From Warm and Blooming to Cold and Snow

Its hard to believe we went from warm sunshine and shorts to cold and snow in less than a week of travel.  As soon as we went north and up in elevation to Ely, Nevada we hit rain that turned to snow.  The first day in Ely we went up to Garnet Hill where you can dig for garnets.  I found one that was really pretty and big.  The fun was over when it threatened to rain.  We had to get down off of the hill because the road quickly becomes impassable if it rains.   Of course overnight the rain turned to snow so we sat in Ely an extra day waiting for it all to melt.  We then went to Twin Falls, Idaho where the wind kicked up and blew too hard for safe travel so we spent an extra day there.  The same happened when we got to Mountain Home, Idaho. 

We finally had a break in the weather and drove up to Cascade, Idaho our new home for the summer.  The drive up from Boise is along a scenic byway.  It was very scenic with water rushing down through the valleys and canyons.  The water is extremely high because of all the snow they had this winter.  We got to Arrowhead Rv Park in Cascade and found the river running right up to the tops of the banks next to the park.  They said it won't flood but its the highest they've ever seen it.  It looks like our new home is in a beautiful part of the country.

Desert Acacia

These are pictures of a Desert Acacia tree by our campsite in Wickenburg.  Our truck and rig are in the background.  This tree was beautiful with all of these fuzzy yellow "flowers".  It smelled wonderful.  Now we are in Alamo, NV about 100 miles north of Las Vegas.  Its a tiny town but has a decent campground.  We will spend a night or two in Ely, NV depending on the weather.  Its time to put away our shorts and put on pants.  We've been enjoying 80 degrees but we probably won't see those temps again until the end of May. 

We had some excitement at this campground in Alamo.  A fence along the road caught on fire and them jumped to the travel trailer next to it.  I grabbed hoses and Jim grabbed our fire extinguisher to help put out the flames.  It looked like someone threw a cigarette out and hit  the dry grass and started a fire which was helped by the wind.  The side of the trailer was black and melted looking after the fire was out.  The trailer was owned by the owner of the campground and he got some burns putting out the fire.  It was very scary and we will be thinking about what we can do to be ready to protect our stuff from fire. 

Wickenburg, AZ -- Cowboy lore

We are in Wickenburg, AZ which is a smaller town west of Phoenix.  It has a history of mining activity and then when the mine played out they started farming and ranching.  The town celebrates its "cowboy" history with lots of interesting celebrations.  We happened to be downtown when we heard the DC riders were coming through on parade.  We had to ask what who they were thinking probably some kind of biker convention.  We were pleased to find out it was the Desert Caballeros a group of male cowboys.  They spend three days out in the desert at a camp and then ride into town.   Of course we fought the traffic back to the campground after the parade only to discover that the cowboys had ridden right past our campsite to get downtown.  We could have had ringside seats without having to deal with the roundabout and all the backed up traffic.

In response to this all male cowboy group the ladies have come up with their own cowboy celebration.  They sponsor the "Cowgirl Up" program at the Desert Museum in town.  They provide all kinds of  homemade knickknacks with a cowboy theme for sale at the museum as part of a fundraiser. 

We really enjoy visiting this cute little town and the weather in April is perfect -- low 80's because its at a slightly higher elevation.  The only drawback is coming into town from the north you hit a series of roundabouts.  We ended up going all the way around one of them thinking it was our exit to the campground.  There we were with our whole train -- boat behind the fifth wheel -- going around the whole circle like Chevy Chase in his European Vacation movie.

April Flowers not Showers

We are saying goodbye to Yuma and all the pretty flowers.  A few homeowners actually have roses blooming and they are beautiful.  Its more likely to see the cacti and palm trees with flowering bushes in most yards.  Its the one thing I hate to leave is all the pretty flowers because I know it will be another month before we start seeing flowers up north.

We are all packed up and ready to head out.  Our first stop is just up to Quartzsite which is only about 90 miles north of Yuma.  We like Quartzsite and its nice to take a short shake down cruise with the RV and boat in tow and make sure everything is road ready.   We plan to spend two weeks in Arizona and then start heading up through Nevada to Idaho.  Our neighbor just left for Idaho and he had to wait two extra days before he could leave or he would have hit snow in Nevada.  Hopefully we won't have to worry about snow since we are waiting until after Easter to go through the high country in Nevada.