We left Ohio for THIS???

Tucson sits at 2700 feet elevation. We’ve had a couple of nights since we got here where the temperature dropped below freezing. However, it’s in the desert, of course, so it doesn’t get a lot of precipitation.

When it does snow, it’s a big deal. It’s certainly not something that we were expecting, nor are we exactly crazy about it. Right now as i write this, about 8:30AM, there’s 2-3 inches on the truck right outside my window, and it’s still snowing steadily.

What's Next for Rick and Cathy

It’s cold, windy and rainy here today - all in all, a good day to settle in at the keyboard and let you all know what’s next for us after we leave Tucson.

Our plans for the next six months or so are driven by a bit of very good news that I’d like to share with you: our youngest daughter Heather and her husband Dan are pregnant with their first child, a little girl. She is due July 27.

Because of that happy event, we’ll be settling in close to Heather and Dan for a couple of months, starting in mid-July. We’ve decided that for 2019 we’ll be staying west of the Rockies for the most part. What follows is mostly destinations and a very rough schedule, although we’ve got a few firm dates that we need to hit throughout the spring.

We are scheduled to leave Tucson on March 12. We’re headed east; our first destination is Big Bend National Park, which is along the Rio Grande River in Texas. We’re not actually headed straight there; it turns out that that week is spring break for the Texas schools, and Big Bend is a big destination for Texans. Every RV park that’s remotely close to Big Bend is sold out. So, we’re ambling that way. We’re going to spend a couple of days in Las Cruces, NM, seeing the sights there - specifically White Sands National Monument, which is nearby.

After leaving Big Bend, we’re heading back west. In early April, We’re going to see Guadalupe Mountains National Park in Texas and, just across the border, Carlsbad Caverns National Park in New Mexico. Carlsbad is located in the southeast corner of New Mexico; from there, we’re heading northwest through the state, exiting the state along I-40.

Heading into Arizona, we’ll hit Petrified Forest National Park and then spend a week or so in the Sedona area. From Sedona, we’re scheduled to meet family at the Grand Canyon, starting on April 19.

Jill, Joe and the kids and Sherry are all going to be at the Grand Canyon. Sherry has tossed out that she wants to do a Rim-to-River hike. This challenging day hike involves hiking down to the Colorado River from the South Rim of the Canyon and back up in the same day! It involves over 4000 feet of elevation loss and gain, in 17 or so miles of hiking. We’ve been doing a lot of walking since we retired: we are averaging about six miles a day walking with the dogs. I don’t think that’s quite enough conditioning for this hike, though. One of these days - real soon now - I’m going to start running some, which I think will be a good test for the old knees for this hike.

After the Grand Canyon, we have to (get to!) watch Madeline for a few days; she’s out of school while everyone else is working. We’re going to head to Las Vegas, which isn’t too far from the Grand Canyon and has quite a bit of family entertainment. Jill and/or Joe will pick her up in Vegas.

We’re going to spend a few extra days there and then fly to New York City for our niece’s wedding the first weekend in May. We’ll leave the trailer in the park and park the dogs in a kennel for the weekend.

From there, we head north into Utah to explore the Fab Five, Utah’s five National Parks. Our plan is to head eastward from Zion, ending up in Moab, which is the closest civilization to Arches and Canyonlands National Parks.

From Moab, our original plan was to head north to see Cathy’s brother Steve in Montana. However, the family decided to host a baby shower for Heather the first weekend in June. So, after looking at plane fares, kennel costs, etc., we decided it was most cost-effective to simply head back west toward I-15, park the trailer for a few days and simply drive, dogs and all, to LA. We’ll spend a long weekend in LA at an Air-BnB place and drive back.

Once we get back to Utah, our plans are a little less structured. We’re planning on heading north, spending a few days in the Salt Lake City area, then on to Montana. Cathy’s brother Steve and his wife Linda bought 20 acres and a cabin near Thompson Falls, MT a couple of years ago; they moved there last year. It’s not terribly far from Glacier National Park; we might take a quick trip there.

We’ll start heading west then. I hope to stop in Lewiston, Idaho and visit my aunt Evelyn, my oldest surviving relative. From Lewiston, we’re going to continue westward into Washington. Scott’s talking about putting a deck on his place on Orcas Island and I’ve committed to helping him do that.

From Washington, we’ll head south and await Heather’s baby. Exactly what we’ll do and the routes we take will depend on how much time we’ve got.

All in all, this should be a lot of fun. We’re talking about seeing at least ten National Parks, maybe more, plus just a lot of very beautiful country.

And the Rain Came Down...

Here in the desert cities like Tucson and Phoenix don’t, for the most part, build bridges over the numerous arroyos and washes. It kind of makes sense; they are dry 99.9% of the time, and it’s a lot cheaper to simply build the road down into the wash and out the other side. Here in Tucson, these washes are all signed, warning drivers not to enter the wash if they can see running water.

There’s a good reason for that. Last night, we had a rainstorm move through. We had about ¾ of an inch of rain last night.

Did you look at the sunrise picture that I posted in yesterday’s blog post? Here’s what that same location looked like this morning.

What’s Goin’ On...

I’ve been meaning to write a quick note on what we’ve been doing here in Tucson. We’ve been greatly enjoying our time here. We have been a little more relaxed now that we’re settled in one place for a couple of months.

We’ve been doing a little bit of sightseeing stuff around the area. As I have previously mentioned, we are only five miles from Saguaro National Park; since we have a lifetime pass to the National Parks, we’ve just dropped in a couple of times to drive around, see the visitor center, etc.

Our friends Dennis and Leah from Monroe (OH) are spending a month here; they arrived about a week ago. It’s been fun to catch up with them and show them around town.

I believe I’ve mentioned that we are staying in a large (450+ spaces), 55+ RV park. It’s a beautiful park with lots of activities and amenities. I could write a book on the culture here. There are clubs and groups for just about any activity you can think of, everything from pickle ball and tennis to sewing to woodworking - on the latter, there is even a large, well-equipped wood shop on site. This place just hums with activity. Neither of us are inordinately social and we’re still adjusting to the vibe here - although I did take, and thoroughly enjoy, an introductory seminar on how to play pickle ball!

I’ll get a post up in the next week or so on our forward plans. We’ve got things worked out - but not fully scheduled! - for the next six months or so. That update will include some exciting personal news for both of us… stay tuned.

Meanwhile, here’s some photos of this beautiful place. The first one looks out over Pantano Wash, immediately to the east of the park; we spend a lot of time chasing Copper and Dodger here!

Reflections

While we’re enjoying our time here in Tucson, I’ve gathered and organized some thoughts

about full-time RVing, after seven months on the road.

1. We love living in our new home. We still find it cozy and comfortable. We went to an RV show the other day, here in Tucson. We didn’t see any other RVs that we thought were more comfortable than ours. This includes even the really fancy $500K+ motor homes. Of course, one always sees improvements and upgrades, but so far as the basic layout of our home, neither of us can imagine what we would change in it - except to make it more reliable. 
2. Mechanical problems: They have been the bane of our existence. The biggest thing we learned: if humanly possible, keep the trailer out of the shop until and unless absolutely necessary. In our first major repair, the trailer sat in the shop for three weeks, waiting for parts. In our second major repair, we spent 3+ weeks waiting in the trailer, waiting for parts. When the trailer’s in the shop, we needed to find another place to live; that’s expensive and less comfortable than living at home, by far.
3. Because of the severity of our mechanical problems, we’ve learned that we’ve gotta just go with the flow. Interruptions due to mechanical problems, weather, or illness will always crop up.
4. We never tire of seeing this beautiful country of ours. Even just driving down the freeway is enjoyable - outside of big cities, at least. We can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings for us.
5. Rent: We (I) had originally guesstimated that we’d be spending about $900 per month, or about $30/day, on space rental at RV parks. We’ve actually been averaging somewhere around $1200 per month, instead. There’s several reasons why this is so: a) We haven’t tried too hard to economize here. We’ve largely stayed in fairly nice parks, except when we’ve been traveling and have been forced to stay in marginal places. b) Staying for a day or so in a park is more expensive than staying for a week, which in turn is more expensive than staying for a month. Generally, weekly rates and monthly rates are significantly cheaper when averaged to a daily basis. For example: we’re staying two full months in Tucson, in a really upscale park with lots of amenities; it’s costing us right at $900/month. c) We’re not really set up to boondock or to dry-camp, so we haven’t done it at all. Our trailer really needs 120V AC power on a fairly regular basis; we can go overnight without it, but that’s about it.
6. Fuel: Same deal here. We’d guesstimated somewhere around $500 per month for diesel, which is not unreasonable for months when we’re not moving around much. When we are hauling the trailer, though, we can spend more like $1000 a month. When towing, we get right around 10 mpg; diesel fuel is typically in the $3.00-3.50/gallon range. Do the math: it costs us 30-35 cents per mile to simply haul the trailer down the road.
7. Groceries: In the old days, we (Cathy) shopped for groceries once a week. We rarely hit the grocery store in between the weekly shopping. Now, we (Cathy and Rick) probably shop every 4-5 days. The reason is obvious: we don’t have enough space to really store a lot of groceries.
8. WalMart: We used to rarely shop at WalMart. Not any more. There’s two big reasons: a) We moved our prescriptions to WalMart. If you’re a full-timer, you need a pharmacy that’s national. That limits you to one of the national pharmacies like Walgreens or CVS, or to WalMart. WalMart’s pharmacy program is surprisingly robust and well-organized, as is their IOS app. b) WalMart sells a little bit of everything. Especially in the early days, every time we hit town we need a number of the little items that make a house a home: extension cords, shelf paper, etc., etc. Where do you go in a strange town to find all of these things: WalMart.
9. Staying connected to the internet has been fairly easy. Many RV parks have halfway decent WiFi. When so, and connected to our WiFi booster, we regularly enjoy acceptable if not spectacular internet access. When park WiFi is not available, we use our company-provided Verizon hotspot, again connected through our booster, to do the same. 
10. TV is similar: our three main options are: a) Over-the-air via the trailer’s built-in antenna and amplifier. This’ll usually get us the major networks plus a few other channels. b) Park cable, when available. This usually covers the major networks plus basic cable (ESPN, CNN, USA, etc.) c) Dish network, courtesy of our Dish Playmaker portable satellite receiver. This generally works very well, and gives us a ton of cable access - more than we’ll ever need. Highly recommended. d) We’ve also got a Roku stick, which works but requires a fairly robust WiFi connection, which is a little more problematic. As such, while this works, we rarely use it as the other options usually suffice.