Crazy times!

Before leaving Yuma, I was able to get a replacement wing panel for my Elan and on Sunday, met my buddy Paul at the AMPS club field in Phoenix and got a few flights in. The weather was perfect and it was a very enjoyable day.

The next day, Monday, we spent getting the trailer ready for the road as we had heard that our Canadian government was telling all Canadians to get home due to the COVID-19 virus outbreak. This was about 10 days earlier than we had originally planned but felt we should probably heed the request.
As a send off, Arizona gave us another one of its beautiful sunsets.

Our plan was to leave Tuesday morning and head for Las Vegas and get as far as we could the first day. As it turned out we made it about an hour north of Vegas to Mesquite. We spent the night at the same Walmart we stayed at on the way down.

Before I carry on, let me back up a couple of months for a minute. Back in December I had heard of a company (TDS Logistics) that was offering discount prices for diesel fuel to RVers. The company is a fairly large trucking company that is able to negotiate special pricing on fuel at some major truck stops. They use a 3rd party payment system and provide their customers with a card that works in the pumps in the truck lanes at most truck stops. They have decided to offer their arrangement to RVers as well. It seemed a bit too good to be true at the time so I just filed it for the time being. Fast forward to Boomerville in January and there were a couple folks there that had signed up. They had used the program a couple of times and it all seemed to work as advertised. I looked into it a bit further and while it still sounded very interesting, there were a couple of stickler points for us. Mainly the fact we wouldn't be able to receive their payment card as it would be mailed to our address back in Canada and as far as I could tell at the time, was required to be able to activate the pumps. Fast forward again to the beginning of March and I found out that as long as we knew the number on the card, we could link it to a Loves (one of the major truck stops in the US) rewards card and I could use that to activate the pumps.
Anyway, I decided to give it a go. I filled out their application on-line and then gave it a week to let them process the application. I then contacted them and was able to get the number. We then made a trip to a Loves in south Phoenix to pick up a rewards card. I should add that there is an app for smart phones where you can see where the discounts are available and what the discount price will be.
The first time we used it was at the Loves truck stop in Kingman, Az.  If I remember correctly, the posted pump price was $3.04.9 / gallon. Using the TDS program, we paid $2.19 / gallon. That's almost a 30% discount!

Anyway, back to the story. After getting parked in Mesquite, we ventured into the store to see what was left. Not much! There were no paper products, almost no canned fruits or vegetables, the meat racks were virtually empty and basic staples like flour, sugar, rice, etc. were nowhere to be found. We really weren't desperate for anything so weren't too worried but there were a couple things we would have liked to stock up on a bit.
The next morning we were both up fairly early and decided to head over to the store again just before 6. There was a line at the door but we got in fairly quickly. We wanted to pick up a couple more packs of TP so I headed there first. Chris went over to the meat section and picked up a couple of items there as well. We found a couple of other items then headed out. After we went through the checkout and just as we were about to leave I spotted a cart with a bunch of hand sanitizers on it. They were limiting these to 2 per customer and as we didn't have any, we picked up a couple.
We carried on and made our next stop at Perry, Utah, just north of Salt lake City. At this point, our plan was still to cross into Canada at Coutts, Alberta, leave the trailer in Calgary for some warranty work and drive to Vernon.  On checking the weather, it looked like it was going to get damn cold on the east side of the Rockies so we decided to turn west and cross into BC at Osoyoos instead.
After an uneventful trip with stops at Boise and Wenatchee, we crossed into Canada Saturday morning and are currently hanging out at the Real Canadian Superstore in Vernon.  We hope to be able to stay here for our 2 week self isolation and then get back to a somewhat normal life for a while.
We don't know what is happening with regard to our summer camp hosting job at this point yet but hope to find out fairly soon.
Oh, and after using the fuel discount card 6 times on the trip home, we saved almost $168 off the posted pump prices, about 40%. If you drive a diesel powered RV in the US, I recommend you check out the program. There are also a few stations here in Canada that do offer a discount as well although not to the same extent as in the US. As far as I can tell it seems that these are the Petro Canada truck stops.
If you do decide to apply for the program, please consider adding me as the referer on your application. If you do, I will receive a small credit from TDS as a thank you.

The Good, the Beautiful, the Bad and the Ugly!

While we were staying with Michael and Robin at their new place in Yuma, I offered to help repair a section of their patio that was damaged while they were parking their trailer.
I didn't get a full 'before' pic but the damage was considerable and required ripping up a 10' x 10' section and completely redoing it.  I have some prior experience with doing paver patios so dove right in.
The first step was to extract all the old pavers and salvage as much as possible. It turned out that about half the pavers were broken up to the point they were unusable.  Next was to re-level, repack and prep the area. That took a couple of days.

After this, we had to find a source of the original style pavers which, considering this subdivision and most of the brick and paver work is about 20 years old, was easier than we thought. We found a location in town that had lots of stock at a very good price.
Once the area was ready, laying the new pavers only took a couple of hours. A bit of work after that to seal it all up and clean up the mess, had it looking as good as or better than new.

A quick side bar: After my last flight at the Yuma Aeromodelers Airshow, I noticed some damage to the bottom of the right wing on my jet. I contacted the importer and ordered a replacement set of wings which he shipped to us here.
Upon examining the damage, it became apparent how close I had come to losing the aircraft during the airshow! The wing structure was so badly damaged internally that any extra stress during flight would likely have caused a complete failure and a total loss of the aircraft.
This was the apparent external damage.

And once I opened it up, this is what I found. That black tube is all that holds the wing onto the aircraft. It was split in several places and the support ribs were fractured. As a result the wing had lost about 90% of its strength! The only thing holding it together was a thin 1/16" balsa wing skin.

While we were here, we contacted the manager of the Pleasant Valley RV Park in Peoria and explained that we had been there before and that we were unable to find other suitable parking for a week or two. We managed to convince them to let us come back for a week or two and park in their dry camping area, so after spending a wonderful week with Michael and Robin, and after receiving my replacement wing set, we pulled out last Tuesday and headed East. It took us about 3 hours to get to our destination and once there, were set up in short order.
We have good friends who winter in Phoenix and on Wednesday, met up with them at the AMPS model club flying field where Paul is a member.
We plan on several more visits while we are here.

Now, you are probably wondering what is up with the title of this entry.

The Good is that we are again able to spend a couple of weeks here in Peoria.

The Beautiful is that spring is here! The desert is again starting to green up and flowers are blooming. There are many Brittle Bushes that are in full bloom again.

Also along the roadsides are many of these which I believe are Desert Globemallows.

And these Desert Marigolds.

Another beautiful aspect of this area is the regular appearance of a number of gentle giants.

We see these quite regularly if the weather is suitable. Sometimes they come quite close as they did yesterday, landing just across the road from us. There is a company in Arizona, Rainbow Ryders, that flies regularly in the area. Yesterday there were about a dozen balloons that flew in just before dusk.

Now the Bad. I don't know what it is with people, but we see this quite often. Shotgun shells and bullet casings just dumped in the desert. Why can't shooters at least clean up their empties?

And if that isn't bad enough, then there is the Ugly.  Out walking Maya the other day, I came upon this about a half mile from where we are parked.

I have no words for this except perhaps, disgusting!

We had planned to possibly head further East and spend a bit of time in New Mexico before heading North this year but now I think we will just head North from here. I am still unsure exactly what route we will take as that will depend on weather forecasts but we ultimately plan to cross back into Alberta around the end of March.  Stay tuned.

Winter Blast and the Fly Yuma, Yuma Aeromodelers Airshow

It's been a couple of weeks since the last update. We were hanging out near Lake Havasu City with good friends while waiting for the start of Winter Blast which I wrote a bit about in the last installment.
During the 2 weeks we were here waiting for Winter Blast to start we did some touring around and checked out a bit more of the town.
One day, we parked down near the bridge and just took a stroll along the canal. Lake Havasu has a number of functional navigational lighthouses. One thing that is interesting is what they have done with them. There are somewhere around 30 lighthouses on the lake and quite a few right around the city proper. There is a club in town, the Lake Havasu City Lighthouse Club, who have converted most of the navigational lights into full functional 1/3 scale replicas of actual lighthouses around the US.

Another day, we took a short ferry ride across the lake to the new Havasu Landing Casino. We went more for the boat ride than the casino, but did drop in to lose a few bucks. Most US casinos still allow smoking in the facilities and frankly the smoke drove us out in fairly short order.

The fireworks shows started on Thursday and for the first night, we elected to watch from camp. I did take the time to check out a ridge close to camp that I thought would be a better vantage point for watching the fireworks.

This is the view from the ridge looking back toward the camping area. Our rig is at the far right edge of the photo.
Around dusk they started shooting off some of the earlier effects. Being that it was still quite light out, not too much was visible. Later on, there were some nice effects but we were in a spot where we could only see the higher level bursts. There wasn't an official show on Thursday so we really weren't expecting a lot.
Friday was the start of the official shows and they kicked off just after sunset. Again we elected to watch from camp. There were sporadic shots until 7:30 when the official shows started. The first one was about 15 minutes long and was mostly low level so we didn't see too much. The second show however was mostly high level and was very impressive. There were several effects I hadn't seen previously. The main shows ran until 8:30 but there were shots going off right up until about 10PM.
We were worried about how Maya would react as she does not like any kind of loud bangs or booms. While definitely uneasy, she didn't do too bad. She stayed in the trailer most of the time and curled up in her safe place in the bedroom beside the bed or under the kitchen table. There were a couple of real loud effects, called salutes, that rattled the trailer even as far away as we were which she really didn't like though.
Saturday, Steve, Tammie and I, drove up onto the low ridge where we had a clear view of the firing lines. Tammie and I set up our cameras and attempted to photograph the show. I had played around with photographing fireworks a bit in the past but this was something all new to Tammy.
Long story short, we had a great time. I think we both got some good shots and both learned quite a bit. I do know one thing though; my camera is ancient! After playing with Tammie's for a bit, I am very envious.

Both of the shows on Saturday were fantastic. Lots of variation in effects, colour and patterns.
Sunday evening, we again watched the show from the ridge but Saturday was the main show. There were some good sequences on Sunday, but it wasn't nearly the show that Saturday was. There were also a couple of bright lights that were affecting our photography as well.
Monday was a sad day as it was the day that Steve and Tammie, and Chris and I parted company. We had traveled together for over 6 weeks and got to know each other quite well. They were planning to hang around Havasu for a while longer while we needed to get to Yuma as we had an appointment to get some more warranty work done on the trailer. We also wanted to be in Yuma for the Yuma Aeromodelers 'Fly Yuma' model airshow. I have taken part in this show for the past 2 years and am always amazed at the spectacle they put on.
We were able to get most of the planned warranty items taken care of (but not all) then over to Fortuna de Oro RV park where we had a coupon for 3 free nights. This gave us a chance to get caught up on a few things in town before the airshow weekend.
Thursday, while still at the RV park, I loaded the jet up and took it out to the field. I hadn't flown it since September in Princeton and wanted to burn the dust off both it and me before the show. Made a couple of flights and by the end of the session, was feeling quite comfortable again.
Friday, we took the trailer back out to the airfield and got it set up. We were able to get the same spot we have had for the last couple of years just off the parking lot.

I put in another flight and felt ready for the show on Saturday.
It would be nice to say that airshow day dawned sunny and warm but alas, that wasn't the case. I should of known because we had a stunning sunset the night before which indicated clouds moving in.

I was up about 6 on Saturday and noticed it had rained somewhat over night and was still quite cloudy and overcast. I started getting my gear set up and about 9AM the skies opened up! It was the hardest rain we have had since leaving in October. It rained quite hard for almost an hour but then started to clear about 10AM. The show was supposed to start at 10 but it was looking promising so was delayed to 10:30 by which time most of the clouds had moved off and the sun was back out.
The show went off without any more delays and was very successful. I think the attendance was down a bit due to the weather though but there was still a very impressive turnout.

Just a part of the crowd line. People were lined up 2 deep along the entire length of the runway.

After the formal flying portion of the show, everyone moved their aircraft out onto the runway and the public was allowed onto the field to look and ask questions.

Sunday was a model swap meet at the field and once that was done, we packed up and moved on to our next stop which is still in Yuma. Another couple who we have become good friends with have purchased a lot in the foothills area of Yuma. They plan to park their trailer here for most of the winter season. The nice thing is their lot has enough room for two rigs. It was a bit tight but I managed to squeeze our Big Ass Trailer (the B.A.T.) into the space alongside their Arizona room.

The plan is to hang out here for a week or so or until a new set of lenses Chris needs for her glasses arrives. After that, we will head east towards New Mexico before turning north.

Lake Havasu City

We are now back in Lake Havasu City for a couple of weeks. We have been here a couple of times in the past but each time just passing through. We did stop to see the London Bridge a couple of years ago.
The plan this year is to stick around for a couple of weeks and take in more of the local sights and an annual event called Winter Blast. This event is billed as the largest fireworks extravaganza in the western USA. Fireworks companies come here to test out new products and displays. The shows start on Thursday the 13th around 5 and go to 11 on each of Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and 10 on Sunday.
The Escapees Boomers are here as well but camped closer to the show down by the rodeo grounds. We elected to camp a bit further away in a BLM area called the Gravel Pit. This was primarily for Maya's benefit as she doesn't like loud noises. Time will tell if we are far enough away.
We originally arrived here last Thursday but they have a camp host at the gravel pit and are enforcing the BLM 14 day stay limits now. As a result, in order to be able to stay at the gravel pit through the show, we had to move to a different site for a few days. We stayed there until Monday and then came back here.

Saturday, the 4 of us made a day trip up to Oatman, an old mining town, come ghost town, come tourist town. I wrote about Oatman last year so won't repeat that again but you can read about that visit here. After Oatman, we carried on up Route 66 a ways to Kingman before turning back south and returning to the rigs. We did stop at one spot near the summit of the pass between Oatman and Kingman which was a weird kind of shrine/memorial of some sort. There must have been 30 or 40 memorials and markers located here.

Up until Monday, the weather had been stunning! Sunny and warm during the day and not too cool at night and almost no wind. That changed on Monday and things got downright chilly. We went from daytime temps in the mid 20's and overnight temps around 10, to daytime highs around 13, overnight lows barely above freezing and howling winds.  That lasted 3 days. For the most part we just hunkered down and stayed close to camp. The 4 of us did go out for a wonderful dinner on Wednesday though to a place just across the London Bridge; the Barley Brothers Brewery. They have a rib special that was very good.
Thursday, things got back to more seasonal weather. Steve had been talking about a hike he wanted to do called SARA's Crack. SARA stands for Special Activities Recreation Area. The "Crack In The Wall" is a 5 mile round trip hike with a narrow slot canyon in the middle. As the weather was now more conducive to outdoor activities, we decided to tackle this. We set out around 10:30 and parked at the trail head then set off. About 45 mins later after hiking down a wash, we entered the slot canyon.

The first serious obstacle was a drop of about 15 feet down a slick rock slide. Someone had thoughtfully placed a knotted rope to assist ascents and descents.

 

After another 45 minutes we reached the end of the trail at Balance Cove which is named for a balancing rock on the shoreline.

While some have climbed the rock, we elected to just enjoy the site and rest up for the return hike.

After a short rest we started back up and essentially retraced our route back to the jeep.

The Quartzsite RV show and Boomerville 2020

This year is our third year in Quartzsite for the January zoo or, more properly, the Quartzsite Sports, Vacation and RV show. It is a totally crazy time where the the population of this sleepy desert town swells from approx. 3500 year round residents to over half a million! Almost all of them boondocking out in the desert in a dozen or so main areas around town. The main draw in January is the 'big tent' where a hundred plus vendors show and try and sell their products and services.
In past years, most of these vendors were selling primarily RV related products. The last few years though, things have changed and the tent now seems more like a large home show. Yes, there are still lots of RV related products and vendors, but more and more non RV related stuff is showing up. Things like hot tubs and cell phone accessories, leather belts and wallets to name a few. Also the hucksters selling the latest 'must have' miracle kitchen gadgets!
There is also another area across the road called Tyson Wells with longer term vendors who usually stick around for a good chunk of the winter. Here again you can find almost anything you like from RV accessories to hats to Trump wear to yard art.
Quartzsite also hosts a couple of large RV dealers during this time and they display and sell a large assortment of RV's. This makes for a great place to explore different floor plans and 'kick the tires' so to speak.
All of this, plus Quartzsite is also known far and wide among the rock and gem hounds. There are quite a few vendors who sell every kind of gem or mineral you could want.

After my last update, Boomerville filled up quite quickly. The total this year hit 239 rigs! It was actually quite crowded toward the end.

On Saturday the 18th, a bunch of us saddled up and headed off to a spot north of Parker which, while only about 5 miles off the highway but feels more like 20, called the Nellie E. Saloon or just the Desert Bar. This is a spot where someone converted an old mine camp into a completely off the grid bar and restaurant.

The road out was pretty rough in Steve and Tammie's jeep but once we got there it turned out to be a pretty interesting place. They have a very impressive solar array to keep it all powered. As far as the restaurant goes, the best way to describe it was fairly average but over priced. I get the price bit though as I don't imagine it would be cheap to transport all their supplies out there and that solar plant is pretty extensive.
The drive back was the best part though. Instead of taking the road back, we decided to take a back trail more suited for jeeps, ATV's and off road vehicles.  There were a few challenging sections but Steve did a masterful job. We also got to see some new terrain as well.

One thing Steve picked up from one of the vendors at the big tent was a new set of batteries for their coach. Their old ones were getting pretty tired and as they full time, they needed a new set that would provide for all their needs. This was our project for one of the days. It wound up taking part of one day and most of the next as they were a tight fit and we had to get a set of cables custom made. We also installed a new inverter and battery monitor for their coach.

Before installing the inverter though, was the Boomerville pot luck. As last year, there was a ton of food and we all ate way too much!

It was after we stuffed ourselves that Steve and I decided to finish up their install by mounting their new inverter. I should add that this thing weighs about 60 pounds and is mounted to the ceiling in one of their cargo bays. That was a lot of fun but we did manage. Their refrigerator and other appliances are much happier now with clean pure sine wave power.

Thursday was the annual CARE auction. I wrote about this last year but Chris and I, along with Steve and Tammie got a bit more involved this year. Somehow we got nominated to be on the teams that canvased the vendors in the big tent for donations to the auction. I think we did pretty good collecting quite a bit of merchandise.
The auction this year started around 11:30 and went til after 3. Chris, again this year, put some of her famous cinnamon buns and some pineapple upside down cakes in. I didn't keep track but I believe they garnered over $400 this year.  All in all, with the proceeds of the auction and other fund raising efforts over the last couple of weeks, the Boomers brought in about $18,000 dollars for CARE!

Last Sunday a bunch of us headed out to the Kofa National Wildlife Refuge to do some crystal hunting. There is a small area where they allow people to hunt for crystals; mostly quartz. After 3 hours or so we all had had some success in that we found some small ones. This area is pretty well picked over so not too much left to be found. We all had a good time though.

That is Ed, he is a retired geologist, in the light green shirt explaining what to look for and the best places to look.

This was taken up on the hill where I was hunting.

After the end of Boomerville, on Monday, Steve and I along with Ed and his wife Jan, headed back out to the area northwest of Parker to try and find the rest of the route we started out on earlier.
There is a route (676) that Ed had found both ends of but wanted to connect together. We did the eastern half earlier but lost the track and had to return. This time we started from the west end and worked our way east.

After 3 hours or so crawling across the desert on what would generously be called a goat track, we finally found our way to the spot where we lost the route earlier. It turns out we had missed it the first time by only about 10 yards! So close!
We did also get to go back to the old mine we had found earlier as well. We explored around a bit and got to check out the old mine tunnel, powder bunker and some of the old works. Very interesting place.

This is the entrance to one of the mine shafts. You could go in about 20 feet before the entrance was blocked by a heavy steel barrier.

You could see quite a ways down the shaft and I have no idea how deep into the hill it actually goes.

This is the one surviving powder bunker where they would have kept their explosives.

One of 2 vertical shafts that had been covered up.

I'm not sure who this fellow was but he apparently passed away on June 17, 1994. I wonder if he owned the mine or just worked there.

As I write this tonight, we have left Quartzsite and headed north to Lake Havasu City. We had originally planned to go back to Peoria and the Pleasant Valley Airport but when we called to see about a spot they told us they were no longer doing dry camping there. There really isn't a whole lot of boondocking areas in the Phoenix area so we regretfully had to come up with another plan.
Steve and Tammie had told us about "Winter Blast" in Lake Havasu City, so we though we would give that a try.