A Soggy Trip Up The Front Range

Hello again, welcome back. Our last chapter concluded on Wednesday, May 6^th, with our arrival in Monument, Colorado, just north of Colorado Springs. We arrived on a rainy, stormy day, and the forecast for the next four days doesn't look any more promising. On Thursday we spent most of the day at home, watching the rain come and go. We had about 20 minutes of pretty heavy pea sized hail that accumulated on the coach and car and looked very much like snow. We also saw on the news that further south in Colorado Springs they had very heavy small hail that closed the freeway for a while so they had to get the snow plows out.

One storm went right over the top of us in the early afternoon and there was a lightning strike VERY close. It was right outside our front window and I would have sworn it hit inside the RV park, but I talked to one of the workers a little later and he said they didn't find any evidence that it hit in the park. We did lose all electric power, however. We did go out during one break in the action to Walmart and the local Safeway, looking for coffee since we are running low and are having trouble finding the Folger's Simply Smooth brand that we use. After we got back to the park we played cards for a couple of hours since we didn't want to put too much strain on our batteries by running the TV. We didn't know how long the power would be out. As it was, the power came back on about 4:00 and we were up and running again.

The storms continued to come and go throughout the evening and night. About 1:30 in the morning I woke up and noticed that the lights that we leave on at night in the living room were flashing. I also noticed that the monitor panels for our inverter and power system were flashing and giving weird indications. I also heard a very loud rattling or clicking noise coming from outside by the power box. I threw on some pants and shoes and went outside and found the noise coming from the area of the power box. It was raining pretty hard, but I shut off the breakers and the noise stopped. I went back into the coach and the power was back to normal, although running off of the inverter now since the shore power was off. I knew we had plenty of battery capacity to get us through the night, no different than dry camping, so I shut off all the unnecessary lights and appliances and went back to bed.

The next morning, Friday, I was up early and went outside to do some trouble shooting. It didn't take long to discover that the noise was actually being made by our surge protector that we use between the RV park power box and the coach. We bought that surge protector not too long after we bought the coach, so it is at least nine, maybe close to ten years old and has been in constant service. I guess it just gave up the ghost. I got my multi-meter out and checked the voltages in the power box just to be sure everything was OK, and it was, so I plugged the coach directly into the power and everything worked perfectly. Fortunately, the malfunction of the surge protector didn't cause any damage in the coach.

I was not comfortable not having a surge protector, especially with all the thunderstorms we have been having and that are forecast to continue. So I started making some calls and found that Camping World in Colorado Springs had the one I need on sale. We had lunch and then got in the car and drove the 30 miles to Camping World and bought a new $400 surge protector. The drive down on the freeway was kind of wet, with a lot of rain showers, but the drive back was fairly clear and by 3:00 I had the new surge protector plugged in and we were protected again. Yea! We spent the rest of the day in the coach, watching the storms come and go.

Saturday, May 9^th, the forecast was for another round of storms today, so we decided to just stay in. We had rain most of the morning and the first part of the afternoon, but by about 2:00 it turned to snow and we started getting some good accumulation. Within a couple of hours the satellite TV went out as the snow built up. At least we can still watch recorded programs for a few days before the receiver resets and won't work at all without a signal. I setup my 100 watt light bulb that serves as my freeze warmer inside the water compartment and filled the water tank so we could use the internal water and disconnect the hose in case it freezes. It is supposed to get below freezing tonight, but not by much, only 29 or 30 in the early morning hours. We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening watching the snow build up. We played some cards and watched some TV and just relaxed. At least once the snow started it was too cold for any thunderstorms, so the weather died down. There were a couple of tornadoes in Colorado, maybe fifty miles from us, but nothing that was threatening to us.

Sunday, May 10^th, Happy Mother's Day. Not much of a holiday for us since both are mothers are gone and Jackie never had kids, but I hope all the other mothers out there had a great day. We woke up to about four inches of beautiful snow coating everything, but relatively clear skies. We took some pictures and enjoyed the beauty, only pretty because we knew that we didn't have to go anywhere, and it was going to be all gone when we did have to move. We spent the day in the coach, played some cards and watched a movie we had recorded on the DVR.

By early afternoon the snow on the sat dish had melted off and we had TV again. I did make an ugly little snowman on the picnic table next to the coach. Can't have snow without a snowman. By sundown most of the snow was gone and we were back to just wet. The forecast had called for possible showers today, but nothing materialized and we had the first dry day in a while. Tomorrow is supposed to be mostly clear and we may be able to get out for a while.

Monday, May 11^th, we finally awoke to clear skies after a pretty cold night. The forecast calls for a couple of days without rain. The last of the snow is melting and it now looks like we never had four inches on the ground. We left the coach after lunch and went shopping. We ended up at a King Soopers market, which, based on it's internal styling and the Kroeger house brand, is Colorado's version of a Fry's market. After our shopping we did four geocaches, or first caching since arriving in Monument six days ago. We then headed home and stayed in for the rest of the day.

Tuesday, May 12^th, we left the coach around noon and drove down to the northern fringe of Colorado Springs to have lunch with our friends Jim and Pat Goetzinger. Jim and Pat are fellow full timers, with about 11 years of travel under their belts, and we met them at a rally about seven or eight years ago. They are retired school teachers from New Mexico, but they always spend some time in Colorado Springs because their two daughters live here. When we were last in the area in 2011 we met Jim and Pat for lunch also.

We met at a place called the Colorado Mountain Brewery. It was a nice place with an interesting menu. Lots of bison dishes and some interesting pairings, like bison poppers and bison chili. I had a bowl of the bison chili and it was wonderful. I had the prime rib dip with fries, which was also very good. Jackie had a bison burger and was only able to finish half of it, taking the other half home. The only down side was that this is a brewery, featuring it's own craft brews, but when I ordered their version of a Heisenberg I was told that they were changing kegs. An hour later they were STILL changing kegs. I ended up getting one of their blond ales, which was OK. At least they didn't charge me for it. Later, about the time the food got to the table, they finally brought me a Heisenberg, also on the house. At least it was a good beer.

We ate and chatted with the Goetzingers for about an hour before we left the restaurant and went out to enjoy the clear weather and do some geocaching. In a couple of hours we had scored eight new finds, along with one DNF. After caching we went back to the coach for the rest of the evening.

Wednesday, May 13^th, moving day. At least we woke up to sunshine again with only a 30 percent chance of showers and minimal chance of thunderstorms. We were hooked up and on the road by 10:30, and back on Interstate 25, headed to Westminster, Colorado, a suburb of Denver. It was only a 60 mile trip, but traffic was bad, there was a lot of construction, and I had to stop at an urban Pilot truck stop for fuel. Getting in and out of the truck stop was a bear. We then got to the street I am supposed to turn on to get to the Westminster Elks Lodge, our destination, and it was closed for construction. We had to call the lodge to get alternate directions. I was pretty stressed out when we finally got to the lodge. They did have a water and electric site available, which is all we have ever had in the past, and we were in and parked by about 1:30 or so. They do have some 50 amp full hookup sites here, but the lodge has no stay limits, and all of the premium spots are taken by people who come in early and stay all summer. We got all setup for our five day stay here in the Denver area and relaxed in the coach for the rest of the day and evening.

Thursday, May 14^th, we left the coach about noon and drove to the south side of Denver to the Bagel Deli for lunch. We had eaten at this great Jewish deli in 2011 when we were here and the food was outstanding. The place had been featured on the TV show Diners, Drive ins, and Dives. This time we both had versions of a pastrami sandwich. We also had an appetizer of chopped liver and I had a cup of chicken soup. A real Jewish meal. The food was just as good as last time.

After lunch we went to a laundry to wash clothes. Once the clothes were done we headed back to the coach, stopping for one geocache on the way. We had a couple of brief bouts of rain, nothing serious, but the forecast calls this on and off afternoon sprinkles for the rest of the weekend. After we got home we relaxed for the rest of the evening.

Friday, May 15^th, Happy Birthday to my wonderful wife Jackie! And, it's also our baby cat Benji's birthday. He turned three today. Jackie did not. After lunch we went out to do some geocaching. We got in three new finds, including number 7,000, before the rain started again. We decided to do a couple of Elks Lodge visits, since most are not open on weekends and we didn't want to cache in the rain. We drove to the Denver Lodge, Number 17. We had last been in this lodge back in 2008. We got there right after opening time and were the only one's in the building besides the bartender. He was actually the Exalted Ruler of the lodge and was filling in for the bartender who was sick.

The ER's name was Ron and we sat and chatted with Ron over a couple of Cokes for close to an hour. He took us on a tour of the lodge and we saw one of the most magnificent dedicated Lodge rooms we have seen. In their Lodge Room they have about 3 million dollars worth of 19^th century stained glass from the original downtown Denver lodge building. Ron told us some interesting stories about his past. He was an Alaskan State Trooper, a Denver cop, a drug enforcement agent, fire chief and a few other things.

After the Denver Lodge visit we went to the nearby Lakewood Elks, another Lodge we had visited in 2008. We had a cocktail there and visited with the bartender and a couple of the members. They were unable to get us a lodge pin because they couldn't get into the display case, no one had the right key. We did have an old pin on the banner from this lodge, so it was not a big deal. After visiting Lakewood Lodge we started towards home. We stopped at a Safeway store for a couple of things and were able to get another couple of cache finds, bringing the total for the day to five. The weather in the immediate area was cloudy with sprinkles, but to the east and north there were some severe storms, including a couple of small tornadoes. Fortunately, most of the tornadoes in Colorado don't form until they get a few miles out on the prairie to the east of the Denver metro area.

After a brief rest at the coach we went down to the Westminster Lodge, where we are staying, for dinner. We both had the New York steak entree, which was wonderful. We also each had a piece of very good cheesecake to celebrate Jackie's birthday. After dinner we went into the bar for a couple hours for some drinks and karaoke. They had a very long rotation, so I only got one song in, but we had a good time listening to the singers and talking with some of the people at the bar. About 9:00 we left and went back to the coach for the rest of the night. A very fun day.

Saturday, May 16^th, we left the coach after lunch to do some more exploring and geocaching. We were only able to go after a couple of caches before the rain started coming down again. We switched to sightseeing mode and drove downtown to look around. We thought that the weekend would be better for driving around downtown, but there was still a lot of traffic and a lot of construction going on. We had a major driving rainstorm while we were touring, but after an hour or so it cleared up. We continued just randomly driving around Denver, looking at neighborhoods. We did a couple of geocaches, and stopped at a Costco that we happened to pass. We ended up with only two new finds and three DNFs for the afternoon. We finally got back home around 5:00 and just stayed in for the rest of the evening.

Sunday, May 17^th, we had a nice Sunday paper and coffee morning and decided to just stay in for the day. We didn't have any rain, although the skies were cloudy for much of the day. About 4:00 I decided to take the sun screens off the windows since they were dry, just in case it rained overnight. I don't like putting the shades away wet. As it turned out, we had rain a couple hours later, so, good decision.

Monday, May 18^th, we were packed up and on the road about 10:30, still heading north on Interstate 25, this time to Cheyenne, Wyoming, about 100 miles to the north of Denver. The skies were overcast for the whole trip, but we never got more than a few sprinkles on the trip. We arrived at the A-B Campground in Cheyenne about 12:30 and were parked and setup by 1:30. We had a quick lunch and went out to do some exploring, since it still wasn't raining. We spent a couple hours driving around downtown and the Capital area. We also stopped to get one geocache since we were not sure how much caching we would get done here. The weather for our stay is supposed to be cold and wet. After sightseeing we went to Walmart for some supplies and then back home for the rest of the night.

Tuesday, May 19^th, woke up to more rain and cold. It's only supposed to be in the low 40's today and rain on and off all day. Some of the forecasts even call for snow flurries. I went out after lunch on a mission to find an electric space heater. Jackie didn't

want to leave her warm couch. We had no idea we were going to run into these kinds of temperatures this late in spring. We are running low on propane and I thought if I could find a small space heater it would let us stay warm in the living room without having to run the furnaces. If we run out of propane we will have to pack up the coach and drive somewhere to get refilled. I would rather be able to get by until Friday when we leave here and can stop and get propane.

I stopped at Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, Target, and Bed, Bath and Beyond and no one had any heaters. Everyone had fans and air conditioners, but no heaters. I guess this is warm for this part of the country. I was able to get some new wood blocks for our jacks from Lowes. I have been looking for some new ones since the ones I am now using have gotten wet and are not very useful anymore. Our jack pads are only about eight inches around so I use two foot square pieces of three quarter inch plywood as jack pads to keep them from sinking into soft ground, or hot asphalt as has happened in the past. After I got home we just stayed in for the rest of the day.

Wednesday, May 20^th, we woke up to 33 degree cool with cloudy skies, again. We decided that we needed to get out of the coach no matter what, so we bundled up nice and warm and left about noon to go out and have lunch. The highly rated local place we went to was closed until next month, so we ended up at the local Outback. We had a very nice, filling lunch, and then went out to do some shopping and caching. We went to the indoor mall, more to get exercise than anything else, and walked around the mall for a couple of hours. We did a few geocaches, ending up with four new finds for the day, and then headed for home. On the way we passed a pawn shop and decided to stop in just on the chance they might have a small electric heater. Well, they had a dozen or so. We ended up with one that still had the box and operating manual and looked brand new, although the original receipt inside the box said they bought it in 2005. We got it for $12 and took it home and we now have a little heat source. It doesn't heat the whole coach, but it works for the small area we are in during the evening and we don't have to worry about running out of propane now. We stayed in for the rest of the evening.

Thursday, May 21^st, it was again cold in the morning, only in the low 40's. The forecast called for rain again, but all we had in the morning was fog. We went out after lunch for some last minute caching and such. We were able to get five new finds, and one DNF, before we decided it was a little too cold. Unlike earlier cold days, today there was a pretty stiff breeze the accentuated the cold. After caching we went back to the mall and we both got haircuts. Jackie gets one about every month or so, I was about six months since my last trim. After our haircuts we headed home and stayed in the rest of the night.

Friday was another travel day and we were closed up and ready to go by about 10:00. It was cold, in the mid 40's, and raining, which didn't make for a pleasant preparation time. We were back on I-25 again, heading north and a little west to Casper, Wyoming. The trip was 168 miles, one of our longer recent trips, and it rained for nearly the entire time. However, there wasn't much traffic and the roads were good, so it really wasn't a bad trip. Except, our older cat Smokey had a bout of motion sickness near the end and made a bit of mess in several areas of the coach. Gave us a little something extra to do when we were getting set up.

We arrived at the Fort Caspar Campground around 2:00 after a stop for fuel and propane just outside Casper. The campground is located inside a State park, but it is a private operation. We got a nice full hookup pull through site and the weather was nice enough to stop the rain for at least as long as it took me to get us hooked up and settled in. By the time we got settled in it was nearly 4:00, so we just stayed in the coach the rest of the day. The decision was helped by the fact that the rain started again and it was pretty wet.

We are here in Casper for another four day stay. This is our first time in this town, so we are looking forward to exploring, doing some caching and enjoying new things. This is also a good place to publish this chapter, since it has been just a little over two weeks. Until the next time, remember the words of author and entrepreneur James Altucher. “Learning to find happiness with less is true wealth. Ultimately, we are the sum of our experiences, and not the sum of our belongings.” See ya soon.

Standing on the Corner in Winslow, Arizona, and Other Fun Stuff

Hello readers, glad you're back. Our last chapter concluded on Thursday, April 23^rd on our last day in Camp Verde Arizona. On Friday we packed up and left Camp Verde about 10:30. I was a little concerned about the weather since there was a storm front moving through the area and there were predictions of rain and even some sleet in Flagstaff. Flagstaff is over 7,000 feet, so there is always the threat of ice if it gets cold enough. We are not staying in Flagstaff, only passing through on the way to Winslow, which is only 5,000 feet elevation. The biggest problem on the trip was the wind, which was blowing about 20 mph with gusts to 40 along I-40 out of Flagstaff.

We did run into some rain, heavy at times, on the way up the hill to Flagstaff, but by the time we got to Flagstaff we were in partly cloudy, mostly sunny skies and we did fine. We arrived at the Homolavi State Park campground, just north of Winslow, Arizona, about 12:30 or so and quickly setup camp. We only have water and power, 50 amp, but we are only here for three days so sewer is not an issue. This is the first time we have ever been to this park. It is quite barren, sitting on the high prairie that marks most of northeast Arizona. There are not too many other RVs in the park, but we were greeted by a park volunteer who checked us in. The wind is blowing up here too, so we didn't put anything outside, not even the sun screens. It is supposed to rain on Sunday and I don't like the

screens being put away wet when we leave on Monday. After we got setup we just had a relaxing afternoon, watched some TV and I made a pot of chili for dinner. We will go out tomorrow to explore a little.

Saturday, April 26th, we woke up to partly cloudy skies, morning temps in the low 50's and lots of wind. The wind blew all night and I expect it will blow all day too. We left the coach after lunch to go out and do some exploring and geocaching. We first went to the Visitor's Center for the State Park we are staying in to see what it was all about. Homolavi State Park was founded in 1986 to help preserve and study over 300 Ancestral Puebloan archaeological sites. Homolavi a Hopi word meaning "place of the little hills". The Homolavi cluster of archaeological sites includes seven separate pueblo ruins built by various prehistoric people, including ancestors of the Hopi people, between approximately 1260-1400 AD. This fertile area is on a floodplain of the Little Colorado River, and the inhabitants grew cotton, corn, beans, and squash. The visitor's center was interesting, but we learned that the sites are actually little more than ruins, piles of rock, and we have been to better preserved pueblo sites before. Given the cold and wind we decided to forgo visiting any of the ruins today.

We then drove down into old town Winslow. Although we have been through the town many times over the last ten years, we haven't really spent any time here. Winslow was incorporated in 1900 as a rail stop on the Sante Fe line. It sits an an elevation just under 5,000 feet and has a population of just under 10,000. Winslow was located on the famous Route 66 cross country highway, and the main street of town reflects this history with dozens of old motels, eateries, shops and ersatz Indian trading posts. Some of these buildings are still in use, many are barely standing ruins.

Although Winslow missed out in being named in the lyrics of the song Route 66, it does make a big deal of being a part of the 1972 Eagles song, “Take it Easy.” “Standing on the corner in Winslow, Arizona. Such a fine sight to see. It's a girl my Lord, in a flat bed Ford, slowing down to take a look at me.” There is now a park in old town called “Standing on the Corner” with a bronze statute of a guy with a guitar and a big mural depicting a Ford flatbed truck reflecting in a shop window. In one of the second floor windows shown in the painting is a large Eagle. There is also an actual restored red 60's model one-ton Ford flatbed truck parked at the curb next to the park. In the middle of the nearby intersection is a large “Route 66” shield incorporated into the pavement. Of course, we had to take our pictures at the park. We also visited a couple of the souvenir shops nearby.

After “standing on the corner,” we started doing some geocaching, and actually, the park had a virtual cache and was our first find of the day. We ended up with 13 new finds and no DNFs for the afternoon. Two of the caches were located at the historic La Posada Hotel. The La Posada was the last of the famous Fred Harvey railroad hotels to be built. Harvey began partnership with the Santa Fe Railroad in 1876. He started by opening eating houses along the railroad. At its peak, there were 84 Harvey Houses, all of which catered to wealthy and middle-class visitors alike and Harvey became known as "the Civilizer of the West." Harvey also gained a boost in business with his incorporation of the "Harvey Girl". He hired women between the ages of 18 and 30 and did not permit them to marry until they had put in a full year of work. Harvey Girls resided in housing adjacent to the restaurants, where they were supervised by the most senior Girl, who enforced curfews and chaperoned male visits. Roughly 5000 Harvey Girls moved out West to work and ultimately marry. The corporation also built more than a dozen large, luxurious hotels at various stops along the Sante Fe line.

The La Posada opened May 15, 1930, just after the stock market crash of 1929, and remained open for just 27 years. In 1957, the hotel closed to the public. The museum-quality furnishings were auctioned off in 1959. In the early 1960s, much of the building was gutted and transformed into offices for the Santa Fe Railway. Several times over the ensuing 40 years, the building was nearly demolished, as recently as 1994 when the railway announced its plans to move out for good. The building received protection from the National Trust for Historic Preservation and was finally purchased by a private company from the railroad and was completely restored and reopened in 1997 as a full service, luxury hotel. It also still serves as Winslow's Amtrack station. We walked around the public rooms and grounds of the hotel for a while before continuing our caching.

After our caching adventures we went to the local Walmart for some supplies, then headed back to the coach for the rest of the night. Sunday we had a stay at home day. The weather called for possible rain most of the day and we did have some on and off rain showers. We got a few chores done, but mostly just relaxed.

Monday, April 27^th, we finally woke up to clear skies and light winds. It was another travel day and we were packed up and on the road by 10:30. We headed east on Interstate 40 towards Gallup New Mexico, about 120 miles. The trip was uneventful except that the further east we went the more clouds we encountered and the winds picked up some too. The trip only took a couple of hours, however, when we crossed the border from Arizona to New Mexico we lost an hour as we entered the “actual” Mountain Time Zone as opposed to Arizona Mountain Time, which is the same as Pacific Time during the summer. Arizona does not do daylight savings time. We got settled into the USA RV Park in Gallup, New Mexico, a place we have stayed numerous times in the past. We decided that we didn't need to do anything today, so we just spent the rest of the day in the coach.

Tuesday, April 28^th, we went out after lunch and did laundry. After laundry we did one geocache, just so we would have somewhere to visit all our travel bugs in Gallup, and then went to Home Depot to get some light bulbs for one of our fluorescent lights. We then went back to the coach for the rest of the night. Wednesday was another travel day. We left Gallup around 10:30 or so and got back on Interstate 10 heading east to Albuquerque, New Mexico, about 140 miles. We made a fuel stop about 20 miles out of Gallup, but the rest of the trip was uneventful and we arrived at the Enchanted Trails RV park on the west edge of Albuquerque about 1:00. We have stayed in this park before and they have a couple of their sites setup as kind of an RV museum with some nice old restored late 40's cars and some vintage trailers that are also restored. We decided to stay in the rest of the day and we just got some chores done and relaxed.

Thursday, April 30^th, we left the RV park about 11:30 and went out to do some exploring in Albuquerque. We first went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant called Sophie's Place. This was a restaurant that was featured in the Food Network program, Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. We watch the show and like to visit some of the featured restaurants from time to time. This one was a little bit of a disappointment. It was a pretty dumpy taquaria that didn't even have a sign outside. It did appear to be pretty popular with the locals and there were a lot of shirt and tie types in there for lunch. The feature dish on Triple D had been duck enchiladas, but nothing on the menu about those. Jackie had fish tacos and I had carne asada. The meals came with beans, rice and a little salad, but you had to pay extra for chips and salsa. Everything was OK, but a little bland, especially for New Mexican cuisine which tends to the hot side normally. I will say you get a lot and everything is freshly made, including the chips.

After lunch we did some geocaching. We had a good afternoon, getting eleven new finds with no DNFs. We ended up in Old Town and we spent an hour or so walking around shopping and sightseeing. As many times as we have been to Albuquerque we never went to Old Town before. It was very nice and reminded me of the Old Town area of Sante Fe. After our great afternoon we went back to the RV park and relaxed for the rest of the evening.

Friday, May 1^st, Happy May Day. We left the coach after lunch to run some errands. Jackie had cleaned out her shirt closet the other day, so we first went to the Goodwill store and dropped off a bag of shirts. We then went to Costco to buy some vodka. We still have a couple bottles in stock, but Jackie brought to my attention that we should check the liquor laws for the next couple states to see if spirits can be bought at the grocery store. As it turns out, Colorado and Wyoming, the next two states on our travels, both have very restrictive liquor laws, which always means higher prices. New Mexico is very permissive, but the next permissive state we go to is North Dakota and that's a month away. So, we bought a six pack of vodka at Costco, which will certainly hold us until the next permissive state.

After Costco we did a quick run to the Post Office and then did a couple of geocaches. We had three new finds and one DNF. We then went to Walmart before heading back to the coach. About 5:00 the winds came up and it looked like we might get a storm, but nothing came around and we had a quiet night watching TV.

Saturday, May 2^nd, our next travel day. We were packed up and pulling out of the Enchanted Trails RV park about 10:30. We were traveling about 125 miles north to the little town of Las Vegas, New Mexico. We have stayed here several times before because it is a convenient stop between Albuquerque and points north in Colorado. The trip went OK except that it was a long grade out of Sante Fe and the coach was getting a little hot until I slowed down some. We made it to the KOA campground in Las Vegas just before 1:00 and quickly got checked in, parked and setup for our two day stay here. We are at about 6,200 feet, so I don't see us doing a whole lot while we are here.

Sunday, May 3^rd, we went out after lunch to do some exploring of Las Vegas and a little geocaching. We spent a couple of hours driving around town, checking neighborhoods and enjoying the sightseeing. We also picked up three geocaches, two of which were cemetery caches, although they were on the edges, not inside. This is a very Hispanic area and that culture is really into decorating grave sites. We spent half an hour driving around inside one of the cemeteries checking out all the fencing, lighting and flowers that are on many of the graves. After our tour of town we stopped at Walmart for some supplies and picked up some chicken from the Colonel for dinner and then headed home for the rest of the night.

Monday, May 4^th, Star Wars Day! (May the 4^th be with you) Another travel day for us. We packed up and left Las Vegas, New Mexico about 10:00 and headed north on Interstate 25. After going over the 7,832 foot Raton Pass we entered the State of Colorado. We only went about ten miles into Colorado before exiting and stopping at the Cawthon RV Park in Trinidad, Colorado. We had run into a little rain in northern New Mexico, but it was just a very light drizzle when we checked into the RV park. We got our spot and I no sooner got the utilities hooked up and the coach leveled and the skies opened up. We heard a little thunder and we had some small hail for about ten minutes. After that it was just on and off rain for the rest of the day. About sunset it cleared some and we had a little bit of blue sky and some sun, but the forecast says the rain isn't over. Because of the weather, the altitude and the fact that it was a travel day, we just stayed in the rest of the day and listened to the rain on the coach. Thankfully, still no leaks so we are dry inside. Before I got the leak in the slide fixed a few months back we would have had to pull the kitchen slide in for the rain and we would not have been able to have it out for about a week now.

Tuesday, May 5th, Happy Cinco De Mayo. We decided to celebrate Cinco De Mayo by having some Mexican food for lunch. We went to a place about a mile from the park that we had seen on the way in yesterday called El Rancho. The place had quite a few cars outside, so we were hopeful. Inside was quite strange. It was a very old, stone building and the inside looked like an old nightclub, big dance floor, stage in the corner, and a bar. The restaurant was way over in the far corner and very small. The rest of the place looked abandoned. There were quite a few people in the place, including one big party, so we thought it must be popular with the locals. As it turned out, I don't know why. We both ordered a combo lunch with an enchilada, a taco and a chili relleno. That is kind of our “go to” dish in new restaurants. I had wanted a burro, but the waitress told me the beef burro was ground beef, and I don't care for ground beef burros. It turned out the taco was ground beef also and very tasteless. The enchilada was OK, the chili relleno was deep fried, very small, and the red sauce was very hot. Jackie had the green sauce, which was even hotter. She couldn't eat the enchilada. It turns out they smother mediocre food in super hot sauce and hope no one notices. They didn't even have any chips and salsa. They ran out – on Cinco De Mayo! Never be back to that place again.

After lunch we went out to do some exploration of Trinidad and some geocaching. It was sprinkling on and off, but we still got four caches. One of the caches was located near an old, abandoned coal mining town called Ludlow, about ten miles north of Trinidad on Interstate 25. There is a monument there commemorating the 1914 Ludlow Massacre. The Ludlow Massacre was an attack by the Colorado National Guard and Colorado Fuel & Iron Company camp guards on a tent colony of 1,200 striking coal miners and their families at Ludlow, Colorado, on April 20, 1914. Some two dozen people, including women and children, were killed.

The massacre, the culmination of a bloody widespread strike against Colorado coal mines, resulted in the violent deaths of at least 26 people. Reported death tolls vary but, all include two women and eleven children, asphyxiated and burned to death under a single tent in what was later called the “death pit.” The deaths occurred after a daylong fight between militia and camp guards against striking workers. Ludlow was the deadliest single incident in the southern Colorado Coal Strike, lasting from September 1913 through December 1914. The strike was organized by the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) against coal mining companies in Colorado. The three largest companies involved were the Rockefeller family-owned Colorado Fuel & Iron Company (CF&I), the Rocky Mountain Fuel Company (RMF), and the Victor-American Fuel Company (VAF).  The picture is one that is on the memorial and shows the Colorado National Guard machine gun pit situated on a hill top overlooking the miner's camp.

In retaliation for Ludlow, the miners armed themselves and attacked dozens of mines over the next ten days, destroying property and engaging in several skirmishes with the Colorado National Guard along a 40-mile front from Trinidad to Walsenburg. The entire strike would cost between 69 and 199 lives and is often described as the "deadliest strike in the history of the United States". The monument was erected by the union and was quite interesting to see. There were a number of plaques with the story of the strike and the massacre. We also drove around Trinidad for a while and got a couple of caches in town too. After caching we headed back to the coach and relaxed for the rest of the evening.

Wednesday, May 6^th, we woke to cloudy skies, but no rain. This was another travel day and we were packed up and ready to go by a little after 10:00. We started north on Interstate 25 again, this time headed about 150 miles to Monument, Colorado. Monument is a small town at the north edge of Colorado Springs. The exit we take to get off the freeway is just a few miles north of Air Force Academy, which we visited when were last here in 2011. We got settled into the Monument Heights RV Resort pretty quickly. This is one of our Resorts of Distinction membership parks, so we stay here for free. We did have to pay $5 a day to get one of the 50 amp sites, but it was worth it. We are going to be here for a whole week, our longest stay since we left Camp Verde. We have nice site on a mesa that overlooks the surrounding hills and mountains. It would be really nice if it wasn't so cloudy and rainy. We had a bit of rain after we got checked in and setup, but not too much. It is supposed to be quite stormy for the next few days, so we are prepared to batten down the hatches.

It has been a couple weeks since we published, so this change of location marks a good spot to close this chapter of the blog. We will publish in another couple of weeks, so stay tuned. Until next time, remember that to create more positive results in your life, replace 'if only' with 'next time'. See you soon.

A Few Weeks In Arizona With Family

Hello again, welcome back. Our last chapter concluded on April 5^th, 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 7^th, 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 35^th 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 8^th, 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 35^th 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.

After the fair we did a little sightseeing in the downtown area. I am amazed at how different the city looks even after just fifteen years. So many new buildings and new streets. We then fell in with the rush hour traffic and worked our way back to the west side of town. We made a couple of shopping stops along the way, looking for some things Jackie wanted. After we got home we just relaxed the rest of the evening in the coach.

Thursday, April 9^th, 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 10^th, 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 11^th, 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 12^th, 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 13^th, 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 14^th, 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

l's sister Courtney, who lives in Arkansas, will be having a little boy in a few weeks. We have seen lots of pictures of Zoe, but this was the first time we would see her in person.

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 15^th, 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 15^th 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.

Thursday, April 16^th, our last full day in the Phoenix area. For the most part we had a stay at home day and did a bunch of chores. I fixed a couple of little things that needed work, cleaned out the storage bay, which had gotten a little messy, and put stuff in away in preparation for leaving tomorrow. One of the things I did was send a copy of the repair invoice for the A/C on the Jeep to Jeep customer service. They had contacted me by phone late yesterday, and after listening to the story of the continuing problems, offered to reimburse us for the $250 deductible we had to pay for the repair. Its not perfect, but better than nothing.

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 17^th, 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 18^th, 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 19^th, 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 20^th, 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 21^st, 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 22^nd, 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 23^rd, 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.

2015 FMCA Spring Rally & Our Summer Travels Begin

Hello, welcome back to our travel blog. Our last episode concluded on Monday, March 23^rd, when we arrived in Pomona, California to the LA County Fairgrounds for the FMCA Convention and rally. We spent Monday in travel and getting setup at the fairgrounds. The rally doesn't actually start until Thursday, so we have a couple of free days ahead of us.

Tuesday, March 24^th, we were able to sleep in a little this morning and have a relaxing morning with our coffee and nothing else we had to do. I got a few things down, like publishing the last chapter of this blog and doing some office work. After lunch we went out to do some geocaching. We haven't cached in this area before and there were lots of caches to choose from. Our first cache was a DNF, but after that we had eleven good finds before we decided it was getting a little hot. The A/C in the car is still broke, so after a bit we decided to go back to the coach to cool off. About 5:00 some friends of ours who are vendors, Geoff and Johanna, came over for cocktails. We had last seen them in Quartzsite back in January. They stayed for about 45 minutes. After they left we went out to do some shopping we had been meaning to get to and were back at the coach just before 7:00. We had a nice dinner of some of the meatloaf Jackie made on Sunday and then watched TV until bedtime.

Wednesday, March 25^th, another relaxing morning. We went out after lunch to do some shopping and we picked up one geocache while we were out. At 5:00 we had a bunch of people, mostly members of the Full Timers Chapter, over to the coach for a happy hour. We ended up with about 20 people sitting on our “patio” talking and enjoying themselves. This went on until about 7:00 when everyone went off to do their own thing. We had dinner, a crockpot meal of pork ribs that Jackie had been cooking all day. We then watched TV until bedtime.

Thursday, March 26^th, the first day of the rally. The vendors do not open until tomorrow, but the seminars and meetings started today. We left the fairgrounds about 11:30 or so and drove a few miles to nearby San Dimas to meet for lunch at Bev and Jerry King's house. Because they live so close to the fairgrounds they wanted to have everyone over for lunch. Gary and Ramona Wilson and Ray and Suzie Babcock were also there. We had a great time talking, especially about Gary and Ramona's new motor home, or at least new to them. They had sold their old one a couple years ago, but got the hankering to go back to full timing, so they have been shopping and found one very similar to the one they sold.

After lunch we went back to the fairgrounds and gathered our stuff for the Chapter Fair. We set up the booth for the Full Timer's Chapter, but were a little disappointed at the turnout. We only had eight or ten people come by the booth and talk to us. We had better turnout at the Chapter Fair at the Western Area rally in Indio in January. At 4:00 the fair was over and we took our stuff back to the coach. About 5:30 we went back to the events area for the Elk International business meeting. They had a short meeting and then adjourned to a picnic area near where the coaches are parked for a social. They had beer and wine, along with a big stack of pizzas. We spent about ninety minutes eating and visiting with other members of the chapter before heading back to the coach for the rest of the night.

Friday, March 27^th, the mobile service guy came at 8:00 a.m. to service the transmission on the coach. It was due for new fluid and filters. The job was done in a little over an hour. We are good for another five years now. We had lunch at the coach and then packed up the stuff we needed for the Full Timing Seminar we are putting on today at 3:00. We dropped the stuff off at the meeting room and then walked over to the vendor building to tour around the vendors. We spent an hour and a half or so looking at all the vendors. We didn't buy anything this trip, but will probably be back another day to pick up a few things. We went back to the seminar building and hung out until it was time for our seminar. We had a crowd of about 60 and Jim and Pat Goetzinger helped Jackie and I put on the hour and fifteen minute seminar. It was well received and there were a lot of questions and comments.

After the seminar I convened a business meeting of the Chapter which took about 20 minutes or so. The only major item of business was to elect new officers for next two years. Also, FMCA rules require at least one Chapter meeting each year so we needed to do this one to meet the requirement. When I adjourned the meeting I was officially the Past President of the Chapter. I had a good time during my term, but am now looking forward to helping when I want rather than because I have to. After the meeting we packed up our stuff and went back to the coach. We skipped tonight's entertainment, which was some female unknown (to me at least) country singer and just had a quiet evening at home.

Saturday, March 28^th, we had a relaxing morning and had lunch in the coach. After lunch we went over to the events area so I could start getting things setup for the Ice Cream Social at 1:00. FMCA always has an Ice Cream Social at the big conventions, and the Full Timers Chapter has always been the chapter that provides the people to hand out the ice cream. I picked up the aprons at the Miller Insurance Agency booth in the vendor area. Miller is the sponsor of the event and pays for the ice cream. They have a box of aprons with their corporate logo on them that we are supposed to wear when we hand out ice cream.

I took the aprons over to the area where the ice cream was to be and worked with the fairgrounds staff to set up the tables and lines properly. The ice cream, sandwiches actually, was already there and ready to go. As always, we had great support from the chapter and had way more people to help than we really needed. Everyone shows up because it isn't hard, doesn't take long and is always fun. The people were lined up ten minutes early, but we were ready so we opened early. Within five or six minutes we had served the majority of the customers. There are a little over a thousand coaches here, so figure about two thousand people, give or take. We stayed open until 1:30 and were almost out of ice cream when we closed it down. I took the aprons back to Miller and my duties for this rally are complete.

We walked around the vendors for a while, bought a couple little things, and then went back to the coach to rest for a while. About 7:00 we caught a tram back to the events center for the evening entertainment. Tonight was Peter Noone and Herman's Hermits. We saw this show back in 2008, also here at Pomona. We were only three rows back from the stage and Noone did a great show. He is very personable and interactive with the audience, and a lot of oldies to sing to. It really was a good show and we were glad we went. After the show we caught a tram back to the coach and got home about 9:30. We watched a little TV and then off to bed.

Sunday, March 29^th, the last day of the rally. I went out and got a Sunday paper and we spent the morning with the paper and morning news shows. After lunch we walked over to the new coach displays, which were just down the parking lot from where we were parked. We spent an hour or two looking at coaches, but didn't see anything that really lit our fire, not to mention was affordable. We really like our floor plan and the fact that our coach is paid for. I was able to pick up some engine fuel filters I needed from the parts truck and then we went back to the coach and relaxed the rest of the day. There was no entertainment tonight except for a patriotic salute put on by the FMCA Volunteer singers and band players, the Frustrated Maestros. It didn't start until 8:00 and by that time we decided we didn't want to go out anyway.

Monday, March 30^th, another travel day. We didn't get into too much of a hurry to leave the fairgrounds, since we knew we had to travel the I-10 all the way through the Inland Empire to Indio and the morning rush hour was something to be avoided. Of course, that didn't stop some people as we heard engines starting up as early as 6:30 this morning. By the time we got everything packed up and were ready to leave it was 10:00 or so and everyone around us had already left. Traffic was still heavy, but we made the hundred miles to Indio in a couple hours and arrived at Indian Waters about 12:30. We got settled into our space and spent the rest of the very hot afternoon resting inside the coach. We are only here for a three day stopover, so we didn't do anything outside except put the awning down and hook up the utilities.

About 5:30 we drove over to Cactus Jacks to meet our friend Barry Cohen for dinner. Regular readers will remember Barry and Colleen as our best friends when we lived here in Indio. Colleen died a couple years ago and Barry just started getting out in his motor home last year. We were hoping to be able to meet up with him somewhere along the road this summer. He is planning to travel again this summer, but it is unlikely our paths will cross. We had a great dinner and after went back to the coach and watched TV until bedtime.

Tuesday, March 31^st, we left the park around 11:30 to meet our friends Jerry and Bev King for lunch at our favorite Chinese place in Indio, the China Bistro. Bev had called last night and asked us to meet them for lunch. She also asked if we would then come over to their RV place at Desert Shores here in Indio to help Jerry load a few things into their car so they could take them back to San Dimas. We knew that Jerry has been having a few health issues lately, so we were glad to help.

We met them for lunch and had a great time, good food and visiting with friends. Bev then told us that Jerry had been able to get the stuff in the car on his own and they didn't need our help after all. They still bought lunch, which was very nice of them. After about ninety minutes they headed out to go back to San Dimas and we went to Walmart for some supplies. We then returned back to the coach for the rest of the afternoon.

About 5:00 or so we left again to go to some geocaching friend's house for dinner. Rex and Vicki Jennings are fairly new to the Coachella Valley and are really involved in local geocaching. We first met them at the Christmas Party that our other caching friends, Roy and Darcy, put on last year. We also ran into all of them in February at the big geocaching event in Yuma and they came over to our place there for a BBQ. Rex and Vicki live in North Indio in a newer area of town and have a very nice place with a spot to park their motor home on the property. Roy and Darcy were there, as was another caching friend of ours, Kevin, and his partner Ron.

The eight of us visited for a while, of course talking about geocaching mostly, but also some traveling stories. Rex cooked some burgers, Jackie had made a big salad, and Vicki had some beans made. All that and some chips made for a great BBQ meal. We talked and visited until about 8:30 when everyone left to head for home. We went home and watched a couple TV shows until bedtime.

Wednesday, April 1^st, NO April Fools Jokes! We had a relaxing morning and after lunch we went out and did our laundry. When we got back to the coach we relaxed until about 6:00 when we went to our friend's Jay and Donna Blumenthal for a barbeque. We were parked only a couple of spaces down from Jay and Donna, who have been here since November. They spend six months here in Indio and then drive their coach back to New York, where they are from, and park for the summer months. They are full time Rvers, but only go two places for the most part.

Jay and Donna had their daughter and son in law, as well as their granddaughter Linda, who was almost two. They also invited a couple other long term neighbors from the park and we all sat and talked and ate salads, chips and burgers. It was a great time, and the night was very pleasant. About 8:00 we went back to our coach for the rest of the night.

Thursday, April 2^nd, we headed out of Indio about 9:30, moving east about a hundred miles to Ehrenberg, Arizona, just across the river from Blythe, California. We wanted to get an early start because it is supposed to be close to a hundred degrees today and there is quite a climb from below sea level Indio to a couple thousand feet at Desert Center, halfway to the river. The coach did well, no heating issues, and we arrived in Ehrenberg, Arizona right around noon time. We got checked in for our one night stay, which didn't cost us anything.

When we were in Pomona at the rally the parent company of Arizona Oasis had a booth and when I mentioned to the lady in the booth that we would be passing through Ehrenberg later in the week she gave us a free night. We had a pull through spot and didn't even unhook the car. We connected the utilities and just vegged for the rest of the day. I got a lot of travel planning done for our summer travels and Jackie got all the paper and stuff sorted out from the rallies. We just made a relaxation day of it.

Friday, April 3^rd, we left Ehrenberg about 10:00 and continued east on Interstate 10 towards the Phoenix area. We arrived at the Cotton Lane RV Resort in Goodyear, Arizona, about noon, a trip of around 130 miles. We will be staying in Goodyear for two weeks, mostly enjoying the Phoenix area and visiting with my family. My three kids and all but one grandchild still live in the Phoenix area, as do three of my great grandkids. My brother lives in Goodyear, just a half mile or so from the RV park.

After we got settled into the park we went out to Walmart for some supplies and then went back to the coach to relax the rest of the night. My brother's wife works for Southwest Airlines and was working late tonight, so we won't see Ken and Susan until later in the weekend. This should be an enjoyable couple of weeks.

Saturday, April 4^th, I was up early and headed to nearby Avondale for an 8:30 appointment with the Jeep dealer regarding the air conditioning on the Jeep. You may remember from the last episode that the A/C quit on the Jeep AGAIN and the dealer in Pahrump was unable to get the needed parts in time to have it fixed up there. We waited until Goodyear because we will be here for two weeks and should be able to get it done here before we leave.

I made the appointment online at the dealer's website last Tuesday, but when I arrived this morning the service writer didn't have the appointment and could not explain why, even when I showed him my confirmation email. He said they were fully booked for today and there was no way they could get to our car today. I have to come back on Monday morning. Not so great service Larry Miller Chrysler-Jeep in Avondale!

I went back home and then after lunch Jackie and I went out and did some geocaching. We were able to get a dozen new finds, one of which was another milestone, find number 6,900. Although it was a bit hot, we stuck it out to get the milestone. After caching we headed back home and stayed in the rest of the day. We are hoping to visit some of the family next week after the Easter holiday weekend is over. We figured that most people probably already had plans for the weekend. We did a visit late in the afternoon from our Coachella Valley caching friends Roy and Darcy. They had driven to Goodyear for one of the Spring Training baseball games and were on their way back home. They only stayed a half hour or so, but it was good to see them again.

Sunday, April 5^th, Happy Easter. I went out first thing in the morning and got the Sunday paper and we spent the morning with coffee and the paper. After lunch I started on a couple of my projects. We have been having a lot of trouble with the front door, it doesn't close properly and is hard to lock sometimes. I spent some time diagnosing and have determined that the latches on the door itself are out of adjustment. The coach is ten years old, so it is not surprising that things would shift over time. I did a workaround that allows the door to open and close, and lock, more easily, but it still needs to be adjusted. I have looked at the diagrams online and have decided that I may leave that to a professional later on down the road.

I then did some work on our door steps, which quit working a week or so ago. I crawled around in the dirt under the coach for an hour and finally got the motor unbolted from the steps themselves. A quick examination showed that the main gear in the motor box was stripped and that was why the steps were not working. I had heard that the motors for most RV steps are actually just standard automotive power window motors. The motor I took out had a part number and within ten minutes on the internet I had found multiple suppliers for the motor. The step manufacturer wants over $200 for a new motor, I was able to find it on Ebay for $70 plus another $15 for expedited shipping. I ordered it and it will be here by Tuesday.

Around 6:30 or so my brother Ken and his wife Susan, who live only a half mile or so from the park, came over to visit. We have not seen them for a year or so. They were busy all day with some duties with the Arizona Rangers, a quasi-police unit they volunteer with, as well as some family obligations for Easter. They stayed until about 9:00 and we were able to chat and catch up with everything going on in our lives. I am sure we will be spending a lot of time with them during our two week stay here. After they left we watched a little TV and then off to bed.

Today marks about two weeks since we last published, so I will close this episode and get it online. As I said, we still have about two weeks here in Goodyear and we look forward to lots of good times. Until the next time, remember the words of Frederick Keonig, 19th century inventor and philosopher.

“We tend to forget that happiness doesn't come as a result of getting something we don't have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.” Find your happy. See ya next time.