So Long Salome

100! Not a perfect score, but the temperature! Several days in a row, has convinced us that it is time to head north. We’ve had a great time here at Centennial Park / Greasewood Golf Course, first alone and then the last 10 days with John and Bill! We have hiked the desert, done car trips to Alamo Lake, Wickenburg, Lake Havasu, and Parker. That’s about all that is around here and those are all about an hour or more away. But stunning, air conditioned, and socially distant!

We discovered, a little too late that Joanette’s first cousin Kathy from Lewiston, Idaho spends her winters just down the road at Wagon West. We were in touch but not able to see each other, due to covid-19 quarantining (no visitors allowed at their park) and both being over 60 decided it will wait until next year. We are pretty sure we will come back down here. The climate is great, the scenery beautiful, and perhaps our kids from the north will come down and spend a few days with us when their weather starts to make them rust or shiver (depending on whether it’s the ones in Western Washington or the ones in Montana!!!). If not, John and Bill are just three hours away!

Sunday morning, April 26th, we all got on our bikes. Keith went with John and Bill on a 10.65 mile ride!!! So excited for him. Joanette stayed behind, divided up some meat for the freezer, vacuumed and then went for her first bike ride in quite a while. Had to practice and make sure of her stability since her leg has been giving her troubles. She tells us that the leg doesn’t hurt as bad riding as it does walking, so perhaps it is getting better! We will start riding our bikes way more frequently!

The plan is to head north through Nevada. Another of Joanette’s cousins, Shelley lives near Fallon and if she is comfortable visiting we’d like to see her. Then we will head west to first Roseburg Oregon to visit the Veteran’s Cemetery there and the final resting place of our friend, Scott Hall, who suffered from ALS so valiantly and passed away a few months ago. On to Eugene to see Scott’s daughter and family, have a couple of windows replaced at Coach Glass near Coburg where we stayed last August!. The windshield that was replaced in Phoenix is part of the same insurance claim to replace the side window, but they only do side windows in Coburg, Oregon, or we would have to wait for quite a while for measuring, ordering, delivering to Phoenix and it’s too hot to wait. We opted to go back to Eugene (and cooler Pacific Northwest weather! A stop in Junction City, Oregon to check out a possible new couch for Coach! And then……. We’ll let Covid protocol determine that! In the mean time, a few pictures from our last few weeks!

This was a photo op in the little town of Hope. We didn’t stay at Ramblin’ Roads RV Resort, although it was very nice, we just stopped to take pictures!

So we left Salome, Arizona, the morning of Monday, April 27 and headed north through Wickenburg for cheap diesel ($2.17/gallon) and on toward Kingman, AZ where we had planned ahead to stay the night at Desert Diamond Distillery (a Harvest Host location). Desert Diamond Distillery is a craft distillery specializing in rums, whiskey and vodka. We did make a purchase there (hard times for these types of businesses during this pandemic, and we were able to stay for free so we tried to do our part for the economy) but the purchase was a gift, so we can’t elaborate!!

We left the next morning headed for our next destination, Caliente, Nevada and a free BLM campground.

We enjoyed the drive through the saguaro forests and then the Joshua tree forests and finally into the canyon lands as we neared Hoover Dam. Although very desolate, the desert offers tons of stunning scenery!

ON TO NEVADA! But that is another post!