Today was our last full day in the Tucson area but we were lazy and didn’t get much done. We took a drive through the town of Catalina, AZ, where we are camped. We found that the Wishing Well RV Park is near the center of activity in town because it is next to the Circle K.
We did find a store Peggy wanted to visit called Tractor Supply. We have seen them advertised but have never visited one before. I know – we need to get out more. Anyway, the Tractor Supply here in Catalina is great. If we still lived in a real house instead of a fifth wheel trailer, we could happily spend a great deal of money in this place. This store had a clothing section where they sell Carhartt shirts cheap.
Only about $60 later, we escaped with three shirts and a big bag of black sunflower seeds for birds. Last time we were in Texas, a bird-feeding neighbor stated that cardinals love the black seeds and the dozens of birds hanging out at his feeder indicated that he was right. We should be in Texas in a week or two but we’ll be ready to hang out our feeder so we can watch these easily-baited but gorgeous birds. We have at least one more stop here in Sierra Vista and maybe a couple stops in New Mexico before we get to Texas.
About a week ago, I guessed that we were set up at about 2500′ elevation in the Wishing Well RV Park in Catalina. Our GPS unit says I am wrong. The park is actually located at 3100′. From up here, if there are any clouds west of us, the sunsets are spectacular.

We did an old trick to start our explorations of stuff around Tucson today. We got in the truck and went east, stumbling our way through places we have not seen previously. After 25 miles of driving on Tucson city streets, we turned off on the road to a place called Mount Lemmon. Not long after turning, we started climbing through some foothills with very fancy houses built on them before entering the Colorado National Forest.
The road climbs steadily from about 2500′ at the bottom through switchbacks and many turns to an elevation of over 8000′ near the top of Mount Lemmon. Alongside the road are many turnouts and viewpoints which is fortunate because the terrain is spectacular. In some places are grand vistas of Tucson, arroyos and distant mountain ranges. Other spots offer magnificent views of massive rock ridges, hoodoos and steep-sided chasms. There is even a pullout for a gorgeous group of waterfalls called 7 Cataracts located in a narrow stone gorge.
At the top end of the road we entered a town called Summerhaven which we guess was named because it is higher and cooler than Tucson below where the temperatures in the summer can be torrid. The area around Summerhaven and areas above about 6500′ were blanketed with a thin layer of snow. The road was good but it would be an extremely poor place to have brake problems. Once you start down, it is all downhill for about 20 miles.
We ended up our day by swinging in to Trader Joe’s and purchasing more food that is probably not very good for us but it sure is tasty.
We got some pix that you can see if you click here

The western unit of Saguaro National Park and the nearby Arizona Sonoran Desert Museum were our planned destinations for today. We started the day with breakfast at the Sunny Side Up Cafe here in Catalina. The meat portions were microscopic but the biscuits and gravy were good. Peg’s pastrami and rye sandwich was reported as dry. The prices were good and so was the service but nominal food will win few hearts. A two-and-a-half star joint. We then drove west through Tucson and/or Oro Valley (not sure which – it is hard to tell the difference) across I-10 and up the screwy one lane road into the western unit. This portion of Saguaro National Park is just as stunning as the eastern unit but it looks like a bit more water lands here because everything was very green.
We took our time as we passed through the park but eventually emerged on the other side and passed into a Pima County desert park where we pulled off at the Arizona Sonoran Desert Museum which was packed. Folks were even lined up back into the parking lot awaiting a chance to purchase entrance into the museum so we moseyed right through the parking lot and set the Garmin again for the Tucson Camping World. This time they were open and sold me much stuff.
We then set the Garmin for a small local botanical garden or park called Tohono Chul. It is another of our favorite spots in the Tucson area. It sits on a small piece of land right in the middle of a big commercial district. The place is packed with all kinds of desert plants, little scurrying reptiles and fabulously colored birds all visible from the narrow, plant-lined pathways wandering through this serene retreat. There are great sculptures and fountains throughout the gardens along with buildings in the great southwestern architectural style. What a terrific legacy the original land owners left to the city.
On the way back to our RV park we stopped at a place called Tucson Tamales and purchased a variety of tamales to take home. At $3.25 a pop they ain’t cheap but they are very tasty, particularly their masa.
We took some photos you can see if you click here

Although it is not yet 2017, we started our explorations for our early 2017 travels today. We drove south down Oracle Road and through Tucson on our way to the eastern unit of Saguaro National Park. We have been here a couple times before but the scenery here just never quits being dazzling.
I am old and since I am, we now have a permanent old geezer’s pass for Federal parks and monuments that allows us free access. We showed the pass to the Ranger in the booth and he gave us the “move along” gesture. We rolled right onto the park’s 9-mile one-way loop road for another pass through this enormous cactus garden. Virtually all the plants here have formidable defenses, particularly the sharp, pointy kind.
We pulled off the road at almost every wide spot in the pavement, shut down the engine and listened for animal life. Initially we could not see anything moving but after we hung out for a while, we would start to hear a variety of birds singing and would get glimpses of little scurrying things speeding across the scarce clear ground between prickly forests. Strangely, we even spotted a squirrel and a woodpecker both perched in a scrawny ocotillo cactus just like good neighbors. The scenery here is spectacular.
After our slow pass through the east unit, we set the Garmin for the nearby Camping World which was inconveniently closed for the holiday that occurred yesterday. We need a new tank washer hose and some other stuff but I guess we’ll be getting them some other time.
We headed back to the Wishing Well RV Park and our dry, warm trailer. It is cold at night with no nighttime temperatures above 40 degrees since we got here. We love our electric heaters.
There are some pix available if you click here

Today is Christmas and we did very little other than hang out in our nice warm trailer. All last night a rainstorm raged and temperature were in the 30’s but, due to the gigantic range of mountains east of us, the sun came up at about 8:30 and drove the storm away. The Catalinas were all dusted with snow this morning and just gorgeous. By about 5:00 PM, it didn’t look like much had melted. It was in the 40’s outside today in our RV park but our brand new Vornado heater seems to be up to the task of keeping it 70 inside.
We got to speak with both of our kids on the phone today. That was nice.
There are some pix available if you click here

We had no formal plans for today other than to go shopping at the nearby Trader Joe’s. We were successful in that we got our shopping done but the rest of the afternoon we enjoyed making food items with phyllo dough and then eating almost every unhealthy bit. It was great.
The weather man two days ago was correct when he said there was a nasty storm headed for the Tucson area. When we left the park towards T Joe’s, there were gusty winds of about 20 miles per hour. They were stronger when made our return trip and by about 3:00 PM they were raging along at about 55 or more. As the wind speed increased, we were able to watch the approaching cloud bank of the storm marching in from the west. Right before the rainstorm hit, the wind started to diminish but not before knocking over my satellite antenna and our lightweight sewer pipe.
Once the rainstorm started, it was plain that it was open for business. Happily, our recent repairs to our trailer made it dry, warm and cozy for the nice woman and elderly geezer living therein. The outside temperature started to plummet soon after the rain began and ultimately dropped down to nearly freezing around midnight.

We hopped up this morning and departed from Yuma’s Adobe Sunset RV Park. I am at a loss to describe an “adobe sunset” as anything other than a brown mud brick late afternoon’s lighting. Hmmm. We continued our trip east on I-8 up the gradual climb from Yuma (elevation 300′) through Gila Bend and Casa Grande (elevation about 1700′) until turning southeast on I-10. The gradual climb continued until we pulled into the Wishing Well RV Park in Catalina, a small town north of Tucson (elevation 2500′).
I am old and chicken so I did not drive along the Arizona freeways at the posted speed limit of 75, but do almost religiously stay in the slow lane and averaged about 67 which seems to be almost supersonic compared to the maximum speed for trailers in California of 55 mph. With an empty schedule like ours, there just doesn’t seem to be any reason to push the truck harder merely to change our arrival time. We think we get to see more stuff that way, too.
We were setting up our fifth wheel trailer in the Wishing Well when Peggy noted that the loud thump from the roof we heard a week or two ago was not merely a sound. After removing a skylight insulating pillow from the skylight, it was evident the dome was fractured. The weather report speculated that a large storm is headed our way Saturday night. We broke out the roofing repair supplies and Peggy crawled up on the roof and fixed the skylight, at least from a waterproofing standpoint. We also had a wayward gasket over our living room slideout and we spent a part of the afternoon trying to secure it in the proper position. We will know if we were entirely successful when we fold up our trailer for travel in about a week.
The Wishing Well RV Park does not seem to have wi-fi but it does have full utility hookups. It is right next to Oracle Road which is a pretty busy north-south multi-lane highway. Traffic pretty much died down in the late evening but a Circle-K store and gas station on one side of the park does spit out some assholes with pickup trucks having very loud exhaust systems operating at nearly full throttle. They are very easy to hear within the park.

We have been lounging around near our hometown of San Diego for most of December. We were able to visit our son and his wonderful fiance several times. We both got nasty colds and spent a week or so doing nothing, We made big shopping excursions to Costco and Trader Joe’s where many dollars were expended. We jammed food into all the available storage, dumped the tanks, filled up the propane and got back on the road. It feels good.
We have a scheduled commitment in San Diego in April 2017 so our journey in early 2017 will be a short one compared with our last two outings (the East Coast in 2015 and the Great Basin in the first ten months of 2016). Peggy and I speculate at this time that eastern Texas or maybe Arkansas will be about as far as we can go east before turning back west to make our April return date without cramping our style.
However, today we only made it from San Diego to Yuma, AZ. From TT Pio Pico in San Diego to a park called Adobe Sunset east of Yuma was about 170 miles. Leaving San Diego we took I-8 which climbs over not less than four 4000′ passes before descending down the frightening In-Ko-Pah grade into the desert towns of Ocotillo and Plaster City. Soon we were driving through El Centro, CA, where the ground elevation is below sea level. Despite being at an elevation that should be underwater, there are massive agricultural fields here being watered with imported water carried through massive aqueducts from the Colorado River. We failed to spot any naturally occurring bodies of water in the areas visible from the freeway.
The Adobe Sunset RV Park was quite similar to the dozens of other RV parks in the Yuma area. Many full-timers, like us, come to the southern part of the country in winter to thumb our noses at nasty weather and it seems tens of thousands of them plant themselves in Yuma for cold months. Our space was a pull-thru and had full utility hookups. There was no wi-fi in the park except at the office. The park is right next to a fairly busy road. Trains run within earshot but the volume of the fairly distant horns were not obnoxious. The cost was quite reasonable – about $28. Fuel and RV services are abundant.

For the last two days we were relaxing around our campsite. It was great. Today, however, we invited our son and his fiance over to the Original Pancake House for breakfast. I think there may be more than one “Original” pancake house and I am uncertain which one really is the original. The establishment on Convoy Street in San Diego serves a great breakfast with pancakes.
After breakfast, we drove to our former residence in San Diego where I was supposed to help Sam with an automotive issue. It turned out the issue required some welding skills from me that have been dormant for about 35 years. I was hoping that it would be like riding a bicycle; once you master it, you can always do it. It wasn’t
The welding involved joining some exhaust components by the oxyacetylene process. Although I was competent at this type of work back in the Pleistocene, the finished product in this age was quite ugly. At least there weren’t any holes. I am glad I am not looking for a welding job. Surprisingly, the welded parts did go back into the car without resorting to hammer fitting.

Today we gathered up our stuff from our RV spot on the north side of Pio Pico and moved over to the south side. The south side has sewer connections, ample shade, the store, mediocre wi-fi and large RV spots which are not available on the north side. We hope to be set up here for two weeks.
We also got lined up with the wi-fi service which costs about $15 a week but since there is very little cell phone service in this locale, texting is about the only way to communicate with the outside world. We can now irritate our kids and friends at our leisure.