Monday 30th January 2017

January is done and we are finally drying out.  We brought the watery weather with us from San Diego and I do believe the California drought might be on the wane.  There were many rainbows. Our area is in the wind farm corridor and there is a forest of giant windmills snagging all that windy goodness.

Oh Boy!  This bank of clouds gave us a few inches of rain.

All the surrounding mountains got a good dose of snow.

Finally some sun days. Time to check out a polo match. At half time plenty of spectators paced the field stamping back upturned divots of earth.

We had a fun time watching the game and scarfing down a picnic with our good friends Deb and Bill.

We hiked about Joshua Tree National Park a couple of times.  This park is named after the very distinctive tree.  It’s actually not a tree but a type of Agave.

We did a nine mile hike to see this oasis of fan palms tucked into a narrow valley. A small spring keeps this tiny eco system alive.

Dean found this comfy rock for a little nap.

Dean would NOT curl up into a ball to get in the hole, even after I had pushed these rocks apart to clear the trail for him.

We had a good time visiting our friends Deb and Bill at their fancy resort. They have an electric boat at the end of their waterfront RV lot. We took a nice mile loop cruise around the park on the waterway. It curled in and around the golf course and we admired the many beautiful Motorhomes and posh casitas people had built. Some had tiny swimming pools, fountains and lush plantings.

Marathon Coach had an evening event at their park.   This company is based in Oregon and makes motorhomes for many of the rich and famous.  They had 2 motorhomes to check out. They also gave us a never ending supply of excellent Oregon wines and a great guy singing classic pop all night. We got to eat, drink, dance and ogle the fancy “campers.”

This baby has heated floors, leather furniture, sub zero fridge and window shades, doors, lights  and just about everything else run by remote control.

Even the WC has a TV. The king bed is adjustable and reclining and there is a 49″ curved  TV in the bedroom. All this for only $2,108.158.  That’s before any personal upgrades of course.

I still love my camper. OK it’s getting on in years but we like the layout and best of all it’s paid for.

Another day we hiked to an old abandoned Calcite mine.  I guess someone wasn’t too impressed as there were quite a few bullet holes in the sign.

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The area was pretty barren but due to all the rain the Ocotillo plants had sprouted lots of leaves. Those stems have some really sharp thorns hiding amongst the leaves ready to cause some major bodily damage if you brush up against them.

I was thrilled to hike through a couple of slot canyons.

We love holes in rocks.

We also love wielding our walking sticks.

Onward to Yuma for February.  Just a heads up to anyone traveling in the next few months.  We will be in the Phoenix area for March, Southern Utah for April and Bend Oregon for June. We always love to latch up with our wonderful family and friends.