HAVE YOU EVER BEEN LEFT HOME ALONE & UNATTENDED??

A few more things into the rig today.  Seems each time I carry something out I end up re-arranging things I have already re-arranged every other time I have carried something out.  It is the way of Snow Birds.

  

OCOTILLO BLOOMS

Some years we have already been home by now.  But those were the earlier years when we had tired of being in the rig for months on end & just wanted to get on home, stretch out in our large overstuffed recliners with big TV & a decent stereo sound system playing endless ambient music.  Spend a couple days in the nice spacious hot shower & just wander from room to room going ‘WOW’ is it ever great to be home & have all this wonderful space to stretch out & live in again.  Fortunately we have this at both ends of the trip now & that sure makes traveling a whole lot nicer for us.  Now if we can just convince all the people back home to get outside with their hair dryers & tackle all those frozen snow banks around our 5 Seasons Park.

Dictionary defines the word ‘explanation’ as, ‘a statement or account that makes something clear.’  Sometimes in my rambling thoughts describing things or offering opinions I get myself off track.  It can be a bit confusing to a reader at times so when someone questions something I have said I generally always come back with what I hope is a clearer explanation about things.  And I don’t mind doing that.

High overhead this morning one of those daring young men in their flying machines must have got his foot a little heavy on the gas pedal & launched himself right through the sound barrier causing a double sonic boom that about blew our shorts off.  Wonder if his Commanding Officer will have a few words with him when he gets home.  Ya, ya, I know jets don’t have gas pedals.

VERY FIRST BEAVER TAIL CACTUS BLOOM ON OUR PROPERTY >>>

Have you ever been left alone & unattended with 37 freshly baked Oatmeal cookies left cooling on a kitchen countertop?  Nobody around, no security cameras anywhere, not even an alert doggy keeping a watchful eye.  Just you & 37 freshly baked warm Oatmeal Cookies.  Happened to me this morning when Kelly baked a batch then took Pheebs & headed off to the Library.  No……..you do not want to know the rest of the story.  Some things are just better left unsaid.

The battle of the Alamo raged on for over 13 days back in 1863 when hordes of Mexican troops savagely attacked the weary defenders.  A similar type of battle was just waged by Contessa & Colin in Mexico lasting long hours into the night.   Battle weary & exhausted they did manage to stem the tide, fend off, & kill countless numbers of their armed to the jaws assailants.   Check out ATTACKED!!

  

MAMA GILA WOODPECKER PEERS OUT OF HER SAGUARO NEST IN OUR FRONT YARD

Ever wonder about dreams? I am a lite sleeper so frequently wake up 3 or 4 times during the night. Not very restful but I do dream a lot & I figure the reason I remember them is simply due to the fact that I don't slip into that deep heavy sleep for the entire night. I have also learned that as I am waking up from a dream I can remember it better if I don't open my eyes. I liken it to opening the back of a 35mm camera with a roll of unexposed film in it. As soon as the light hits the film the images are erased. Same thing with the brain so if I'm coming out of a dream I resist the urge to open my eyes & look at the clock. Well, as long as it was a good dream that is. I try to go back into the dream sometimes but it usually begins to fade & I'm only able to retrieve bits & pieces most of it. I like my flying dreams best as I float over trees & people on the ground. I have never remembered a landing but my take off is always the same. I take about 4 quick steps forward & very carefully step up into the air & begin to float skyward. Sometimes I fly very fast but most times I just kind of move along slowly hovering over things here & there. And sometimes there are others in the air with me. Meeting old friends is another part of the dream process I enjoy. People from 50 & 60 years ago occasionally come to visit. No rhyme or reason but all of a sudden there they are & I'm talking to them. Could be someone I only met once or twice decades ago or it could be a current friend. People who seem to have the most impact & leave the longest lasting memories for me are the ones who have passed away. In any dream sequence a departed friend or relative may appear & it is always such a good feeling inside to once again see & talk with them.  But it doesn’t last.  They drift away into the mist & a sadness fills the void. It's those dreams that I try to hang onto as I'm waking up. I try to re-enter the dream & run after my old friend or family member to see them just one more time.  But they are gone until one day they choose to re-appear in my dreams to once more put a smile on my sleeping face.  And I like that………………………..

GROANER’S CORNER:((  Three elderly men are at the doctor's office for a memory test. The doctor asks the first man, "What is three times three?"
"274," came the reply.
The doctor rolls his eyes and looks up at the ceiling, and says to the second man, "It's your turn. What is three times three?"
"Tuesday," replies the second man.
The doctor shakes his head sadly, then asks the third man, "Okay, your turn. What's three times three?"
"Nine," says the third man.
"That's great!" says the doctor. "How did you get that?"
"Simple," he says, "just subtract 274 from Tuesday."

ANSWERING SOME QUESTIONS, A FEW EXPLANATIONS, & SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT

After a gusty wind & cloud shrouded cooler day Wednesday we woke up to clear blue sunny skies this morning with light winds from the North-West.  Always nice to step out in the early morn & see a sky full of shimmering stars.  Planet Venus & a crescent Moon were very prominent low in the South-east side by side.  The Moon and Venus rank as the brightest and second-brightest celestial bodies in the nighttime sky.

<<< PHOTO TAKEN FROM MY BEDROOM WINDOW OF THIS MORNINGS CRESCENT MOON & PLANET VENUS TO THE RIGHT

Took Pheebs big comfy bench bed out of the Jeep & replaced it with our rear seat this morning.  Also put the tow bar back on the Jeep & packed some stuff in behind the seats.  A few more things into the Winnie Wagon.  Packing up to go on a trip whether for a few days or a few months is always kind of a nice low key excitement for me.  Just the fact I know we are going somewhere puts an extra spring in my step.  Kinda like getting the maps out & plotting a route.  Fun stuff:))

Our cell phone mysteriously quit working Wednesday.  Kelly spent all morning with Skype calls here & there trying to find out the problem.  It seems Bell Telephone in Canada dropped their partnership with T-Mobile yesterday.  Our phone generally works off AT&T towers but here at our Congress house the only tower we accessed close by was T-Mobile.   So now our phone is dead in the water.  Kelly finally did find a solution but we will have to wait a couple days until another cell phone arrives from T-Mobile itself.  She sure spent a lot of time on Skype this morning getting all our phone stuff straightened out.  Only thing I managed to get straightened out today was me in my recliner.  This technical age for the most part is great but there always seems to be so many glitches along the way.

 

In Wednesday’s post I said the following:  “How unlike our other 6 years when we would spend the entire winter boondocking in our 33’ Class A Damon Challenger & got along just fine”.  A reader in our Shout Box checked me on that statement saying, “you spent a lot of years ranch sitting near Bisbee not boondocking”.  First, I should have worded my initial statement better.  Without going back & looking things up I’m guessing we Ranch sat in 09, 2010, 2011, & 2012.  Four years averaging maybe 2.5 months a season.  Rest of our time was spent boondocking from Fall of 07 to Spring of 2012.  Though technically not boondocking at the Ranch because we had electric & water does not take away from the fact we spent our entire RVing time from day one in the Fall of 2006 right up to the Spring of 2012 living in our rig while Snow Birding in the South-West.  And in Thursday’s post it was the smaller space in our Class C I was referring too.  I should have remembered, referred to, & separated our time at the Ranch as RV Park living & not full blown boondocking.    But for someone to say, “you spent a lot of years ranch sitting near Bisbee not boondocking” is partially incorrect as well.  Whether in an RV Park or Boondocking, a small space is a small space & that was the gist of my post.

Bob over at the THE CARETAKER CHRONICLES & Paul from R SANITY RV ADVENTURES in comments on my Wednesday post wondered whether that Winnebago Destination was really on a Peterbilt frame.  All’s I can say is it had the ‘Peterbuilt’ logo embedded on the front of the coach so from that I was assuming it’s a Peterbilt (truck) frame.  Also has the ‘Workhorse’ emblem as well so maybe it was somehow a combination of both.  Definitely a Chevy gas engine for sure.  To complicate things further the Destinations manual said UFO chassis.  So, confusion is the order of the day here about the chassis thing.  If the numbers had worked out in our favor this week we would probably have grabbed this coach.  We read & researched this type of Winnebago & as with any rig there were some issues but overall we found people who had these rear end Winnebago Destinations & Latitudes loved them.  Nowhere did we read, as some have suggested about the engine being too small for the coach etc.  And no, we do not have any plans whatsoever in buying a diesel coach……………….

Now, to clear up a few other comment things.  In deciding to go back to a Class A all’s we had to do was reverse our pros & cons about going from bigger to smaller to going from smaller to bigger.  People’s needs, circumstances, & priorities change.  Some folks go with change as it happens while others remain steadfast with where they are & what they have.  Kelly & I have always been of the belief if one has the desire & means to make changes then do so.  After all, that is how & why we ultimately arrived at the Snow Bird lifestyle.  It is precisely why we spend our winters where we do.  Had we not thought that way even years ago we would still just be sitting in our Bayfield house every winter forlornly looking out our frosted windows complaining profusely about the miserable cold & stormy weather outside like every other poor soul has had to do this winter.  Sitting in a house all winter in Canada or the Northern States to me makes no sense if, & I emphasize IF one has the financial means, are free of work commitments, & are currently in good enough health to head south into warmer healthier climates………..then why not.

We sold our Damon Class A Motorhome for several reasons last year.  It was 10 years old & we had it for 6 of those years.  It treated us very well in those 6 years but we didn’t want to wait until we got ourselves into an ongoing fix & repair cycle at some point as inevitably happens with aging vehicles.  I am not mechanically inclined & have no interest whatsoever in trying to fix this, that, or the other little thing.  I have zero interest in keeping any kind of a vehicle for 10, 20, or 30+ years unless it was some kind of antique hobby I enjoyed.  Give me the challenge & excitement of a newer & different vehicle any day as opposed to same old, same old, same old. 

Getting back to what I was originally talking about let me say that after buying our Congress house we very contentedly busied ourselves last winter totally enjoying our time working away fixing things up.  Thought to ourselves, ‘well now that we have the house we won’t be traveling as much’ & that was true last winter.  That is how we felt.  We were focused on the house.  But that was last winter & in our lives things have a habit of changing & thank heavens they do.  Remember, I am not a fan of same old-same old. 

With the thought in our heads a year ago about not traveling as much we made the decision at the time to downsize our RV.   Coupling that with our aging Damon we figured it was the right time to make the change which it was……. except for one thing & here is where we made our mistake.  Yes, we here at the Bayfield Bunch, unlike some, do admit our mistakes.   We should have stuck with a Class A instead of switching to a Class C.  Simple as that.   Nothing wrong whatsoever with Class C’s & they have many pros but we have learned in this past year a Class C no matter how hard we tried to adapt, just was not the best vehicle suited to our particular needs.   Remember, every one of us is different & what works great for one person or couple does not necessarily work great for the next person or couple.  It’s important to remember that.  And that is precisely why some of us come south for the winter while others chose to stay in the North.  Why some are Snow Birds, some are Full Timers, some prefer RV Parks & some prefer Boondocking.  Think of what a crowded mess this RV world would be if we all thought alike eh.

In a rather rambling round-a-bout way that brings me back around to my previous thoughts.  Either make the best of what you have & perhaps not be happily satisfied or make the effort to change what it is that is not feeling right about your situation.   Thus our decision to put ourselves back into a roomier Class A Motorhome again at some point in the not to distant future.  Is there a chance we could be making another mistake??  Is there a chance you could walk out of your house & slip on a banana peeling??  If you think not then you are the people out here with that so called perfect Motorhome………….10-4:))

And a reminder to folks looking for any of my ‘Older’ or ‘Newer’ posts…..scroll down to the bottom & look for the pink bar with the word ‘Home’ in the center of it.’  Hover your mouse either on the left or right side of that word for ‘Older’ or ‘Newer’.  I don’t know why this new template won’t visibly display the words openly!!

GROANER’S CORNER:((  A little boy opened the big family bible. He was fascinated as he fingered through the old pages. Suddenly, something fell out of the Bible. He picked up the object and looked at it. What he saw was an old leaf that had been pressed in between the pages. "Mama, look what I found", the boy called out." What have you got there, dear?" With astonishment in the young boy's voice, he answered, "I think it's Adam's underwear

CONGRESS GARAGE FIXED OUR JEEPS CLUTCH STARTING PROBLEM FOR $5 & SOME CLASS A MOTORHOME THOUGHTS

A strong Skunk odor rousted me out of my dreams this morning.  Guess that is what I get for leaving my window open.  Waited awhile before I took Pheebs out.  Glad I still have a good working nose.

Our Jeep clutch switch appointment at the garage was at 9.  Thanks to MARK & MIKE'S suggestions the problem has been solved for $5.  Kelly did take the Jeep in to make sure it was the switch & not something else.  Fellow at the garage said it was common for Jeepers to by-pass the switch but he first took it out, cleaned it, & tried it again.  Yes, definitely a faulty switch.  While he had himself wedged under the dash he just rewired the wires & charged Kelly $5.  Now if it had been me there he might have charged me $10.  Always best to have the right gender go to get the best job done:))  And thanks to Mike for offering to fix that problem for us as well.

A few more things loaded into the rig today & the calendar finally came out to have us a look at a departure date.  Our 180 days away is up on Saturday April 19th so we are using that as a target date to be home.  Still figuring on wandering up through North-Eastern Arizona across Northern New Mexico into South-East Colorado & out onto the Kansas Plains.  Long range weather forecasts for my 10 weather check points along the route between Congress Arizona & Bayfield Ontario are so far looking favorable.  Chances are good we may roll out of here around April 10th. (or sooner)  As much as we wanna get goin….we don’t wanna get goin.

Our neighbors Shirley & Lou from around the corner are going to keep an eye on our place this summer.  It is their yard where I sometimes get those nice cactus garden & spring daisy photos.  Nice folks & they have a little dog named Pebbles.  I’m in the habit of calling her Pickles.  Shirley & Lou live right next door to Dally.  We stopped & gave Dally some big scruffles Tuesday morning.  She’s looking good & being given more attention by her owners.  

  

NEIGHBOR LOU CUTTING HIS GRASS LAST WEEK & LITTLE PICKLES…ERRR, PEBBLES

Reason we were down to Surprise 2 days in row was to look at a 2008 37’ Winnebago Destination Limited Edition Class A Motorhome we really liked.  It was different than anything else we had seen & that was precisely what caught our attention.   I drove it & it was the quietest smooth driving coach I’ve ever driven.  Course I’ve only ever driven two, our Damon & this one.  Liked the fact it had the bigger tires normally found on Diesel coaches.  Had the most beautiful hardwood floor we’ve ever seen in a rig.  It was a rear engine gas Chevy Workhorse on a Peterbuilt frame.  Had a lot of extras on it & had been ordered new by someone on the 06 Colorado Ski Team.  Definitely one of a kind………… Had we been able to work out a trade-in deal with our Class C on this coach we might have……well, who knows.

 

 

It was during our boondocking venture over in Arizona’s Kofa mountains nearly 2 months ago that we had to accept the fact ‘the writing was on the wall’ about our 26’ Class C Winnebago.  As nice a coach as it is with it’s many pros we just could not adjust to it’s smaller size, try as we did.  There was just no getting away from it, we have been increasingly missing that big Class A living space ever since downsizing over a year ago.  Not so much the storage space as the living space.

We found ourselves cutting our boondocking trips short this winter for several reasons.  Smaller fresh water & holding tanks for one thing.  We used to get about 2 weeks out of our Damon tanks before we had to consider dumping or taking on fresh water.  Our Class C has smaller tanks.  But the biggest reason was simply by the end of one crowded (for us) week we were already uncomfortable enough & just wanted to head home.  How unlike our other 6 years when we would spend the entire winter boondocking in our 33’ Class A Damon Challenger & got along just fine.

With an added piece of memory foam I found the overhead bunk in our Class C comfortable.  What I hadn’t figured on was the getting up & down from the bunk though.  I just assumed I would be able to skitter up & down the ladder from there with no problem.  Somewhere over the years I’m afraid my skitter has up & skattered.  The clumsy tumble from my bunk one morning made that very clear to me.

Ever since renovating our Class A Damon in 09 we have never had a proper easy to use dining room table.  You know the kind where you can just walk up, pull out a chair & simply sit down.  Supper time has always been some kind of food balancing act for us with plates resting precariously on laps or laptops & food clinging to shirt sleeves & pants pockets.  I’m tired of trying to wring soup out of my socks.  We do have an easy to set up small table in the Winnie Wagon but found it kind of awkward after a bit & stopped using it.  I did try to get used to sitting in the half turned driver’s seat to do my blog stuff at night but it turned out to just be too uncomfortable after awhile as well.  I really think our Winnie Wagon would be the Cat’s Meow for a single person.

Two people together in a small space for any prolonged period of time has it’s own problems.  Not only do people need their individual space but there has to be enough room for each person to call their own.  And I guess this is where we have become spoiled over time.  Both in Bayfield & here in Congress Kelly & I both have our own coveted space.  And as we have found out, that space is of prime importance to us & if we are going to continue to travel as we plan to do we just have to bite the bullet & accept the fact we have to go back to a Class A Motorhome.  If we are able to set out across Western Canada next September on our way south we realize we not only want but need the room to be comfortable.  Maybe that comfort thing has a little something to do with aging.  I gotta remember I’m 69 & not 29 anymore.

We have poured over hundreds of rigs on-line these past couple months checking floor plans, makes & models, manufacture’s pros & cons, gas vs diesel again, what size would be too big for us & what size would be too small.  Cheaper entry level coach or something better with some quality to it.  Chevy or Ford engine.  Newer as opposed to older.  We wrote out a list of needs, wants, & ‘no ways’ early on.  Drove down to Phoenix about 6 weeks ago looking at rigs.  Checked out some friends Class A’s & had a look at a nice Itasca Suncruiser in Camp Verde about a month ago.  Stopped & looked at others wherever we saw a ‘For Sale’ sign.

The question in some reader’s minds may be, ‘why not wait until your back in Canada until you think about changing rigs”?  Good question & of course much easier to buy a coach in Canada & basically that is what we have finally decided to do.  We have been in touch with our good friend Ron from FOUR SEASONS PERFORMANCE all along & he has been helping us with suggestions & advice about the pros & cons of different rigs & manufacturers.   We will be talking to Ron further when we get home………………….

GROANER’S CORNER:((  An elderly man went to his doctor and said, "Doc, I think I'm getting senile. Several times lately, I have forgotten to zip up."
"That's not senility," replied the doctor. "Senility is when you forget to zip down." 

JUST STAYING COOL & RESTING UP

NEIGHBOR’S BIRD OF PARADISE IS BEGINNING TO BLOOM

Three a.m. this morning found me wide awake.  Been a long time since that has happened.  Maybe it was the fresh night air gently rustling curtains through my open bedroom window.  Long time since it’s been warm enough for me to sleep with a window open.  Nice:))

Had to drive ourselves back down to Surprise Arizona this morning on a little business but other than that we are just staying cool in the house out of the heat.  Been having a harder time starting the Jeep with that faulty clutch switch just above the clutch pedal so the Jeep goes into our Congress garage in the morning for the fellas to see if it needs replacing.  Lot of Jeeps around here so we figured it would be a good place to have Jeepers looked at.  Garage has a good reputation & we have dealt with them before.  Don’t want to wait until that switch fails completely & leaves us stranded in the desert somewhere.

Gerry & Larry dropped around this afternoon to say Hello.  They are friends of Mike & Pats & Janna & Mike.  They are the folks Janna & Mike go ATV’ing with.  Real nice easy to be around people.  They usually drop in to see us when they are in the area.  We’ll see them again when we get over for Happy Hour at Mike & Pat’s again shortly.  Hey Mike, have ya ever thought of moving that Happy Hour up to about 10 a.m for us morning people:))

Has been a few RV related questions coming in such as, what type of work/jobs can a Canadian snowbird do in the USA, where to dump black tanks while boondocking, & what about Northern Campgrounds/RV Parks that are closed for the season before Northerners would be able to leave (say November) and wouldn't be open again until April.  My best advice for everyone with RV questions is to refer folks to the RV NET FORUM.  This is a great place for RV’ers & wannabe RV’ers to go for all kinds of RV related questions & advice.  It was a big help for us in our early RVing years.  We didn’t know nuthin from nuthin.  The forum is made up of fellow RV’ers numbering in the thousands so the resources one has for answers to any kind of RV question is many.  We have always found people to be very helpful on RV Net Forum.  For example, here’s a question from a reader the RV Net Forum folks might have an answer for…….“what about the weird 3 year calculation of days allowable in the States for Canadians; after that limit they make you file income tax there”.  ????  I don’t know the right answers for some of these questions so it’s just best to go to the Forum where all the smart & knowledgeable RV folks hang out.  I might be able to accurately tell you what color shirt I’m wearing today but for sure I would have to look first……………

I LIKE IT WHEN UFO’S OCCASIONALLY APPEAR IN MY PHOTOS:))

GROANER’S CORNER:((  HOW DO YOU DECIDE WHO TO MARRY? (written by kids)
You got to find somebody who likes the same stuff. Like, if you like sports, she should like it that you like sports, and she should keep the chips and dip coming.
-- Alan, age 10
No person really decides before they grow up who they're going to marry. God decides it all way before, and you get to find out later who you're stuck with.
-- Kristen, age 10
2. WHAT IS THE RIGHT AGE TO GET MARRIED?
Twenty-three is the best age because you know the person FOREVER by then.
-- Camille, age 10
3. HOW CAN A STRANGER TELL IF TWO PEOPLE ARE MARRIED?
You might have to guess, based on whether they seem to be yelling at the same kids.
-- Derrick, age 8
4. WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR MOM AND DAD HAVE IN COMMON?
Both don't want any more kids.
-- Lori, age 8
5. WHAT DO MOST PEOPLE DO ON A DATE?
Dates are for having fun, and people should use them to get to know each other. Even boys have something to say if you listen long enough.
-- Lynnette, age 8 (isn't she a treasure)
On the first date, they just tell each other lies and that usually gets them interested enough to go for a second date.
-- Martin, age 10
6. WHEN IS IT OKAY TO KISS SOMEONE?
When they're rich.
-- Pam, age 7
The law says you have to be eighteen, so I wouldn't want to mess with that.
-- Curt, age 7
The rule goes like this: If you kiss someone, then you should marry them and have kids with them. It's the right thing to do.
-- Howard, age 8
7. IS IT BETTER TO BE SINGLE OR MARRIED?
It's better for girls to be single but not for boys. Boys need someone to clean up after them.
-- Anita, age 9 (bless you child )
8. HOW WOULD THE WORLD BE DIFFERENT IF PEOPLE DIDN'T GET MARRIED?
There sure would be a lot of kids to explain, wouldn't there?
-- Kelvin, age 8
And the #1 Favorite is...
9. HOW WOULD YOU MAKE A MARRIAGE WORK?
Tell your wife that she looks pretty, even if she looks like a dump truck.
-- Ricky, age 10