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October 26 to November 1, 2002
Saturday October 26:
Left Winslow without a picture of a street corner again; I guess the street corners here are more memorable to songwriters than to me. :-) This is a driving and webpage workday. The weather is rainy, and we stop briefly at a Sears in Flagstaff. The weather forecast is for snow above 8000 ft, but we do not expect to go there. The overcast covers the higher elevations in Flagstaff.
Claire is disappointed in her search for good socks, and we continue to Cottonwood through mixed rain/snow at the higher elevations, and are happy to descend to 3000 ft elevation and the warmth of Cottonwood. We find the Walmart parking lot filled, and park in the almost empty lot next door. Signs proclaim "Customer parking only; others will be towed at owners expense"; uhhh, WHAT customers? We move after dinner.....
Sunday October 27:
I slept late and did no computing. We left a bit too late, and the Walmart lot was crowded. If a kindly truck owner had not moved his vehicle to give us extra room to get out, we might be there still... :-). We visited Tuzigoot National Monument near Clarkdale AZ, 5 miles from Cottonwood.
This was a great display, with rangers answering questions, a museum, as well as the WPA reconstructed (sorry, STABILIZED) ruins. The stabilization included raising the 5 foot ceilings to accommodate modern statures.
The changing color above Claire's left hand is where the original walls were added to. A tall prehistoric Indian man was about 5' 4", a woman 5' 2". There are mine waste remains visible below the monument, and these are kept constantly wet to keep dust down.
A nagging thought creeps into my mind; how toxic must something be in the west for them to use scarce water to keep the waste wet? ...... The river runs right along the edge of the waste field, so evidently the waste does not leach toxic products into that...?? We can see Jerome on the distant mountainside. Our Golden Age pass has gotten us in here free, and it is worth many times the price. :-). We moved the RV to the empty lower parking area, and walked the cats, then dressed for the Manzanita restaurant. We drove directly there, arrived only a few minutes early, and enjoyed our dinner. I had fisherman's combo, Claire had her sirloin, and we thoroughly appreciated this place our second trip through. We returned to the Cottonwood Walmart for the night and after dark finding space was no problem.
Monday October 28:
I again slept late, no computing. We left Walmart early, fueled and dumped across the street at Giant, but did not take on water, as the sign said "Non-potable water, not for drinking or household use". All local advice said " we do not drink the water, we buy bottled water". Hmmm, the nagging though about the toxicity of the Tuzigoot mine wastes returned. We have half a tank, enough to take us to Phoenix where I'm confident the main water supply will be drinkable. We will not foul our water tank with undrinkable water. Perhaps this is a major negative for the Cottonwood area? :-) We drove to Jerome; we had seen it on the mountainside from Tuzigoot, so expected a switchback drive, and it met our expectations. We parked at the edge of the road just entering the town; it was far from level, but we assumed little parking would be found for our vehicle here in the built up part of town.
This is a fun town NOW, but I'm sure it was less pleasant during it's active mining days. Phelps Dodge closed the copper mine in 1953 when the copper prices fell too low to justify continued operation, and the population in the Company owned town fell to 50 hardy souls. They formed a historical society, flower children moved in, the town was declared a historic district, and rebuilt as an artists' colony with quaint shops, restaurants and inns. There are still remnants of the decay caused by building owners removing roofs of abandoned buildings to avoid paying taxes on them.
Signs of damage to ceilings of some shops remain if you look, and buildings still abandoned and unoccupied (but locked up) remain. I'm sure the buildings here are all now spoken for, as they have almost half a million visitors a year. Even the "Sliding Jail" that moved downhill in various landslides caused by extensive underground mine tunnels is now a tourist highlight.
The mining moved to open pit after fires in the underground tunnels could not be extinguished. The climate is much more temperate than in the valley, not getting so hot in summer. They get some snow but it is reported to be gone in a day, and they do not need to clear the roads. I would not want to move on these steep roads when they are snow covered though.... I saw one photo for sale with snow clinging to everything in town. The shop owner said "that was a REALLY unusual year..." :-). We enjoyed lunch at our roadside parking place before proceeding to negotiate the switchbacks through town and across Rt 86A to Prescott.
Claire did the driving, so it was only the minor chore of staying in the passenger seat for me. :-) We stopped at pull offs for pictures.
Some of the higher elevations had snow in the shaded areas along the roadside, but none on the road. We proceeded into Prescott; the country flattens out and changes to an agricultural (ranching) emphasis. We easily find the welcoming Walmart, and it has PLENTY of parking :-). Claire noticed a sign for a movie she wanted to see; she investigated while I finished the dinner dishes. We went to the excellent movie "My Big Fat Greek Wedding". It had been produced independently, flopped, then was bought and re-released by a major production company. It is now a well deserved, REALLY funny hit. We hit the pillow quite late for US this night.
Tuesday October 29:
Battery is 70% again; I am beginning to believe 70% is as high as the vehicle generator or the converter will take the house batteries without MANY hours of driving or days of plug in. I'm really looking forward to the new converter! :-) We visited downtown Prescott, found street side parking, and walked along lots of shops on Whiskey Row. This toilet paper on sale was cute, but nothing we would take on the RV as it does not appear very functional.... .:-).
The Chamber of Commerce had only local info, nothing on the Phoenix area that we were seeking. The Arizona Pioneers Home I walked to turned out to be an old folks home of modern construction...oh well...the veterans hospital is mentioned on the tourist map too. :-) I walked through the historic museum, which includes the historic seasonably decorated Governors Mansion.
We heard a strange noise leaving our street side parking space, saw nothing, continued without recurrence. We stopped to switch drivers at a rest stop, and found a water faucet marked "Drinking or Radiator water"; we moved into position and filled the water tank to the marks we had made when we dumped. We are now fully loaded with water. :-)) We drove through Phoenix at rush hour, arriving at Camping World near closing time and found they no longer carry Generac generator parts, since they switched to being an Onan dealer. :-(( They DID allow us to stay on their lot overnight. :-) I bought a new gasket for the toilet; we need to decide on further purchases here. Dinner is buffalo burger, squash, and rice; lean and quite good but very expensive as a staple. I read that the buffalo population has grown from 500 in the late 1800's to over 130,000 today. It is VERY warm here compared to what we are used to; elevation is 1000 ft, daytime temperatures near 80, overnight low above 60. The heavy quilt was unbearable, the rest of the blankets were nice toward dawn with open overhead vents
Wednesday October 30:
Battery is 68%; I decide that for under $4, I will buy a second spare toilet gasket, and do the work of replacing the gasket elsewhere. I cannot bear the thought of doing it now, the fume leak is not bothering us much if we use the fan blowing in instead of on exhaust, and if I did get the wrong thing, for $8 I can take the risk. :-) Measured for replacement waste vent cap, then bought it and spare cap for sewage line. Ours is no longer captive, and may sooner or later be lost. Tried to install vent cap, entire plastic structure collapsed... :-(((( Went in to buy entire vent cover replacement, and return unused cap. The replacement cover assembly (like the original) has "Turn to remove" embossed on the top, yet it is glued so that turning will break it...DUHHHHH!!! Well, we must keep water out of the house, so I hopefully try to telescope the new one over the remains of the old one, and it FITS! I seal the new one on top of the old one with plenty of adhesive sealant, and debate how much curing time it needs...we decide to leave by 3PM. I am happy I have avoided the need to buy the special two part sealant needed for EDPM rubber roofs. We need to deal with fully resealing the roof seams is real for the near future, but not now. We drove out of Phoenix on I-10 east toward Tucson, destination a Flying J about half way there, in Eloy an hour away. Phoenix is a VERY large and built up town, CITY definitely.
The mountains surrounding the city are attractive, and we certainly do understand why it is called the Valley of the Sun.... :-) I am VERY tired when we arrive at the Flying J in Eloy, even though Claire drove the whole way. We fuel and inquire about the dump, and receive permission to stay overnight. We will take on propane in the morning too. The stations are usually less busy then. The temperatures are TOTALLY summery during the day, near 80 degrees, but drop below 60 at night. We are going to sleep with the vents open, closing them during the night. The heavy quilt is stuffed back into it's closet for the present, unneeded. The long sleeve shirts of last week are but a memory...occupying space in the laundry bag. ELEVATION is the whole story out here. Phoenix is 1000 ft, Tucson 2000, and Yuma only 100. We expect summer until we leave Arizona in late November. We have hopes to see Organ Pipe National Monument half way to Yuma on the Mexican border, taking us off the Interstate highways for a few days. First, retrieve the new converter in Tucson and install it!
Thursday October 31:
Battery 60%; I am needing to connect briefly using prime minutes to get the tracking number of the converter package by e-mail, and check the delivery date. The package is due Friday Nov 1; elapsed phone time used, 8.5 minutes. We do not do this unless it is necessary, as even the briefest tasks take long with respect to our allocated 5 minutes per day prime usage. It is nice to have the capability when we need it though. It is near the month's end, so will not cause us to go over; if the usage does not get back to our billing office in MA quickly, it could be billed next month though... :-( We shower after asking and determining that the water is potable; we've learned that it is a necessary question in the west if signs are not posted. One cannot assume faucets dispense potable water if they are not marked. Non-potable recycled water is common here; this is a REAL cultural departure from the east, and requires our constant attention to avoid tasting water from faucets before asking. :-(( After dumping and filling propane we fill water from the gas island and CLEAN the windshield. We head out for Saguaro National Park West, northwest of Tucson. This is an easy drive, taking us through Marana, an agricultural town with a small airport. The cotton fields are everywhere.
The bolls look fluffy, but the stalks are not very pleasant to touch, having sharp prickly points on the pods. Claire loaded up on good local info at the local information station while I reloaded the GPS with local map data; we had run off the end of the last load, and missed having the detailed local roads in it. We were disappointed in the 20 minutes lost time, but coming into Tucson thought it necessary, as we were looking for places off the numbered highways. We found Saguaro National park without difficulty, and accepted their advice that large vehicles should not use the "gravel" road over gateway pass; on passing, it looked more like loose sand to me. :-( The visitor's center recommended a two mile hike and we proceeded to the trail head; parking might have been available at the trail head, but the 270 degree turn into the narrow driveway definitely was not in the cards for us, so we parked across the street in the private desert museum parking lot. There were few visitors here, so no problem finding a place at the back of their lot near the trail head. I do wonder when the peak season hits here; the lot is geared to several hundred cars, and less than 10 are present.... We sign in at the trail head. The huge cacti are EVERYWHERE, popping up from the beautiful desert terrain!
The hike is pleasant but the sun is hot; we've taken water and brimmed hats as protection from the sun. The saguaro cactus is a magnificent plant!
Tree huggers are mere pikers when compared to us cactus huggers... :-)) We hug very tenderly, and with long sleeves..... :-)))) These thorns mean business; they are defending tender juicy interior flesh from some pretty hungry, thirsty critters. The supporting strength for the plant is provided by this internal woody cage like structure that remains standing after the cactus dies and decays.
These cactus "trunks" are even useful for construction.....
After failing to find the longer return trail past Gould's mine, we returned by way of a dry (right now) wash that paralleled our original trail; one of the first things we saw were numerous honey bees crawling on a ledge we had to climb down. It looked like the bees were gathering water from cracks in the rocks, though no water was visible. We gave the bees as much room as we could, knowing that African (aka "killer") bees have moved into this area. Bees are usually not aggressive when feeding, only when their hive is threatened. Africanized bees do defend their hive with unusual ferocity, and we would not approach a hive out here without fully covering protective clothing with face covering. We arrived back at the RV without finding any other notable wildlife, even after being warned against rattlesnakes, scorpions, and black widow spiders. We did make sure we signed OUT of the area so we did not have rangers looking for us later; overnight use is prohibited in this area. This is Halloween, and we plan to stay at a Super Walmart in south Tucson close to the UPS terminal; we strongly prefer the lighted guarded Super Walmart this night to fend off any mischievous ghouls.... :-)
Friday November 1:
Battery 62% this morning; at least the inside temperature does not require the furnace; I compute after 6:30. Claire shopped in Walmart, then we left for the UPS terminal to pick up our new converter. One quirk of the Tucson area we quickly found; the same street changes name at city boundaries...Duhhhh??? Oh well; at the same time we realized that, we saw the big UPS terminal we were seeking.. The wait in line was long, as UPS is now opening and inspecting the contents of each package before accepting it for shipment, then repacking it while the sender waits. The package is there, and we quickly determine that battery cables will be needed to install it. The friendly parking lot security guard suggests Pep Boys a few blocks away, and I soon have one long cable with lugs on two ends, perfect to cut to make two cables of the right length. We proceed to Saguaro National Park East, and circle the 8 mile one way winding scenic road looking for a suitable one way parking spot for the installation. Maybe Pep Boy's lot would have been better? The neighborhood there was not the greatest, but they had no objection. Well, once this starts, there will be no moving the vehicle until we're finished, as the batteries must be disconnected. We find a place where we fit off the road, and still leave parking space for others. The scenery sure beats Pep Boys.
We do need the awning for shade while working outside; this sun is H O T! The old converter removes easily, and the new one which is much smaller and lighter requires one new mounting hole that the self tapping sheet metal screw can make without a drill (no battery to start the generator). The cabling fits perfectly when cut, and only one minor flash of spark from shorting the battery (Oh, I must disconnect the ENGINE battery too? Duhhh...) We find enough hardware lying around to put everything together; a few more washers would have been nice and more professional, but it is tight and serviceable. At Pep Boys we could have bought them..... The "Charge Wizard" controller which mounts inside the RV came with an unnecessarily large connector that would not fit easily through the hole into the converter compartment. After prying the RTV sealant out of the hole, I had little hope of getting it through the hole with the existing cable; Claire convinced me to try. I placed the connector inside the split cable sheath and pushed while she pulled from below; before we realized, the connector popped through into the compartment below! :-) A quick screw connection installed the controller connector, and we were ready to test; hook up the batteries, and away we go. The generator starts, current drawn by the converter is almost double what we learned was normal with the old converter, and the voltage on the battery is up near 14.4 volts quickly. It works! The fan soon starts on the converter as it gets warm, but the heat sink remains only warm to touch. :-) This is a switching converter, but a check of weak TV signals shows switching noise is no problem. As the battery charges, we cut the hole in the dinette seat for the controller cable and mount it to the wall above the seat back cushion (the only possible place the 6 foot cable will reach; easy decision). Clean up of tools is quick, and we are ready to leave 30 minutes before the park closes. Claire volunteers to drive, and we head to the north end of Tucson to a different Walmart for the night. The drive is longer and more complex than we expect, but it hopefully will put us closer to the racetrack park for the Highland Games tomorrow. The sun's last rays shining on the mountains are striking.
We arrive at Walmart, and observe "No Overnight Parking" signs in the outer lot, so park in the inner one close to Walmart. I ask at customer service whether we can stay, and am told the mall operator forbids it, but we can stay at a Super K-mart a short distance away. After finishing dinner we drive there and find other RVs, so cozy right up to them. :-) Sleep comes very early for me, but Claire has plenty of electricity to watch TV. :-)
THAT'S ALL FOLKS; Sorry we're late with this one, but the electricity shortage and work to solve it put us behind with the webpage. As we finish this it is Friday, November 8, and we are in Yuma, where hopefully we get the current week finished and everything uploaded this weekend. If not, we'll run a week behind.....