We have contact

As I mentioned in the last post, I was not sure we would have contact to the outside world while in Sedona. We are now in Sedona and have contact. We have cell coverage and Internet. We arrived this morning after a short 1-½ drive and are staying at the Sedona Elks Lodge.

This photo is a view from our front window

We have a view of all the named formations in Sedona. This photo is one called Coffeepot. If you look at the right side you can see the spout of the coffeepot. I have got to say, Sedona is NOT RV friendly . There is only 1 real RV Park in Sedona and NO; I mean absolutely NO sewer dumpsites in all of Sedona. The only RV Park has full hookups but no dump station and will not let anyone dump at one of their sites. The closest dump is 20 miles away in Cottonwood, the opposite direction we are going. We may not stay the 4 nights as planned because of this. There is quite a grade for 12 miles out of here and I don’t like the idea of hauling 1000lbs of waist up that hill.

Grand Canyon Railroad

We took the train to the Grand Canyon today. It was a pleasant 2 hour ride up to the canyon. We met a very nice couple from Colorado on the train and had good conversation during the trip. Goes to show, they don’t have to be RVers to be fun people. They even invited us to stay with them on their property when we travel through Colorado. It’s always nice to have good friends to visit during our journeys. Anyway, although the train was fun, I would suggest driving your own car from Williams to the canyon. There really wasn’t much to see on the train and you are on their schedule. The train takes 2 hours up and 2 hours back, arrives at the canyon at 12:00 and departs at 4:00. This really doesn’t give you enough time.

The Canyon was awesome of course. When you look over the edge, the first words out of your mouth are WOW. At first glance it just looks like one huge mural. You really have to just stand there for a while and take it all in before you realize it is REAL. I added a few photos to our photo site. You can view them by clicking on the photo link at the left. Unfortunately this is one of those things that photos don’t do justice, but they are still worth taking a look at. There are free shuttle busses running throughout the park and you can get on and off as much as you like. The shuttles are great because there is a lot to see and you will wear yourself out trying to walk it all. They also offer a number of bus tours along with hiking and mule rides down the canyon walls. We had a great time and are worn out for now.

We may loose contact with the world tomorrow since we are heading into Sedona. Cell phone coverage may be impossible, which includes Internet. If you don’t hear from us, we should be back in 4 days.

We are out of range

We are a little over 300 miles from San Diego, as the crow flies. This means I am just at the edge of the Direct TV local San Diego channels spot beam. We have lost out local channels. We can switch over to the West coast feed which comes out of Los Angeles but we will be within range in few days so we will leave it as is for now.

Williams Arizona

We are on the road again. We are now in Williams Arizona. It was up hill all the way. I am not kidding. Most was just a gradual climb that wasn’t even noticeable. We left about 400 ft elevation in Lake Havasu City and are now at 6770 ft. Williams is one of the famous towns on the Historic Route 66. Today we drove down a portion of Route 66 through Williams and checked out the motels, shops, and restaurants that were in full swing back in the days travelers traveled Route 66. Of course there is plenty of memorabilia to be bought. Why are we in Williams? Tomorrow we are going to take a 2 hour ride on a historic 1923 steam train to the Grand Canyon (more on that tomorrow) and the train departs from Williams.

Clyde guessed it

We have always had a home, even though we live in our motorhome. Now our motorhome has a home. We purchased an RV lot in Lake Havasu City at the Havasu RV Resort. It isn’t officially ours until the paperwork is done but there should be no problem with that.

The Havasu RV Resort has just added a really nice Virtual Tour of the park to their web site. You can click on THIS link to see it or go to www.havasurvresort.com, click on Photo Gallery, and click on the Virtual Tour panorama photo at the top.

The Main Arial (first view) was shot from the site just to the right of ours. Our site is the first empty slab you see, in fact our site is in the lower left corner of the photo before you start the tour. As it pans all the way around you get a better view of our site. As you will see, a little landscaping is in order but that will happen soon. We enjoy the same views as this tour. Be sure to check out the inside views of the Clubhouse as well as the other views.

We’ve got a secret

As you know from our previous post, we are in Lake Havasu City Arizona. There is a reason why we came here besides the fact that it is on our way to the Route 66 Fun Run, which we are going to join up with. Can you guess what our secret is? Comment to this post by clicking on the comment link below this post if you think you know.

The owl flew the coop

You may remember in the last post that we are sharing a spot with a baby owl. We have been watching for the last 2 days as the baby moved around the top of the tree spreading it’s wings. We knew any day now that it would take off. Well last night must have been the time. When we woke this morning, the owl was gone.
Today we moved again. We are now in Lake Havasu City Arizona. I decided to take AZ-1 up the Arizona side of the Colorado River instead of US-95 up the California side. I think it was a good choice since we traveled past farmland and through small towns. The California side is just boring desert.

We are at a very nice resort here in Lake Havasu City. Yes I did say Resort. This is a REAL top-notch resort. I was disappointed for a while when I found we were on the Verizon Extended Network. This means NO INTERNET from my Aircard. Then I found the park has free WiFi, and it is fast…Real fast. We will be spending 6 nights here in Havasu checking out the area. This resort makes you feel like you want to stay a while.

We are movin on

We have moved to Blythe California. We used to come here many years ago when the kids were young and we had the boat.
It is right on the Colorado River as you can see in the photo. The weather is perfect here right now. It can get over 100’ during the summer and I have seen 120’ here. Today it was in the high 70s to low 80s with a nice breeze.
They put us in a site right next to a tree with a baby owl in it. Actually this owl is getting ready to take flight so it is the size of a full grown cat. Mom is out all day getting food and Dad sits in the Palm tree across the street. We will be here for 2 nights then we will be on the move again. We chose this park because it is a Passport America park and we can get it for ½ price. Actually, here, they just remove some amenities and give you the basic site for ½ price. I had to pay extra for electricity, they have WiFi for extra, and Sewer hookup sites are extra. For non Passport America members these are included. Once you add all the extras, it comes close to full price. This is not the case with other Passport America parks. There is another PA park just around the corner for ½ the price of this one but their sites are not right on the river as this one is. I wanted to be on the water. They call this place Hidden Beaches which is a good name. I looked and looked and could not find the beach. Finally I looked at the campground map and found it. It is the little mound of dirt between the boat ramp and the dock.

We are finally off

We left Vista California today and don’t plan to return to Southern California until November. We are now in Indio California and it is warm. The temperature has been around 80 all day and it’s supposed to be hotter tomorrow. The wind was up earlier but has subsided. I used my Passport America membership and got us into a pretty nice resort for ½ price. This is one of those places that will not allow coaches over 10 years old.
This is a photo of their pond that is loaded with huge fish and lily pads. We will be here for 2 nights and then we head east. On the way here I nearly took off the door of a California Highway Patrol vehicle. He had someone pulled over that blew by us earlier. Just as we got close he swung his door open right into my lane and I had to hit the brakes and swerve a little to avoid him. I guess he was just wrapped up in giving the guy heck and not thinking. Glad I dodged that one.

The Easter bunny came

Since we are finally getting back on the road tomorrow, we had the family over for Easter dinner. Of course the Easter bunny came to hide goodies for the Grandkids.
Alexa shows Papa some of her loot.
Later Alexa helps her brother Landen with his goods. We were so fortunate to have everyone over before we leave again since we don’t plan to come back this way until the end of the year.

Spending time with the Grandson

Since we are leaving soon and will most likely not return to this area until November, we are spending as much time with our grandson as possible. He has spent the last few days with us and will be over for Easter to hunt for Easter eggs. While here he got to help Nana bake and decorate cookies.

Today we spent some time on the scooters (and some time on the ground). Don’t worry he was fine.

In preparation for the Easter bunny he also got to color and decorate Easter eggs.

We sure are going to miss having him around but will also look forward to seeing him again in November.

Visitors

While doing a little maintenance today, I had a visitor. After removing the engine cover I heard a jingle and when I turned around this little kitty
was making his way up the engine and into the motorhome. After escorting him outside, I no longer turned around and there he was again. It wasn’t until I turned on the vacuum that he finally got the hint.

Why do I believe them?

While at the FMCA rally this past March I had the opportunity to have 3 problems remedied. I have a leveling jack that leaks, my generator was in need of a tune-up, and my water heater needed a part.
The jack company couldn’t replace the jack on site but they talked about how great the company was and how responsive they are to the customers needs. They promised me they would expedite a jack to me right away.
The generator company did tune my generator however they didn’t have some needed parts. They also spent an hour boasting how great the company is with customers and also said they would expedite the parts.
As I passed by the water heater booth I mentioned a needed part. The guy handed me a piece of scrap paper and said here right your address and I will send you one as he seemed to otherwise not even notice I existed. Yeah right I thought.
Of all 3, can you guess which was the ONLY one that came through? That’s right I got the part for…the water heater. I never did hear a thing from the other 2.

Because we can

We woke this morning fully intending to move on out of here at Santee Lakes and going back to Vista. Our friends that we are visiting came down to our site and invited us to take a ride with them up to Traveland In Irvine to check out some new RVs. We reminded them we were going to head out today and they said, so stay another day. I said we would if we don’t need to vacate the site today. Well here we are for another night. We spent the whole day looking at so many RVs that I don’t care to see another RV for a long time…Oh Yeah; I live in one, well new ones then. Tomorrow we are heading back to Vista, maybe.

They asked us to leave

Actually, there is a rally coming in to the Vista Elks Lodge this weekend and they are going to cram 25 rvs into the 19 spaces they have so they need all the room they can get. We took this opportunity to move down to Santee Lakes in, where else, Santee to visit some friends we met almost 2 years ago when we first started fulltiming. They moved to Arizona, Kentucky, and are now back in California. This photo is a view from our front window. We have stayed here before and really like this place. It is situated on 7 man made lakes and is real nice and peaceful. It was only about an hour drive but the weather was lousy. I generally don’t like to travel in such weather but we needed to vacate the lodge. We would be heading for the unknown but Susan still needs to finish up on some dental work. Hopefully we will be back on the road in another week.