A very busy day in Yuma...

Our Location: BLM Road 801, near American Girl Mine Road

 

(Today's pictures were also taken yesterday)

 

A nice night for sleeping but I was awake once again around 4 AM. I just don't seem to be able to sleep past that hour for some reason. No matter when I go to bed, I guess my internal clock is just set to wake me up then. 

 

Yesterday morning's early morning sky.

 Today was a day of errands. We headed off around 9 AM PST to do a few things. First stop was the garbage at the rest area, second stop was to check out a laundromat on 8th street. The next stop was unscheduled but it was another laundromat not too far from the first one. We will be returning to the second one in the next day or so. 

 

A decaying Ocotillo Plant, they look like an octopus.

 

After those two stops we did another unexpected stop to check out a few trailers with a couple of floor plans that interest us. We aren't buying something new but we are looking toward the future. We spent a great deal more time looking than we expected. We also stopped at their service center and managed to chat with the service manager Jesus who gave me a very definite idea of what he thinks is wrong with our system. 

 

The rocks are full of holes and cuts.

 

We dropped back in to CJ's repair as Jason hadn't returned our call from Friday. He agreed with Jesus when I mentioned the fact that we had a boiling battery late last week. Both gentlemen agreed that it is definitely a battery issue. Tomorrow morning we will haul the Igloo back to CJ's for two new batteries and hopefully that will fix the problem. Even though they both tested fair to good, the gentlemen both feel the boiling indicates a bad cell. The boiling is new in the past few days.

 

I wonder which cacti will win out?

 

The boiling battery was the reason we stayed in the area longer than planned. I really want to get this issue solved. Hopefully this will do it and we can move on to enjoy the rest of the winter with no worries. I guess time will tell. I'm still not convinced it's the batteries, but think it may be a two issue problem. Again, time will tell.  

The trails are everywhere back here.

 

From CJ's we headed to the 99 cent store for a few little things, then to Fry's for some groceries and finally to Walmart where we needed to return an item purchased last week, and to finish picking up the rest of the things on the list. After that it was a straight run for home. 

 

The washes are deep in places.

 

We pulled into the yard shortly after 3 PST. I carried the groceries to the door, Riley hauled them away from the door and started putting things away while I cleaned up the outside, putting away all of our things for tomorrow's early appointment in Yuma. 

 

Looks are deceiving, that is still a long walk home.

We think at this point we will return to this spot for another week but again, plans can change as we all know. We shall see what tomorrow brings. Thanks for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed your visit. 

 

I know I posted either this one or one similar yesterday but I love the play of the sunshine on the dunes and the mountains beyond.

 Until next time... take care, be safe, 

 

Deb

 

 

Outings, shopping and a lazy afternoon......

Our Location:  Quail Ridge Rv Park, Hauchua City, Arizona


A nice night, a bit cool but still nice. The sun shine warmed everything up quickly. I was out the door before 8:30 AM heading into Sierra Vista to the Chevy Dealership. A quick visit snagged me an appointment tomorrow morning at 8:30 AM. No loaners, only rentals or a shuttle.  So tomorrow I’ll see what their inspection finds before I make any decisions. I then wandered along the road to the Fry’s grocery store to pick up a few things.  From there I was homeward bound. 

 

Lawn ornaments here in the park.

 

At home I realized I’d forgotten to stop at the ATM machine but Riley and I were heading off to an RV dealer to look for a tire cover so after our stop there we headed back to Sierra Vista. We revisited Fry’s, stopped at Target and then of course a quick drop into the Walmart.   From there we headed home again. Did you realize we forgot about the ATM again? I’ll have to do it tomorrow. 

 

Some lawn ornaments, and the two bottom corner pictures are real cacti, the other two are metal.

 

I was going to sit outside and read but I could hardly keep my eyes open and I didn’t want to fall asleep outside in the sun. I’ve been exhausted all day and so I basically stayed tucked in my chair dozing and waking up for the afternoon. Around 5 PM I headed out for a walk around the park stopping at the dumpster which was one of the reasons I managed to get my butt out of the door. A nice walk, not long but enough for today. 

 

A fairly strong wind today.

 

So there you have it, a bit of an outing but nothing exciting. I hope you all had a fantastic day.  Thanks for stopping by.

 

The second clubhouse.

 

Until next time…. take care, be safe,

Deb

Hustle, bustle, nice walk and beautiful sunset...

Our Location: Saddle Mountain BLM, Tonopah, Arizona

A cool night again, right near the freezing mark. The day didn’t dawn with bright blue skies, instead it was overcast and somewhat drab and dreary. The sun could be seen as a hint up there somewhere but the temps didn’t go up as high as hoped either. The overcast kept the temps down to about 60F/15C but not any higher. The absence of wind was wonderfully helpful today to at least make us feel somewhat warmer. 

Holiday Decorations in Buckeye, Arizona

Daughter Courtney sent me a text message around 7 am this morning telling me that she truly enjoyed the musical Bat Out Of Hell with her friend Jodi. She sent me a couple of pics of her and Jodi posing on the ‘bike’. It looks like they had a fantastic time.

Riley rolled out around 8 am and we chatted about what to do with the day. We both agreed we needed to get out and about but we couldn’t really decide what we wanted to do. We needed some drinking water and so Buckeye was our destination. We spent some time just touring around and arguing with the GPS but finally managed to find the places we wanted to go. I know, I know, you are shaking your head asking me if I’m sane or not. It’s a Saturday, 2 days before Christmas. Well it wasn’t as busy as I thought it would be but it was still busy enough. Our first stop was at the Visitor Centre we’ve been trying unsuccessfully to find for the past few days. Obviously we finally found it. It wasn’t the easiest thing to find. Of course it was closed but we did manage to grab a couple of little things but after getting home and looking at them, one is totally unless to us as it shows only RV Parks. Since it was listed as a camping guide I assumed it might show us some BLM spots as well. Nada, nothing, zippo. Oh well it was worth a try. 

Cotton in the fields...

Our next stop was at Walgreens to get some drinking water. They have an outside machine that is easy to access and pretty much the same price as Walmart’s but Wally’s is inside the store and you have to go through the register to pay. At Walgreen’s it’s a pay at the dispenser type deal so no line ups. It wasn’t working. No problem, another Walgreens just up the way. Sorry, out of water. Hmmmmm…..okay we were going to Fry’s Supermarket anyway. They have TWO outside the front door. One…sorry out of water. Second was good. I put in our big jug, put in our money, it dispensed not quite a gallon and stopped, gave us back most of our money. Sorry out of water. Hmmmm…this is not a good thing. So we braved Walmart and it only took us about 20 minutes to get parked, get the water, pay and get back out. Not too bad at all. We only filled up the big jugs. A nice lady told us that Circle K has a machine as well. She’s correct but there were a couple of ‘scruffy’ looking fellows with two dogs between where we parked and where the water dispenser was, we opted to by pass that option. So instead on the way home we stopped at Wintersburg and topped up the remaining smaller jugs for 20 cents more a gallon. We don’t like taking all the small jugs inside, it’s cumbersome and time consuming, so if we can’t do it outside then we just don’t do it. We use the smaller jugs for quick things water for hot drinks, or cooking, instead of using the water from the tank. It’s just simpler that way. 

Looks like oranges....

So finally home we managed to get everything put away and I started prepping lunch by 1 pm. I made my green salad of course, Riley declined one today, and I chopped up assorted veggies for a vegetable medley (fresh green beans, celery, sweet peppers, fresh mushrooms, spaghetti squash, carrots)  with fresh ground Italian Seasoning, and I also did a garlic potato for Riley. To that we added a ham steak. It was very good, if I do say so myself. 

After cleaning up the dishes we grabbed our walking sticks and headed off for a walk. Riley went for maybe 15 minutes while I headed out for a bit longer trek. Riley stayed on the road way and I headed off cross country. I climbed up, up, up on one of those hills I’ve showed you so many times, walking completely around the ridge under the rocky peak. It was an interesting walk, lots of things to see and numerous interesting sights I may not have seen otherwise. Very, very, very rocky. I had to be very careful not to twist an ankle. I did manage to get some great pictures. Riley even managed to blindly get a pic of me waving my bright orange sweater. I’m a long way from the Igloo. I managed to make it back home after about an hour and half. So I truly did get in a good walk today. It was certainly a work out.

I chatted with daughter Bradey upon reaching home. They were returning to their apartment after having had a family meal with David’s family, I believe Mom’s side of the family was there for this for this meal. Last week it was Dad’s side for a meal. According to Bradey, it was turkey at both meals so Christmas for the immediate family will be Ham and Lamb. I think probably everyone is full of turkey by now. They are enjoying the festive season as Bradey is very much filled with Christmas Spirit. 

Back inside the Igloo I edited pics from our morning excursion and from my trek around the hilltop. When I finished that I grabbed the camera and headed out to catch the sunset. A call to my sister had her off visiting some folks so I promised to call another time. She and her partner Rick will be heading to Sudbury tomorrow to spend Christmas with Jan’s children/ grandchildren. A busy time I’m sure. 

I spent the rest of my time outside snapping pics of the sunset. A beauty tonight with the sky on fire over many parts of the land. Truly a magnificent sight. Riley even came outside at one point to ohh and ahhh over the sky’s ever changing colour palette. After that back inside to write this post and edit the sunset pics.

So there you have it, our busy type day. A bit of fun, a bit of hustle and bustle, and touring around. Today marks 14 days here at Saddle Mountain. We like it but we’re getting restless and are looking forward to moving a few days after Christmas. Not sure where we’re headed exactly but a few ideas are being tossed around.

Thanks for stopping by, hope you had a fantastic day as well. Feel free to drop a comment if you like, I read them all. 

Until next time…take care, be safe, 

Deb

Our first full day here, quiet and relaxing....

Our Location: Quail Ridge Rv Resort, Huachuca City, Arizona

 

A nice night for sleeping with the vents open, one of these nights I'm certain we'll leave the windows open too. Maybe tonight. 

 

Heading into Sierra Vista, Arizona

 

I slept later than usual, not waking until 7 am. I think the higher day time temps may be tougher on us than we think. Riley didn't start moving around until I was making noise in the living room around 8:15 am. She tried to tell me she'd been awake for a while but I could hear her snoring. Or at least I told her I could. 

 

I love those long tall trees....

 

We were debating about what to do today. We had some plans but in the end decided we'd feel better with just doing some looking around and getting some groceries. 

 

Nice view, huh?

 

We climbed into the Dogsled and headed for Huachuca City but ended up slipping on down into Sierra Vista. A nice little town with plenty of shopping and a LOT of restaurants. We found the Safeway, took a spin around but didn't find any good prices or deals. The store seemed cold to us, even though we had sweaters on to combat the A/C. It was a nice clean store, big, spacious aisles, well stocked but it wasn't a fit for us. We moved on to Fry's Grocery a bit further down the way. There we grabbed a cart and started our shopping. We found some pretty good prices but you really had to watch as some things were quite a bit more expensive than we've been paying at Walmart. The store was well stocked, clean, and spacious as well. We will go back again for certain. 

 

The look of this building appeals to me, very southwestern.

 

We drove off to find the Walmart, looked for a few clothing items but found only a couple of things for Riley. Hard to believe they don't have any capri's, shorts, and t'shirts out, instead it's long sleeved sweaters, knit sweaters, long pants in varying material and believe it or not, fleece one piece PJ's for adults. We did manage to finish up our grocery list. We shouldn't need groceries for a week or more now. Believe it or not, they all fit in the fridge too. 

 

On the way home from Sierra Vista

 

 We enjoyed the drive, and since it's Sunday there was no construction going on, just the pylons and etc. The drive was short, scenic and fun. We noticed a few interesting things along the way, including our first Segundo Cactus right in Huachuca City at the site of the historical plaque of Fort Huachuca. We of course had to stop and get a picture of this cactus. 

 

No workers present today...

 

Back home I made a couple of green salads, and doctored up the spaghetti sauce in the jar. I also made cheese garlic bread. While outside eating my salad, Riley cooked the spaghetti and that was lunch. Sorry, no pics, I forgot.

 

 

Since Riley was finding the heat a bit much I sent her outside where it was much cooler in the shade of our awning and I cleaned up inside. Bringing Riley some water, her hat along with my own water, hat and book we both settled down to read for a bit. She felt better after a while and we enjoyed some watermelon outside in the shade. 

 

 

A short walk around the other side of the park when the temps started falling and we returned home to finish up the rest of the day in the comfort of our awing. The outside temps reached a bit higher than yesterday I think, I think the thermometer  reached 85F/29.4C during the afternoon today. It was cooler outside than in side. 

Love this purple coloured cactus

 

I sat outside for a while editing pics and when the temps started dropping rapidly I came inside to finish up. We've closed up most of the windows and will close the rest just before going to bed. Think we'll leave the vents open tonight though.

 

Wonder what Santa is sitting on?

 

So that was our first full day here in Quail Ridge. A nice quiet day, relaxing and warm. We'll take it. Thanks for stopping by. Feel free to leave a comment. 

 

Stunning view.

 

Until next time...Take care, be safe, 

 

 

Our first Segundo Cactus

Deb