Time to say goodbye to our Summer Trip...

We did have one last lovely camp-out with friends just before heading home.  Four days at Catalina State Park in Tucson.  Nice sunny days with cool breezes and lovely sunsets.  Another couple friends of theirs joined us, so we made new friends as well, which is always fun.  We even got in a couple of games.  Tried to play cards in spite of the wind, which was a challenge.  I think we laughed more about that than the game!  

It was pretty there with the Datura plants in bloom and mesquite trees everywhere...but the biting bugs...ugh!  I'm not sure what they were, gnats, or mosquitos, or flies (lots of those too) or ?  But I am still itching from those bites!  They had had quite a bit of rains prior to our visit because you could see the residual dried mud runoff, so maybe they were from that...or from the plants?  Don't know, but they sure liked us and made sitting outside a challenge.  ;-( 

All good things come to an end (so the saying goes)...and so does our "Summer Trip".  We rolled back into Surprise earlier this week and was greeted with lovely mild sunshine!  So nice to come home to low 80's instead of "triple digit" weather here in Arizona!  Wow, such a nice arrival and a great way to have to unload and do all the trudging of bringing everything back in plus cleaning up the 6 months of dirt on the outside of our little home!  

We did have wonderful neighbors who watched our little home while we were gone, watering our few potted plants (they even added some for us!) and ridding the weeds.  But our ground plants have grown out of control...so we have our work cut out for us...might even need an ax to get to them!  lol

Well, I think it's going to be awhile before we go out again, but you never know, so we keep our baby "ready" just in case an offer to good to pass up comes along....so I won't close up the year...just yet!  ;-)

Until then, we are home in Arizona,  Marie

...and we are off!

We are finally off on our 2019 Summer trip!  It's taken weeks of  s l o w l y  getting ready to depart.  It's different now, having a house and an RV.  Having moved a lot of our belongings into the house, now having to move them back into the RV...remembering what to bring, what we don't have to now, etc.  It's all good...just different.  With a shorter trip, and with the weather doing it's wild and crazy things, we changed our plans (several times) too.  I had really wanted to do the eastern seaboard this year, traveling all along the coastline, all the way up to Maine...but after seeing what Mother Nature has been up to, we decided it was best we stay away from that area...so, we will first head out to New Mexico, then over to Colorado to visit some friends, on to Nebraska, then in June we have a Tiffin Rally in Wyoming, then we plan on heading into Canada.  All this depends on the weather of course!  The only "reservations" we have is the one in Albuqueque because of the appointment for the RV and the rally...the rest is "go with the flow"! 

First stop turned out to be a bit more interesting than planned.  We just wanted an "over-night, no-frills" stop.  I found what I thought was a cheap, albeit, perhaps interesting, pull over, called the Crystal Forest Gift Shop in Holbrook AZ.  It was just outside of Winslow, which was about halfway to Albuqueque.  The write up said you could park for free, or it had electric for $10. It also said it had pull-thrus.  We thought for $10, the electric was worth it.  So off we went.  It was confusing.  On one side of the road was the boondocking, pull-thrus; on the other side was the electric, all back-ins.  Ugh.  Oh well.  The parking lot was surrounded by large petrified logs...different! 

We also  ended up visiting  Gray's Petrified Wood Company down the road, which was interesting. 

One thing about traveling to places you've been (a number of times), is a feeling of "coming home again", and finding your favorite places!  We have a mechanic in Albuqueque that we have gone to a number of times that knows our baby well, and we trust, so we come here every couple of years for an oil change and tune-up.  It's Advantage Automotive, and they are great!  While we are here, we always have dinner and breakfast at our two favorite spots too!  Range Cafe in Bernalillo for dinner, and Wecks for the best breakfast ever! 

We left there as soon as possible, as the KOA (right next door to the mechanic) was way to expensive! and headed out of town!  Best place we could find was another KOA, in Raton, on the boarder to Colorado.  Nothing much here, just a place to stay en route to our friends. 

We had planned on spending Memorial Day/week with our friends, but found out yesterday that plans have changed, and now we won't be seeing them until June.  So, I spent all afternoon trying to find us a place for the holiday!  After about 30 calls...FINALLY I got us a place that seems nice, and new to us, in Alamosa CO, so should be interesting.  Phew!

...on the road in New Mexico,  Marie