Warm Week

Here I am again, five days since my last post.  For doing a lot of nothing, the time flies by!

It has been warming up into the mid to high 80's.  It's a dry heat...hahaha, but it's true, it makes the heat easier to handle.  We haven't had the a/c on.  With the awning out on the afternoon sunny side of the trailer and a breeze, we have been okay.  After the sun goes down, the temps cool down too which cools the interior of the trailer.

We've been taking walks, doing our research, talking with people and looking at alternatives to our plans.  We never know what's around the corner.  We still intend going to and looking hard at the Mancos area.  But, with Colorado's massive growth the past year, over 100,000 people, maybe things are changing to fast there.  We could care less about the marijuana laws, but apparently many are flooding there for that reason...so we keep reading and hearing. 
  
We have learned a long time ago to never say never.  Thinking back to where we were last year and not having a move on our radar, to now....hahaha!  Sold house, wintering in our travel trailer in Arizona....we wonder what we'll be looking back on this time NEXT year!  Who knows where we'll be?!  

It has just been so pretty around here with everything blooming and greening up.  As the teeny flowers finish we find different shrubs getting ready to flower.  It looks flat out there, but when you walk it, there are many little drainages and washes that take you on all kinds of detours. I wanted to find the poppies again, and it is like hunting for a needle in a haystack, but we lucked out and found them.  We still haven't run across the desert lily again, though I have been looking.

I had to get down on the ground for this....

Gracie was nearby and had to see what I was looking at!

Tromped right on the flowers!  Goofy dog.

These large, gnarly trees are Ironwoods.  They can live 300 years and beyond!

They shed limbs during their lifespan that nourishes the soil as they decompose.

We love them!

I love all the gnarly wood on these trees.

This hardy thing is hanging on in a high traffic area.

We found the poppies!

This is my view from my seat at the table inside.  It's pretty busy out there with birds, bunnies, squirrels, and lizards.

 The following are from this mornings walk.

 Gotta run!  Until the next time!  We are off to have lunch at the Cracker Barrel in Buckeye and woo hoo....go grocery shopping!!!  A big, big day.  Hahaha!

Random pics

Our traveling home.

Here are random pictures from January and February.  We left Cool on Jan. 4th and spent the 1st night in Roseville.  Then we headed south and stayed a few nights in Patterson, Ca and then to Acton, Ca and spent a few nights there.  We wanted to take our time because we had worked our butts off getting packed and moved in Nov. and Dec.  We spent January here in Arizona just relaxing and getting settled in and organized.  We kept to ourselves mostly.  Then as we were starting to do things etc., Feb 5th we were hit with the flu and that lasted four weeks.  I have never been sick that long.  The cough and lethargy lasted forever.  

Gracie chilling.

Sunrise south of Patterson, California

We loved this RV park.  Reasonably priced, well maintained, large sites and can walk right out to the desert.  We loved it until we were hit by the SMELL a couple days in.  We discovered that a commercial egg operation is mere blocks away and when the wind is wrong...OMG!!!  As bad as any cattle feedlot, think Coalinga if you've traveled south on I-5 from Sacramento.  Some days we don't smell it but most days we'll get short whiffs and others...we run around closing up the trailer.  The ammonia is the worst!  

Our site in Tonopah, AZ

We have since learned that though the owners here have been building this RV park up for the last 15 years and taking months and years to get the various permits for everything they have done.  The chicken farm's permits just breeze through.  It had 3 sheds last year and this year there are 9 and they are putting in another 18 this next year as we understand it!  I have researched and learned that the way the "civilized" world raises it's food is cruel and nasty and toxic, toxic, toxic.  This isn't just animals by the way, even the "vegetarian" crops.  The community here in Tonopah is trying to stop the operation, the few businesses are dying, it is sad, sad, sad.  

one of the many awesome sunsets

Me with a gigantor crystal cluster from Arkansas

Oh, did I mention that each of these sheds houses 315,000 chickens!!!  If the 9 they currently have are all occupied at the same time...that's over 2 million!!!  Laying eggs and then after 90 weeks, into the grinders they go to become fertilizer.  I will have to share more later.  I didn't mean to take up this much space in this post about it. :)  The flys, the smell and sometimes the feathers!!!  Oh my!!!  We now know we don't won't to live anywhere that there is big time agriculture or AG Business as they are calling it.

a real Roadrunner

We've ended up staying here because we found a good dentist in Buckeye and are getting necessary stuff done.  We'll be here into the second week of April.  We still aren't sure where we'll be going after then.

This is a phainopepla, no common name.  Sounds like a cardinal to me so I searched black cardinal on Google and there it was....hahahaha.

Saguaros.  They are at least 15 feel tall and decades old when the have arms.

Cool for a few days

This was written on Saturday the 12th, posted on the 13th.
Yesterday was overcast most all day and we had the awning put away which was a good thing last night.  The wind was cranking.  Yesterday was laundry day.  The days big event.  







Living in a small travel trailer is simple living for sure, everything is pared down.  Where we each had 6 feet of closet pole in our walk-in closet in Cool, here we each have barely one foot.  We have one teeny drawer for our undies, but it's been fine.  It takes hardly any time to clean the bathroom or mop the floor or vacuum.  












 
Other things take longer because of the limited space.  Cooking takes longer.  I have to pull everything out of the various places from all over the "kitchen".  I have 8 inches of a counter, but there is a cover on the stove and the double sink has cutting board covers for both sides and then Larry put in a flip up table at the end by the sink for more space and behind is the table.  I can get breakfast put together pretty easily now that I have done it and know where everything is.  Dinners can be a challenge if I don't plan far enough ahead.  Things like crock pots are helpful, but can get in the way.  And so it goes.

Having a furry beast with us this go around is different.  We have to worry about getting back for her so she can potty or eat.  Worry about it being too hot, can we take her or will we starve to death because we can't leave her in the car while we go get some lunch or dinner because it's too hot in the car for her.  Her fur all over our bed makes us crazy because it gets all over us if we decide to stretch out on the bed.  So I spend about 10 to 15 minutes every morning using one of those sticky rollers de-furring the bed. 

 




We miss our recliners.  I miss my own washer and dryer.  Probably the biggest misses.  Oh, and our refrigerator is way smaller than the one we had in our 5th wheel, limits meals and when we are far from stores, a challenge because we can't load up on much.  

A collection of bottles someone left here.

So though some things take us longer to get done, we have the time.  We have been enjoying the sunny weather and watching the desert bloom and change with the weather warming and the rain from January.  The trees are bright green with new leaves.






Today, on our morning Gracie pee/poop walk, we checked out the cactus we have been watching bloom.  I came across a desert lily in bloom.  I had spotted it several days ago and the leaves were all yellowing so I wasn't sure if we missed the blooms.  But today we caught it's first flower, and if we can find it again we will hopefully see it covered in more next time.

Gracie had to see what I was looking at.

Gracie

Gracie may never want to leave here.  Because of the amount of ATV traffic and dogs getting walked about, we don't worry to bad about coyotes snatching her, and there is most times not another person, so we have been able to let her off leash and be a dog.  She is in heaven sniffing all over and leaping after bunnies, ground squirrels and lizards!  She doesn't mind at all when her nose is on the scent or down a hole.  We may have to get a vibrating training collar for her.  

The desert outside the RV park here is sided by the freeway and farmland so not a lot of predators and we can't get lost and she can't get to far away.  

Gracie is learning she can't bark at every dog and person that walks by our trailer.  Some days she is great and there are sometimes she can't help herself.  She has enjoyed socializing with other dogs at the fenced dog park they have here.  She gets lots of walks and then spends most days on her bed in the sun, watching and sniffing the world go by.  She is tied up with a real light cord so she can't escape.  

"What?!  I have to stop and leave!?"

"I'm closer and closer, can't stop!"

Gracie's work.  I wonder how long she would stay with one hole.