Back in Arizona

Hope every one had a great Thanksgiving, but for now we wish you all a wonderful Christmas season!

It’s been a little longer than usual since our last posting, but I hope to get back in the swing of things to keep you all updated on what we are up to.

Since my last post, we have accomplished lots of things, but are now back in Arizona preparing to fly back to Salem, Oregon to spend Christmas with our kids, grandkids, and great grandkids.

We left Arizona last June 5, which was later than our normal departure.  Temperature was 97 when we left AZ, but while in Laughlin Nevada, it hit 105.  We stayed in Laughlin till the 10th of June and spent all of our time geocaching.....even made it over to Oatman, AZ for some touristy stuff and more caching.

After we left Laughlin, we stopped in Rachel, Nevada.  This quaint little town is right in the middle of the Extraterrestrial Highway, and is well known for a lot of eerie sightings along with some late night fly overs.  Our reason to stop there was to go off roading and caching.  We spent three nights dry camping next to the Little A'Le' Inn and had some fun trips off road.  One day, we made it a very tricky road to high in the mountains where a Phantom Jet crashed.  There was a cache there, so we had fun finding it and viewing what was left of the jet.  The views from the top of the mountain were amazing.

We left Rachel on the 13th of June and made it to Hawthorne, Nevada where we spent five nights.  We were hoping to visit some friends while in the area, but they had already left, so we spent our time there caching and taking in the sights.  We took one full day and drove up the back way into Yosemite (over Tioga Pass).  Normally when we come through Hawthorne, the road over Tioga Pass into Yosemite is still closed because of snow, but this year being later, they had it open.  We had a wonderful day in the park, but the highlight was going to Glacier Point and looking down on Half Dome.  We could see many hikers climbing the dome, but we were just as happy to view it from afar....that climb up looked very treacherous!

Our next stop was Reno/Sparks, Nevada for 3 nights.  We always stop here while on our way home in order to visit relatives and spend some quality time with Ken's aunt and uncle.  We had a wonderful time with them and our cousins.  Little did we know that this visit would be our last with Ken's uncle Francis.  Shortly after we left Reno, he suffered a heart attack and was placed in a care facility for rehab and healing.  However, he slowly declined and passed away in October.   We feel so blessed that we were able to have such a wonderful visit with him in June.

The whole time we were in Reno, the temps were in the 80s which was wonderful after being in triple digits for so long.  Once leaving Reno/Sparks, we spent one night on the road, then made it into Prineville, Oregon and parked the coach at the Crook County RV Park.  It was sunny and 80 when we got to the park, but that afternoon, after leaving the coach in Prineville, we drove the Grand Cherokee home in Salem to pick up camping supplies.   From Sisters all the way to Salem, it did nothing but rain, we even hit some snow up on the summit, but back to rain all the way into Salem (it was 64 in Salem).  We quickly loaded what we needed into the Cherokee, then spent the night (the 22nd) in Salem.  The next morning, we fueled up and headed back to Prineville.  Thankfully, on the east side of the mountains, there was no rain and temperature was back to 65.  Once back in Prineville, we drove Jeep down to the river and found one site not in use and quickly put our names on the tag and set up a couple tents to hold it until we could move the coach there.

We moved the coach to our site on June 25 and dry camped till July 7.  We were  joined by our best friends, Rod & Lynda and another couple Darryl & Kathy.  We all had a great time doing a whole lot of nothing but eating, visiting, and some hiking.  Temperatures ranged all the way from high 50s to low 70s but we had a fun time enjoying what sun we did get and the campfire with our friends.


When we got home on July 7, our lazy days were over.  We spent time cleaning coach and getting stuff resettled in house.  Once that was done, we spent the next couple months working on house:  First, we replaced the front door.  Second, we replaced the back sliding door, then Ken stripped the old popcorn ceiling stuff off and re-textured the ceiling with a "paint on" type of texture.  Things were looking really nice, but we soon decided the living room and dining room needed repainting......All of this work was done up to the time we were scheduled to take off to Alaska for our annual fishing trip.  However, before we did go to AK, we decided to replace the huge living room window.  We ended up ordering a new window and scheduled it to be installed after our Alaska trip.

Our Alaska trip was Sept 4-12.  We drove to SeaTac on the 3rd, spent the night, then flew to Yakutat on the 4th.  Had cold wet weather most of the time fishing, but we successfully caught our limit each day.  One day, while cleaning our fish on a small rocky island, we spotted a sick & dying Octopus.  We ended up pulling it further up on land and left it along with our fish remains for a couple beautiful Bald Eagles that were watching us from the nearby tree tops.  Those Eagles, and some other birds, had quite a feast after we left.  After fishing only 6 days this year, we ended up with 3 full boxes of Salmon Filets, plus some in a 4th box.....about 175 lbs worth.  The fish we got this year were much bigger than what we caught last year.  We caught less fish, but they weighed out more (yay).  We did look into buying some Halibut Filets, but they wanted over $800 for 50lbs, so we passed on that.

Once back in Salem we continued working on the house and had the front window installed.  Things were looking really good, but we had to quit and leave the rest of the work (mostly trim work) until the summer when we get back from our winter in Arizona.

We scheduled our yearly coach service/maintenance for Oct 17.  We go to Cummins' in Coburg, Oregon for all our work which usually takes a half day to complete.  This time, they found an oil leak in motor, so had to replace a seal which took much longer than expected.  We had reservations for camping in Newport (17-22) and were antsy that it would be dark when we got there, but actually lucked out and made Newport's South Beach State Park at 6:20 pm and got into our site just before dark (whew).  The next day was a gorgeous 72 degree day.  Ken & I took a very long walk on the beach, then later that day Rod & Lynda pulled into their site.  That was our last nice day for the whole weekend.  Even though it was cold, wet, and windy, we had fun spending our time going out eating, shopping, and best of all just visiting.

The next week was a rush to get the coach ready for our trip south to AZ.  We left on Oct 29 and made it to the small town of Likely, CA where we pulled into the fire station's parking lot for the night.  The next day, we made it to Reno/Sparks, Nevada.  Since we weren't towing the Grand Cherokee, we rented a small car so we could drive out and visit our aunt and cousins.  Our uncle had just passed away on Oct 24, but since we couldn't make the funeral, we wanted to spend some quality time with our aunt.  We did have a sad, but nice visit with her before spending a quiet evening with our cousins.

We headed south on Nov 1 and ended up staying the night at a very small RV park south of Beatty, Nevada.  We were back on the road early the 2nd and pulled into our site in Queen Valley, Arizona around 4:45 pm.  The next few days were spent cleaning the coach and getting everything settled.  Our first gathering of residents was on Nov 5 for the first coffee of the season.  It's so nice being back in QV and seeing all of our old friends.  We love the 80-90 degree weather too!

Since our arrival in Queen Valley, AZ, we have gone on several Jeep rides with the Rough Rider group and have been eating out with many other friends in the area.  Right now, we are getting ready to fly back home to Salem to spend Christmas with our family.  When Christmas is over, we will load up our Grand Cherokee and drive it back to Queen Valley.

For now that should catch everyone up on what has been happening, and I do hope to keep this up better in the future.