Beautiful Sonora Desert

I received this in my email box and just had to pass it on to all of you. The author is unknown.


Hey everyone out there!

We, in Arizona, know you're boycotting us -- but you really should come out here and see our Beautiful Sonora Desert. It's just gorgeous right now! We know you'd love it and maybe you can share what you saw with the rest of the country so they can love it too!

This is on an 'illegal super - highway' from Mexico to the USA (Tucson) used by human smugglers. This area is located in a wash, approximately 1.5 miles long, just south of Tucson, Arizona. If a flood came, all this would be washed to the river and then onto the sea!

It is estimated over 5,000 discarded backpacks are in this wash. Countless water containers, food wrappers, clothing, feces, including thousands of soiled baby diapers. And as you can see in this picture, fresh footprints leading right into it.

As we kept walking down the wash, we thought for sure it was going to end, but around every corner was more and more trash!

And of course the trail leading out of the wash in our city, heads directly NORTH to Tucson, then leads to your town tomorrow.

They've already come through here. Isn't Arizona just beautiful, America? Why would you boycott us??? Our desert has basically been turned into a landfill.

The trash left behind by people illegally crossing our border is another Environmental Disaster to hit the USA. If these actions had been done in one of our Northwest Forests or Seashore National Parks areas, there would be an uprising of the American people.....but this is the Arizona-Mexican border. You won't see these pictures on CNN, ABC, NBC or the Arizona Republic Repugnant newspaper. Nor will they mention the disease that comes from the uncovered human waste left in our desert. However, with respect to CNN, ABC & NBC, they do offer us “Special Reports" on cheating celebrity spouses.... This information needs to be seen by the rest of the country. "It's not about Right vs. Left, Liberal vs. Conservative, Republican vs. Democrat. It's about supporting the US Constitution"

What boycott

After the signing of State Bill SB-1070, which gives the local law enforcement the right to question the legal status of a suspected illegal immigrant, several California cities staged a boycott against Arizona claiming this could lead to racial profiling. Well it appears the boycott is having no effect on Lake Havasu City since the hotels and campgrounds are reporting record bookings for this holiday weekend. In the same sense San Diego has reported a number of reservation cancellations from Arizona residents for the summer. The term “Stepping on your own…well you know what” comes to mind.

The weather has been fabulous here in Havasu. We haven’t seen the 3 digit temperatures we usually begin to see this time of year. It has been very warm but comfortable.

We have been of the lake a couple of times this month and the water is smooth as glass and the temperature is very nice. The resort is empty and I personally think everyone left too early, but they all had their own reason to head north this soon.

We will be heading to California soon but only for about 10 days to visit with family and pick up our grandson for a summer of travel. We are really looking forward to having him for the summer and he can’t wait to travel with us. He calls every night and talks to Susan about it.

You gotta see this

Hi there America. My name is Lucas Van Engen. Dutch last name, the "Engen" pronounced like "Singin". And now you know.

In 2 days I will be getting on a Craftsman 54 inch Kohler Courage Riding Mower (basically, a kick-butt riding lawnmower) and traveling from coast to coast, starting in Fontana California, ending in New York, New York. The whole trip will cover 3,300 miles and take about three months, roughly the time it took for the Mayflower to crash on our shores. In that time I will be making several stops across America, many of them planned, most of them unplanned. The mission is two-fold: a durability test on the lawnmower and a chance to meet America.

This weekend he was here in Lake Havasu. You can follow him here. http://www.facebook.com/craftsman?v=app_121480821206742

Read from the bottom up because the newer post are at the top of the page, similar to my blog.

Interesting day

My day started out pretty good today as I popped out of the motorhome to be greeted by this little guy.

Look how small he is compared to my finger. I watched as I sipped on my coffee and soon he scurried off. A bit later I turned on my patio TV and was disappointed at what the Stock Market was doing. After today, this year has been a total loss. In other words the market took back all the gains I made so far this year.

On a good note, I called about the shade screen I ordered for our patio and they informed me it would be installed today. I hurried off to put gas in the car before they came but when I got back they were here and just about had the job done. Wow, that was quick.

Now I feel better about my patio furniture knowing that I won’t have to buy a new set next year after the sun destroys this set. The shade will keep the sun from baking it and also me. The shade will roll up when I want my views, even thought I can see through it, or I can roll it down to protect my patio.

I like cold beer as everyone else does, even though it’s fake beer (non-alcohol), but I guess I got my frig a bit too cold.

I found this can sitting in the bottom of our casita refrigerator after it tied turning itself inside out knocking it off the shelf. Now that’s cold.

No one left

Well we are alone again. All our neighbors have left and we are the only ones left on the block.

I still say they left too early. The weather is the best right now.

Yesterday we headed out on the lake

with some friends and even the lake was empty. Well, it was Thursday. It can get pretty crazy out there on the weekends.

Wind wind wind

It’s been downright windy here the last couple of days. We are getting a bit tired of it and it doesn’t look like it will let up soon. Oh Well, I guess it could be worse as I look at the weather across the nation.

I had quite a scare in the stock market the other day. I have a good chunk of money invested in the market and as I watched the other day the market took its worst plunge ever.

I kept thinking, don’t panic, we are in it for the long run and it will come back. Turns out that it came back as fast as it plunged. Although it was still at a great loss, it could have been worse. The scary thing is no one knows what happened. There is a lot of speculation but nothing definite yet. Today was a good day as the market saw it’s biggest jump since 2005 but still has a ways to go before it pays back everything it took last week.

The resort here in Havasu is about a mile from the Havasu Airport where a number of small planes fly in and out everyday. There is no official rule but they are not supposed to fly over the resort on their approach or takeoffs. Sometimes, however, It appears they are going to land right here in the resort. We all say it’s a matter of time before one does just that. Well the other day I was sitting outside when I heard a plane go over that sounded like it was having a problem. Shortly after I heard a BOOM! I wondered what it was but didn’t give it another thought until I started hearing sirens. I took a look around to see if I could tell where the sirens were headed when I spotted a cloud of black smoke rising from the airport. Sure enough the plane I heard crashed at the airport, flipped over, and burst into flames. Fortunately the student pilot made it out with only minor injuries.

Sure is thinning out here at the resort. Most have headed out for the summer, a bit early in my opinion. We are going to head on over to California next month to pickup the grandson for a summer of travels. He is pretty excited about that.

Dodged a bullet

Sometimes you have to spend a little money to save a lot of money. Today I did just that. We have a very limited calling plan on our phone and have been able to live within those limitations for a long time. But things in life change and so did our calling habits. We have been receiving and making a lot of calls outside of the Verizon network during this last billing period and have greatly exceeded our allowed minutes. I was looking at an additional $400+ this month over and above our usual bill. So what I did was bumped up to the next plan, which not only gives us twice the minutes but also allows us to add 5 out of network numbers to call without using our minutes. Now the reason I dodged the bullet is because during the change over I was given the option to start this new plan beginning with the present billing period. So the additional minutes are now covered. So for only an additional $20 a month I saved over $400 in just this month.

Crazy day

Today was a mess…Weather wise that is. We were supposed to have some guests visit us and stay for a week here at the resort but they emailed me and said they would wait a day or more for the wind to subside. Wise move since today was a mixed bag of weather. Last night the wind blew so hard I was wondering if we were going to have a tornado or something. The motorhome was shaking and rocking quite a bit. It blew in to the morning until about 8:00a when suddenly it stopped, the clouds went away and it started to warm up. Then as suddenly as the nice weather came it went away. The wind roared again and even a few raindrops fell.


These photos were when it was sunny here but raining off in the distance. This went on most of the day. It made for kind of a useless day. I did get the refrigerator defrosted though. It’s not supposed to get any better for the next couple of days.

Fun weekend

It all started Thursday with the run over to Laughlin Nevada for the River Run Bike Rally. I wrote about that in the last post. This weekend was also the 5th annual Desert Storm Boat Race on Lake Havasu.

Friday morning I want down to the channel for the boat parade. I ran out of space on my camera’s memory card. There were so many boats I couldn’t get them all. I was there for about 4 hours and decided I had seen enough…for the day. I knew I would be back before the weekend was over. I was right, because Friday night we got a call from a friend inviting us for a day on their boat to watch the time trials from the water. Getting up and personal, as close as they let us, was a thrill. Some of these guys were blowing past us at over 170 mph, top speed was 175 mph done by a 50-foot Mystic Catamaran. THAT’S FAST ON THE WATER. Each boat/team had to pass a technical inspection, which consists of checking for approved helmets, life jackets, safety shut off switch and every person on board had to pass a breathalyzer test. Later we took a ride down the lake and back. There were SO MANY boats on the lake. Some of them were going past us like we were going backwards. I posted pictures, check them out. After Thursdays rainy weather, the rest of the weekend was fantastic with temps pushing into the 90s.

Bike Run

This weekend is the 28th annual Laughlin River Bike Run. Lots of nice bikes and this thing they call the Hoss Fly.

Yeah, pretty much a V-8 engine with a seat. Unfortunately it was quite a disappointment though. Between the economy and the increased police presents, the attendance was really down. The increase police presents is due to the shootout a few years back between the Hells Angels and the Mongols. The weather was cool and it was a bit drizzly. This actually made it a nice day since last year was in the 90s. Check out the pictures in the left column.

This is also the weekend of the Desert Storm Boat Race here in Havasu, where over 170 of the hottest and biggest performance boats are in town. We will have to go check it out.

Boat day

As I was standing in my drive yesterday, a neighbor drove up and asked,” want to go boating today?” Well duh! Remember the picture of the snake in the water a few posts back?

We spotted one yesterday while out on the lake. It wasn’t a rattler though. The last couple of days have been great as far as weather goes. A lot of the snowbirds have gone home and are missing out on all the good weather. This morning it was a bit cooler and cloudy so I took advantage of it and washed the motorhome. That’s a big job. Someday I will get up enough energy to wax it. Yeah right, I have been saying that for a long time now. By noon the sun came out and turn out to be a really nice day.

Back in Havasu

We arrived back in Havasu this morning at about 11:00a. We got lucky heading to and from Phoenix since the wind was at our back in both directions. The winds were pretty strong but didn’t bother us much. The weekend was fun with lots of racing action. Susan was happy even though her driver didn’t win. It is always nice to visit with our daughter and her husband and their dog Reese. I have uploaded our Phoenix NASCAR photos to our photo site. You can see them by clicking on the thumbnail in the column at the left.

We made it

We made it over to Goodyear Arizona today. It was a good drive. Seems every time we plan to go somewhere the wind comes up. Fortunately most of the wind was at our back today so it wasn’t too bad. Today was prep day. Susan was busy baking a bunch of goodies for the weekend and I did… well, nothing. Tomorrow we will head on over to the track to spend some time with out daughter.

Today was also a test day. I pulled the ABS fuse to disable the Anti Brake System in the motorhome before the trip. Everything was back to normal, No strange braking. Next step is to remove the ABS sensors, clean them, put the fuse back in, and road test it again. Un fortunately the next road test might be a while since I can’t just jump in and taker her for a ride.

All ready

We are all ready to head on out of here tomorrow. It will take us 3 hours to travel over to Goodyear Arizona where we will park the motorhome. The RV Park we are staying in is about 13 miles from the track so it’s about a 20 minute drive. We have infield passes so we can drive right into the infield where our daughter’s motorhome is. The wind has come up around here as usual. It’s supposed to be windy tomorrow also but not as bad as today. Hopefully we will get out of here before it get too bad. I hate driving in the wind.

The drive tomorrow is going to also be a test. Since the last time I had my brakes worked on they have been doing some real strange things. I have been told it might be due to the Anti Lock Brake system so I pulled the ABS fuse to disable the system. If the problem goes away I will know for sure it is the ABS that is causing the problem. We will see tomorrow.

Getting read to roll

Tomorrow we will be getting ready to roll on over to Phoenix for the NASCAR race. We will be leaving here on Wednesday morning. Susan can’t wait. Since we are only going for the weekend we won’t have too much to prepare for. I am not even going to put anything away here at the resort.

Snakes in the water

No I did not take this photo. It is a photo that came out in the local paper here at Lake Havasu. Yes it is a rattlesnake that someone spotted in the lake. It is a rare site but does happen. It is that time of year that the snakes start showing up. This time of year they are heading for the streets to warm up. Once it gets hot around here they will be hiding under the creosote bushes to keep cool. Fortunately we haven’t come across one of these guys yet.

Classic cars

You really need to click on these photos to get the full effect.

One thing Havasu has plenty of is classis and custom cars. I heard someone say we have the most classic and custom cars per capita in the US. Today I went to one of the many car shows here every year. There were no shortage of classics, custom and some of the strangest looking cars I have seen.

This is not a pile of junk found in a junkyard. It is a functional truck.

On the other hand, this is the best thing I have seen in quite a while. It is made by a company in California. It is built on a Corvette chassis and is a combination of (from front to back) a 57, 58, and 59 Chevy. It's called a 789 for obvious reasons. Check it out here http://www.n2amotors.com/. It is really something you have to see in person. Very nicely done. I talked to the owner and he said it is a pleasure to drive.

This custom job has a homemade V16.Actually it is 2 V8s mounted in line. No that is not a mirror on the firewall, it’s the second engine tucked up under the dash.

And there are 8 exhaust headers under each door. He said with 2 distributors he has it timed to where each cylinder fires 45 degrees apart. First one cylinder on the front engine then one on the back engine and another on the front and so on. No 2 cylinders fire at the same time. Last year I was at a show where he brought his dual inline V6 car. In that one he uses a 12 cylinder distributor from a Jag V12.

I missed it

I missed the walk today. Every Thursday here at the resort they have a hike somewhere in the area. I wrote in the last post about the trip to the Stagecoach Trails Guest Ranch. Today they headed up to the mountains near Kingman. I have been through there before in a car but would have liked to go on the walk today. This is the last walk until after the summer.

So much to do

We have been busy here in Havasu the last couple of days. Monday a bunch of us at the resort piled into 15 vehicles and headed on into the desert for the Stagecoach Trails Guest Ranch in Yucca Arizona.

We had to travel off the main highways on dirt roads for what seemed forever to get there. We stopped along the way for some hiking and photos of the desert scenery. Check out our photos by clicking on the thumbnail in the left column. Cool Place!

Today we loaded up 5 boats for a day on the lake. We headed for the far south end of the lake where we stopped for lunch then motored around the bend to view the Blue Herons.

After that we explored the lake a bit including the famed Copper Canyon and the London Bridge Channel. Spring break is just beginning and there are already lots of partiers on the lake.

My new boat

Yeah I wish! As I said to my friend, “I would like to take a ride in this thing…it would scare the hell out of me, but I would like to go.” If you look carefully, you can spot me standing next to it.

This was one of the Hot Boats at the 19th Annual Boat Show at Lake Havasu State Park.

These boats are too wide to travel down the streets so they have to use these special trailers with hydraulic tilt to haul them. And at 44 feet long, 12 feet wide, and two 1,250 hp motors on board, you aren’t going to haul this with your average family pickup. A lot of the big manufacturers were at the show which is not unusual as a lot of them are right here in Lake Havasu City.

Tuesday is the official start of Spring Break here at the lake and the weather is shaping up for it. It went from the 60s last week to the 80s this week. We are supposed to go out boating Thursday, hope it’s not too crazy out on the lake.

Humming bird rescue

Today I was sitting outside the motorhome and I saw something out the corner of my eye. It was a humming bird struggling to fly.



I scooped him up and now he was my responsibility. I can’t just watch him suffer. Well I was in luck. I caught the curiosity of my neighbor and soon there were more neighbor around. Apparently one has some experience with this situation because she brought out an eyedropper and started feeding the little guy. Soon he was warm and feed and looking a lot better. Looking too young to be on his own we called the Humane Society and they agreed to take him. They said to call in a day or so and they will give us an update. Maybe we can get him back after he is well and he will be our resort hummingbird.

Rain again

Man it seems like we have been getting a lot of rain this season. It’s raining again today. The good thing is the desert is going to look fabulous this spring. Lots of rain always brings out the desert flowers. It’s already looking green. We noticed the green when we were coming over the hill from the north coming into Havasu from our NASCAR trip in Las Vegas.

Zonie

I am officially a Zonie. That’s what we used to call people from Arizona that would show up in California during the summer. When I say I am a Zonie, I mean I went to the Arizona Motor Vehicles Department and got my Arizona drivers license. Since we own an RV lot in Arizona and are severing our ties with California I decided to get an Arizona license. What a simple process. I simply filled out the short form, handed them $10, stood on the line for a photo and the machine spit out my license. That’s it, no driving test, no written test, no eye test, no questions asked.

Nice drive

We are back in Lake Havasu City. We left Las Vegas this morning about 8:30a and had a good drive. No rain and little wind. Our time in Vegas was great. The weather was sun, rain, wind, and cold but we didn’t let it get us down. We were with friends and family so we had a great time. Pictures will be posted soon.

At the track

We took the long 12 mile trip over to the track this morning. We are staying in one of the parking lots outside the track for the race where we will be on generator power for the weekend. Our daughter has an infield site and we are going to be spending the days with them. We were suppose to head to the track yesterday but Christina couldn’t make it here until today. We were supposed to have dinner inside the track with them tonight but they got a late start and didn’t make it in time for dinner. No problem, we will have dinner at our motorhome and head on into the track tomorrow morning.

Sin city

We are in Las Vegas Nevada today. We were expecting bad weather but we got up this morning and the weather looked good. It didn’t take long though before we were in some bad weather. Going up the Cajon Pass we ran into a lot of wind and a little rain. At least it wasn’t fog like the last time we made this trip.

The cool thing is we drove right under a rainbow. The rest of the drive was OK except for the wind. We had wind the whole way. It was fun trying to keep this thing on the road.

Mountain Pass had lots of snow.

It’s kind of neat seeing cactus with snow on it. But we arrived safe and sound in Las Vegas about 1:00p where we will stay until after the NASCAR race this weekend. I will post some NASCAR pictures of the California race soon.

Hauler hunt

We went on a hauler hunt this afternoon. There are a couple of High End hotels around the Ontario Mills Mall and some of the hauler drivers stay there and park the haulers in the Mall parking lot.



This year all we could find is the Jack Roush Racing haulers. Landen still got a kick out of them though.

Let’s go racing

This morning we moved from Vista to Ontario. We will be here until Monday for the NASCAR race in Fontana. The drive was great with little traffic…for this area at least. We actually aren’t going over to the track until Thursday morning but we usually make sure we get here by at least Tuesday so we are pretty much guaranteed a spot, another advantage of being fulltime.

The votes are in

The poll I posted a few days ago about background music has confirmed my suspicions. No one like the background music. It’s kind of ironic that I added the music since I keep my own speakers turned off because I hate background music myself. I have removed the music so you can turn your speakers back on. Thanks for the votes.

Can I come in

I looked out the window today to check out the rain and saw this guy looking back in at me.

It’s as if he was saying, “Can I come in?” Of course I didn’t let him in. The weather was up and down today. The sun would come out and I would head outside. Then the sun would duck behind a rain cloud and it would get cold so I would head back in. Then the rain would fall. Then the whole process would start over again. Tomorrow is supposed to be pretty much the same. I sure hope this weather gets over with this rain by next week. We are heading up to Ontario California on Tuesday to get ready for the NASCAR race in Fontana.

What’s that

If you want some cool stuff to look at you need to check out this place. Go to the buttons at the bottom of the page and check out the Surface Orbiter

and the Hydrocar

Some people just have too much time on their hands and too much money to burn. It makes good viewing for us that don’t though.

Just hanging out

We are just hanging out waiting for the rain. They keep calling for rain here but everyday they put it off. Susan’s mother is doing better. She is home and Susan and her sister are taking good care of her. While Susan is off to her mothers, I have been pitching in here at the Elks lodge fixing plumbing, electrical, bathroom remodeling and doing some general cleanup. There is plenty to do around here, that’s for sure. We will hang out here until it’s time to head off to the NASCAR race in Fontana California. Susan can’t wait!

I haven’t heard anything back from Webshots about the possible virus so it looks like I won’t be using their site to post our photos anymore. As soon as I get more photos to post (most likely NASCAR) I will be looking for another site to host them for you all to view.

Oh No Virus

I was alerted that I may have a virus on the website. I checked everything out and found that the virus appears to be on the site that I store my photos on. These are the photos that the Thumbnails in the left column link to so I removed the links for now. Fortunately when I clicked on one of the links, my virus scanner alerted me of the virus and quarantined it from my system. I have notified Webshots (the photo site) and am waiting to see if they respond. If they do find a problem and correct it I will bring back the links. Otherwise I will use another photo site.

Unexpected move

We are now in Vista California. This was an unplanned trip and was decided just last night. Susan’s mother is going in for surgery tomorrow and Susan wanted to be with her. Since our house has wheels I said, “Let’s go.” We had a good drive here with perfect weather. The rains stopped and the sun came out. Along the way we saw plenty of evidence of the storm. Lots of highway signs were blown down and we saw a blown over Big Rig that they were trying to upright. We also past through an area that was flooded. Fortunately the water had subsided away from the road when we went through.

There is also plenty of snow in the mountains. Tomorrow is supposed to be even nicer but more rain is coming next week.

Lots of water

We had lots of rain and it it’s over yet. I know some of you are thinking this is no big deal, you’ve seen worse. Well this is unusual for Lake Havasu City in the middle of the Arizona desert. The wash as I mentioned in the last post did not fill up. There was water in it from the rain falling but no runoff. My neighbor took a drive through town yesterday and said some of the washes in town had lots of water in them and some roads were closed as the water made it’s way from the hills to the lake. There was a tornado reported in Blythe about 90 miles south of us that turned over 3 trucks and uprooted a few power polls.

Our golf course here at the resort has a new water hazard in it and our path has turned into a small river. We are supposed to get a reprieve from the rain this weekend but there is more coming next week. So far we are cozy and dry inside the motorhome.

All hunkered down

We are hunkered down awaiting the big one. We have been having rain off and on since Monday. So far it hasn’t been too bad but a lot for Havasu this time of year. The weather is supposed to take a turn for the worst about 8:00p this evening. They are calling for lots of rain, wind and even thunder for about 24 hours. We have a wash for water runoff that runs through the middle of the resort. I have never seen any water in the wash in the 4 years I have been coming here but might this time. We shall see…

Another repair

Our Convection/Microwave oven has been giving us fits for a couple of years now. The convection fan has been on the outs and I have been able to revive it through out the years. One reason I have been procrastinating is because I could see no way to get to the fan to replace it. I have scoured the Internet with no help. I even emailed GE and asked how to go about this. Of course they didn’t respond. Well I decided I need to do something so I ordered the part. $44.00 later I had the part in hand. Today I got the nerve to tackle the job. I got part way through and gave up and put everything back together. After pondering over it I couldn’t let this thing get me so I tore into it again.

It took dismantling 11 assemblies and removing a number of panels to finally access the fan.

I carefully noted all the screws and where they go for reassembly. Well it looks like all went well.

The new fan is in and the oven is back together and mounted in its place. Susan even cooked dinner in it tonight and all came out well.

4 wheel fun

Full of dirt

Stop and re-group

Which way from here

A little air adjustment

We took off about 9:00 this morning and didn’t return until 3:00 in the afternoon. What a fun day. There were 3 Razors, a quad, and a dirt bike. Eight of us in all. I never realized how many trails there are in the hills above Havasu. We covered about 36 miles today and haven’t even covered a fraction of them. Can’t wait till the next time.

Bees

Seem the bees are out in full force but the flowers aren’t. Therefore the bees have taken to artificial means for their nectar. As in artificial flowers or better yet humming bird feeders.

It is amazing how fast these little critters can suck a feeder dry. I think it only took 4 days to drain a half-quart of fluid from my feeder. Today I chased away the few bees that were sipping the last drops from my feeder so I can refill it. After refilling the feeder those little buggers were on it before I even got it hung back up. The poor little humming birds have to fight for a flower to get their share.

With the weather so cold in most of the country, I am glad we are in the Southwest right now. The weather has been great here.

Drip Drip

The pressure relief valve on my water heater has leaked since the motorhome was new. I finally added an expansion tank a few years back that cured the drip drip. However lately it started dripping again. Following the instructions in the manual, I tried re-establishing the air pocket at the top of the tank by turning off the water supply, opening a faucet, opening the relief valve until the water stops flowing, closeing everything up and turning the water back on. The only thing this accomplished was making it drip worse. I opened the valve and let it flush for a while, no help. I opened the valve and let it snap shut a few times, no help. I tapped on the valve, no help. It was time for a replacement valve.
Well I went ahead and replaced the valve today. It went a lot easier than I thought. The hardest part was finding a replacement at a reasonable price. One place wanted $30, I got one for $15 which is still robbery since they are only $9 at the hardware stores. The hardware stores just didn’t have the right model. The old one came out easy and there was enough clearance around the door latch to get the old one out and the new one in. After cleaning all the white stuff (calcium/lime) from around the hole and wrapping Teflon tape around the threads the new one went in just as easy as the old one came out. No leaks and no more drip drip.

A new decade

Well we have officially entered into a new decade, 2010. I hope everyone made the journey OK. We did. The last decade was good to us. We had good jobs and paid off the house in the first half, then sold the house for a BIG profit and started our fulltime journey in the second half. It’s hard to believe we have been fulltime for ½ decade and still love it. So far our investments have kept up with our spending even through this tough economy. We have always come out with a positive balance in our portfolio at the end of the year. Granted we spent a lot of money this year building our casita but I conceder that as an investment rather than an expense.
Havasu tried a new thing this year for New Years. They closed off most of down town and charged everyone (adults only) $15 to $20 to party in the streets, one drink included. There were 3 bands spread out through the town. As far as I know it was successful. I say, As far as I know, because we did not participate.

Instead we stayed close to home and went to a New Years party here at the resort. It was a lot of fun. We didn’t have to fight crowds, or brave the cold. The music was good, good friends, and good food and drink. Today was a typical New Years day. We did absolutely nothing. After a morning walk I sat on the patio all day and watched TV. Susan did the same after doing some laundry. The rest of our friends played golf in the morning then went to the Clubhouse to watch the game.

Well I hope this coming year will be a good one for everyone.

Back in Havasu

We are back at our RV lot at the Havasu RV Resort. We left this morning about 8:00a California time. There was no rain but we didn’t see much sun the whole trip. Funny thing, the desert is supposed to be a hot place. The further we got into the desert the colder it got. The weather is supposed to be cool here in Havasu for a while.

Well is it or isn’t it

Being we are leaving Monday, at least that’s the plan, I have been keeping an eye on the weather forecast. Earlier all the weather sites I check said rain Sunday into Monday. Then they shifted to Monday into Tuesday. Now some are showing only 20% chance of rain Monday into Tuesday and some are showing No Rain Monday or Tuesday. It looks like, even if it does rain, it won’t be much and we should be out of it by the time we get to Palm Springs. I believe we are leaving Monday as scheduled.

I hope Christmas was good for all of you. It was good for us. We are looking forward to a new year. Hopefully our expenses in 2010 will be due to travel instead of repairs and maintenance like in 2009.

Oh No more rain

If you remember, when we traveled from Havasu to here in Vista we were concerned about rain. Fortunately he rain stopped the morning we hit the road. Well now I look at the weather report for the day we head back to Havasu and it says rain. Hopefully we will get a break like last time. If not we will wait a day for it to clear.