My Trails

On the 7th of November, one day after the midterm elections, I left Tempe and drove to Quartzsite , AZ. and purchased an LTVA season pass. Even though I usually move around southern Arizona in the winter, I still like to buy the season pass for the Long Term Visitors Area. That way I have a home base so to speak.

Quartzsite is not awfully busy yet. The biggest migration of RV dwellers wait till after the holidays to descend here, consequently causing the population of the town and surrounding desert to swell to many times it’s normal size. I rode into town today and only a handful of booths were open. When the Big Tent Show is in swing, and rows of shops selling their wares are open and after your money, it is hard to find a parking spot within a quarter-mile of the main drag.

The temperature has been almost perfect. This next week is forecast to be in the mid 70’s everyday. The one thing that’s not pleasing in the open desert is wind and today is one of those days. You never want to leave for the day and forget to take down your awning. Wind can come up very quickly and rip away anything it can get a hold of.

I parked in the same place I did last year. It is across the wash from the nudist area. I like it because it is isolated from other campers. Other campers keep away for fear they will see something shocking.

Yeah I see… Last night I was setting up camp and there he comes…. walking down through the wash wearing nothing but a sombrero! I yelled, “Don’t look Ethel!” but it was too late. She’d already seen a desert bush.

After my doctors appointments in Tempe, I drove up to Payson for a couple weeks. It is almost time to head for southern Arizona and stake out a spot in the desert to ride out the winter.

I had three reasons to stay in the area for a few days: I still needed to wait for test results ( all ok), the election was coming in a couple weeks, and best of all, Donna and Hanna decided to come up in her motorhome and camp with me in the tall pines and cool weather.

It was chilly nights above Payson and it rained a few times that we were there, but Donna has a car she tows behind her motorhome and we could run around in comfort. We went to see some nearby boondocking sites on a few days, made a trip to places Donna remembered from her time with the Cancer Society, went into town for a movie, and made several trips to Walmart for odds and ends. I think we only stayed all day in camp on two occasions.

We had a campfire on most nights. The nights got very chilly so it felt good to slide our chairs close to the flames and roast marshmallows. I very seldom have a fire when I’m camping alone but those s’mores sure tasted good. About 7:30 or so we would retire to our motorhomes and watch a little tv or read.

I won’t go into any more detail about our camping trip because Donna is going to write about it too.

Right now I’m parked in Bulldog Canyon, just north of Mesa along the Salt River. When I was in Payson the tall pines blocked most of the sun during the day and my solar panels struggled to keep me charged. For the last two days my panels have really appreciated being here in the open desert to soak up sunshine and turn it into electricity; they are usually able to fully charge the batteries shortly after noon.

My plan it to head for Quartzsite next week. Even though I make home base at one of the LTVAs, I still seem to wander abound southern Arizona all winter. Last year I was working my way over to Boot Hill when I made a detour back to Phoenix. I like to go back to places I know I went to when I was young because Ican’t remember them anymore. And my memory is getting so bad as I get older it seem like every place I go to is new – even if I was just there – Wonderful!

Not much to tell about. I’m just hanging around Payson until my scheduled doctor appointments are taken care of. I’m testing out a new (to me) phone I received from Donna. It is an iPhone, so will involve relearning different system operations. It has been many years since I had an iPhone.

Over the last few years Don gave me a Samsung 4, Daryl gave me a Nexus Google Phone, and Donna has given me an iPhone 6+. It’s nice to have siblings that upgrade to the latest technology and give me perfectly good devices. Thanks again guys!

While I camped at Datil Wells campground in New Mexico, I rode Honda a short side trip over to the VLA. The VLA, which stands for Very Large Array, is a group of 28, giant, parabolic dishes, built in a remote section of windy, New Mexico desert, and used to capture radio waves from distant reaches of the universe. With these radio telescopes they have photographed galaxies, black holes, and thousands of cosmic objects millions of light-years away.

I have been here before but it’s an interesting stop. The visitors center costs $5 for a senior, allowing you to browse the rooms of displays, watch a movie, and take a walking tour out to one of the dishes. All this science and astronomy is all quite boring, of course, but what is exciting and interesting is that Jodie Foster filmed a movie here! She even narrated the movie you watch in the visitors center.

There have actually been several films that have used the VLA as a backdrop for visuals in parts of their story. It pricks the imagination to wonder what alien and unknown things might be out there and movies are good at exploiting our curiosity and making us think about it.

It has been quite warm here. Even though this campground is at 7800′, the temperature has been in the high 80’s. I’m pretty close to Elephant Butte State Park so I may drive there to take a look. It will not be a place to camp, however, because the park is located at 4000′ elevation with temps approaching 100° this time of year. I’m definitely going to have to find someplace high up in the mountains.

I’m doing a little wandering now that all the legal hurdles of residence in Arizona have been taken care of for the next year. I found out that insuring Minnie in Arizona is way, way more expensive than South Dakota, and getting an emissions test every year is more of a hassle, but it feels good to have all my legal pieces of residence in one place.

I still go by the philosophy that inquiries about my travel plans are best answered: “Wherever I end up, I guess.” Right now I’m in the Apache-Sitgraves National Forest at the Rim campground above Payson. I have been here several times before. The campground is full this weekend, mainly because the fire closures have limited choices for campers, and partly because this is a Father’s Day weekend.

It still bothers me that people take a trailer or tent or some other piece of camping gear, drive up to the campground several days before they intend to camp, and leave the gear in prime sites to reserve the place for the weekend. I talked to the camp host about it and came to the conclusion that even though it is illegal, no one is going to do anything about it.

Last night a young couple parked in front of my camp and walked through two adjoining campsite looking for an open site. The site next to me was occupied by a vehicle left to reserve the camp for the weekend. My site is large with room for more than one camper so I told them they were welcome to camp here with me. They were very happy to have a place to pitch their tent. They were courteous, respectful, and quiet during the evening. In the morning when I awoke, they were gone.

There is a storm headed this way. The remnants of hurricane Bud are expected to dump some rain on eastern Arizona and western New Mexico in the next two days. I was planning on moving east into New Mexico but decided to wait here until the storm passed. That’s the nice thing about traveling with no specific time table, you can always stay put until you feel like moving.