Last day forever......

 4:20 pm - Monday - April 1st - Yuma, AZ - 71° F, humidity 40%, wind 4 mph out of the south by southeast......overcast with occasional sun, and a forecast high of 71° F, which has been realized.  On this date in 2012 TLE and I were courtesy parked in the driveway of long time friend Ernie Prociw in Stuart, FL.....

....he has a circular driveway, so we parked the trailer at one end and the Newell at the other end with the T-Bird in between.

Sunday was our last full day at GNHS for the rest of our lives.  We started around 8 am to take down, and stow the dining canopy, and finalize the organization of the trailer so we could insert the turf, and then the VW.  Once that was complete around 12 pm I backed the Newell out of the place where it has resided for 6 months (5 months and 2 weeks), and then, with Kyle's help we turned the trailer around using his 1/2 ton pickup.  We then backed the Newell up to the trailer, dropped it upon its hitch, and pulled forward to park for the night next to the COA office.  We would not insert the VW until Monday morning just prior to our departure time around 10 am.  We mounted the new Rubber Maid container on top of the tool box mounted on the tongue of the trailer and used a ratcheting cargo strap to hold it in place.....↴

....I attached a couple of cargo anchoring points for attachment of the ratcheting cargo strap. 

We had a quiet final evening at GNHS while watching the current episodes of Survivor and Amazing Race, and were in bed by 9:30 am.  My back continues to mend, and is improving by the hour.

Below we have arrived at our destination for the next 5 days, and will be dry camping for that duration.  Cost for the RV site is $8 per day.....↴

....an for any of those naysayers out there who may not have believe we would get the VW into the trailer this time, here is proof that we were successful.....↴

.....it was just 48 hours ago that the interior of trailer looked like this.....↴

....at any rate, we have successfully overcome the gravitational pull of GNHS, and have repositioned ourselves close to TLE's dental appointments coming up on Thursday and Friday.  We're facing west with the Newell, so we'll have sun on the solar panels from morning to dusk.  Our fresh water tank is full, and our waste tanks are virtually empty as I write.  We have the Starlink modem plugged into the Bluetti 2000 watt solar charger for continuous WiFi, and will set it outside tomorrow  with it's portable solar panels attached to recharge it while it continues to provide continuous power to the Starlink modem, and all of that without the sound of the Honda 2000 generator running in the background.  Life is good!

Thanks for stopping by!

The Jello jiggled.....

 7:40 am - Easter Sunday - March 31st - GNHS - 52° F, humidity 71%, wind 6 mph out of the southeast......mostly clear skies today with a forecast high of 70° F.  On this date in 2014 TLE and I were riding zip lines at 'Out of Africa' near Cottonwood, AZ......

....what a cool dad that was!

Saturday began with the threat of rain early afternoon, and by 12:30 pm it had begun to fall.  We had four all day rentals on Saturday, which was our last day of working for COA this winter.  We had them all on their way by 10 am (not everyone shows up at 9 am), and then I returned to organizing the trailer, and taking down the balance of the 'lido deck'....

.....all that is left is to stow the dining canopy, pull the turf into the trailer, and we're ready to turn the trailer around, which we will do sometime Sunday afternoon.  We've moved up our departure date to Monday, April 1st.  We're going to drive down to Los Algodones on Monday, setup at the Quechan Casino for 5 days, and take care of TLE's dental appointments on Thursday and Friday, then begin our trek northward from there.

All of the rentals were back by 4 pm as it was raining quite steadily, and the RZRs were filthy.  I think it took Hunter until 6:30 pm to finish cleaning them.  I would have been helping, but I strained my lower back taking down the flagpole.  As I was stepping off the step stool I missed the bottom step, but thought I had stuck the landing, and then I lost my balance, and fell over backwards.  I'm fine this morning (Sunday), but I didn't want to aggravate it more than it was.

During the morning I dumped our black tank for the final time here at GNHS, so the final list of things we must do for departure is dwindling rapidly.

We're down to the 'Elite Eight' games now

Thanks for stopping by!

That ennui.....

6:45 am - Saturday - March 30th - GNHS - 55° F, humidity 65%, wind 10 mph out of the southeast......partly cloudy today with rain forecast for this afternoon, and a high of 68° F.  On this date in 2018 TLE and I were having a late lunch at the Back Abbey in Claremont, CA....love that place.....

 That all too familiar feeling of melancholy and vague ennui is hovering just over my head as I write this morning.  Whenever it is time to roll our wheels and change our views I begin to miss, in advance, where we have been the last period of time.  Our two winters here at GNHS have exceeded our expectations, and we have made new friends whose contributions to our lives will be felt for years.  We have just a week until we depart GNHS for perhaps the final time in our lives as we change up our plans for travel next winter.

We had two bookings for Friday....one 1/2 day rental for a family of four, and an all day rental for the guy who was late for his 1/2 day rental on Thursday.  Both were on their way by 10 am, and then it was a matter of awaiting their return in the afternoon.

I spent some of the time packing the 'through bay' in the Newell, taking down the BBQ table, and stowing the Sea-B-Que, and both propane tanks in the through bay, and taking down the two tool tables in the trailer, and stowing them, also, in the 'through bay'....

Tool tables gone

Sea-B-Que, Cowboy Wok and BBQ table gone

Through bay packed

....the dining canopy will come down Sunday afternoon, and my Haibike SDURO eBike will be stowed, and all of the stuff left on the floor in the trailer will be moved forward to prepare for turf and VW insertion.

The day was beautiful with light breezes.  After Hunter returned from driving his friends back to the airport in Palm Springs, he joined us to work on installing all of the new RZR parts which have arrived in the past two weeks.  That will be a mammoth task, and one in which I will not be partaking....that is a job for the young guys.....

Hunter working on RZR #1

....both of our customers returned on time, and without incident, and by 5:15 pm we had ended our second to last work day.

Thanks for stopping by!

How about a call?

 6:41 am - Friday - March 29th - GNHS - 57° F, humidity 63%, wind 6 mph out of the west by southwest......crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 76° F, and wind later today.  On this date in 2012 TLE and I were kayaking with new friends near Cedar Key, FL....

Our days here at GNHS are numbered, and they are flying into the rear view mirror at a rapid pace.  After Thursday we have just 7 days left before we haul anchor and change our view for the first time in almost 6 months.  However, things are not going so fast that we can't take time for a nice 2 mile walk, which is what we did around 9 am Thursday.  We only had one 1/2 day booking for Thursday, and they were not going out until 1 pm, so we had the whole morning.  We averaged around 3.3 mph for the two miles, and have now covered 106 miles this winter at GNHS.  My right foot is now 100% again, and I don't even think about it anymore....how quickly things can change....

.....during the morning I was exchanging text messages with our employer at LPG&RVR and I was asking if he could get a bucket load of gravel dumped at our site there before we arrive, so when we do we can use it to level out the area where were going to park the trailer this year.  To illustrate where we wanted the gravel I went to Google Earth on my phone and took a screen shot....I was surprised to see that the current Google Earth view of our site shows our Newell and trailer in last summer's configuration....cool....

....anyway, the red circle is where we wanted the gravel dropped.

I clocked in for work at 11:30 am to wash, and detail two of the RZRs, which were quite dirty after several rentals last week, and by 12:30 pm TLE and I were awaiting the arrival of our 1/2 day rental customers.  Well, 1 pm came and went, then 1:30 pm, then 2 pm.....they finally arrived around 2:35 pm, which essentially reduced their 4 hour rental to a 2 hour rental.  They were a tad upset as they assumed they could be out as late as sundown, but we are not open after 5 pm, so that is a 'no go' as they say.  Our rental policy is you can stay out until sunset, or 5 pm, whichever comes first....well, 5 pm comes first now.  On normal work days we clock in for work around 30 minutes before the first scheduled rental of the day, which usually begins at 9 am, making our start time 8:30 am.  Since two of the RZRs needed a spa treatment I went to work 90 minutes early to get them done.  Anyway, they headed out on their abbreviated 2 hour ride, and were back by 5 pm without incident.  They also have an all day rental on Friday, so they'll get in some more riding time then.  During the entire day we never got a call from them saying they'd be late, so we were just kind of hanging out doing nothing the entire time.

We now have just two work days left (Friday and Saturday), with no bookings for Sunday.  We'll spend Sunday through Tuesday finishing the takedown our camp, and organizing the trailer, and then on Wednesday we'll turn the trailer and Newell around facing the entrance so when we return from Los Algodones Friday all we'll have to do is unplug the electrical and roll our wheels early Saturday morning.

Thanks for stopping by!

Stow, stow, stow your boat.....

6:35 am - Thursday - March 28th - GNHS - 57° F, humidity 70%, wind 3 mph out of the east by northeast......partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 79° F.  On this date in 2014 TLE and I were touring the old ghost town of Jerome, AZ.....very cool place with great alfresco dining.....

We were on the job a little after 8 am, and ended up having two all day rentals on Wednesday.  One customer arrived for their rental at 8:45 am, and the other around 9:10 am, so they were both on their adventures by 9:30 am.  We only have four RZRs available for rent right now.  Of our original 12 units 5 have been prepped for return to Polaris, 1 was totaled a few weeks ago, and the other two have been out of action, awaiting the arrival of parts for at least couple of months.  I say that to say this.....we rented half of our available fleet on Wednesday.  Normally we are not open on Wednesdays, but this is the beginning of Spring Break, and people are here all week, which is not the norm.  We have bookings for Thursday, Friday, and Saturday so far, but nothing for Sunday yet.  Since Hunter has friends from Colorado visiting this week we've taken all of the hours, which is nice as we haven't really had a big payday for a long time now...not that anyone is complaining, but it is always nice to earn a little extra cash here and there, especially when not much actual physical labor is required.

Since there was nothing else to do until our customers returned I spent some more time in the trailer stowing stuff, and managed to get quite a bit done....

Two of the bikes, which are now stowed, used to be back there....

.....and now they are now in their travel positions up front, under the work bench....

....but before I could stow the bikes I had to stow the Black and Decker Workmate workbench (above), and the Ancheer back machine (below), which are both collapsed and stowed against the front bulkhead of the trailer

....now I only have my Haibike eBike to stow, take down the two tool tables and stow them, stow the Adirondack chairs, stow the umbrellas, stow the Ozark Trails dining canopy, and I'm pretty much ready for turf and VW insertion.  I always think it will take twice as long as it does, and didn't expect to finish until Tuesday, but now it appears I will be done by Sunday....yay!  On Wednesday I'll dump our waste tanks for the final time, turn around the trailer, and Newell, drop the trailer on the hitch, and we'll be ready to leave when we return from Los Algodones on Friday afternoon.  Time is short, and confidence is high!

Our two all day customers returned at 4:05 pm, and 4:35 pm respectively without any damage.  After the second customer returned TLE and I drove the two RZRs down to the fuel station, filled them up, and parked them.  I'll wash them on Thursday when we only have one 1/2 day customer who is not leaving until 1 pm for their 4 hour adventure.

Remarkably, the temps are still in the 70's this late in March, and with the exceptions of 1, or 2 days currently forecast to be in the low 80's, every other day will be in the 60's and 70's, and we may even get some rain on Saturday if the weather guessers have anything to say about it.

Thanks for stopping by!

The small things first......

 7:06 am - Wednesday - March 27th - GNHS - 53° F, humidity 74%, wind 3 mph out of the southeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 77°  F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were in Aiken, GA, the home of Fred Astaire, and William 'The Refrigerator' Perry (Chicago Bears) having lunch at Aiken Brewing Company......

When I begin putting tools away, and rolling up the putting surfaces you know it's not long until we haul anchor, and I've got to get it all done by April 3rd.  Did I ever say I have too much stuff?  Well, I do have too much stuff, and we're going to have to get pretty creative to make it all fit, and insert the VW.  I don't believe TLE would appreciate having to drive the VW all the way back to Likely....lol!

We were up kind of early Tuesday, but not because I needed to organize the trailer.  We went to bed early Monday night because we were tired from the round trip drive to Poway, and, therefore, woke up early.  At any rate I began the slow process of bagging up all of my large tools for another reposition.  I worked at it most of the day, taking occasional breaks, but I got a lot done....

All of my sockets are stowed

The Bluetti and solar panels are stowed

All tools, and power tools are towed

Putting greens and small artificial turf pieces are cleaned and rolled up.

Without this Rubber Maid container, which will sit on the tongue of the trailer (strapped down, of course) I would not have enough room for everything....this is what we call getting creative!

Portable driving 'range' is down

Camp chairs and anti gravity chairs are stowed

....we've got a long way to go, but it is a start.  Now that most of the small stuff is stowed, the bigger stuff will go fast!

We did take a 1 mile walk just before I began work on the trailer covering the distance averaging 3.4 mph....not bad for a one week layoff.  My foot feels great, by the way....

......it was our 64th one mile walk of the winter.  The day seemed to pass quickly, and soon it was almost 5 pm, and time for a shower.  Day one of packing was a success with us getting everything done we had planned to do.  A lot more yet to do, but plenty of time in which to do it all!

Thanks for stopping by!

A twofer.....

6:41 am - Tuesday - March 26th - GNHS - 58° F, humidity 58%, wind 6 mph out of the north by northwest......partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 73° F. On this date in 2012 TLE and I were in DeFuniak Springs, FL.....

.....taking a bicycle ride, and visiting a local winery.

Well, my promise to write about Sunday when we returned from Poway Monday afternoon  was unfulfilled once again.  I guess after driving over 300 miles in 8 hours I was a little tired, but the result is you get a rare 'twofer' (two for the price of one), so here we go with Sunday's happenings.

Sunday was the 2nd day of the 'Round of 32' ('March Madness')  in which all winning teams advance to the 'Sweet Sixteen', which begins this Thursday.  On this particular day there were no upsets, but we came close to a couple with one game actually going to overtime before the favored team outlasted the underdog.  In fact, most of the 8 games Sunday were quite lopsided.

I also continued to remain off my feet for most of the day due to my right foot injury last Tuesday, but I am happy to confirm that after 3 solid days of indulgent NCAA 'March Madness' basketball viewing my foot is doing quite well, in fact, as I sit here this morning (Tuesday) composing this brief missive, my foot does not hurt at all, and it appears I will be able to return to regularly scheduled programing, which will include, but not be limited to  beginning the arduous organizing of the trailer  today (Tuesday) for our April 6th departure.  I must be done with all the pre-departure preparations by next Wednesday as we will be in Los Algodones Thursday and Friday, returning late Friday, April 5th,  afternoon.

We wanted to be on the road Monday morning by 6:30 am for the 3 hour drive to my dermatologist's office in Poway, so we were in bed around 9 pm Sunday evening, and according to plan we were in the VW just a tad before 6:30 am Monday morning doing just that.

We always stop in Borrego Springs, which is about 1/2 way to Poway, to take a bathroom break at the public restrooms in the middle of Christmas Circle (roundabout), and we arrived there just before 8 am, did that, and were on our way up the Montezuma Grade minutes later.  My appointment was for 10:15 am, and we arrived at Dr. Jou's facility at 9:40 am.  Unexpectedly, my name was called just 5 minutes later.  Dr. Jou examined my lower lip, and I could tell by the big smile upon his face that he liked what he saw.  The 'chemical peel' of a few layers of skin off my lower lip was a resounding success, so my lower lip will remain intact!

We were back in the VW around 9:55 am, and on our way back to GNHS, but not before a quick stop in Ramona at the local Stater Brothers Supermarket where TLE did a pretty big shopping.  When we were living at Ramona Oaks RV Resort for 9 months from April of 2019 to January of 2020 we shopped there quite a bit.  By stopping in Ramona to do our shopping we saved ourselves a drive into La Quinta this week.  We brought along two ice chests to keep the produce, and other items requiring refrigeration, cold on the drive home, which the purchase of a 9 pound bag of ice did quite nicely.

We were back in the VW by 11 am arriving in Borrego Springs around 12:20 pm....just in time to visit Los Jilbertos Taqueria for lunch.  I love their 2 crispy tacos combo plate!

We were back on the road around 1 pm, arriving back at GNHS around 2:30 pm.  After 8 hours of driving, shopping and dining I was ready for a nap, but not so quick!  Why?  Well, COA had two all day rentals Monday, which Hunter took care of first thing Monday morning, but he had to go to the Palm Springs airport in the afternoon to pick up friends who will be visiting with him this week, so it fell to us to take care of checking them back in at the end of the day.  Fortunately there were no rescues required Monday, and both all day rentals returned on time without incident!  By 5:15 pm we had clocked out, and then I took a nap.....lol!  That, my friends, was a long day, but one filled with all kinds of good news.  And now you are once again caught up with the lives of the Nomadic Hockwalds.

Thanks for stopping by!