Heading Home

Well, we're getting there.  We stayed in Amarillo, Texas, then last night we stayed in Tulsa, Oklahoma.  Tonight we're in Stanton, Missouri, about 60 miles (96 km) from St. Louis.

At one of our fuel stops along the way, I saw this truck.  I can't believe it's still on the road!  Still hogging gas (kinda like our truck hauling the RV).

We pass through some interesting town names, but I think I could live here.



We expect to be home probably on Monday, later in the day.  Then we'll have the RV to deal with after that.  A little earlier than expected, but we're ready.

Carlsbad, New Mexico

We left Deming, NM, continuing our eastward trek.  We stopped at a rest stop and didn't realize it was THIS rest stop.  I've seen this roadrunner 2-3 times while driving by.



Once we got to El Paso, we cut off the I-10 to head east to Carlsbad.  It's pretty desolate country out here.  This is part of the Guadalupe Mountains, and in front of it is a lake...well, it was a lake, or maybe is a lake sometimes.  Not today though.  It did show a blue lake on our GPS.

We arrived at our RV site around 1:30.  We keep flirting with time zones because we crossed to the Central zone while driving in Texas.  But then when we crossed back into New Mexico where Carlsbad is, they're on Mountain time.  Just the way the roads work, we drove through a piece of Texas to get here.

Anyway, we enjoyed the afternoon here until the winds came up.  So Monday afternoon was quite windy, but yesterday afternoon was crazy windy again.

Yesterday was our day to visit the Carlsbad Caverns.  The name has been in my head since I was a kid.  My dad used to get National Geographic magazine back in the 1960s, and I would browse through them (probably 8-12 years old).  One of the cover stories was about the Carlsbad Caverns.  Anyway, we're here!  The caverns are in the Guadalupe range.

Gerard is standing in the amphitheatre they use at dusk when the bats come flying out of the cave.  And of course the cave entrance is in the background.  We went in through there.

Unfortunately, this is the wrong time of year.  The bats come out looking for insects, and the insects aren't really buzzing around just yet.  It's too early in the year.  So they don't start doing that until April.  It would be a neat thing to see though.

This is the side of the hill, and the cavern entrance is just below.

There are 2 ways you can go in - walk in through the natural entrance (which we did) or take the elevator down.  The elevator goes down 754 feet (about 250 m).

It was difficult to get decent pictures down here unless I had my tripod along (which I didn't).  But I got a few.  This was a giant column (stalagmite).

This is an old rope ladder still here from the 1920s/1930s when the Carlsbad Caverns were first opened to the public.  There are a couple of remnants left here to show people what others used to go through to explore the caves.  Yikes.

This was on another column.  Rather pretty looking.

A small alcove of smaller stalactites.

All in all, it was a great experience to go through these caverns.  The place is absolutely huge, and there's so much more to them not available to the public.  National Geographic people are doing more research down further.  Definitely the largest we've been through, and we've been through quite a lot.  I wouldn't say it was the most beautiful, but certainly worth the side trip.  Very cool.

When we were done at the caverns, we went into town to grab a few things and fill up with gas.

Today we're really heading out to find our way home.  We're on the road and heading to Amarillo, Texas, for the night.  That's at the I-40, so we'll take it east for a while until we get to Oklahoma City, then we'll take I-44 northeast as far as St. Louis and then northeast to Indianapolis.  We think we're heading over to I-75 from there because there are no RV places open this time of year in Michigan, that we've found.  But we know of one open on I-75 in Ohio.  Anyway, we haven't booked anything beyond Amarillo at this point.

We're ready to be home.

Superstition

Superstition Mountain.  That's what they call this mountain just east of Apache Junction.  So we had to go over there and check it out.

There are many trails to choose from.  We did the Hieroglyph Trail into a canyon of the mountain.  It wasn't a difficult trail, but it was all uphill on the way in, of course.  This is looking up into the canyon.

I'm loving the variety of plant life here.  Everything from the big Saguaro Cactus to the spindly ones (like we saw in Borrego Springs).  This one's flowering - beautiful.

And another flowering cactus.

I can take this little critter, in terms of the fauna.  He crawled out of a crack in the rock.

Here are the petroglyphs at the end of the trail.

There's water running in steps down from the mountain.  This is a view looking out from the mountain, above one of the pools.  Beautiful day.

All in all, we like this area.  We might just come back here next year for a while.  We're far enough away from Phoenix that it is less busy, but Phoenix is close enough if we want to go in there.  Hmm.  Maybe.

We went out for dinner to the Handlebar Bar & Grill, not far from our RV park.  These taps are all over the ceiling.  It's not a big place, but it was busy, and a 2-piece band had started up while we were there too.  It was Saturday night.

We left Apache Junction and headed down Hwy. 60 to catch the I-10.  They said it was a scenic route, and a good chunk of it was.  We had to go through a mountain pass.  Nice scenery.

And a tunnel we went through.

 

We arrived in Deming, New Mexico, around 3:15 pm and we're on MDT.  Arizona does not change to daylight savings time, so we lost an hour when we crossed into New Mexico.

Our plan from here is to go to Carlsbad, NM, today.

Bye Bye California

We packed up Thursday and Friday morning, preparing to leave Caliente Springs, starting our trek home.  It's amazing.  I worried about the little hummingbird all week, wondering if she would ever fly - maybe her wing was damaged, or something.  Gerard took Tibby out yesterday morning and noticed the bird was still there.  When we were finishing up with the trailer to leave, I took a look and she was GONE!  Hallelujah!  And she wasn't on the ground either (I checked).  Something about that - she left the same day we left.  Hmmm.

It was about 2 hours to the Arizona state line (the Colorado River).  We stopped at an associated RV park (associated with Caliente Springs) right on the Colorado River to check it out for a possibility next year.  Some nice spots on the river.  The park is OK, so we'll see.

We carried on to Apache Junction, east of Phoenix.  Traffic was a bit of an issue around Phoenix, but we made it here (Sunrise RV Resort) around 4:15 pm.  This is another one we're considering for next year.  The park is beautiful.  Lots to do within the resort itself.

My cousins, who stay in Mesa for the winter, were not available for drinks.  One left on Monday, and the other one was leaving today.  They had dinner plans with friends for their last night.  If we had been here earlier in the day, it would have worked (darn Phoenix traffic).  In any case, we oriented ourselves with the park a bit.

They have lots of rabbits running around.  Here's one.

Nice little park area, within the RV park, to walk through.  

So today we'll get out and see the area a bit.

The Days Are Counting Down

Since Saturday, we've been out for dinner in Palm Springs, been out geocaching 3-4 times around the desert, been biking, had visits with our neighbours, and making plans for our trip home.  And we spent some time at the pool.  We thought we should go in the middle of the day at least once.  Not bad.  This photo doesn't do justice.  You can't even see the pool.  Those are hot tubs in the foreground (4 of them, I believe).  Each one gets hotter as you go toward the clubhouse.  The pool has 3 main areas and the warmest one is closest to the clubhouse too.

This is looking down on the street from our balcony table in Palm Springs.  We spent a bit of time there Sunday afternoon/evening.

So we pretty much know which direction we're going home.  Gerard has been doing most of the work planning that.  And we're meeting up with one of my cousins again on Friday evening as we're heading back toward Phoenix for our first couple of nights while scouting out places for part of next year.

And of course, we've been watching our hummingbird baby.  Here he/she is.  She's pretty much full-grown - but so little.  Remember this nest is only about 5 cm across (outside).  I had been a little worried about it as it didn't seem to be moving its wings much at all...until this afternoon.  I finally saw some activity.  It's been over a week since its brother/sister left the nest.  Funny how they're so different in their development.

We've had some pretty good winds again the last couple of days, but the little bird hangs on.  The mother doesn't hang out with it any more as it doesn't need to be kept warm...but she does continue to feed it.

Next blog will probably be from Arizona!

Different Things going on

Here I thought I was staying on top of the blog, but I guess not!  I can't believe it's been 5 days since the last one!

Tuesday was a chores day.  Went into town to get some groceries, did cleaning, and prepared for hosting a street happy hour at 3:30.  Last Friday I had a brainwave, so we printed off and delivered a bunch of flyers inviting everyone on our street and the one behind us to a happy hour get-together at our place.  Some people were leaving, but enough were still around.  We weren't sure if 2 people would show up, or 42 (we were hoping not that many).  As you can see from the picture below, we had about 25-30 people, which was great!



It was another hot day, and our site is such that the RV provides some shade in the latter part of the afternoon.  As many people said, we wish we had done it sooner.  It's nice to get to know some people around us a little bit.  The last people left around 2 hours later.  Perfect!

Wednesday we decided to do something to get out of the heat for a while.  So we took another drive up to Idyllwild.  The 2 photos below are from that drive.

It's about a mile high and about 20 degrees F cooler.  It was so nice to sit outside in the sunshine and have lunch.  We were going to do a hike up there, but we had Tibby with us, thinking it would be cool enough in the truck.  But the sun was shining full strength and heated the inside up too much.  And he couldn't walk the distance we wanted to hike, so we did a little, then went back.

There's still a bit of snow up there, but only where it was piled up.  They got dumped on the same day it poured rain here (the last day John & Judy were here).



Thursday, we ran around looking for some stuff in Palm Springs, one of which was that Canadian flag.  No luck...yet.  I also had my hair done in town.  I got it cut last week, but it needed more attention.  Wow, I wish I had that hair dresser back home.  I loved the job she did.  Wish you all could have seen it - and I never thought to take a picture!

Thursday night we had a St. Patrick's day celebration in the hall.  Corned beef supper, and some shortbread cookies for dessert.

They had a guy with a ukulele singing a bunch of Irish tunes.  Fun time.

Yesterday morning we went geocaching not far from here.  After about 2 hours of traipsing around in the desert, we were absolutely exhausted.  We should have started 2 hours earlier as the heat is overwhelming.

We're keeping an eye on our hummingbirds.  We think this little guy has flown the nest.  We were looking and looking yesterday, and could only see one bird.  We were rather worried about them, but the day before, this one was flapping his wings...like a hummingbird.  He hadn't lifted off yet, but I guess it doesn't take long once they start doing that.  So the one that was left I guess was a little behind in development and was not flapping his wings at all.  The mother bird was still feeding him.  So I'll let you know what I find out, and how long he stays.

That brings us up to today.  We decided last night we were going to do the 2 flags trail.  It leaves from behind our RV park.  You can see our park here from one of the hills we had climbed.

The elevation gain was about 355 metres, so that's quite a bit of climbing to get there.  I told you we have looked and looked for a Canadian flag to replace the one that was up here.  Well, we finally found it.  On top of the hill!   Someone else had replaced it (glad I didn't spend $26 U.S. on a flag).  If we come back here next year, we'll bring a flag along.

Here you can see we made it to the top.

Glorious flags with San Jacinto in the background.  Kinda like climbing Mt. Everest ;)

Our selfie.

That took us about 2-1/2 hours with stops along the way, and a bit of a detour.  The cactus flowers are just starting to bloom.  Beautiful.

We are down to our last 6 days here at Caliente Springs, then we'll start making our way east.

Dates?

I didn't mention in my previous blog, we went out for dinner Saturday night into Palm Springs (date?).  Although it's hot during the day, when the sun is behind the mountains, it's absolutely gorgeous to be outside.

Here we are on a sidewalk patio.  Gerard and his giant Margarita (who believes that).

And here I am with Sonny Bono.  Sorry Sonny's a little dark.  It was night time.  Remember he was the mayor of Palm Springs at one time before his tragic ski accident.

We had a terrific dinner out.  We haven't done that much lately, since John & Judy left.

So yesterday, we just hung out and didn't do much of anything at all.  It was too hot.  Having said that, I did make up a batch of lasagna, split it up, and froze it to be eaten on 3 other nights as well.

In the evening we went to the pools and hot tubs.  A lot of people enjoy them during the day, but I find when the water is warm, and the air is warm, it's not so refreshing.  My personal opinion.

So today we thought we should get out and DO something.  So we went to the Shields Date Farm in Indio (just a few minutes down the road).  I've kind of avoided going there because I am not a fan of dates.  Or at least I wasn't.

They have been established here since the 1920s.  It takes a long time to cultivate a date tree to the point of bearing fruit.  This is a male tree.  They take the pods filled with pollen and shake them on the female pods so they produce fruit.  A real trick to the business, I guess.

They have a garden area to walk through.  Very nice.

Here are some dates ripening and hanging.

Moi in the garden area.

So you can eat at their restaurant which is supposed to be rather nice.  We didn't.  But Gerard got a date shake to take along.  I have to say, I was skeptical, but it was really good.  Kinda wish I had ordered one myself.  I even ate a date they had out for tasting and thought it wasn't too bad.  Hmmm.  I might have to rethink my childhood distaste for dates.

On the way home, this is what our vehicle thermometer showed.

And for you Celsius people.

Yeah, kinda warm.  Here's an example of another flower blooming in the desert.  All the flowers are in full bloom, and the cactus flowers are in the process of starting to bloom.

The hummingbird nest is starting to get a little crowded.

Heard from Heather this morning.  She and Sam flew into San Francisco to celebrate their 40th birthdays.  Great way to do it in a beautiful city.  Enjoy!

And David is now back in Ontario today after his 4-5 month stint in Australia and short visits to New Zealand and Hawaii on the way home.  They must have met each other in the air!