Ashland, Oregon

We have had a busy few days having stopped in Torrance, CA to visit Lee's Mom and then up to Sacramento for a quick visit to Millie's brother, Bob, and long time family friend, Mommer. We are now on the road back home.

It was "very interesting" driving around in the LA, Long Beach and Sacramento traffic in this bus. Nobody died so it must have turned out okay, but the experience was not one that we would recommend to anyone.

We plan on being home sometime on Wednesday. Anyone who wants to help wash this beast is welcome to stop by.

Joshua Tree National Park

Part of the beauty of this park is the unique rock formations that seem to just grow out of the desert landscape. Actually, they are part of an ancient volcanic flow that has erroded away all but these huge bolders that lay around the desert floor.

...and here is the Park namesake - the Joshua Tree.

Again, we did not have the proper hiking shoes to take advantage of the many trails so we just made a quick drive through this park on our way to see Lee's Mom in Torrance. We are arriving over the holiday weekend and we are having a problem finding a place to camp the RV so our visit will be shorter than planned. Then we head north toward home.

Arizona Connections

On our way to visit friends in Phoenix we made a quick stop at the newest National Park in the system - Saquaro National Park - named after the Saquaro cactus. This is the largest cactus in North America and can grow to a heigth of 50 feet. There are over 500 different varieties of cactus in this park which is located just outside Tucson.

We made a quick trip to a RV repair place in Tucson to have the converter replaced - we knew it was bad before we bought it but couldn't find a place to get it fixed on the back roads we were taking in Oklahoma and Texas.

We spent two full days in Phoenix visiting with several friends who have moved out of the northwest and into the sunny, warm and less expensive Phoenix area. Our first stop was to see Rogar & Karen Warren who let us park in their front yard and watch the sunset over the western mountains from their back patio.

The next morning we were at Dean & Bev Bass's beautiful home. Bev worked with Lee at Potelco and just recently retired.

Rick & Linda Gray (Linda is a high school friend of Millie's) have live in this area longer than anyone else we know and they love it. They met us at a parking lot so we wouldn't have to commute around in the RV. We had a wonderful lunch and saw some sights around Surprise.

Next on the list was Jim and Dawn Vorass (Dawn & Millie go back a hundred years). They showed us around their new community of Trilogy. It is one of the newer planned developments outside Phoenix and is just beautiful. We toured some model homes and got jealous. We also saw these coyotes wondering around the gold course.

It was wonderful to see all our friends so happy with their lives in their beautiful neighborhoods. Every one of you deserve the good fortune and happiness that you are now enjoying.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park - New Mexico

This was an amazing sight. We took the trail down through the natural entrance to he caverns and then spent the next 5 hours 800 feet below ground looking at some fantastic natural structures.

The caverns were once part of a tropical ocean reef made from billions of shells that had calcified. As the ocean receded the combination of water and oil deposits trapped in the reef created sulfuric acid which ate away at the interior of the reef structure thereby creating the huge caverns.

The "decorations" within the caverns were created by individual drips of surface water finding their way into the cavern and depositing minute particles of calcium over thousands of years.

Naturally, there since this is a cave, there is a very large bat colony that roost inside.

After leaving Carlsbad we drove into Las Cruces, NM and had a quick visit with one of Lee's co-workers from Potelco. Barry & Sylvia Hendrickson retired about a year ago and bought their retirement home in Las Cruces. We had a great visit and enjoyed their beautiful home with wonderful desert view.

Guadalupe National Park - Texas

On our way to Carlsbad Caverns we ran into another National Park just down the road. Guadalupe National Park is pretty small as parks go but is filled with caves, rock walls and lots of back country trails.

Since we arrived with only limited gear we could only walk around some of the easier trails and take a few pictures of the wildlife.

Tomorrow we will spend the day at Carlsbad Caverns and then keep heading west.

Big Bend National Park - Texas

Big Bend National Park is a huge park that has very few visitors due to its remote location. We stayed about 100 miles north of the park at Davis Mountain State park and had a beautiful site with deer right outside our door.

The vistas at Big Bend are amazing. We took a short hike out to an overlook to see the Rio Grande river and look into Mexico. The river is really low right now and the border patrol is having a heck of a time with drug smugglers using the park to bring drugs into the US.

On the road in Texas

Well, we are out of the cold weather and have hit the heat. We arrived here in San Angelo, TX with the temperature reading 87. The motorhome has kept us nice and comfortable through the changing weather. We are getting used to its size and are finding it pretty easy to get around in with a little pre-planning.

This is how a "Nordstrom's Girl" goes camping

...and here is Lee with his ever present computer.

After getting out of the snow we headed for McAlester OK to visit Millie's childhood friend, Kathy, husband Mike and family.
We "camped" in their yard and had a wonderful visit as well as a tour of the McAlester area. It is a beautiful place with lots to see and do. We will be back.

Then on to Lewisville, TX to see Millie' Aunt Vye who she has not see in about 25 years. We were honored that the many cousins and grand cousins in the area came over to eat pizza and visit with us. We managed to get the motor home up onto Vye's driveway with not much room to spare.

Tomorrow we off to Big Bend National Park. We have just heard about a beer drinking goat in Casthlon, TX right on the Mexican border that we will have to find. Stay tuned......