City of Angels and Bill Williams (08-19-15)

We’ve taken two trips in the last week.  The first one was up to Williams again, to escape the heat for the weekend. It’s so nice to sit outside and watch the wildlife, and maybe have a fire.  This particular campsite was near a prairie dog colony.

I also love that the temperatures are perfect- in the 50s at night-so we don’t need hook up to sleep comfortably.  That makes it easy to stay in the national forests, and pay nothing for our campsites.

One of our goals was to do some hiking.  Our first hike was along the Historic Overland Road.  It’s hard to believe that the Civil War reached all the way out here but Arizona was a route to California, and both sides wanted it.  Soon after the Union won it, gold was discovered in Prescott, and the Overland Road was built to access it.

Our second hike was more intimidating-the peak of Bill Williams Mountain, which turned out to be 9 miles round trip, and 2500 feet of elevation gain.  Although it is cooler than Havasu here, it was still in the 80s, making this a challenging day!

We finished off the trip with a stroll through downtown Williams.  They sure decorate their town different than most towns.  This is a gift shop/museum.  There are classic cars all throughout the town, which takes good advantage of its place on historic Route 66.




There are quite a few sets of these types of signs along Rte 66, and they are fun to read:

Our second trip of the week was to Los Angeles to act as moving van for our daughter.

It was a whirlwind two days of using the truck to move her and Kellan into their new apartment. I am glad she was able to retain her sense of humor with all the stress of moving. 

     
Having an F450 is both a blessing and a curse.  Its large size is helpful when you need to move something, but a detriment in a city like Los Angeles, where a 4 door car is considered large. The narrow driveway into the new apartment complex parking lot was nerve-wracking, and not quite wide enough for us.  Luckily the hedges were soft.  We only attempted it once.

Parking is a nightmare for a truck and in fact we had to park several blocks away, and shuttle her belongings to her apartment using her car.

Once the move was complete, the building of some new bureaus took up our time.

  Some helped more than others….

After a crazy two days, Paul and I booked it back to Havasu.  It’s really nice only being four and a half hours from Jess!

House Update

We actually have a front door now!  Well, at least part of a door.

The window won’t be placed until later.

The inside is now full of electrical outlets and plumbing.

And the Lathers are working on wrapping the house before putting on the stucco.

It is totally closed in now- no more walking through walls!  It’s also getting dark inside!  

The latest advancement is the placement of the roof tiles on the roof.  They will stay like this until the exterior stucco is finished, so that the stucco color won’t splatter onto the roof.  At least we’re getting watertight!

House Update and Other Stuff (08-03-15)

First of all, I must say, I really enjoy the weekends when we can escape to Flagstaff and cool off.  In fact, it was so cool in the Flagstaff area last weekend (50s at night!) that we had a campfire!

It was also the weekend of the Blue Moon, but skies weren’t clear enough for us to really see it.

Although we only had a short time, we made the trip in part because my cousin Linda (seated near Paul) invited us to a party at a friend’s house. While we relaxed, we listened to two live bands playing in the house. What a great time!

Back in Havasu, the projects continued.  We did our first Test Tow, towing the Jeep with the truck- I am happy to say that the “way too much money”  we spent on the tow bar worked- the Jeep towed just fine.

The big excitement for us was our first small monsoon.  When we saw it coming on the radar, we headed up to the house.  The roads were already streaming with water.

The wash that runs behind our house had some water in it, but nothing outrageous.

Unfortunately when we got back to the trailer we realized that we did not get through the storm unscathed.  The wind had unwound our awning and partially torn it off the side of the rig. We’ll have to figure out the best way to get it replaced.




And apparently the wind was gusting enough to make one of the Waterford wine glasses wiggle off the wine rack and land on the floor.

 I was just glad Dozer hadn’t stepped on the broken glass before we saw it.

House Update

  Things are moving right along on the house.  During this part, its’ easy to see the progress.
The framers have been working hard on the outside, finishing the plywood for the roof and the walls.

The RV garage is looking quite massive!

Once the basic structure was finished, they started working on things like the patio, and the windows were put in place.

  On the inside, the frame for the island has been built….

 

As soon as the framers were done, the HVAC and plumbers entered the picture.

We now have one tub.  They’ll spend the few days or so roughing in the air conditioning and the plumbing, and then the electricians will  join in the game.

While they’ve been busy working inside, we’ve been meeting with pool contractors and fencing companies. In order to give them a sense of where we want the pool, we used a ski rope and garden hose to lay it out in the back yard.  The enhancements and  text “bubbles” are a sure sign that I have too much time on my hands, haha.

Kaibab National Forest (06-07-15)

Kaibab National Forest, in the Flagstaff area of Arizona, also sits at an elevation of about 6500-7500 feet, and when we arrived, it was a brisk 54*- quite a bit cooler than the 93* in Havasu. The section of forest we headed towards is the Bill Williams area, near the historic town of Williams, AZ. If we had more time we would be blowing through Williams and driving just a little further- Williams is a major jumping off point for The Grand Canyon.  Some other time.




  The route we chose to get there took us along parts of historic Route 66, and through the town of Seligman.  We have fond memories of this town- we stopped here with the kids on our vacation way back in 2002.

We actually ate with the kids, at this Snow Cap, where the owners are known for their sense of humor. 

Do you want ice in your drink?

I made the mistake of asking for a small cone. 

The signs on the building say things like “sorry, we’re open” and “ we serve cheeseburgers…with cheese”

My favorite (ok, not favorite, but strongest) memory of this place is the outhouse.  Back in 2002 I asked if they had  a ladies room and I was directed to the Outhouse- a fully functioning bathroom, set up as an outhouse. It wasn’t until afterwards that I realized that there is, indeed, a regular bathroom attached to the building.  Oh well, the kids thought it was funny.








Once we arrived in Williams, we stopped at the Forest Service Visitor Center to find out about local hiking and dispersed camping.  Dispersed camping is when you are (usually) alone, and not in a campground.  It’s usually either free or very low cost.


  We got some intel on some good spots, and headed out to the forest to find a place to park.

Paul immediately went on the hunt for firewood, but as it turns out, it was too chilly and too windy, to have a fire that first night.

We were moving pretty slow the next day, but we had already decided which trail we were going to hike.



  There is an 11 mile trail called the Sycamore Canyon Rim Trail. At this elevation we had no intentions of attempting the whole trail, so we started at the most interesting point, and walked till we didn’t feel like walking anymore.









The first point of interest was the Pomeroy Tanks.  These are natural reservoirs that provide water to the local wildlife.














Next up was Sycamore Falls.  Unfortunately there is no water falling right now.  We did get to watch some kids zip line across the chasm.

Further down the way, we watched some people do some rock climbing, and about that time we thought we had hiked enough and turned around.

The closest thing to wildlife that we saw was a HUGE flock of sheep being herded by both a shepherd and a dog.  The dog blended in quite nicely with the sheep.












  The following day we hiked another….um…..uninspiring….section of trail, and found another pretty neat place to spend the night.












As we sat around the fire looking at the sky, we started wondering what we were looking at, so it was time to get out the smart phone Apps that are so amazing, all you have to do is hold it up to the sky and it shows you what is up there.












After three nights in the National Forest, we headed into Williams for the night so we could recharge the batteries and empty the tanks..
Of course, we were hungry, so we stopped at the Grand Canyon Brewery, where we ate outside while listening to some really good live music.







It is really different traveling with absolutely no destination in mind except someplace cool.  Soon enough we were ready to move on……