Day 1 Heading Home

We left around 9am today after goodbyes from the neighbors.  Our route took us north to Mesa and then on the ring roads around Phoenix and Scottsdale.  We headed west to Wickenberg and then northwest to I-40 and Kingman.  The drive was not bad.  I was very disappointed that there were no wildflowers.  Last year when we went this way in April the desert was ablaze with them.  Not enough rain this year, I guess.

Getting ready to go after sitting for five months was a little crazy.  You would think we had never hooked up before or didn't have a routine.  Rog ended up raising the stabilizers manually because he couldn't remember how to do the auto level.  Little things like that in the routine had to be dredged from the memory banks.

Shortly after leaving Florence we got into some heavy duty stop and go RV traffic.  Fortunately not for long, as the turn off for  Country Thunder Music Festival was a few miles outside of town.  But, the traffic coming south was simply amazing.  It was over six miles before we didn't see any more RVs. We were so happy we were going in the opposite direction! And the concert doesn't start until tomorrow!

We stopped on the side of the road for lunch in a truck area just after we left I-17.  We've stopped in uglier places, but not by much.  We just put out the awning and got out our chairs and watched the traffic go by.

In a little town called Wikiup, just before we reached I-40, there is a place called Luchia's.  According to the billboards, it specializes in Indian jewelry and homemade pie!  We made a pit stop there and bought a slice of pie each for tonight's dessert.  It was pretty good.  I was a bit leary - the last time I stopped for homemade pie was in Montana and I wanted huckleberry pie.  The crust was awful and inedible.  This pie today, however, was good.  Rog even went to the little store in the campground and got some vanilla ice cream to top it with.  (Diets commence when we get home - all three of us!)

We are about 16 miles east of Kingman at about 4,250 ft in altitude - close to what we are at home.  Having climbed from about 1,500 ft, we forgot about the pressure changes and when Roger opened his ranch dressing tonight he got a lot more than he wanted!  It just kept coming out of the bottle.  

The inside of the RV took a little beating on the rough roads today.  I opened the pantry door and a can of tuna fell on my foot.  A few things fell out of the fridge when I opened the door. The pole lamp had fallen against the kitchen island but didn't break.  The lid for my tea mug came from out of somewhere and smashed on the floor.  Rog has it superglued together but I'm guessing once the hot steam from the tea hits it the glue will let go.  No major disasters, though.  

We are in Blake Ranch RV Park and Horse Motel.  It's a nice park for an overnighter.  Paved roads, pea gravel sites, fairly large pull-thru sites.  We have no one on our door side, so that makes it nice. There's a big dog run, but it is dirt and gravel, too.  We do have a little traffic noise as we aren't very far off the interstate.  Rog didn't have far to go for fuel as there is a Petro station at the exit.  We will stay here again, I'm sure.  Staff is friendly.  When Rog got the ice cream he told them that the cable hookup wire was stripped so they came right out and fixed it.  Didn't help much - still a lousy signal.  It'll be a no tv night.  Wifi not strong enough for streaming. One thing we don't miss at Desert Gardens - screaming little ones chasing each other around after a long day on the road.  It'll be dark soon and maybe they will go inside.  

I didn't get a chance to edit the photos of the park.  I just pulled them from my phone because the wifi is a little iffy tonight.  

 



We are going to Beatty, NV tomorrow.  Still watching the weather closer to home, though.  We may be delayed a day if the storm that is predicted actually happens.  Not making any decisions on that quite yet.  

Now I'm going to try to load some photos.