Las Vegas to Flagstaff

We stayed one extra day in Las Vegas to finish up our sightseeing, lose a bit more money, and once again wait out the winds. We left by way of the Hoover Dam,wow what a sight. The last time we were in Vegas, we had toured the dam site so we did not stop. But we did drag our camper across the dam. The trip's scenery was a tad boring in a way because it was like the trip to Vegas. Then we hit trees and green grass, finally. Another exciting event was rain. We figured we had not seen rain since the middle of March when we left Livingston.

We arrived at my aunt's house with no problems. In Flagstaff that one day they had had rain, snow and hail. In one day!

We are parked on their property right across the driveway from their house, so we visit back and forth. Out our side windows is a horse pasture for Sally. Out our back window we can watch the goats and their kids play. We are hooked up to their electricity with a long cord and their water....we love this campground!

Since we have been here, we have been treated like royalty. For almost a week it has been family stuff with cousins, second cousins and more cousins!We have had big family dinners, gone out to eat,shopped, and just had a blast! Mother's Day about 17 of us went out to dinner...all ages from 6 to 69.

Monday, the day after Mother's Day, Erwin, my aunt and uncle and I went to Lake Powell to spend 2 nights on their boat, The Fella-Ship. Talk about strange weather....when we left here it was sunny and cool, just perfect weather. By that night we were freezing in the rain as we ran from the car to the boat. My uncle said we would have snow by morning and we just laughed at him. Sure enough Flagstaff had nine inches that night and the next day! We just had cold but sun. We cruised the lake for about 5 hours. So different from lakeshores in the East. This is all big rocks, sand, no trees and green water.

Today, Erwin is flying with Uncle Jim and his nephew to Sedona. Aunt Mary and I are supposed to go to Jerome and Sedona, but it looks as if that trip may be delayed. I am content to watch the horses and goats play, so that is all right.

Red Rock Canyon, Las Vegas

We spent very little time in the casinos in Las Vegas except to walk through the shops and down the street gawking like tourists are supposed to.




One day we drove out to Red Rock Canyon.

I had read about this in Les's blog( see side bar) and thought we would try it. Believe me the pictures in no way show the sight. It is magnificent!
Some visitors even dye their hair for the occasion.

There is a large visitors center, information center and gift shop for the first stop. You meet the Rangers and tell them what kind of hike you would like to take. A 13 mi. scenic drive surrounds some spectacular scenery and the hiking trails branch off the drive.
There are many mountain climbers out here, some free climbers and some technical. It all looks technical to me!


Erwin and I have always wanted to see the desert in bloom and we got our wish....enjoy

Cha Ching

After a long drive through the desert with nothing to see but the straight road and cactus we are finally here in Vegas. We are staying in Sam's Town RV park not too far from the strip..Oh all right it is about 10 miles more or less. We have a very nice site with a tree and nice neighbors. Our first night here we had happy hour with them and had a wonderful time.



The next day we were gone all day. We started out at Ethel M's Chocolates.

As you can probably tell I am fascinated with cactus gardens.
Such prickly things to have such gorgeous flowers.


Next on our to-do list was to visit the MGM Casino and see the lions...not too exciting there. Lions mostly sleep during the day and these were definitely well fed and ready for naps.



Then a long long walk to see Imperial Casino where they have these amazing cars for sale. You know I hate my truck so why not?

How about this one? They only made two, I wonder why?



Or perhaps one of these? Wouldn't it be an eye catcher with my 5th wheel on the back!



Finally the Bellagio to see the dancing fountains.







I will try later to get the video on here, but so far no luck and that is a shame because it is beautiful!

I HATE THIS TRUCK!!!!!

We get all packed up and ready to go this morning. We stop at the post office to get our mail. It was there. We love our mail service! Erwin hops back in the car, starts the motor and what? No air conditioning? This cannot be!
Six hours later and a much lighter pocket book we are on the road to Winterhaven, CA for the night just so we can say we stayed in CA then on to Las Vegas. Let me just say here that I hate this truck!

We have found Salvation (Mountain)

It is too hot here to even think about sight seeing or doing anything outside. The humidity percentage is so low that if you get wet, you shiver because the air just sucks the moisture from your body. I gave the poodles a bath and took them outside to dry. In 103 degree weather I didn't see that it would take too long even for them. I sat in the shade and looked down at poor Buffy. Not only did she look like a drowned rat, she was shivering. What the ???? I felt her coat and it was ice cold. Evaporation is such a cool thing.Moved her to the sun and that solved the problem.
When you cannot go outside and play the next best thing is to get in the car and drive. We have heard about The Slabs and Salvation Mountain for years.Since Niland was only a few miles away comparatively we decided a day trip was in order. If we liked it we would come back and camp, if we didn't then the trip was definitely worth it.
We drove for miles in the desert replete with sand , sand dunes, boon dockers and heat. When we first reached Niland we knew we were in for something unusual to say the least.
Definitely we were overdressed.
But hope and direction were right around the corner.
Just a few more miles of this and we would be there!
Ah ha! there on the side of the road another art project.
And a bit further on. All I could say was, "Oh My"At least 50 feet high and close to 200 ft across...all images from the Bible.

Yes folks, seeing is believing.
And I believe that Slab City is not for me! I felt like we were in the midst of a rag pickers commune. I am sure that during the season, it is full of 5th wheelers, motor homes, etc, but right now all that is there is the rag tag of society.

Oh my.

Change of Plans

( Written on April 24th)
We are now in Yuma about 2 mi from California. We will be here two nights, for laundry,groceries,etc. Then on to Imperial Dam in California, again boondocking for 2 or three days then to LAS VEGAS (to win gas money we hope!), unless something else catches our attention.
(Written on April 26th)Well once again our plans have changed.................
We happened to look at the weather channel and realized it would be over 100 degrees here by next week, so we are taking ourselves to the mountains probably on Wed afternoon or Thurs. We have to wait for our mail to be delivered, then we are gone.This campground closes Wed so we hope to have our mail if not we will move down the street.We had talked about Las Vegas, but 100 degrees, I don't know. We will watch the weather.
I think we will wind up in Camp Verde or Cottonwood for a few days and hopefully catch up with a few friends there.

Ajo, Why, and Gringo Pass

After leaving the beautiful Saguaro Co-op Campsite the next day, we drove for miles through the most boring desert scenery. We decided to take a short (HA!) detour from the Interstate over to Organ Pipe Cactus Monument and stay for 3 nights. This is the way we travel. We have a plan but do we stick to it? Not if something else is close by that we might want to see.
As we were driving down Hwy 85 we were passed by about 7 Border Patrol cars. When we got to the campsite, 80+ miles later, all traffic was directed to their parking lot. There had been a shooting in Mexico, one person killed and the other had crossed the border..........Great.We were about as close as you can get to Mexico and still be in the USA.This is one of the places that has no fence,no river,no barricade, just walk across. We passed through the town of Why,AZ and Ajo,AZ plus the Barry Goldwater Air Force Base where the boys in blue practice bombing raids.
By that afternoon the "perp" had been arrested so all was well.

Beautiful country...lonesome country....dusty country.....quiet, so very quiet.But the stars were not as bright nor the sky as dark as in Fort Davis,TX. I was surprised considering we were miles from any towns.
We really enjoyed boondocking,as it is called, and found lots to do. No phones, no electricity, no computer, no TV, no problem.
We took one very long hot hike up to an old mine site, about 4mi round trip from our site.

For 60+ yr. olds we did right well, at least we made it back. Another day we went to the ranger talk on desert survival. I thought it would be about me surviving in the desert, but it was about the desert surviving. The rest of the time was spent reading, knitting, and just listening to the quiet.
Those tall cacti you see with arms are over 75 year sold when they grow their first arms, so imagine how old some of them are. The Organ Pipe Cactus is just stalks of cactus. A few of the trails in the park have been closed due to drug smuggling and illegal crossings.