Having Fun in Arizona

Having Fun In Arizona

I realize we have been out of touch for a while, but we have been busy! How did we ever have time to work!  We found a great RV Resort in Gold Canyon AZ called Canyon Vistas.  It is about 30 miles east of Phoenix and is situated near the base of the Superstition Mountains. We have a beautiful view of the mountains right out of our front windshield.

When we arrived at this place, we only signed up to stay for one week as we had never been to this area before and we were not sure if we would like it.  After just a few days, however, we liked it so much that we decided to stay for 2 months! The thing we like the most is that everyone was so friendly.  Canyon Vistas was also offering a special rate of $795.00 for October through January 2nd and they even included free tickets for their Thanksgiving Day dinner, Christmas Eve dinner and New Year’s Eve Party.(Over $100.00 if we had to purchase!) It was such a great deal that we could not pass it up! We have never stayed this long in one place before but we decided we would still have January, February and March to explore southern California before the weather got warmer and we could begin our journey up the West coast. The facilities here are great (swimming pool, hot tub, fitness center, tennis and pickleball courts), they offer lots of activities and as I mentioned, the people here are very friendly. I have been going to an exercise class every morning and have tried line dancing and Zumba!  Tom  joined the local model airplane club and got in some good flying time! He had many successful flights and one minor crash but he had his plane repaired and back in the air the next day! We have both joined their golf leagues and are playing 2-3 times a week.

They have a great bike riding area and Abbey & Jameson even have a nice dog park with real grass! (Not much grass in Arizona!)  I even got Tom to try “couples country dance” lessons. We are not ready for Dancing with the Stars but we are getting better with the beginner dances! Tom would have enjoyed it more if the lessons had not been on Sunday afternoons right in the middle of football games!

When we are not involved in the club activities we have taken in some of the local sights.  One of our first trips was up into the mountains to a small town named Tortilla Flats. Over 100 years ago Tortilla Flats was a thriving stage coach stop on the Apache Trail. It was almost destroyed by a flood in 1943 and then a fire in 1987.  The town survived and today it is a quaint little “Old West” town with real wooden sidewalks, a great little restaurant, a post office, an old schoolhouse museum and an old fashioned ice cream parlor!  In the restaurant the walls are covered with dollar bills and the bar seats are saddles! The custom of putting dollars on the walls started years ago when the local ranchers and prospectors would pin their tab and a dollar bill behind the bar. The tradition continues and the walls now contain currency from over 67 countries! It is mostly a tourist attarction but today the official year round population of Tortilla Flats is 6.

We celebrated our first Thanksgiving and Christmas on the road. Canyon Vistas provided a big turkey dinner for all the residents with all the “fixins” on the day before Thanksgiving. On Thanksgiving Day, Tom and I headed for the local Golden Coral restaurant for an “All You Can Eat Turkey Buffet” for only $9.96 each! (senior citizen discount!)  Good food and lots of it!  On Christmas Eve they again provided a great roast beef and stuffed pork chop dinner in the afternoon. Later in the evening we attended a candlelight Christmas Carol Service with around 150 other residents.  On Christmas Day Tom & I packed the dogs in the car and headed out for a day trip to Roosevelt Lake and Apache Lake.  It was a beautiful drive through the mountains traveling through several old mining towns. We packed a picnic lunch and had a great day!

Before we arrived, we thought Arizona was going to be mostly a desert area with nothing but cactus.  This drive along the Apache Trail twists through wild desert areas and then winds its way up and through the mountains hugging the shores of several beautiful lakes. It is a really beautiful area!

  

There is a local legend about a hidden gold mine somewhere in the Superstition Mountains named the Lost Dutchman Mine.  When the Lost Dutchman died, he refused to tell anyone how to find the mine. For years, many have tried to discover its location but no one has found it yet. Last summer three men from Virginia when up into the mountain to look for it and they have not yet been found!

Tomorrow night is New Year’s Eve. We are going to the big party at the Clubhouse and then after a day to rest (and pack) on Saturday we will be on the road again Sunday morning. We have made some great new friends and will definitely be back here again!

 Our first stop will be Tucson to visit some friends and see Saguaro National Park and then it will be  “California Here We Come”  (not right back where we started from!)  and year two of our full-time adventure will begin!

A few Arizona Facts..........

Arizona has the largest percentage of land designated as Native American Tribal land in the United States.

Arizona has more golf courses per capita than any state west of the Mississippi River.

On February 14, 1912, Arizona became the last of the contiguous states (that is, not including Hawaii and Alaska) to join the Union.

Arizona has more parks and national monuments than any other state, more mountains than Switzerland, and more golf courses than Scotland.

The world's largest telescope is at the Kitt Peak National Observatory, Arizona.

Photos
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Back To Colorado

Back To Colorado

Leaving the RV Rally in Farmington, NM we traveled north back into Colorado.  We were debating about stopping at the local casino to park or going to a real campground. At the Rally we happened to meet the owner of a campground in Bayfield, CO so we decided to check it out. It turned out to be one of the nicest campgrounds we have stayed in. It was right next to the Pine River. (Lots of trout!). There was grass and trees and great places for Abbey and Jameson to run.  They even got to go for a quick swim in the river one morning. (Their idea, not mine!)  This was our view from our campsite!

From the campground we took a few short day trips, one to Pagosa Springs, a cute little town with lots of “Hot Springs” to enjoy. We forgot to pack our bathing suits but I did dip my fingers and toes into a few of them. The temperatures ranged from around 99 (warm & comfortable) to 110 (too HOT!) From there we drove up to see a local ski area; not much of a ski area but a beautiful drive! We even crossed the Continental Divide just before we reached the ski area. On the way back to the RV Park we stopped to take a quick photo of Chimney Rock Monument. This site was home to the ancestors of modern Pueblo Indians and continues to be of great spiritual significance to these tribes. It was closed for the season so we could not get very close.

The next day we took off to drive to Durango and then on to Silverton, a mining town nestled between the mountains.  Silverton was first laid out in 1874 after prospectors “found gold in them there hills!” We could have opted for a ride on the historic Durango – Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, but at $82.00 per ticket we decided to drive.  The driving was slow, climbing up to an elevation of 10,910 feet as we drove through the Molas Divide. 

We did not have much time so we had a quick lunch in Silverton and then drove on to Ouray which is called the “Switzerland of America”.  This drive is often referred to as the “

Million Dollar Highway

” but you really can’t put a price on the experience. The origin of the highways nickname is disputed. Some say it refers to how much it cost to build the road but others insist it has to do with the amount of gold that remains under the highway! We followed this beautiful winding mountain road passing by old mining camps and stunning vistas around every turn.  Since we did not get here until late October we were seeing these places at kind of the end of their season but we would definitely like to come back sometime in the spring or summer to see them in full swing!

On our last day in Bayfield it was raining so we took a day off from sightseeing and just relaxed in the “MotherShip”. We even treated ourselves to dinner out at a local restaurant, “Brenda’s Home Cooking”. …Excellent choice!

On our way out of Colorado we stopped at Mesa Verde NP. It was not the best weather, a few showers and cloudy, but we decided to stop anyway since we were traveling right by the entrance. 

Mesa Verde was established as a National Park in 1906 is the first and only National Park established to preserve the works of people. It covers 52,000acres!  It was actually discovered in 1886 by a couple of cowboys who were chasing their wandering cattle.  From approximately AD 600 through 1300, people lived and flourished in communities throughout this area, eventually building elaborate stone villages in the sheltered alcoves of the canyon walls. Today, most call these “cliff dwellings”.

The park stays open year round but most of the Visitor Centers had closed for the season. We unhooked the Jeep, left the dogs in the RV at the base and started the 20 mile drive to the top. The narrow road climbs up 2,000 feet twisting and turning around the curves (no guard rails!)  with signs telling us “Don’t Stop-Watch for Falling Rocks!  We finally reached the Visitor Center that was still open which was also the Museum. Tom wasn’t sure how his knees would hold up and we were a little short on time so we decided not to take the Ranger led tour of Cliff Palace which they cautioned was strenuous and involved climbing up and down steep ladders. We did take a self guided tour of the Spruce Tree dwellings and drove the 5 mile Mesa Top Loop which had several scenic overlooks. The sun popped out for most of the drive so we got some excellent photos. There are still many mysteries about Mesa Verde. Who were the people who lived there? How did they build such magnificent homes? Why did they move from their homes on the canyon floor and move up onto the cliffs?  Why did they leave and where did they go? It truly is a “must see” place for everyone!

The ride back down to the RV was a little nerve racking as we were hit with an ice storm as we began our descent. We made it safely to the bottom and traveled to our”  home” for the next 2 days at the Sleeping Ute RV Park on the Ute Nation Reservation next to their casino.  On Sunday before the football games began we took a quick trip to see “Four Corners”.  It is the only place in the country where 4 states meet and you can stand in all 4 at the same time!  (Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico).

We did learn that with newer more advanced technology and GPS capabilities, there is some discrepancy as to the actual point where the 4 states meet, but since they already built the “Monument” in its current location they have decided not to change the location. Other than taking a few photos so we could say we were there, there is nothing else for miles around. It is right in the middle of a big Navaho Indian Reservation.  There were many Indian women selling their hand-made jewelry, pottery and woven rugs. I managed to get away with buying only one pair of earrings!

Next stop………..Arizona!

  MORE PHOTOS

http://picasaweb.google.com/KHStaska/BackToColorado02#

Life's a journey, not a destination….Enjoy the ride!

New Mexico Update

New Mexico

The trip down from the Great Sand Dunes to the Albuquerque Balloon Festival was only 250 miles and we had another beautiful sunny day to enjoy the scenery. Jameson’s favorite part was when we were stopped by a couple of cowboys to let their herd of cattle cross the road!  On the way into Taos we (actually Tom) drove over one of the loftiest bridges in the country. This three span continuous truss bridge crosses the Rio Grand Gorge over 650 feet above the river.  There is a pedestrian walkway along the bridge and Tom decided it was an opportune time to “spit” into the Rio Grand. I guess it was one of the things on his “bucket list”?

In Taos we found a big public parking lot and spent a couple of hours walking around the shops, art galleries and found a nice little outdoor café for lunch. I was going to buy a new teakettle but the first one I picked up was $150.00!  I think I’ll try Walmart.  Back on the road we drove through Santa Fe but did not have time to stop. We ended up at one of our favorite Casinos just north of Albuquerque.

On the drive down to the Balloon Fest Tom and I decided we would not need to take as many photos as we did 2 years ago when we were there. Our good Cannon digital camera is in for repair and we only have our older little Fuji digital to use for now. We figured that the balloons would all look the same and we could probably include the old photos in our Blog and no one would know the difference. Once we arrived at the Fest and the balloons started flying, we just couldn’t help ourselves, we just had to take more photos! So….all of the photos included are real 2010 Balloons!

The last time we were here we volunteered to “Crew” on one of the balloons. This year because of Tom’s new knee, we decided to skip this part and just enjoy the show. We met lots of RVers, many “full-timers” like us who were always willing to share stories about the best campgrounds, best routes, best restaurants etc. On the last day of the show, the balloons were landing right next to the lot where we were parked!

From the Balloon Fest we had another short drive to Farmington, NM to attend the Rocky Mountain Motorhome Association Rally. This is a 5 day event sponsored by the FMCA (Family Motor Coach Association). There were 320 RV’s there and once again we made lots of new friends. The Rally included seminars on RV topics, lots of eating and live entertainment every night. Unfortunately, Tom had to make a trip home to Minnesota to attend a funeral for his brother-in-law. I stayed at the Rally to keep and eye on the dogs and the RV.  I also joined some new friends from Texas and did a little sightseeing in the area to see some of the Ancestral Pueblo ruins at the Aztec Ruins National Monument and the Salmon Ruins.

Tom returned from Minnesota and we are now back in Colorado for a few days in the Durango area.   The weather is starting to turn cold, so we will probably start heading south!

That’s all for now, see you down the road!
PHOTOS

http://picasaweb.google.com/KHStaska/NewMexicoUpdate#


 

Kathy & Tom

Jameson & Abbey

Colorado is Beautiful

Colorado is Beautiful!
 This is the view we had this morning from our campsite in the Great Sand Dunes National Park.

We have really enjoyed our brief trip through Colorado and even though we only had 10 days, we managed to pack in quite a few great stops.

On September 22nd we left MN and drove to Sioux Falls, SD. We passed through many small farming towns and enjoyed the views of the “amber waves of grain” as the harvest was in full swing. We hit a little rain but made it to our destination in good time. The Sioux Falls KOA was much nicer than the Massachusetts KOA! The staff were very friendly and even brought over a raised wooden door mat so we would not get our feet wet stepping out of “The MotherShip”. The next morning we were off to the Registry. I passed the eye test and got my official South Dakota driver’s license! 

 Back on the road we drove in the rain again all the way through Nebraska. This was our first trip through Nebraska and I have to say it was pretty boring. We stayed at a Walmart in North Platte, NE; stopped for a late breakfast at Ole’s in Paxton, NE. (We were the only customers in there for breakfast at 10:00 am. I guess the local farmers must eat breakfast closer to 6:00 am). We found another Walmart in Ft Collins CO and were finally ready to begin our Colorado adventure!

Our first stop was in Estes Park near the entrance to the Rocky Mountain National Park.  We spent 5 days there at the Elk Meadows Campground and enjoyed perfect weather everyday…. 80’s and sunny! We drove the jeep (not the RV!) 45 miles over the Trail Ridge Road which is the highest paved road in North America. The highest elevation is 12,183 feet. and the road has many, many hairpin curves with steep drop-offs on both sides. The views were spectacular! One point along the spine of the mountain, the drop off is about 2,000 feet down on either side of the road! On the other side of the mountain we found a great little town called Grand Lake. After a quick lakeside lunch it was time for the return trip back over the top!  We also took a few side trips to Bear Lake and Chasm Falls. Our timing for this trip was perfect as the Aspens were in full bloom. The park was beautiful and hillsides seemed to light up with the sun shining on the golden leaves. The photos don’t really capture the full effect! We saw many elk wandering all over the park. On our last day we took time to play golf on a beautiful course right in Estes Park . The elk had also taken to wandering on the golf course!  On one hole they were hanging out near the green so we were not able to finish the hole.  Course rules allowed us to take a par which really helped my score!

From Estes Park it was a short drive to our next stop at Colorado Springs. We only had 2 days to spend here but we did a lot! We took the Cog Railway up to the top of Pikes Peak (14,110 feet). The ride up was fun but the views from the top were spectacular! Here’s a little history lesson. Katherine Lee Bates took a trip up to the Pikes Peak summit in the late 1800’s and was so moved by the magnificent views that she was inspired to write the words to “America the Beautiful”.  We also toured the Garden of the Gods, and visited the Air Force Academy (right after the Air Force vs. Navy football game….lots of traffic!!), the US Olympic Training Center and the historic Broadmore Hotel. We stayed at a great campground (Pikes Peak RV) in the town of Manitou Springs just at the base of the mountain. The town is full of little shops and galleries and restaurants and is a place we will definitely come back to someday!

From there it was on to the Great Sand Dunes National Park. We really wanted to stop at Royal Gorge but our time would not allow it for this trip. We will definitely plan it for our next time through. We did take a slight detour to stop in Buena Vista, CO. to visit the Frontier Ranch which is a Young Life Camp. Tom wanted to see what it looked like as he spent 3 summers there in the 1950’s. Today it is a beautiful  camp/resort and has been renovated and expanded. In addition to youth camps, they now host adult retreats and other events. Tom had fun “remembering when!” and he can’t wait to send the photos to his former fellow campers.

And that brings us now to our current stay at the Great Sand Dunes National Park. It is an amazing place, especially the history of how the dunes were formed so many hundreds of millions of years ago! The huge dunes, 750 feet tall and the tallest in North America, are a small part of an enormous sand deposit that covers 330 square miles. They have long stood as a landmark for travelers from the Navajos, to the explorers, to gold miners, to homesteaders and now for sightseeing RV’ers!

Our next stop will be the Albuquerque Balloon Festival. We had so much fun the last time we went, we decided to make a return trip!

See you down the road!


Here are the photos Photo

Update - May to September 2010

                     I Have No Excuse

                     (At least not a good one!)

Once again, too much time has gone by since my last update. I am not sure where the time goes but we are beginning to realize that the older we get, the faster it goes!

My last update left off with our arrival in Cincinnati. We spent 3 weeks there visiting my family. There is a beautiful county owned campground, Winton Woods, that has great RV sites. As always, it is great to spend time with Mom, my 3 sisters, my brother and a few of the nieces and nephews. We hosted a big family cookout to celebrate Jameson’s 9^th birthday! We also played a little golf, tried bowling (first time since high school!) and did our part to boost the economy by eating out at our favorite local restaurants! We also took a short day trip to Dayton Ohio to visit the National Museum of the Air Force. They have 6 huge hangers full of aircraft from the early Wright Brother’s days all the way up to the space shuttle. It is very interesting and worth the trip. We only had a few hours but we could have spent 2 days trying to see everything. Tom also took a side trip to South Dakota to get his driver’s license and register to vote, now that we are officially residents of South Dakota.

From there we headed back to Massachusetts for a 6 week stay which again went by way too quickly! Unfortunately there are no nice campgrounds so we ended up at the local KOA. (definitely nothing special but a convenient location for the grandkids to visit.) The first week we both got caught up with all of our Dr. appointments and we are happy to report that we are both doing well (except for Tom’s knee)!  After that it was fun to reconnect with our many friends and Tom even got his part-time job back at the golf course. While he was busy working I was able to run away for a fun “girls weekend” in Ogunquit Maine with some of my friends. Tom & I also made it to 2 Rallys with our RV group which is always a grand time filled with fun and food!

From there we headed out to Minnesota and discovered a great stop on the way.  We stayed 2 nights at the Merry Knoll Campground in Clayton, NY. Clayton is in upstate NY in an area called Thousand Islands right on the St. Lawrence Seaway which is the border between the US and Canada. There are actually more than 1,000 islands……….1,864 to be exact. In order to be counted as an island, the property must have at least one tree and one other form of vegetation. Some of the islands are huge and have several homes, others are pretty small. The entire area up there is beautiful and the weather was perfect! From Clayton we drove about 10 miles down the road to Alexandria Bay (another cute little town on the water) and took a 3 hour boat tour which stopped for a visit at one of the two big castles that were built on two of the islands. There is also an Antique Boat Museum in the area and while we were there we went to an Antique Boat Show. Tom had fun looking at all of the old boats and reminiscing about the fun he had growing up on Lake Minnetonka. After the boat show we took another drive to see the Tibbett’s Point Lighthouse which is near where the St. Lawrence Seaway meets Lake Ontario.

From Clayton we traveled through Canada, not great roads but pretty country and much better than going anywhere near Chicago. Back in the US we tried some of our usual “Casino Camping” in Marquette, Michigan and Hinckley, Minnesota. In Marquette there was a huge field of wild blueberries right behind our campsite so we helped ourselves to a big basket full! 

We arrived in Minnesota and are very fortunate to be able to park our RV home at Tom’s sister Virginia’s home in Minnetonka. Her husband Anson even chopped down a tree down near the driveway to make sure our new RV would fit! They have a big fenced in yard and 2 dogs for Abbey and Jameson to play with. Tom’s daughter, Tamara, also has 2 dogs and when they come for a visit it gets pretty wild here! Abbey & Jameson are getting up there in dog years (Abbey turned 70! on September 1^st and Jameson is only 8 months behind her). Both of their dogs are 2 year olds and have much more energy! Jameson tries to play for a while, but doesn’t last long. He’s still young at heart! Abbey is happy just to lie in the sun or hang out in her RV!  Jameson has also discovered Virginia’s vegetable garden and helps himself to cherry tomatoes and raspberries when he thinks we are not looking!

The big event scheduled for our visit here was Tom’s 70^th Birthday party. His son and daughter and the grandkids from Massachusetts all came out to join the celebration. I think there were more than 40 of us counting nieces and nephews and 7 of our 9 grandkids (one working in Boston and one working in California). It was a great party and we are both grateful that everyone could be here! The grandkids had fun out here tubing on the lake and hanging out at the Mall of America! Our 2 younger grandkids who live out here have joined us as much as they could but they are 15 and 16 now, both in high school and keep pretty busy with all of their friends and part-time jobs!

As long as we had planned to be here for at least 6 weeks, Tom decided that this would be a good place to have his total knee replacement surgery. The surgery was on August 2^nd and he got through that part fairly easily. The follow-up with physical therapy twice a week at the Clinic and home exercises twice a day for the next 6 weeks has been a bit more of a challenge. Tom has been a real trooper and followed the Doctor’s orders, never skipping a session! As a result, today he is doing very well! We walk a mile or two every day and go for short bike rides.  This week we even played golf, just 9 holes at a par 3 course but it was golf!

As long as he was not able to drive for a while with his bum knee, he decided it would be a good time to deal with his deteriorating eyesight due to his cataracts. He had both eyes done and the Dr. was able to put corrective lenses in so now he can see better than ever without glasses or contacts! We went out to dinner a few nights ago with some of the family and he was the only one at the table that could read the menu without glasses! He is really psyched about this improvement! I am too! Now he can share some of the night driving!

So, now that Tom is all put back together we are getting ready to begin our big western adventure! We’ll be heading to South Dakota (I have to get my driver’s license and register to vote!) Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon, Washington and into western Canada. We don’t really have a plan; I guess we’ll figure it out as we travel along!

So in the course of this update we have returned “Home” ……..several times.

 But where is “Home”?  Is it where you grew up? Where your family still lives?  Where you spent most of your adult life and your working career?  I guess for us, at least for right now and the immediate future……..Home Is Where We Park It!

Now that I am caught up and have figured out this Blog thing, the updates will be more frequent and a lot shorter!

Hope all is well with you. See you down the road!

See Our Photos at

http://picasaweb.google.com/KHStaska/Sept2010Update?authkey=Gv1sRgCP7jte-Zp-_JjgE#slideshow/5518809625100127250

Kathy & Tom

Abbey & Jameson