Quartzsite, AZ

We arrived in Quartzsite on Thurs. Oct. 27, 2011 after driving only 75 miles or so.  We stopped at a lookout on the way to Parker where I took these pictures.  The rig is Dos and the toad is Dolly.  The view is of the Bill Williams wilderness wildlife refuge.  South and not in the photo is Havasu Springs Resort.  Lots of mobiles here and a nice looking golf course called Emerald Canyon Golf course.  The golf course is about 10 miles north of Parker, AZ.

We parked in the same spot we had last trip.  It's nice and sunny here so I can see why this little place swells with humans during the winter months. 

There is no large supermarket here so folks either bring their own supplies or go to Blythe, California  to the west; Parker, AZ north of here or Yuma, south of here to shop. 
Hubby quickly got the rig set up and the awning and lawn chair out.  The day was beautiful with a moderately warm day  (high 70's-sorry I don't do metric conversions very easily).  A nice breeze kept our rig cool but left a lot of dust on the window sills that I cleaned up before I went to bed.
Hubby took me round to two bead stores; Hardie's Beads and Jewellry, and Gem World.  He drove me home and I went back; of course I went back; are you crazy?  I didn't find exactly what I wanted; seems briolettes and awarness charms are in short supply here, but I did find some beads that will substitute for the briolettes.
I did three loads of laundry here.  It was time.  A person can only wear a shirt for so many days at a time before it has to be thrown in the laundry basket.
Hubby had purchased a really good looking chuck roast at Safeway in Lake Havasu and he decided to make a stew out of it.  You had to be here!  It turned out sooo good!  His slow cooker recipes; not anyone else's; are just getting better and better.  It was also one of the best chuck roasts I've ever seen.  Well marbled but not too much.  Very little extaneous fat on the edges.  I must say I like the meat down here better than at home.  The butchers cut their meats differently here.  To make this story short; the stew was delicious.  Thanks Chuck.
I cleaned up the dishes and went over to the Hall to watch the baseball game and work on the puzzle of the week.
It got very cold last night.  I don't know what the temperature was but I know I spent a lot of time trying to keep warm.  I was too lazy to reach over my head and pull down an extra blanket.
Today, October 28 is Friday and I'm in the club house wondering why all the chairs are not placed with any tables.  Here are the tables and you can see why.
The kids are coming.  The schools in Quartzsite (school?) take school buses full of little trick and treaters, escorted by the police, around to the various rv parks who are prepared for them and hand out little bags of candy.  This park was prepared for 200 children but there seemed to be over a hundred little bags left.   I guess there is a rule of some sort that you don't give any candy to the adults, although quite a few adults had little ones with them who had a little sac or bucket for candy and some did two bags.   I'm having trouble uploading photos in the same space.  Seems the second photo knocks out the first photo's position.  Still a big learning curve here, lol.  I'm retired, I should know it all by now; NOT.  The story goes that the children do not go house to house here on Halloween night.  This is their time for trick or treating.  Good idea I'd say.

The handsome pirate is a volunteer fireman from Quartzsite Fire Department.  He asked me to mention it.  He's escorting the buses and I guess a costume, this one in particular, keeps him cool and hip looking, lol.  Great job Quartzsite police, firemen and school district.

Laughlin and Lake Havasu

Sunday, Oct 24th we spent in Vegas at Sam's Town RV park.  We had a site that had a tree in front of us so we were shaded a little from the tree.
I found a brochure advertising a large bead store but our drive was fruitless.  There didn't seem to be any physical address that matched the one on the brochure so we gave up and drove out to Henderson and Camping World.  We did some shopping and ordered two fantastic vent covers to be installed on Monday morning.

On Monday morning we arrive for our appointment to find out that we can only have one installed because the solar panels are too close to the fan to have the cover installed.  We saved some money on that one and the gift certificate we have still has a bit of money in it.

We were able to start our journey south at 11:45 am and we headed south to Laughlin.  It wasn't a very long drive and we boondocked at the Riverside Casino overnight.  It was very warm in Laughlin and there were no trees to shade us from the sun. 

  I slept good but hubby had a bit of trouble.  He heard a/c fans running and that kept him awake.  Once I'm asleep I'm asleep.

Tuesday we left Riverside at 9:15 am heading south.    We didn't go far-only to Lake Havasu-where we are now parked.   Campbell Cove RV Park is listed in the Passport America book.  We purchase a p.a. card so that we can find rv parks that have a reasonable rate.  P.A. rate is 50% off the regular rate.  We got our son and his partner using it and they swear by it.  Check out their blog "The Youngest Snowbirds".  Not one photo of Campbell Cove did I take except for this one and Hobo is enjoying the view of Lake Havasu from our rig.

South of Vegas we saw fields of something that was being harvested.  On closer inspection we found that it was cotton being harvested.  I know they grow cotton further south of here so I guess it shouldn't have been a surprise to see it when we did. I wasn't quick enough to pick  up the camera and take a photo.

A good stiff breeze came up Tuesday afternoon.  We opened all the windows and soon had the rig cooled down to a living temperature.

I just wanted to let folks know that not all rv parks have wifi. Some have free wifi. Some charge for wifi. Some charge more than other parks. Those that charge ususally have a daily, weekly or monthly rate. Campbell Cove charges $2.50 a day. Idon't remember their weekly and monthly rates. We bought it. We needed our internet fix. I wanted to keep my blog up to date.
Today is October 26, 2011.  It would have been  my mom's birthday today.
 
We are here in the Campbell Cove RV Resort in Lake Havasu for another day.  The winds are expected to gain in strength as the cold front rolls through.  The lake is roiling with white caps.  The sun is shining though and the temperature in the rig right now is 77 F.  Hubby put up our solar blankets in front of the curtains on the front windows and they are helping keep the temperature down.

 I could be out doing laundry but it costs 2.50 for a load of laundry here and we do have enough underwear to last another day or so, so...

We took a drive yesterday to see "London Bridge".  The bridge was moved from London England to Lake Havasu and reset up brick by brick.  It's quite impressive actually.

The bridge joins the mainland to an island that has beaches, parks, RV parks, homes and lots of land for sale.






We've been seeing rigs pulling trailers with boats and cars and motorcycles.  Here are two examples for our viewers if you're thinking of pulling a car, boat etc.

Double decker trailer holds boat and car pulled behind diesel rig.

trailer holding bike and car pulled by gas rig

Sat. Oct. 22nd Lost Wages here we come

It was a very brisk morning today when we got up in Jackpot.  Hubby had a shower but I was too cold to walk all the way to the restrooms (read that 'lazy').  I dressed in layers.  Fleece pants, short sleeve pullover, sweatshirt, my favourite purple hoodie and lastly, my garage sale found jacket with a lining and rain repellent outer layer.  It took me a long time to warm up.

Driving south to Wells there was a dusting of snow on the mountain ridges.  It took an hour to drive to Wells from Jackpot.  Two more hours to reach Ely.  We've stopped a few times at the Prospector RV park when we've had the rig.  It is very basic but it has clean washrooms inside the hotel.  Dusting of snow on the mountain tops here too.

We stopped in Ely to gas up and grab coffee.  Didn't have breakfast today either.  Met a lady in the store who was from Vernon, heading to Yuma to park their trailer and then drive on down to Rincon de Guayabitos and renting a condo there for the winter.  Small world that's for sure.  This was another very hot, long day driving and we finally got to Las Vegas about 3:30 pm.

We are staying at the Hitchin' Post RV park tonight.  Sandy and Mike from Westbank stay here when they drive down to Mexico.

It is ok here.  It is out of the way of the casinos and it has lovely washroom and shower facilities and a nice pool that hubby and I took advantage of before he made supper.  We unhitched the car and drove down to Fremont street for a couple of hours after supper; lost money in the casinos; watched the light show (Jim Morrison), dodged the crazies that filled the street (Hallowe'en isn't until next week I thought) and were back at the rig by 9:30.  I wish now that I had taken the camera with me to town.  I'm catching up on my blog and I do have a picture to add:

Hobo wanted everyone to see that we are here.
Buenos tardes mis amigos

Oct. 21st third day out already

I need to keep this up or I'll get so far behind I'll just want to quit posting altogether.

Today we changed our minds about how far we wanted to drive.  I had thought Boise, ID might be a good place to stop, but when we added up the miles we realized that we could keep on driving all the way to Jackpot, Nevada.

On our way between Le Grande and Baker City, Oregon, we drove across the 45th Parallel.  The 45th is half way between the Equator and the North Pole.  This bit of trivia is for those who actually look for this kind of information on highway signs.

I would like to say that Washington didn't have many, read very few, rest stops on the route we took on Wed. and Thursday.  Once we got into Oregon they appeared more regularly and were very well kept.  The Weatherby, Oregon rest stop was very clean and well kept inside the washrooms, it was easy to get the rig and toad into a parking space and out again onto the highway.  Thank you Oregon rest stop workers.  You do a great job.

We hit a time zone change from Pacific Time to Mountain Time just south of Huntington, Oregon.  Just a comment about Huntington.  There is a campground down off the highway that is on the river.  We stopped there in the spring of 2010 on our way home from Mexico.  Only thing I remember about this site was that hubby met a fellow from Princeton there on his way back from the south.

The other change we came across was the speed limit when we passed into Idaho.  Cars max was 75 mph and trucks 65 mph.

Between Boise and Mountain Home Idaho there was road construction.  Here is a picture.

  This new road is cement and it goes on for miles.  Just thought I'd throw it in for those of you interested in road construction.

We've been through Twin Falls, Idaho a few times on our travels south and this last spring driving home we came home via I-30 instead of into T.F.  We took I-30 through the Thousand Springs Scenic tour.  We missed T.F. and didn't have quite as many hills to climb.  The route drives through and across the Snake River.  The roads are only two lane but they are well maintained.  This route goes through a farming area and small towns.  I was commenting to hubby that the corn is still not harvested and the stalks don't look as big as the corn we grow at home.

We came out south of T.F. onto I-93 and got to Jackpot about 4 pm Mtn time.  We parked at Cactus Pete's RV park, set up the electric (water turned off for winter) and headed for the casino.  I would like to point out that the washrooms in the RV park are nice and warm when it is cold out.

I had a good luck patch so I treated us to supper.  The area we camped in filled up with snowbirds, and guess who we ran into in the dining room.  Yes, the golfers from our golf club.  We beat them to Jackpot because we were up at 7am and on our way without having breakfast.  We stopped on our way and ate leftovers.  This was also another long day.  We don't usually drive so far, but we wanted to get to Lost Wages while the sun shone.

In the morning, after a very chilly night we said goodbye to Cactus Pete's.  Many of the snowbirds had already left and we didn't hear anyone leaving.  We got away about 7:30 our time.

Oct. 20, 2011 second day out

I put in a little bit of our second day in yesterday's blog so I won't make any more comments about that.
As we drove south we had to decide how far we would go.  We decided to drive as far as Pendleton, Oregon.  The weather was perfect for driving, not too cool and didn't warm up too much.

We passed a golf course and rv park about 15 minutes south of Moses Lake.  It is called Sage Hills Golf and RV Park.  It may be one of our stops in future trips.

I wasn't sure where we would park for the night, but hubby just drove through Pendleton and turned into the Wildhorse Casino.  We registered with Security and boondocked for the night.

Here is Hobo getting a good look at the hotel.  He is very shy so what the heck.  I'll take the picture anyway.

Hubby went for a walk down to the RV park that is part of this large Casino complex.  He tells me there is also a golf course.  Can't see the RV park or the golf course from this parking lot, but it is there.  I believe he said it cost 21.00 a night.  On his walk he ran into a fellow golfer from our home golf club.  He is on his way to Casa Grande, AZ and another couple who live at our home club's RV park were also there.  They are on their way to Yuma for the winter.

It wasn't too bad a night boondocking.  Friday is another day.

On our way

Hello friends and family.  We're on our way south!!  My last blog was dated Aug. 31 and here it is already Oct. 19th and we are sitting in the Coulee Playland Resort in Electric City, Washington.  It was a beautiful day for a drive although we did have one big hiccup-we left all our money at home.  We realized our error when we stopped at Costco in Kelowna and hubby asked me for the money.  I thought he had the money.  We went over the scenario of where the money might be and he finally realized that on Tuesday he had taken it from my purse and put it in the drawer because there was someone working on installing a window in our home and we were busy in the rig putting things away.  Unbeknownst to me he thought I had put it back in my purse because he saw a lump of paper that resembled a bulging envelope with American, Mexican and Philippino bills inside my already bulging purse.  Well, the chase was on.  The race was to make it back to Enderby without hitting any red lights back through Kelowna, Winfield, Oyama, Vernon and Armstrong.  Can you believe it?  We did not hit a single red light all the way home.  There it was, right where he put it.  Now the race was on to get back to Kelowna by 12:00, renew our Costco membership, buy a big tub of popping corn, contact lens cleaner and two big bags of hubby's favourite treat that cannot be purchased in the US or Mexico.  Only close personal friends and family will know what that is.  I'll know you have been reading this blog when you comment on the what that favourite treat is.  Anyway, we had the car hooked back on and out of the Costco parking lot by 12:18 pm.  I'm still laughing.

 We have a new passenger with us.  His name is Hobo.  He was a gift from our daughter this past summer.  He's a little shy, so I took a picture of him while he had his back turned to me.  He was asleep when I took the picture of the sign, otherwise he would have wanted to part of the picture.

We had planned to stay here two days but we decided to get away as fast as possible from the cooler weather so we up and left in the morning.  Lots of fishers here with their boats and it is only four miles south of the Coulee Dam on Banks Lake.  The drive south from here was very nice.  Sun Lakes/Dry Falls State Park is on Hwy 17.  The roads are newly paved all the way to Soap Lake.  There are lots of camping and fishing spots to pull into and launch the boat.  One distinguishing feature of this drive is Steamboat Rock.