The Beginning of summer? (04/20/25)

 

Paul and had already decided to head to Massachusetts this summer- our son is there, and we still have lots of friends and my family there. We don't drive all the way back very often anymore, but I sometimes fly on my own.

So, it was time for a longer visit.

With all that in mind we decided to leave for the summer on April 3rd. That's a full two months before we usually leave Arizona.

We made the most of our time with Liz and Randy before leaving,  getting in one boating day and a couple of pool days.

Just before we left, we went out to dinner to celebrate 75 years of marriage. 25 years for us, and an impressive 50 years for them.

Paul also finished one of his projects that he was working on in his spare time- a stained glass window for the trailer. It came out awesome.

I sorta promised Paul that we would stop and see new things along the way to MA,  and not make a beeline for the coast. By leaving early, we will have plenty of time to explore. We also needed to be in Green Valley, AZ for a week in April to pick out flooring, cabinets, granite etc for the new house.

While we were there we took a drive up into nearby Mt. Wrightson wilderness in the Coronado National Forest. This area is on the migratory path of an  incredible amount of birds, including hummingbirds.

I saw two New to Me varieties of hummingbirds-

The Rivoli Hummingbird

and the Broad Billed.

I didn’t get to spend too much time looking because Paul couldn’t find a spot to park the dually so he dropped me off at the visitor center. I can’t wait till we live here and can spend more time bird watching.

Of course, I put up my feeders as well, and in addition to hummingbirds, we were visited by Hooded Orioles, both the male (pictured) and the female.

Leaving Green Valley, after a short visit with friends in Sierra Vista, AZ,  we landed  just outside Las Cruces New Mexico. The nearby Organ Mountains- Desert Peaks National Monument has some hiking we were interested in. We drove up to the Dripping Springs (note to self, it is barely dripping) area and did two hikes. The first was 3 miles, to Boyd.

The story behind this building is that Dr. Boyd agreed to rent this area from the owner at the time, Eugene Van Patten, for $25 a year, but shortly thereafter, refused to pay, and refused to leave. Van Patten sued him, but in the course of the court battle it was discovered that Van Patten had described the area incorrectly, so his homestead patent was actually for a different area. He got it straightened out, and was still owed all the rent from Boyd, but trying to collect it  for 13 years forced him into bankruptcy and he ended up selling the area to Boyd for a dollar.  Very Strange.

The other hike we did was a 1 mile hike to La Cuerva, the Cave, which is really just a rock shelter. Apparently I deleted all my pictures of it, oh well, I guess that tells the story of how interesting it was.

Next up on our journey was Mayhill New Mexico, which is near Cloudcroft. This is one of those spots we like to stop for a day or two to do some exploring and hiking. The Lincoln National Forest has a lot of hiking trails, but with only one day, we chose the 3 mile loop, Little Apache Trail. I really enjoyed the smells of the forest.

Of course we also stopped several places to watch the wild horses.

Our final visit with friends for this leg of our journey was in Abilene Texas where we spent a few days with friends Wil and Gayle. While showing them pictures of our house project on the big screen, Gayle became our own version of Vanna White…

After a couple of days and lots of camaraderie, it was time to move on from Texas to Oklahoma.

Moving East (09-20-22)

 Once we were done Jeeping in Colorado, we headed east.

We had a specific destination in mind- New Orleans.  We have been there several times and didn’t necessarily need to go back, but I had a reason.  

I am a diehard New England Patriots football fan, but also a diehard Tom Brady fan, and (Tom) The Tampa Bay Buccaneers were playing the New Orleans Saints on a day we could get there, so we bought tickets and headed in that direction.

 

Our first stop was a repeat visit to our friends Tom and Dianne, on our way out of Colorado.  I was so excited about the fresh veggies from their garden that they were willing to share, that I didn’t get any pictures of Tom and Dianne.  Oh well…we will be back.

Leaving them, it was Labor Day weekend and we snagged a spot at Santa Rosa State Park in New Mexico. We were surprised there was availability at this park on Labor Day weekend, but when we got there and realized the nearby lake is at 7% capacity, we understood why. Instead of swimming, we headed to “The Blue Hole”. 

This is a very small lake- 80 ft in diameter at the surface, and 80 ft deep-its one of the most popular scuba diving destinations in the U.S.  It is a natural artesian well, fed by a spring, with the water cycling out every 6 hours.The water was stunningly beautiful but at 60 degrees I didn’t feel like plunging in,  so we observed for a while and then left to explore the rest of the town.

Our next stop on our way to Louisiana was at our friends’ house in Abilene TX.  Wil is a fraternity brother of Paul’s and we stop and see them whenever we are nearby.  After a terrific dinner our first night, we left them for the day so they could work, and headed to Frontier Texas, a local museum showcasing what the Texas frontier was like, back in the day.

I thought it was interesting that this area was a frontier more than once. Very early on, native Americans peacefully lived in this area, until the Comanche Indians, who had the advantage of access to horses, and the expert ability to ride them, invaded the area and took it over.

It wasn’t long before businessmen from the east discovered that Buffalo hides were valuable and hunted them almost to extinction.  From 40 million strong the buffalo numbers were decimated and they came close to extinction.

The museum had some interesting holographic images of people who told their personal story, that made the history lesson more interesting.

After leaving Wil and Gayle, we spent one night on the road before arriving at Betty’s RV Park in Abbeville LA, for a week.  We have been here once before and I have to say- Betty’s is a unique experience.  Unfortunately for us, this time around, Betty was on vacation, so not there, and in fact, we were the only guests in the RV Park.  Betty did call us twice to make sure we were having a good time. Her friend Brenda filled in for her,and we had a great time getting to know her, and her dog, Hitch.

After a month of being busy in Colorado, we were ready for some “down” time and found it difficult to get moving every morning. We did manage to do a few things in the week we were in Abbeville, but not many-

The most important thing we wanted to do is head to Buck and Johnny’s for a rip-roaring Zydeco breakfast.  The music was awesome, but the service was terrible –so slow that we never got a chance to dance before they closed.  Next time, we will be the first ones in the door.

Our other major outing was to Rip Van Winkle gardens.  This property was originally the home of Joseph Jefferson, who, it is said, played the role of Rip Van Winkle over 5000 times (in the early 1800s), so its no surprise that the gardens are named Rip Van Winkle Gardens.

The property was eventually sold to John Bayless, who soon sold the salt mine beneath the land and lake (to Diamond Crystal), and built a new, expensive home along the banks of the lake.  In 1980 a Texaco drilling rig, located on the lake, pierced the caverns of the salt mine, flooding the entire mine. The resulting vortex swallowed the entire lake, 65 acres of land, 5 barges, 2 drilling rigs, and Bayless’s brand new house.  All that remains of the house is the chimney. Remarkably, no one died.

Paul had heard the story of the vortex, so it was pretty neat to be here and see where it happened, first hand.  When I did a web search, pictures and videos showed up of the actual disaster, but there were no clear pictures worth sharing (google Lake Peigneur disaster). 

The gardens themselves were ok, and included the original house,  but it was clear that we were past peak growing season here.

Pretty much the only other thing we did all week was go out to dinner at a restaurant that had live music.  I had the most relaxing time that I have had in a long time at a restaurant. I told the waitress we were not in a rush and she paced the meal perfectly.

I laughed at the menu, because on one side of it, there was literally nothing I was willing to eat.

But after a beer or two, I did try alligator bites, and determined that they tasted “like chicken”.

There was a one man band, playing music I enjoyed, so the whole night was a “win”.

And then we arrived in New Orleans.

As soon as we bought our tickets to the “Saints” game, we booked an RV park.  It’s only one mile from the Superdome, and we have stayed there before, so we were happy to be walking distance from both the superdome, and Bourbon Street.

We have surprisingly discovered that we are over Bourbon Street, but we did walk to a restaurant on St. Peter’s street called The Gumbo Shop- we both had Jambalaya that was delicious. 

We met several people at the RV park who were also there for the game (mostly Saints fans) and we were happy to hear that they planned to walk to the game as well. Even still, we did a test walk the day before, just to make sure.  It took us 18 minutes to get to the stadium.

I knew this was probably (hopefully?  he needs to retire) the last time I would see Tom Brady play, so we paid to get decent seats.

To our surprise, a “hockey” style fight broke out during the game.  Although not physically involved, I could see from the sidelines, that TB12 was definitely part of the fracas.  

The team, and Brady, didn’t play their best, but they ended with a win, which is mostly what counts, so I was happy.

I promised the couple in this picture that I would share the photo on my blog…..Although they were the ONLY ones standing, and several people behind them had asked them to sit down, they refused, continuing to block everyone’s view.

As far as our trek eastward, the term “in for a penny, in for a pound” came to mind. Our good friends Mike and Julie are spending the summer in North Carolina, a “mere” 800 mile drive from New Orleans, so, yep, we decided to beeline there to spend a week with them before heading back west. 

The Journey Eastward (05-29-21)

 We travel to Massachusetts quite often, which can stress out the driver, if we are trying to get there fast. It’s a Lot of miles. So, this time we built in a few extra days, so we could slow down and smell the roses. We didn’t Stop to smell them, because we didn’t want to take THAT long to get to Boston.

Planning our route took some time. The RV park in MA had availability the day AFTER Memorial Day. That meant we had to be on the road for Memorial Day weekend. Most RV parks and campgrounds have a 3 day minimum and book waaaaay in advance for that weekend. So, we looked for Elks lodges (some have RV parking) and Casinos along the way (most allow overnight RV parking)to have options. 

We also joined Harvest Hosts, a membership group that offers overnight stays at breweries, farms, museums and wineries. I am not sure we will use it, but most of our RV friends are aware that there are record numbers of RVers traveling this summer, and supposedly most places are already booked. We shall see, but it doesn’t hurt to have more options.

Our first stop along the way was in El Paso for a few days to see Paul's mom. It’s been very hard, during Covid, to spend any time with her, so now that we could, we spent 4 days taking care of paperwork, and visiting with her.

You realize how big the state of Texas is when you need to drive across it, so we broke up the journey with another stop, this time to see friends Wil and Gayle. It’s always fun to spend time with them, and it helps that their driveway is big enough for our rig! After two nights we said goodbye and continued on our way.

Our next two day stop along the way was Alabama, Fort Payne AL, to be exact. 

Every once in a while you come across a gem...this area, and specifically Desoto State park, was one of those. The park has awesome campgrounds, complete with cable and WIFI, hiking trails, waterfalls, a swimming pool, and lots of attractions in the area. We could have easily spent a week here.

The first thing we discovered is that Fort Payne is home to Alabama.....that is, the band Alabama. We realized it when we passed by life size bronze statues of the band members. There is also a museum, but we didn’t have time for it this trip.

With only one day to explore, we hit the ground running. We took a short hike to Laurel Falls, which is an unimpressive trickle right now. From there we drove to Desoto Falls, which was much more impressive.

In the 1920s, a self taught engineer, Arthur Miller, built a hydroelectric dam at Desoto Falls, which generated electricity for the nearby towns. There was a limited supply, however, so power was available from sunset until midnight. A few years later, enough women had bought electric irons that the decision was made to also “turn on” the electricity on Thursday afternoons, so the women could iron.

Beneath the falls there is a small lake, suitable for swimming.

Desoto State Park sits atop Lookout Mountain, which travels north towards Chattanooga TN. We headed in that direction to visit Ruby Falls, a 145 ft waterfall, 26 stories underground. We bought our tickets online, and our small group was taken down an elevator, into the cave. Once there, we saw the usual cave decorations, stalagmites and stalactites etc.

 After a 15 minute walk we arrived in a “room” where the dramatic music and light show showcased Ruby Falls. Pausing long enough for everyone to get their fill of pictures, we turned around and headed back. The return trip was much faster. The pathway is so narrow that when one group passes another, the group heading back has the right of way, and the other group has to pull off to the side and wait.

Riding in the elevator, we did some quick calculations. There was one more attraction we wanted to see- Rock City. Their website was unclear as to what time they close, so we just started driving there, figuring we had nothing to lose. Unfortunately, there was a detour due to a closed road, so it took us longer than expected, but no worries, we got in 5 minutes before they closed the entry gates.

We spent a pleasant hour wandering around this place. 

There were all kinds of narrow cavelike paths, gardens, gazebos, swinging bridges, huge boulders, waterfalls, and a patio from which you can see 7 states( Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia). 

As an add on, the original owners added a children’s cave experience which featured figurines from nursery rhymes. No surprise, Paul didn’t know many of them, but I did.

Both nights at this campground we were treated to a live concert from the people in the site next door. A few campers pulled up chairs to listen and enjoy the music. I did that the first night, but it’s bluegrass, not our favorite, so one night was enough.