Recall, close call, cranes, caves , a blimp & Mexico: Dawdling in Southern Arizona

The Recall:  We departed Tucson on Tuesday, December 29th with the intention of exploring more of the area outside the city and dawdling a while longer in the area to see if the parts needed to repair an issue with our RV would arrive.  The recall, issued November 25th by Winnebago, involved the propane gas system on our model and we'd been advised to disconnect the gas and seek to get it fixed.  Since the RV is now our "house" and we hadn't noticed a problem, we chose to continue using our propane system, but immediately endeavored to get the part.   This is the 'whine' part of the story - because when the Winnebago company issued the recall they didn't have the replacement parts needed to send out to the dealers/service providers in the USA.  This is apparently not an unusual situation for various vehicle (and other?) manufacturers, however, it sure puts the consumer in a very uncomfortable situation.  We started trying to get the part sent and replaced since the recall notice -- and finally, the Tucson RV dealer called us last week - just after we left the city, to announce the part had arrived.  The dealer couldn't squeeze us into their busy schedule until January 6th and we made the decision to stay at a nice RV park outside Huachuca City.  We rented a car for a week and managed to fill our days wandering around this area.

The Close Call:  Before leaving Tucson, our son, Jay, insisted we use his propane heater as the temperatures continue to be very cold in the mornings here.  In lieu of using our own furnace, we'd been using a small electric heater which helped keep the temperatures inside "Tiny Tin" around 60 degrees when we'd wake in the morning.  Anyway, we went to bed around 9pm that night and were rudely awakened by the blaring of our carbon monoxide alarm, telling us to get the heck out of the RV!   We turned off the propane heater, opened windows to air out the RV.  When we'd settled down, we started giggling about how Jay must have been plotting to get his share of our 'wealth'.  He denied it the next night and told us he and others had safely used that same heater inside tents and houses... We reminded him we're spending his inheritance and we were grateful for the noisy CO alarm!

Cranes:  One of our day trips in the rental car was to the Whitewater Wash Wildlife Refuge east of here.  The Sandhill Cranes stop there to rest and feed in the winter as part of their migratory pattern.  After driving along a mostly deserted highway then country roads, we were rewarded with seeing 1000's of these beautiful birds.  

Blimp:  Each morning since our arrival in Huachuca City, which is just a few miles north of (US Army) Fort Huachuca and the community of Sierra Vista, there has been a big blimp over the community and the Huchuca mountains.  We learned it is part of the drug interdiction strategy.  We're not sure if it's part of the military's operation or the DEA or ??, but it became our landmark.  

Caves: A neighbor in Olympia suggested we see the Kartchner Caverns.  I'm not a fan of caves and we had chosen to ignore this state park when we stayed in Tombstone and Bisbee.  Well, being only 10 miles south of the Caverns and plenty of time on our hands, we visited the Caverns and both of us were delighted with our tour.  The Kartchner Caverns are one of very few 'living' caves and was discovered only in 1974.  The AZ State Parks have done an amazing job of making the Caverns available to the public, carefully controlling the caves' environment and enforcing rules to make sure it remains living.  Cameras (cell phones, water, etc.) are not allowed in the Caverns, so we have no photos to share.  The other surprise to us was the warm and humid temperature inside the caverns.  We had to put our jackets back on once we completed our tour.

Mexico:  One of our day trips took us down Highway 83, with beautiful and varying scenery to the border town of Nogales.  We had wanted to park the rental car and walk across the border - mostly just to explore for a short while.  Unfortunately, Jim had left his wallet and ID in the RV, so we agreed to try to put our toes into Mexico on another day.  This time, we chose to cross at the very small town of Naco, just south of Bisbee.  We parked the rental car on the US side and walked across the border.  The US and Mexican towns of Naco were both poor and lacking any charm.  At least in Mexican Naco there were shops:  We saw a number of pharmacies and a couple of bars, a grocery store and a few other businesses.  In the USA's Naco, there was one bar in operation in the entire little town.  It was a disappointing venture that lasted perhaps 20 minutes as we walked through the little dusty town.  We did, however, get our passports stamped - our only souvenir.  

A window to Arizona's Wild West

We spent a day/night in old Tombstone, Arizona.  It was a bit hokey, with several actors playing the Earp brothers, Doc Holliday and their victims wandering the main street of Tombstone in between re-creating the famous shoot-out at the OK Corral.  We declined to pay to watch the action, but did enjoy wandering the streets and thinking about how difficult it is for some of these old towns to economically survive on such tourism.  We did enjoy a visit to the Tombstone Courthouse, now a state park and museum.  We also stopped at Boot Hill, Tombstone's famous cemetery before we headed to Bisbee.

Bisbee, we learned, is a 'mile-high' city, established in the late 1800's as a mining town, nestled in Tombstone canyon.  We stayed at a RV park adjacent to the Queen Mine and overlooking the open-pit Lavender mine.  We spent several days wandering around the old town.  The Queen Mine is now a visitor center and provides underground tours.  This mine, noted for its copper production, is now closed, like many in Arizona, and the town of Bisbee has re-invented itself as a haven for artists, musicians, old hippies, old miners and others.  There were fun murals and artsy graffiti all around the town and plenty of small, winding streets to explore.  The old homes and businesses cling to the hillsides, some of which have been restored or rebuilt, some in disrepair.  There are thousands of steps that help link Bisbee's streets and homes and the town hosts an annual race up a selected 1000 steps.  Bisbee was delightful and quirky - just our kind of town.  Unfortunately, cold weather and snow on December 26th drove us back to Tucson for a few days.     Posted are some photos of Tombstone and many from Bisbee.  

OF FOOD AND FAMILY

We spent ten days in Tucson, which gave us an opportunity to visit with our son, Jay, his daughter, Melanie and son, Jay, Jr.  We also enjoyed visiting with Jay's girlfriend, Nora, and meeting all her kids, her granddaughter and her mother, Estella.  Jay works at a mine almost 2 hours north of Tucson and Nora works at a dental office in Tucson, but they both managed to squeeze in visits after work and when Jay was able to get a couple of extra days off work.  Akin to most families, much of our visit was around and about food.

During our visit in Tucson, we met with old friends from our days in Italy, Des and Sherman Maultsby, who picked us up for dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  It was a fun time with good food and lots of laughs.  We also helped Jay, Jr. celebrate his 18th birthday at a Tucson eatery on December 18th.  On another day, we found a nondescript place near our RV park that served the BEST-EVER Indian tacos!  The cafe is called "Indian Tacos- Manna from Heaven", although the sign is hard to see from the street.  In the event you're near downtown Tucson, the place is at the corner of St. Mary's and Grande Avenue (1118 W. St Mary) - it's worth the visit!  We were too busy eating our tacos to take a photo of them!

I was so pleased to join Nora and her mother, Estella in their Christmas tradition of making tamales.   Estella, who on the surface appears to be a very pleasant and funny 78 year old woman, was actually a slave-driver!  Last Saturday, I helped make about a million tamales and they threatened not to let me go home.  I was exhausted after several hours of tamale production.  Nora and her mother didn't stop their efforts when I went home to our RV - they continued that night and early the next morning.  Estella reported they made 24 or so dozen ( which in my book = millions!).... It was a very fun time and the tamales, filled with Estella's amazing red chili with beef - and a stuffed olive - are excellent.  Estella and Nora were excellent teachers of this craft.  We enjoyed the fruits of our labor and also got recipes for the chili and Nora's fantastic beans and salsa.  I really scored on this visit!  If we're back this way next Christmas season, I'll sign on to help again.

Another highlight of our visit with Jay and family, was a ride up to Mt. Lemmon.  It's an 8000 foot mountain with a ski area at the top.  The ride up goes through a saguaro forest, then century plants (more cacti) and finally into pines, then to the snow.  The drive was lovely and we had an OK lunch at the top.

On our last day in Tucson, Jay made posole, a Mexican soup, which was excellent.  Combined with some of Nora and Estella's tamales, beans, tortillas and salsa, we enjoyed yet another great meal and good company.  We thoroughly enjoyed our visit with family, friends -- and the food.

Musings in Tucson

We arrived in Tucson last Friday after spending a night and the day just outside the Saguaro National Park.  The Gilbert Ray campground was awesome and just a couple of miles away from the Sonoran Desert Museum.  We've been to this outdoor museum in the past and always enjoy it.  If you've never been, add it to your list of places to see.  It's almost entirely outdoors and has an amazing variety of cacti and animals and reptiles.  We could only spend a couple of hours as we didn't want to leave the boys alone.

We've been visiting son Jay, his girlfriend Nora and their respective families since our arrival in Tucson.  We found an RV park close to downtown and conveniently near a couple of grocery and other stores, too.  Nora, granddaughter Melanie and I enjoyed the annual Fourth Avenue Street Winter Festival last Sunday, with lots of artists displaying their artwork and food vendors galore.  

Now for the musings:  While crossing the desert from Joshua Tree National Forest in California, we noticed lots of abandoned shacks and Jim mentioned folks used to homestead.  It caused me to look it up the other night and I learned about the Jackrabbit Homestead and Small Tract Act of 1938.  We even found a YouTube video about it dated June 27, 2013.  The act ended (or was repealed?) and it appears, like many good ideas, that it wasn't necessarily a good thing for the 'settlers' or the environment.  It was, however, an interesting piece of history to learn.  We didn't, however, stop to take any photos.  Trust us - they were mostly just shacks!

Our other observation is about what appears to be a woeful lack of recycling in both California and Arizona.  Apparently many communities either never started or gave up trying to get their residents to be active and responsible for their own recycling and supposedly do the recycle thing at the local landfill.  I wonder if that's actually true?   In Arizona thus far, it seems very much like a hit or miss option, with apparently no repercussions to residents if they don't recycle.  Our years in Washington State have us both trained and attuned to the need and ease of recycling, and it just kills us not to be able to recycle while we travel.  For a while, I was hauling it with us in the RV, hoping the next stop would have a recycle bin, but the RV is just too small to accommodate that.  We do add, however, that most of the Federal, State and County parks where we've camped have had basic recycle bins available.  

We're not sure where we'll head next - east and south for sure, in search of warmer weather.   The photos below are mostly from the Sonoran desert.  

A hit and a (few) near misses

Musings from Palm Springs, California.

Just before leaving Santa Maria, while slowly backing out of Jim's cousin's driveway, Lynne had her first-ever accident.  Our bike rack dented a young man's car, upsetting to both of us.  Fortunately, our insurance is taking care of the dent, but it was unsettling.  Yikes!

We arrived last week in Palm Springs, finding a nice RV park below a mountain range, close to downtown and within cycling distance to a grocery store.  We needed a place to bide our time before our next stop in Lake Havasu City, AZ, and this RV park in Palm Springs seemed like a good fit.  We have had no agenda here of things to do/see and have been relaxing in the warm days and sunshine. 

Our other upset occurred a few days ago when a car blew a red light and almost hit Jim and I as we started to cross the street (with the pedestrian 'walk' sign ON).  The driver, who was on her cell phone, was apparently oblivious to us or the red light.  We have decided Palm Springs drivers are a very dangerous breed - and seem always to be in a big hurry.  Needless to say, we're now even more cautious while crossing the streets.

We have been enjoying sunrises and sunsets in Palm Springs and days of sunshine.  The exception was our excursion to Joshua Tree National Park when the skies were cloudy and temperatures cool.  It didn't matter:  The diverse desert geography in this National Park was absolutely amazing and beautiful.  We thoroughly enjoyed our day in the park. 

Winnebago issued a 'recall' for our RV and we hope to get the issue fixed next week while we're in Lake Havasu City.   Otherwise, life on the road is fine and always interesting.   We continue to learn something new about the RV and look forward to more adventures down the road.  

Greetings from Palm Springs and Joshua Tree National Park