to make sure that everything
was on the up and up with the contract before he could authorize the
repair. He also said the Good Sam office was closed for the day.
They will have to keep the car overnight. I reviewed the contract
papers, and there is a “5.9” listed next to the car description,
I had no idea that was supposed to be the engine size. The contract
does list the car as a diesel, and it has the VIN number of the car,
which should be the primary identifier. I don't think there will be
a problem with a minor clerical error on a contract we have had for
five years on the same car, but we have to wait until morning. We
had dinner and then watched TV until bedtime.
Friday, April 10th, we had a
quiet morning, especially since we were car-less and couldn't go
anywhere. About 1:30 the dealer called and said the car was done.
The extended warranty folks had approved the repair, apparently not
concerned about the clerical error, and I only had to pay the $250
deductible. It took about 45 minutes for the shuttle from the dealer
to get to us and get us back, but once we were back it took five
minutes to bail the car out and we were on the road again, with AIR!
Yea! Since we were close by, we decided to do our Costco run today.
We spent an hour at Costco before heading back to the coach.
We had dinner around 6:00 and Ken came
over for a visit around 6:45. Susan was still working, so it was
just Ken. We sat and talked until around 9:00 when Ken left to go
home. We watched a little TV and then headed off to bed.
Saturday, April 11th, we
left the coach after lunch to do some shopping and geocaching. We
drove up to the big mall on Bell Road in Glendale first because there
was a Bed, Bath and Beyond store up there was was supposed to have a
kitchen rug that Jackie wanted. It turned out they didn't have the
rug in stock. We did a few geocaches up along the Bell Road area and
a few more as we worked our way back south and west towards Goodyear.
We ended up with eight new finds on the day with no DNFs. We made a
couple of other shopping stops and Jackie found a rug to her liking
at Big Lots. The last stop was Walmart and then we headed back to
the coach for the rest of the night.
Sunday, April 12th, we had
the normal Sunday paper and coffee start for the day. We had planned
to go over to my daughter Tye's house in Glendale this afternoon to
see the family, but late in the morning Tye called and said she
wasn't feeling well and today would not be a good day to visit.
Suddenly we had the day free, so we went out to lunch at a Mexican
place called Macayo's in Goodyear. We had a coupon for two for one
entrees that was due to expire, so we used it.
Historically, as I was growing up in
the Phoenix area, there were two competing families with restaurant
chains vying for Mexican food dominance, Garcia's and Macayo's. I
have always preferred Garcia's and today reinforced that opinion. My
food was OK, nothing bad, nothing spectacular. I had the usual combo
of chili relleno, taco and enchilada. Jackie had one of the
“signature” dishes, a chicken stuffed poblamo pepper. Sounded
good, but the execution was terrible. The whole thing was
overcooked, the breading almost tasted burned, and the chicken was
dry and tough. Had it not been free anyway we have complained and
asked for it free. The service was also marginal with the server
paying very little attention to the table. Compared to Garcia's,
where we ate a few days back, Macayo's was terrible.
After lunch we set out to do some
caching in the west valley area. We ended up with a dozen new finds
and no DNFs, a pretty good afternoon. After caching we headed home
and relaxed with the TV until bedtime. We didn't have any dinner
because of the late lunch. While not especially good, it was
filling.
Monday, April 13th, we left
the RV park around 11:30 and drove to north-central Phoenix to spend
some time with my son, Roy Jr. Roy is working as an apprentice land
surveyor, but had called last night to let me know that he had the
day off since they had no jobs working. We picked him up at his
condo and went out to lunch first. We stopped at Jason's Deli, a
great sandwich shop with stores all over the U.S. I especially like
it because it is one of the only places I can get a reasonably
authentic mufaletta sandwich. I grew to love mufalettas a couple
years ago when we spent a couple weeks in Louisiana. I even got Roy
to try one and he liked it too.
After lunch we went out to do some
geocaching. We sort of got Roy interested in geocaching a couple of
years ago, but he never really did very much of it. Recently we had
noticed that his stats were going up and he was out finding a few
caches. It turns out that his job as a land surveyor takes him out
in the country and on vacant land a lot, and that's where geocaches
are hidden. He said it was kind of natural that he would check his
phone when he was out on a job and see if there are any caches close
by to grab. We cached for a couple hours up in the north Phoenix
area and ended up with ten new finds.
We dropped Roy off at his condo about
3:30 and drove home for a while. We managed to beat the rush hour
traffic headed west, so it didn't take too long. We rested for an
hour or so, fed the cats and had a cocktail and then headed over to
Ken and Susan's house for dinner. Susan made some chicken enchiladas
that were very tasty. We had dinner and talked for a while, and then
we all came back over to our coach because Ken wanted to see some of
the computer programs I use for trip planning. I spent a half hour
or so with them, going over my basic planning process. We then sat
and talked until about 9:00 when they left and went home. We watched
a little TV and then headed off to bed.
Tuesday, April 14th, we left
the coach about 10:00 a.m. and drove down to Tucson for the day. We
went down there to visit with my oldest granddaughter Crystal and her
newest baby, Zoe. Zoe currently holds the office of youngest great
grandchild, but Crysta
The drive to Tucson was about 146 miles
from our spot in Goodyear, but only took a little over two hours
because it was nearly all freeway. We stopped at a Denny's for lunch
and then went to visit Crystal. She and her boyfriend and the baby
are staying with Crystal's dad at a house in South Tucson. We spent
about three hours playing with the baby and talking to Crystal and
the others staying in the house. The baby is very happy and
outgoing, not being at all shy with either Jackie or I.
We stayed until about 4:00 when
Crystal's dad, James, came home from work. I had not seen James
since he and my daughter Tye split up over 20 years ago. We chatted
for a bit and then we were back on the road for the two hour drive
home. It was a very nice visit and we took lots of pictures. Zoe is
number four great grand and, as I said, number five is coming soon.
After we got home we relaxed with the TV until bedtime.
Wednesday, April 15th, Happy
Birthday to our cat Smokey who is 15 today. His birthday is actually
an approximation since we got him in early June of 2000 as a feral
kitten. He appeared to be about five or six weeks old when we got
him, so we picked April 15th because it was close and easy
to remember. Happy tax day also, although we filed early and have
already spent our return paying off the car. Yea!
We went out after lunch to do our
laundry in Avondale. After laundry we stopped at the nearby Camping
World store to pick up a few things we needed for the coach. We went
back to the RV park, unloaded our laundry and stuff and then got back
in the car about 5:00 and headed to Glendale to spend some time with
my daughter Tye and her family. My granddaughter Ashley and her
daughter Mackenzie were also going to be there. We stopped on the
way and picked up some pizza since we were going to be there over
dinner. We had a great couple hours playing with Mackenzie and
visiting with Tye, Frank and Jordan, my youngest granddaughter, who
is now 15. Ashley just graduated from her LPN school and passed her
State license boards. We also met Ashley's boyfriend, who is also an
LPN. We took a bunch of pictures and left about 7:30, headed home
and then relaxed for the rest of the night.
We did go out briefly to take a couple
pictures of Ken and Susan's new house. The next time
we are back in this area they are likely to be living there. We also
went to Walmart for some supplies. After that we went back to the
coach, had dinner and relaxed. Ken and Susan did come over for about
a half hour around 9:00 or so. They had been doing some training with
the Arizona Rangers group they belong to, but still wanted to come by
and at least say goodbye.
Friday, April 17th, travel
day. We were packed up and headed out of the RV park by about 10:00.
We made a stop for fuel and then started the trip north to Camp
Verde, Arizona. It was a little over a hundred miles and it went by
smoothly with us arriving at the RV resort around 12:30. This is one
of our membership resorts with Western Horizons, in fact it is our
“home” resort, where we first signed up. We got the last 50 amp
site and got parked and hooked up in a couple of hours. We thought
we might meet with my brother Dennis, who lives in nearby Cottonwood,
but Friday is a late night at the bank he manages in Sedona, so I
just told him to come by tomorrow for dinner. We spent the rest of
the day relaxing around the coach.
Saturday, April 18th, we
went out after lunch to do some geocaching. We have cached this area
quite a bit in the past, so it is not unusual to have to drive eight
or ten miles for some new caches. In addition, many of the caches
are out on remote desert dirt roads, so it takes a while between
caches. Nonetheless, in about three hours we got seven new finds,
including one cache that we had DNFed two years ago but found today.
After caching we went back home and
relaxed for a while. At 5:00 we went outside and enjoyed cocktails.
Our friends Jim and Pat Goetzinger are also here in the park, having
been here since mid-week, and they came over and joined us for
drinks. About 6:00 my brother Dennis arrived. Dennis has lived in
cottonwood for over 30 years and is in the banking business. He
works now as the manager for a bank in Sedona. He is also active in
the Elks organization, which is what he was doing today. He was
doing training for new Elks officers in the Northern part of Arizona.
We sat and chatted for a while. Jim
and Pat had met Dennis on a previous visit to Camp Verde, so they
stayed for a while. About 7:00 we went into the coach and the three
of us had a nice pot roast dinner that had been cooking in the crock
pot all day. After dinner we sat and talked until about 10:00 when
Dennis left to head home. We watched a little TV and then went to
bed.
Sunday, April 19th, I went
out for the Sunday paper when I got up and we enjoyed the morning
with coffee and the paper. Dennis came over around 12:30 and we left
in our car and drove into Camp Verde for breakfast at the Verde Cafe.
We have been to this little breakfast and lunch place several times
before and the food is always good. After breakfast we set out to do
some geocaching. Dennis is actually the one who first told us about
geocaching. We didn't get started until about a year after he first
talked to us about it, but it was his introduction that got us
interested. Now he has pretty much stopped caching because he has so
much else going on in his life, but he still enjoys going out with us
when we are up here caching.
As I said earlier, we have to go out in
the boonies now to find caches that are new to us, so that's where we
went, out in the Forest Service land about ten miles south of Camp
Verde. We had a terrible day of caching, at least as far as finding
caches. Our first three tries were DNFs. The first one was probably
the result of road work that likely took the cache out. The other
two were just plain DNFs. We looked and looked, but couldn't come up
with the find. We finally found two in a row to break the streak,
but then struck out on two more. We finished up with two finds,
giving us four finds and five DNFs for the day. We have had better
days for sure.
After caching we stopped briefly at the
RV park located near the Indian Casino on I-17 just outside Camp
Verde. We knew that there was a Monacos In Motion caravan stopping
there today for a few days and we knew several people on the caravan.
Monacos in Motion is a chapter of FMCA that we belong to. They do
member led caravans that are much less expensive than the commercial
caravan companies, like the one we used for our Alaska trip, because
they don't make a profit or pay staff, everything is volunteer.
We visited with a couple of the people
on the caravan, which is going from southern Arizona all the way up
to the Grand Canyon, over a period of two weeks. After our visit we
went back to the coach for happy hour. We had cocktails outside and
talked and when the bugs came out at sunset we went back into the
coach and talked. We didn't do dinner because of our late breakfast.
Dennis, who has to go to work tomorrow, left about 9:00 and we
watched TV until bedtime.
Monday, April 20th, we left
the coach about 11:30 and drove into Cottonwood for lunch with an old
friend, Pat Ruese. Pat and her husband Ed were long time full time
RVers when we first started full timing. Ed had been a past
president of the International Area of FMCA and Pat was the President
of the 100%ers Chapter when they first recruited Jackie and I and
elected me as Vice President. That Chapter failed four years later
due to lack of membership, but it was an off shoot of the Full Timers
Chapter, so we moved into activities with the Full Timers. Ed died
four years ago, during the last FMCA rally in Madison, Wisconsin, and
Pat bought a house in Clarkdale, the next town over from Cottonwood.
We try to have lunch with Pat whenever we are in the area. We went
to a Greek restaurant in Old Town Cottonwood and had a great meal and
spent an hour and a half talking and catching up. Pat is planning on
coming to Madison this year, staying in a hotel since she has sold
her coach and doesn't RV anymore.
After lunch we went to Walmart and did
some shopping and Jackie got a pedicure. After that we headed back
to the coach. Jim and Pat Goetzinger came over for happy hour and we
chatted for an hour or so. They are leaving here tomorrow morning,
although we will probably see them in a few weeks in Colorado
Springs. We are going there for a week and they have family there
and will be there as well. We spent the rest of the night relaxing
with the TV.
Tuesday, April 21st, we left
the RV park about 11:00 and drove to Clarkdale to spend the afternoon
riding the Verde Canyon Railroad. This scenic tourist train rides a
branch rail line that was built in 1911 to connect the then booming
copper mining town of Jerome to the main Sante Fe railroad. The 38
mile line was built in one year and includes several steel bridges
and a nearly 700 foot curving tunnel through solid rock. The line
operated as part of the Santa Fe railroad System until 1988 when it
was purchased by Dave Durbano. In 1990 Durbano opened the excursion
service as the Verde Valley Railway. It was later renamed the Verde
Canyon Railroad. The excursion service only utilizes the last 20
miles of track, from Clarkdale, at Milepost 38, northeast to the town
of Perkinsville at milepost 18. However, the entire 38 mile branch
is still used occasionally for freight service.
The line currently uses two refurbished
vintage 1956 General Electric FP7 diesel electric locomotives which
were originally built for the Alaska Railroad, and an assortment of
refurbished WWII vintage Pullman and Budd brand passenger cars. The
locomotives were of the design I remember being used when I was a
young kid in Milwaukee. They also have an old 1929 caboose which has
been reconfigured as a “private” car for six passengers who want
to travel in luxury. The other passengers cars are either coach,
with regular two by two seats, or as first class, with fewer seats
and tables between the seats. We went coach, which was quite
comfortable. In between the passenger cars they had flat cars that
had been configured with railings and bench seats so you could get
outside the confines of the passenger cars and get better views. I
have to say that I was quite surprised at how popular the train was.
When we checked in we saw there were probably three or four hundred
people going on our train.
The ride was very scenic, going from
the relatively flat high desert area on which Clarkdale was built
into some pretty rugged canyons. The area into which the train goes
is not served by any roads other than rugged Forest Service dirt
trails, so after the first couple miles you no longer see any
evidence of human habitation until you get to Perkinsville. Because
the Verde River runs just at the edge of the red rock country of
Central Arizona, you get to see a lot of the red sandstone that you
can see around Sedona. I told Jackie that the ride actually reminded
me of driving through Oak Creek Canyon. We split our time between
sitting in the seat and watching out the window or standing out on
the open car and taking pictures. There was a snack bar with beer
and wine, so we had a couple of drinks on the ride too.
The ride was four hours and we got back
to the station right on time, 5:00. We shopped for a bit in the gift
shop. I had to buy a tee shirt and Jackie got a very pretty copper
bracelet. After our shopping we went to the Moose Lodge in
Cottonwood. We have seen it in previous visits, but we never went
in. It is a very big building with a nice lounge. We met several
people there that had also been on the train, although not in our
car. We had a nice visit and had one cocktail. We then moved back
down the road to the Elks Lodge.
The Elks Lodge is in Clarkdale, but it
is named the Jerome Lodge because when the lodges merged years ago
the Jerome Lodge was the older lodge, dating back to the turn of the
century. This is my brother Dennis' lodge and is where he was
Exalted Ruler. He is still active in the lodge, although he doesn't
hold any office at the present time. We had told Dennis that we
would meet him here for a drink after he got off work. We had a
cocktail and met some of the officers of the lodge. We stayed for
the lodge meeting as well. We don't get to very many Elks meetings
anymore, so it is nice to do one every now and then. The meeting was
fairly short and we were out before 8:00. We went for a quick dinner
with Dennis at a local Mexican restaurant before heading back to the
RV park. All in all a busy but fun day.
Wednesday, April 22nd, we
left the coach about 11:00 and drove to Sedona, about 20 miles north
of the RV park. Sedona is a very high end tourist destination that
sits at the south end of Oak Creek Canyon, a big summer recreation
area and a place where I spent a lot of time as a kid and later as an
adult with my own kids. We did a little geocaching before meeting
Dennis for lunch at a Thai restaurant not too far from the bank where
Dennis is the manager. After lunch we said goodbye to Dennis for
this trip and drove around Sedona for a little while, looking at the
sights. We didn't stop to do any shopping because we had done a lot
of that in the past and there didn't seem to be any new places to
visit. We drove out of town on a different road, stopping at the
outlet mall in the Village of Oak Creek, south of Sedona. We did
some more geocaching on the way back to our RV park, ending up with
four finds and two DNFs for the day. After we got back to the coach
we relaxed with the TV the rest of the evening.
Thursday, April 23rd, we had
no plans for the day. This is our last full day in the Verde Valley
and we made it a stay at home day. We both got some chores done
around the coach, including getting all the outside decorations down
and put away in preparation for travel tomorrow. It is supposed to
rain tomorrow and I wanted to make sure I got stuff put away before
it got wet.
It has been almost three weeks since I
last posted and our last day here in Camp Verde seems to be a pretty
good stopping place. We leave tomorrow and begin a series of two and
three night stops as we work our way towards Colorado Springs, our
next week long stay. Until the next time, remember the thoughtful
words of Dr. Seuss. “Be who you are and say what you feel because
those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.” Bye
until next time.
