Clifton, AZ 3-28-07

The wind howled all night, lots of shaking and shuddering. The scenery was hidden in dust until we got out of New Mexico as the wind was still pretty strong. We left Columbus, NM at 9:25 and headed west on highway 9, then we caught highway 80 north to I-10 west. West of Bowie, AZ we caught highway 191 and headed north.

We gained another hour when we crossed into Arizona. They don’t observe daylight savings time so we are now on Pacific Time again. Gaining that hour was a plus and as we are heading into the less populated eastern mountains of Arizona we had to get some stuff done on the way to our next RV Park which didn’t have a laundry. So in Safford, Arizona we spent about 3 hours, which felt like a month….smile.

Safford has most things, fast food, Walmart, Home Depot and motels, etc.; but on the south end is a Federal Prison and on the North end is a State Prison. We found a laundry and had to fight the wind across the parking lot. The laundry had attendants, two women sitting in a cubby munching and puffing away on cigarettes. The place reeked. Needless to say we didn’t fold the clothes in the building; we folded them in the trailer. We couldn’t even stay inside, it was really bad. So while the clothes were drying we walked down the highway in my favorite, the wind, to KFC for some lunch. We got back to get the clothes and found one load hadn’t dried all the way, no heat when we got there, and some how it was our fault because we didn’t tell them…um how were we supposed to know? It was spinning and working when we left and spinning and not dry when we got back and then we told them…ladies with attitude.

After we got the clothes put away we went to Walmart Supercenter and stocked up on groceries and then trekked through town looking for diesel. We finally found some and then headed on north to the Clifton RV Park.

We got into the North Clifton RV Park around 4:15 and got the last spot. It is a pretty RV park tucked in a tight canyon right on the San Francisco River. Clifton is home to the countries largest open pit mine and a lot of the people living here in the park work there. Our site is really nice, considering it was the last one…it is on a little cul-de-sac and we are backed right up to the river. We are reserving judgment on how long we will stay here, depends on the habits of our neighbors. We were thinking we would like to hang for a few days, but we don’t have sewer here so that would be all we could do.

We traveled 239 miles today and gained the last hour we can gain…for now. The first two pictures are of the scenery here in the mountains near Clifton. The second one shows part of the mine tiered up the mountain.

These last are of our site here. That wall behind us edges the river, which is raging right now and the moon was rising behind the top of the hill right behind us, which is our view out of our front door. Early to bed for me tonight, my body is very confused over the time changes again.