"Light My Fire"

(CLICK ON PICTURES TO ENLARGE)

6:55 am - PDST - Wednesday - 64º F, humidity 47%, wind 8 mph out of the south southeast........change is good! Forecast high is 79º F.....now that is change I can really get behind!  The wind died about 5 am, but it was a good night of sleep!

As I was sitting in my recliner reading Tuesday night a song by the Doors, Light My Fire, came on Sirius/XM Radio's Classic Vinyl channel.......and these words described perfectly the mental process I had just been through......"The time to hesitate is through.....no time to wallow in the mire....try now we can only lose....".......it's been a long time since I was so unhappy with a location that I wanted to leave the minute I arrived.....it's been a long time since I forgot to live in the moment......it's been a long time since I failed to look for Miss Serendipity in a situation, but that is what happened to me when we arrived in Furnace Creek late Monday morning.  It was hot, windy and miserable......I hated all the campground options,  and all I could talk about for the first 24 hours was leaving first thing Tuesday for a better location and better weather......I sat around stewing in my juices all day Monday.....I 'wallowed in the mire' so to speak........all day, into the night and early morning Tuesday before I decided 'the time to hesitate is through'......what have I got to lose?

Tuesday morning cloud formation

The first thing that brightened my outlook Tuesday was finding a  'open' WiFi hotspot across the highway called "Furnace Creek Guest Access" that I was able to connect to using my 'Hawking Dish'....now one might wonder 'what the heck is a Hawking Dish?', and one would be in order to do so.....here is a picture of my 'Hawking Dish'......

My 'Hawking Dish' aimed across the highway towards Furnace Creek Ranch Resort

....a 'Hawking Dish' is essentially a USB directional WiFi dish antenna designed to inexpensively magnify a WiFi signal from a distance and can magnify the signal by up to 300%.  Without the 'Hawking Dish' plugged into one of my USB ports I cannot even detect one WiFi signal, but with it I can pick up no less than 7 including the aforementioned open hot spot.  Using my 'Hawking Dish' enables me to continue writing my daily blog posts without having to walk across the street.

The second thing that brightened my outlook was less wind, and slightly lower temperatures.....at any rate, once the blog was up TLE and I hopped in the Beetle for a 20 mile drive over and up to Stovepipe Wells......I say 'up to' as Stovepipe Wells as it is at Sea Level, and we are 100'+ below Sea Level at Furnace Creek.  We arrived there in about 20 minutes......our intent was to check out their 14 full hookup sites......years ago (probably about 11) we stayed in one of those sites when we had our 1986 Fleetwood Tioga Class C motorhome....at that time these sites were 'first come, first served'.  There were several sites available, it appeared, but upon checking with the nice lady at the Registration Desk we found out they are now reservable, and that all 14 sites were reserved for Tuesday.  

Since there was free customer WiFi there TLE and I let our phones update before make the drive back to Furnace Creek.....

.....standing in the Stovepipe Wells parking lot see the Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes in the distance.......

.....as I gazed at them I was reminded of a trip TLE and made to Stovepipe Wells back in January of 2006......seems like a lifetime ago now......

January 5, 2006....on top of one of the dunes

.....on the spur of the moment we decided to stop in the Mesquite Flat Sand Dune parking lot to snap a few pics........

......the parking lot was already full this day, and many folks were taking the hike out to the highest dune (see it in the background).

Upon return to Furnace Creek we drove into the resort to see what was there and found there was a large warm spring fed pool there.  I decided to go into the office to see if one could buy a day pass to the pool and was advised one could do such a thing for the small charge of $5 so I bought passes for TLE and I to be used later in the day when it got warmer.

About 3 pm we decided it was warm enough and drove over to the pool where we spent a couple of hours reading in between dips in the pool to cool off.....they also had very nice showers which we both took advantage of just before it was time to leave.....ironically it began to rain just about that time.......

.....it only rained for about 10 minutes, but it was a nice way to end the day.....even if the wind had come back up again......

.......my whole attitude has changed and I am back in the moment enjoying exactly where I am, and not wishing I was somewhere else........thank my Lovely Elaine for being patient with me, and for letting me work through my issues........

Our site for 3 days......large barren dirt parking lot

.....once again the wind howled at times, but it seemed a little less windy than the night before, and a little cooler, too.....

Thanks for stopping by!

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