The wind

the sun has been pretty bright here, so Bob and I decided to put up the dining tent to get more shade. during the night the wind as strong enough that we got out of bed to put down the awning on the trailer - it was shaking the whole trailer. When we got up we looked over at the dining tent and it was demmolished. Bob was really angry at himself for not tying down all four legs - he only tied down two of them. So we drove into Ramona and bought a new one. then we tied it down real good. Before we went to bed we lowered it to get it out of the worst of the wind. And guess what? No wind last night. But it was nice to have the awning this morning. Yeah.

This is our home for March

Another nice day, but a little windy and muggy. We thought about going to the hot springs, but decided to do chores like laundry and cleaning the trailer. It is very quiet today with the weekenders gone. We had to pull up the awning because of the wind. Now it is a bit cloudy, but it is blowing over. Anyway, here we are.

A day of travel

The campground was a little busier over the weekend, with lots of kids and families. By yesterday morning they were starting to pull out. Bob and I decided to go on a small trip. We drove to the small town of Borrego Springs. Our campground hostess told us that there was a great mexican restaurant there. So I put that info in my gps and we started looking. There were two mexican restaurants. We went to the first and it was just a hole in the wall - looked like take out. So I plugged in the second one. We followed the directions very carefully and wound up in a very fancy looking and expensive looking golf resort. We kept following the directions. We kept going around in circles. I couldn't turn off the gps because we could figure out how to get out. I finally plugged in the name of another town and the gps led us out. Whew! so we decided to just drive and look. We found the other one, plus a coupld of steak houses. We went to the second one. It was not that great at all. Bob and I still maintain that the best Mexican food that we have ever had was in Silver City New Mexico. Yum.

We did a little touristing and then took off. We had heard about another campground called Fountain of Youth and both of wanted to go see it. We found it easily on the other side of the Salton Sea. The spaces were very small and not very scenic. But the place was very well kept with lots of amenities and LOTS of activities. It reminded me of the activities on a cruise ship - going on all the time. It was not a lot more expensive than what we are paying here. It would have on site wifi, instead of having to go to the visitor lounge - and I bet they don't close their visitor lounge at 6 pm. It also has cell phone reception. The downside is that it is pretty hilly and that there would not be a good 4 or 5 mile walk for me. Or a one miler for Bob. We will think about it for next year.

By the time we got back to Butterfield, the place was almost empty. I had forgotten about daylight savings time and had to plead with the owner not to closse the visitor lounge so that I could check my email. But he agreed and I was able to do so.

This morning started cloudy so it will be cooler. I am using this opportunity to do laundry and maybe clean the trailer a bit. Tomorrow we will probably go to Agua Cliente and spend some time in the spa. Ahhhhh!

We are into a routine.

The weather here is getting better every day. It is in the mid 80's during the day and in the 50's at night. I have been doing my exercises every morning - either a DVD or a one hour walk. the walk that I found has a steep downhill at the 1.5 mile mark. I get to the bottom and turn around and walk back up. It is quite a workoout and I feel really good when i do it. I do my DVD with my laptop on a small table, set up in the shade of the trailer (because it is already too hot by 7 am if I am in the sun.

The placer is OK, but they have not done real maintenance in many many years so it is getting run down. There is only one shower for our area, but it is a nice one, so that is not a problem except on weekends when there are more people here.

We are not doing much. We have found a good one mile walk around the perimeter of the place. It is pretty flat. For the last two days Bob has walked the loop twice a day. It seems to help me. He is much less congested here and is very happy that he is able to breathe better.

We took out the scooters one day and went about 10 miles. But it was really windy and a little tough. We decided to wait until the winds die down before we try it again. Today we are going to Borrego Springs (about 40 miles away) to check out the "historic town" and have lunch at what is purported to be a very good Mexican restaurant.

Nice to be so relaxed. I did not even realize that today was the first day of daylight savings time. We have a thermometer and clock that is automatic and readjusted itself this morning. Bob accused the clock of being wrong. Then we looked at the calendar and realized that it was right. So we reset all the other clocks.

We have heard about the earthquake and the tsunami in Japan. It is just terrrible and I have been coming to the visitor lounge here several times a day. They have CNN on 24/7 so I do get updates. It is very frightening. Wow.

Getting settled

We got to Butterfield on Tuesday. We stopped on the way in Julian for a yummy lunch. We were here by noon. It was still a little chilly, but the sun was shining brightly. The manager (Barbara Jean) told us that they had had gale force winds the night before, but that the bad weather was supposed to be over. They had snow here just two weeks ago. I think that we timed this well.

Bob was surprised to learn that the altitutde here is over 2000 feet, so he is having a little trouble breathing, but it is not bad. We are doing things slowly. It took us a while to set up the trailer. We had our choice of over 100 spots. I asked why it was so empty and was told that it gets more full later in the month and on weekends. OK. So we tried one spot and noticed that it did not have a fire ring. So we wanted to try another. I asked Barbara Jean and she said that the other one had electrical problems. So we tried a third and it is great.

Since this was Tuesday, I wanted to watch the Biggest Loser. (Stefee has gotten me hooked on that show.) There is a TV in the Visitor Lounge, but they close the lounge at 6 pm. Barbara Jean said that if I got there before 6, she would show me how to lock up. She is great. So I got to watch the show. Walking back to the trailer in pitch black darkness with a tiny flashlight was a little difficult, but I finally found it.

I got up yesterday and walked about four miles. I didn't realize that I chose the downhill direction. That meant uphill all the way back. When I walk again I will try the other direction. It was nice getting some walking in.

We set up the scooters, filled their tires with air (Bob has a portable everything), and everything looked done. I was going to use the free wifi. Bob gets too impatient with the slow wifi so he wanted to try our Verizon. We got in the truck and then drove about 10 miles down the road where there was cell phone coverage. We tried our Verizon broadband. It didn't work. So I called Verizon. The first young man (sounds ominous already doesn't it) told me that it wasn't connected. I was frustrated because we had made sure to get it connected a week ago. He kept me on hold for a while and then told me that it was complicated and he was transfering me to a specialist. The next young man identified himself as being in sales and told me that he had to run a credit check. At that point I lost it. Here we were sitting in the middle of the desert and I was having to deal with such incompetence. When I told my story again, he said that he would check. Then he said that he would hook it up and it would be ready in 15 minutes. He gave me his direct number in case it did not work. We waited 15 minutes. It did not work. I tried the direct number and it needed an extension which I did not have. So I tried again and got a third person. She was finally able to fix the problem. URGHH!!! It turns out that they had given me a new phone number because of the length of time that we had closed the service. She just needed to walk me through to change thge number. Now i know for the future.

We got some bills paid and came back to the trailer. I sat out in the sun to read my book and got quite a little sunburn. No sun for me today. I was so tired that I was in bed fast asleep by 8 pm and slept until 5 am this morning.

It had been getting pretty cold at night here - like in the low 40's. But not last night. When we got up it was 50 degrees. NICE. Barbara Jean had put a DVD player in the lounge for me so that I could do my exercise dvds. But I forgot that the lounge is locked. It doesn't open until 9 am. So I set up my laptop outside and did 45 minutes of power sculpting outside in the shade. Also NICE. Barbara Jean says she will meet me to open the lounge at 7 am. I will walk tomorrow but meet her on Saturday. She is really nice.

I don't know what we will do for the rest of the day. Bob was not feeling great this morning. If he feels better we may try riding the scooters or biking. Not sure. But we are enjoying the sun.

Getting ready to hit the road again

In four days we will hit the road again. We are taking Honey to the southern California desert. this time we will go to one place and stay put for the month. Then come home. It will be very different from the great trek. Neither of us know if we will like it. This would not be the year to do another trek like the last one. It snowed in Tucson Arizona this week!

We will be staying at an RV resort that does not have cell phone service, but it does have free wifi. We may have to drive a few miles to call and say hi to family. We are taking the scooters and the bicycles and plan to do a lot of sightseeing around the area. But mostly we are looking forward to warm and dry. (Bob has had a congested chest for several weeks now and that is no fun.

We are planning on driving straight down on I-5 and turning left just at LA. The only issue will be the weather going over the pass (Siskyou summit south of Ashland). We thought about trying a different route (eastern Oregon and eastern California), but once we realized that this would be the rainiest and snowiest March in a long time, we opted for the interstate. It will be quicker and safer. (Just heard about two more families that were stranded for days in the snow. Don't want that to be us.)

Gas is going to be very expensive but I guess we will pay what we have to pay.

We are now busy packing up the trailer and trying to get everything ready. It is amazing to me how much I keep saying - oh don't forget that. We were so organized on the trek and it seemed so easy. Now we have to recreate it and I have already forgotten what we did before. It will work out and we can buy whatever we forget -except for our meds and I already have those in the trailer.


Yeah!!!!

Home with new eyes.

I did not think that I would continue blogging after our return from the trek, but the trek has changed me. When I drive through Oregon I now look at it with different eyes and am just awed by the beauty of the mountains around here. Last weekend Bob and I went up to our favorite camping spot. It has a great view of the Clackamas river valley and of Mt. Jeffereson. We had two days to ourselves and then daughter, grandson and two friends arrived. While it was just the two of us I sat there and almost had tears in my eyes looking over the beauty. It was awesome in every sense of that word. I must be thankful for the trek to have given me those new eyes. Bob and I sat at the cliff edge and just watched the sky and the clouds as it got closer and closer to sunset. I will not say that we watched the sunset because we were looking southeast, but it was that time. We watched the clouds move in, dissolve, and move in again. We watched the mountain turn pink as the sun actually set. We said goodbye to our favorite spot because the altitude is so high that it is difficult for Bob to breathe. He is able to manage, but not really much energy. It takes him almost a week to recover from the lack of oxygen. So we have decided that this is the last time.

Then when everyone arrived I did not really have much time to look at the scenery. Grandson is truly a handful and is very active and into everything. We gave him a small broom and he spent many hours sweeping the dirt. I love him so much.

We were very thankful to have the larger trailer for this trip because it got pretty cold at night. Daughter could come into the trailer in the morning and have coffee, heat a bottle for the boyo, and we could let him run around inside until it warmed up. we even had enough room inside for everyone to have breakfast in the warmth. (It went down to below 40 so it was pretty cold.) It warmed up later in the day, the Honey was very nice in the morning.

Honey is now at the dealership getting some very critical repairs made. She will be there for a while and that is fine. We are not planning on going anywhere for several months.