We decided to leave early this year as we both felt somewhat depressed with the world in general, and needed a change.
We planned to revert to our earlier travel strategy, and simply go a few hours each day and stop wherever we were at that time. Alas, forecasted snow in parts of the planned route re-routed us down I-5 in the early parts.
As usual, we got rained on before we got out of town, and for most of the second day. Highlight of that day was the fellow straddling the bridge rail over I-5 in Oregon, directly over our lane. Lots of cars pulled off or changed lanes quickly to get out of that lane, but we were so focused on them that we didn’t see the guy until we were virtually under him. He didn’t jump, and we never heard if he ever did. Could have been a bad scene, for sure.
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Many of the RV parks (including Elks lodge RV parking) were unmanned. Park yourself and find a place to pay. Many homeless folks in tents under overpasses and other places along the freeway in Washington and Oregon.
Arrived in California to 80 degree weather - probably to be expected in mid-October. We camped and ate tacos at the Redding California Elks RV Park. Got a thrill watching some folks summoning their Tesla from the parking lot with a hand remote. It came to them by itself --- nobody inside! Oh, my --- guess we didn’t know they could do that!
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On the way home last spring, we joined an organization called “Harvest Host”, wherein wineries, golf courses, museums and others allow you to camp overnight for free, and hope that you buy something at their restaurant , tasting room or gift shop. In Roseville, CA, we stayed at a very nice golf course. Our contribution was to have an early dinner of wonderful tri-tip sandwiches, and eat them outside watching three fellows practicing 70 or 80 foot putts on the (very big) putting green. They were pretty good. (Both the sandwiches and the putters.)
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| Turkey Tee Time Coming Up - gobble gobble |
As usual, something on the RV broke as we went along. In this case, it was the automatic step. Dean could see no way to repair it, and other owners on the internet said you just had to replace the motor, so we ordered one too be delivered to the Indio Elks. It was there when we got there, and it solved the problem. Dean later took the old one apart and discovered what he said was a dumb-ass way of building it, and predicts that the new one will fail in time for the same reason. Guess we gotta order a spare.
As we got into AZ, we began to remember why we don’t come south this early. Too hot! Even the natives were complaining that temps in the high 90’s were unusual this late in the year. Kinda kept us close to the air-conditioned RV and car. (Life is tough sometimes).
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| Beautiful lake from our campsite at Rio Bend RV |
We arrived in Tucson and stayed at the Catalina State Park. They had had “several” rain events that led to the road into the park being closed several times, with much evidence around the park of high water.
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| Mountains from our campsite |
Our time in Tucson we were able to visit Laurie’s sister, Irene, and her husband, Richard, who moved there from Florida last year.
We spent three days visiting.
We all visited the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum.
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| There are even frogs in the desert - their cage was decorated for Halloween |
Dean and Richard went to the Pima Air museum and aircraft boneyard. 
Irene sings professionally and the week we were there she had a singing engagement at a memory-care facility. She planned the songs to spark their memories with songs they would remember from their youth. They did and they sang along. So good to see.
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Then north to Mesa, and our favorite county park, Usery Mountain, where we are spending six weeks feeding bird seed and peanuts to the lovebirds and squirrels and touring around to get re-oriented to the local area. That’s necessary because new housing developments --- by the hundreds --- spring up every year. It’s been that way since the first time we came here 20 years ago or more. Sheesh!
Pass Mountain from our campsite
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| PHOENIX sign - <-- Thataway |
And guess what? More global warming. For the whole month of November, the temperature in the Phoenix area was 10-15 degrees over their normal November average of 76.
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| Beautiful sunsets |
The birds, squirrels, and bunnies were very happy that we had 4 bowls of water out.
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| This squirrel we named "mama" - she had been beat up pretty good Her tail had a V in it and her left hip had a big scar She always got extra peanuts |
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| He was hot too - he stayed in the shade |
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| He is indicating that he's not appreciative of me following GET LOST! |
We love watching birds. And the green, red, orange, and blue peach-faced lovebirds are a special thrill. Here the lovebirds are hitting the feeder and knocking the seed they don't like to the ground and the quail and doves are thankful!
Green lovebirds atop the pole -
throwing seed over the side for the quail and doves
Do enjoy this park.
