A short one.....

6:59 am - Monday - April 8th - Bishop, CA - 32° F, humidity 60%, wind 7 mph out of the northwest......crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 64° F.  On this date in 2014 TLE and I visited the world famous Antelope Canyon (slot canyon) near Page, AZ.....

.....the view this morning....

I never get tired of this view

 Overnighting in Rest Areas is a crap shoot.  We've had good experiences, and bad experiences, mostly with semi trucks running either their engines, or refers for hours on end.  Our overnight at COSO Station Rest Area was the best of the best....so quiet, and we slept so well.  I always want to say we 'slept like babies', but babies don't really sleep that well, do they?  Anyway, we awoke to sort of cloudy conditions Sunday morning, which gradually cleared as the morning wore on.

We were only going to drive the rest of the way to Bishop, CA (98 miles) on Sunday so getting out on the road early was not needed.  Besides, we awoke to temps in the 30's Sunday, and we needed to use the block heater to start the big Detroit Diesel 6v92.  Around 8:30 am I pulled out our Honda 2000 generator/inverter to power the coach so we could turn on the block heater for about an hour.  By 9:30 am she turned over and roared to life.  These old series 92 engines don't start easily when the temps get way under 50° F, so a little heat makes them more amenable to starting, and it is easier on the engine to boot.

We were on our way and merging onto US-395 northbound shortly thereafter, and the views, as always, were  wonderful....

.....TLE took a short video catching me in the act↗ of singing along to a Bachman Turner Overdrive song.  As we passed by Owens Lake we could see it was still just as full as it was last year when we passed.  Until last winter this was a dry lake bed, and had been so for most of my life....

....with about 32 miles left on our drive to Bishop we stopped at another Rest Area to take a break.  I cleaned the windshield, and took another picture of the eastern Sierras....

....we arrived at the Tri-County Fairgrounds in Bishop around noon time, quickly found a spot, plugged into electrical for the first time in a week, deployed the Winegard satellite dish, then the Starlink, and settled into our recliners to enjoy the afternoon, watched a little golf, and the final of the NCAA women's March Madness.....  

....around 3 pm we walked over to Eric Schat's Bakkery (4.5 stars on over 2,500 reviews) for a Hot Pastrami sandwich, and a couple of cups of Joe...

Both pictures courtesy of Yelp

....their Hot Pastrami sandwiches are quite large, so we split one alfresco.  If you are ever in Bishop, or Mammoth Lakes for that matter, you must stop and check them out!  The air temp was only in the high 50's at 3 pm, so jackets and pants were required for the 1 mile round trip walk.

We spent the evening watching the finals of Tournament of Champions (a cooking show), and were in bed by 10 pm.  Monday we'll cover just 156 miles, but we'll be climbing over passes and summits all day long before arriving in Minden, NV early afternoon, where we'll spend a couple of days shopping (COSTCO and TJ's), and visiting with friends before continuing to LPG&RVR on Wednesday, where it is still winter, and the forecast shows rain and snow for opening weekend....lol!

Thanks for stopping by!

A new Newell world record!

7:11 am - Sunday - April 7th - Olancha, CA - 39° F, humidity 58%, wind 2 mph out of the west by southwest......cloudy today with a forecast high of 60° F....heading back into winter...lol!  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were hiking the Honiker Trail down to the San Juan River near Goosenecks, UT......

I was awake around 4:30 am thinking about how many miles I would have to drive Saturday, and decided getting an early start would give us plenty of time to make multiple stops along the way, and still arrive at our destination between 3, and 4 pm.  I was up by 5 am, so we could roll our wheels before 7 am.  You're thinking, that sounds like 7-8 hours of driving, and you might be close.  Since we decided not to drive in the side wind on Friday afternoon and cover at least 120 miles, we had to add those miles to Saturday's already long drive to get our selves back on schedule to arrive in Likely this Wednesday. 

We managed to haul anchor around 6:36 am, arriving at our first stop of the day, the Travel Center in Salton City where we would dump a week's worth of effluent from our waste tanks, then take on 70 gallons of fresh water, and finally top off our propane tank, which we have not filled for nigh unto a year.  We arrived at the Travel Center (Marina Drive and HWY 86) around 8 am, and proceeded right to the dump station.....

....where I attached the sewer hose (to dump) and the water hose (to flush the tank), then proceeded to pay for the dump using the handy POS card scanner at the dump station....

....the old POS scanner required you to be able to read the display screen in direct sunlight, which was almost impossible.   Now, all you have to do is tap your car, and you're done.....nothing to enter, nothing to read.  Once you pay, the cover on the sewer connection can be opened, and you can begin to dump.  Within 20 minutes we were done with stage one, and then it was on to stage two.....refill our fresh water tank....

.....this is always the most time consuming part of the three stage operation, and it took around 25 minutes before the fresh water tank was full.  Then it was on to stage three, top off our 60 gallon propane tank.  It's been a year since we last topped off this tank, and I was expecting to pay for 40-50 gallons.....

....surprisingly we took on just 32 gallons of propane.....WOW!  We've only used half our propane capacity in 12 months!  That is a new Newell world record!  On the other hand, it means we didn't have to pay too much, but remember, it is California.  Propane costs close to $5/gallon here, and we paid almost $150 for just 32 gallons....ouch!

We were back on the road by 9:45 am after this major, but oh so necessary rest stop, and on our way northward.  Within minutes we passed by the Mecca Travel Center (ARCO) where diesel is selling for $5.49/gallon....almost $2 more per gallon than we paid in Yuma......

.....in order to reach our destination (Rest Area at COSO Junction just south of Olancha, CA) we took 9 completely different highways.  We left Yuma on I-8, then headed north on HWY 111 to 86, to I-10, to HWY 62, then 247 to I-15 merging onto 58 to US-395.  We drove a route we have never driven before since it involved fewer long climbs.  Just to get to I-15 in the Pomona Valley we would normally climb to Banning Pass out of Palm Springs, which is about a 25 climb, then descend into the Pomona Valley only to climb Cajon Pass, which is another 20-25 miles...so 50 miles of climbing.  We opted to leave I-10 near Palm Springs and take HWY 62 into Yucca Valley which involved a single 20 mile climb, and from there it was only 4, or 5 short duration climbs to get us to US-395 at Kramer Junction....

Passing through Morongo Valley HWY 62, on our way to Yucca Valley

On California 247 heading to Barstow and I-15

Super bloom north of Kramer Junction

....we took another long stop at Kramer Junction (58 and US-395) before driving the final distance to COSO Junction (south of Olancha).  You can see snow capped Mt. Whitney in the distance as we near COSO Junction.....

....we arrived at COSO Junction Rest Area around 3:45 pm...you can see an extinct volcano just to the south of the Rest Area.....

We quickly found a pull through spot in which to park for the night

.....once we had parked, and leveled the Newell I turned on the inverter to power up the Winegard satellite dish so we could watch the two NCAA Final Four matches.  The sky was clear when we arrived, and the views of the easter Sierra Nevada Mountain Range were spectacular as always....

.....I managed to catch a picture just after the sun slid over the Sierras.  In all we covered 376 miles finding ourselves almost half way to Likely.  This was one of our longest driving days in some time, but now we are positioned to be in Likely by Wednesday giving us 3 days to set up camp before opening day at the golf course.  Last year we covered 368 miles from GNHS to Bishop on our first day of our drive to Likely.  We haven't done that amount of mileage in one day since our first year on the road, and now we've done it two years in succession.  Are we regressing?

Both Final Four games were close matches for most of the game, but each winning team began to pull away in the final minutes leaving just UCONN and Purdue standing at the end.  They will play the final game of this year's edition of March Madness on Monday evening.

Thanks for stopping by! 

La Dentista, day two....

5:26 am - Saturday - April 6th - Yuma, AZ - 45° F, humidity 68%, wind 5 mph out of the west by northwest......dark right now, but the forecast calls for partly cloudy with a high of 72° F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were hiking through Carter Caves State Park in Kentucky with good friends Richard and Rhonda Entriken, who are also fellow Newell owners.....

Rhonda and TLE

The winds, which arrived Thursday evening, continued unabated all day Friday and into the evening, so we were essentially Newell bound until we left for TLE's final dental appointment of the winter.  Her final appointment to install the two new crowns was set for 1 pm, and we were hoping, along with Dr. Eva, that they would arrive at her office close to that time.  We were in the VW headed for the border parking lot around 12:30 pm, arrived there 5 minutes later, and were at Dr. Eva's office by 12:50 pm.  By 1:10 pm the crowns had arrived, and TLE was in 'the seat' getting them installed, and by 2:20 pm she was done, and had her beautiful smile back once again.  We paid the bill ($380/crown) and were on our way walking back to the border by 2:30 pm where we found a much shorter line than Thursday, but it still took the better part of an hour to get back across to the border parking lot ($6/day), and we were back to the Newell just before 4 pm....not too bad, really....a tad over 3 hours beginning to end.

We had hoped, as you know, to depart on Friday afternoon, but that was not to be due to the winds.  We had also hoped to cover about 120 miles of the 800+ miles to Likely Friday afternoon, leaving just 340 more miles to Bishop, CA where we plan to spend a couple of days, but that did not work out, so Saturday will be kind of along driving day, and we won't get to Bishop until late Sunday morning.....we hope to get as far as Coso Junction (Rest Area, and Truck Stop) where we almost always take a break during our drive to Bishop....we'll spend the night in the Rest Area there instead, and be on our way to Bishop early Sunday.  Wow, that was one 'run on sentence' wasn't it?  Anyway, I say that to say this.  We busied ourselves reinserting the VW into the trailer around 5 pm, fighting the winds all the way, so we can depart The Quechan Casino early Saturday morning....hopefully before 7 am.

As I sit here typing it is still dark outside, and is around 5:40 am....hope to be rolling our wheels before 7 am....all we must do is turn on the engine, air up, and be on our way, but not before we enjoy a good cup of coffee.  

We got a subtle sunset Friday night....

...thanks for stopping by!

La Dentista, day one......

 7:29 am - Friday - April 5th - Yuma, AZ - 55° F, humidity 43%, wind 20 mph out of west....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 67° F....that's like 20° F cooler than yesterday!  On this date in 2020 my mother, Virginia, entered Hospice....does not seem like four years already.....she passed to the next life a few days later.....

I think I was around 8, or 9 years old in this picture...my mother was a beautiful, and talented woman

My father, Art, and mother, Virginia circa mid 60's

So, the day for which we came to Yuma finally arrived on Thursday.  TLE had a 12 pm appointment to have molds made of her gums, and bite so two crowns could be made.  They will be installed on Friday afternoon around 1 pm.  Dr. Eva asked us to arrive around 11 am in case she could get to us earlier, so we left around 10:15 am in the VW to make the 2 mile drive to the border parking lot.  We were able to stop at one of the pharmacies, of which there are many in Lol Algodones, and pick up some medication for friends, which we will mail to them.

By the time we arrived at Dr. Eva's office it was just before 11 am, however, it appeared that she would not able to get to TLE until just after 12 pm, so we walked about a block to a little plaza where there are a couple of water fountains, and an expresso shop.  TLE got coffee, and I a Mocha Frappuccino....of course!  We sat and read for about an hour before heading back to Dr. Eva's office.  They took TLE in around 12:10 pm, and by 1:20 pm she was finished.  We walked back to the border to find a relatively long line, but nothing like a few weeks ago.....

That's Ken right there↗

....we passed the time talking with a guy in line with us named Ken (see first picture....that's him on the right), who was a very interesting guy.  While we were in line for over an hour the time flew by as the conversation flowed without end.  I don't normally get involved in long conversations while waiting to cross the border, but this day was one of those exceptions.  Ken had just got in line after spending 4 hours in his dentist's chair.

By 3:10 pm we had been processed through the check point, and were on our way to the Beetle.  From the border we headed directly to Old Town in Yuma where we had an early dinner at Prison Hill Brewing Company....one of our favorite micro breweries over the 12 years of our nomadic wanderings.....

...we both ordered a pint of their Chango Malo....a coconut stout with 'flavor profiles of chocolate and coffee'.....yummy....I am not really a coconut kind of guy, but I loved this brew!....

....we decided to just order appetizers, which consisted of two plates of fried avocados, and a plate of spring rolls....what a perfect combination!  They've had those fried avocados on the menu for a decade, and it is the only place I have ever found them.....so, so good!

We were home around 4:30 pm, and relaxing for the balance of the afternoon and evening which found both of us reading, and listening to the growing wind event outdoors, which is still raging as I write with gusts up to 30 mph. I did, however, walk over to the Casino to extend our stay for two more days.

We had hoped to depart Quechan Casino Friday afternoon to begin our trek northward after TLE's  final dental appointment, but with the wind coming directly out of the west (it is hitting right on the nose of the Newell) we would be facing a side wind from the driver's side for most of our drive, so we will delay that departure until Saturday morning, after the winds have abated.  We've got around 800 miles to cover before we arrive there Wednesday, or Thursday next week, and I will enjoy every mile of that drive on cruise control, just holding onto the steering wheel.  Driving the Newell day after day is one of my happy places, and I never get tired of it.

Thanks for stopping by! 

Hole in the wall.....

7:42 am - Thursday - April 4th - Yuma, AZ - 56° F, humidity 53%, wind 4 mph out of the east by northeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 86° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I arrived at Goosenecks State Park in Southern Utah near Mexican Hat....$10/night.....one of our all time favorite boondock sites...what a view!

Day three at the Quechan Casino began like the other two with crystal clear, blue, sunny skies, and temps in the high 50's....no wind. For the first time since I hurt my back last Saturday TLE and I took a walk.  When we've stayed here in the past we usually walk two loops around the casino which equals about 1.8 miles.  We managed to average around 3.3 mph, and my back felt great....

....notice the blooming Ocotillo on the left in the picture above.

We had no plans for Wednesday morning, but we had made plans to meet Marnie and Rich (managers from Ramona Oaks RV Resort) at a hole in the wall Mexican place called Las Palapas Taco Grill in Fortuna Hills, which is east of Yuma, and about 22 miles from the Quechan Casino.  We left in the Beetle around 12:15 pm to make the 22 mile drive, arriving without incident around 12:40 pm.  Marnie and Rich invited former Ramona Oaks Residents Bill and Debbie to join us.  Marnie and Rich winter in Fortuna Hills each winter, and Bill and Debbie were here all winter, also, and will not be departing until late May....it's going to be hot by then!......

Left to right: Moi, Rich, Marnie, Debbie, Bill and TLE

Marnie always likes to take a 'footie' whenever we meet up in our travels

.....we talked, laughed, and enjoyed great Mexican fare for the better part of 2 hours before deciding it was time to bid our 'until next times'.  We had a great time reminiscing with everyone about our time at Ramona Oaks RV Resort which will always stand out in my memories as one of our favorite long term gigs in our 12 years of nomadic wanderings.

We still had a moderate shopping spree to attend to at the local Fry's grocery store and fuel station.  By the time we paid for our purchases, and I had topped off the VW gas tank it was 3:30 pm, and the day was fast coming to an end.

The high temp for the day was forecast to be 85° F, but it only go to 83° F....nice.  Thursday will be the warmest day of the week at 86° F...if it gets there...and then it will dip into the 70's on Friday, which, if all our ducks line up, will be our departure day (afternoon).  If the ducks fail to cooperate, then we'll be departing The Quechan Casino Saturday morning.

We spent the rest of the afternoon reading, and enjoying the coolish breezes wafting through the Newell windows.....thanks for stopping by!

Turn down day.....

7:36 am - Wednesday - April 3rd - Yuma, AZ -  57° F, humidity 54%, wind 2 mph out of the northeast.....crystal clear, blue sunny skies today with a forecast high of 86° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were taking a sunset tour of Monument Valley (on the Utah/Arizona border)....

....the lighting was amazing that evening!

We've been using our Bluetti solar charger to power our Starlink while we are dry camping, as I mentioned in yesterday's installment.  After pretty heavy use Monday afternoon, and into the evening we were down to 59% of battery capacity from the 94% at which it began.....I used it to power the trailer Fantastic vent fan a few days before without recharging it.  After typing my blog Tuesday TLE and I took it outside around 9:30 am and hooked up the 3 portable solar panels to recharge it.  By 1 pm it was fully charged again....amazing!  That is the advantage of lithium batteries....they charge on a straight, continuous, steady line, unlike flooded cell batteries, which charge more slowly as they get over 90% of capacity.  It can take hours to get that last 5%.  Of course, I neglected to take pictures of the setup, so I'll be sure to do that Wednesday, or Thursday when we recharge it again.  

That was pretty much the highlight of the day.  We both spent most of the day reading, relaxing, and decompressing from our six month stay at GNHS.  It was great to have no obligations, or even the hint of possible obligations.  It was kind of a 'turn down day'...a saying from the 60's, which meant 'turn down the volume', or relax if you will.  The day was beautiful with blue skies, and soft zephyr like breezes wending their way into the Newell through open windows.  

'Turn down day' by The Cyrkle

This is our first extended time dry camping stint in over 2 years, and it is nice to feel that sense of freedom from connecting to city utilities.  Someday (who knows for sure, right?) those utilities may no longer be available, so it is good to flex our boondock muscles once and while, and experiment with the new solar charger technology.  Over the next few years we are striving to become totally self sufficient, and be able to live off grid indefinitely.  We've got a ways to go, but are getting there slowly, but surely.

As far as the solar we have on the Newell (620 watts) we were at 89% battery capacity Tuesday morning and, without tilting the panels, we got back to 97% at the end of the day.  Could we have gotten to 100% with the panels tilted? Probably, but you only need to get to 100% once every 5-7 days.  I can tilt 2 of the solar panels from my ladder, but the other two require me to be on the roof, and since we're only dry camping for 5-6 days this time I would rather take the easy route for a change.  The summer of 2020, when we were wandering through rural America and boondocking quite a bit, we never had to tilt our panels, and it worked out quite well.  In the past, most of our boondocking has been during the winter when the sun is quite low in the southern sky, so tilting the panels at a 45° angle is mandatory to get their maximum charge, and, therefore, get back to 100%.

It's obvious the 'snow birds' have begun to migrate northward again as the parking lot here at the Quechan Casino is virtually empty....there are maybe 10 RVs here at the time, but during the middle of 'snow bird' season the place is packed with maybe 75-100 RVs most of the winter.

Well, that's it for Tuesday....thanks for stopping by!

Changing views.....

7:51 am - Tuesday - April 2nd - Yuma, AZ - 54° F, humidity 77%, wind 2 mph out of the north by northeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 80° F.  On this date in 2012 TLE and I were canoeing along the intercoastal water way with our friend Ernie Prociw near Stuart, FL (on the Atlantic coast)......

We were not in a rush to roll our wheels Monday.  We only had about 104 miles to drive, and all day in which to do it, so we were up around 7:30 am taking it easy until around 9 am when we began the final preparations for our departure, which included moving the Newell and trailer forward about 30 feet so we could lower the ramp door on the rear of the trailer, and insert the VW.  By the time we loaded the car, and dumped the last of our trash it was around 9:40 am, and then it was time for goodbyes.....I say 'goodbyes', because I do not know if we will see any of them again.

Whenever we have been sitting in one place for 6 months, as we have done often in the past years, I am also a little antsy on getaway day, hoping that everything will work as it should, and we will have one of those great nomadic days of setting the cruise control, holding onto the steering wheel and enjoying the scenery out our large windshields, and that is exactly how it turned out.

Our first stop of the day was just 17 miles later in Niland where we pulled off the road to briefly check on the Rubber Maid container strapped to the front of the trailer, to be sure it was secure.  Our next stop was about 20 miles later when we stopped at the Pilot Travel Center in Brawley to buy a couple of gallons of drinking water, and another ratcheting cargo strap, which I wanted to use on the Rubber Maid container to make sure it stayed in place, which it was doing, but I wanted to be doubly sure.  We also needed to check the torque on the trailer wheels.  You will recall we recently installed new tires, and torqued all the lug nuts to 90 foot pounds, but you always want to check them again a few times over the next few days of travel to be sure they remain tight.  Since my back was still a little sore TLE volunteered to do the task under my supervision.  She caught on pretty quickly, and within minutes all 24 lug nuts were retorqued to 90 foot pounds...

.....from there it was another 90 minutes to the Love's Travel Center in Yuma, AZ where we took on 90 gallons of diesel at $3.50/gallon using our Open Roads discount card.  The posted per gallon charge was $3.81, so we saved 31 cents a gallon.  On top of that the price at the Pilot Travel Center in Brawley was $5.74/gallon, so we saved $2.24/gallon by fueling up outside of California....a savings of $201.60.  Our total bill for 90 gallons was just over $300, as opposed to the over $500 it would have cost in California....Go Brandon and Newsom!  We now have enough fuel to reach Likely, CA without filling up again, if we so chose, but we like to keep our tank full when sitting for months at a time, so we'll top off the tank in Minden, NV where prices are similar to Arizona prices.

Within 20 minutes we had pulled into the Quechan Casino parking lot on Algodones Road, and parked facing due west....

.....the sun is getting much higher in the sky as we edge towards summer, so I don't think we'll have to tilt the solar panels to maximize charging....we'll see.  We deployed our Starlink, but plugged the modem into the Bluetti Solar Charger as it takes a lot of juice to run that thing.  That way we don't deplete our house batteries beyond what the solar panels can replace during the day.

We had a delightful sunset.....

....followed later in the evening by lightning, thunder, and torrential rain for about an hour.  As I sit here typing this morning there is not a cloud in the sky.

Thanks for stopping by!