Heading East, new territory!

Hoped to get an early start from Benson Friday, but instead, spent a lot of time making sure my tow setup was just how I wanted it. Do you blame me? By the time everything was done, gas purchased, I left Benson about 1:30 in the afternoon, aiming for Pancho Villa State Park in Columbus, New Mexico. 

It is the amazing Southwest again. The clouds make moving, dramatic black shadows on the vast views of mountains and plains. Worn rocky fantastical Dragoon mountains remind me of the Alabama Hills, near Lone Pine in California. I hated to bypass the Cochise Stronghold and Chiricahua National Monument. However, I've got a timeframe to get to Austin, and I don't want to use up my buffer days too early, in case I run into bad weather in Texas. Highway I-10 is not too bad, traffic is light.  

Leaving I-10 and heading abruptly south, there's a sudden change, a portal to another universe on Hwy 80, from giant trucks passing 55 mph me at 80+ miles per hour, to a deserted two lane country road. The scenery was of distant ranches, rangeland, dust raised by farm equipment. Cotton City, depressed, a grand name for what I actually saw. There were dried out wetlands, and fallow fields. An optimistic speed limit of 55, but I'm at 45, taking my half out of the middle to decrease the bouncing. Finally turned East on Hwy  9 very isolated, close to the border. No other cars or traffic, so I have poor sense of my speed. A few cars, a few Border Patrol vehicles. Suddenly, and with no obvious altitude increase, a sign for the continental divide, 4520 ft. Its all downhill from here, on the way to New Orleans. No telephone poles or fences in sight. The road follows a railroad that operated between 1882 and 1902 to haul copper ore from Bisbee to El Paso. 

Arrive at Pancho Villa State Park at deep twilight. Not fond of setting up in the dark. Retired to my blue cocoon for the night, thankful for automatic levelers, as it was windy.

Have discovered that wearing tight lycra running gloves to sleep helps my hands and twitchy focal dystonia fingers quiet right down. Each finger is wrapped in its own little Ace bandage, which helps to quiet the fingers. Hope this continues to work, as it is my aching hands that wake me up in the middle of the night. I had put the gloves on some days earlier for driving and liked them. I thought they would feel funny while sleeping, but they don't, they feel great. Weird, huh?

   

Once it was daylight, I could see that the park was pretty empty and pretty nice. Saw a roadrunner, but he was hard to catch on film, speedy little sucker!

Saturday morning was a lovely time of solitude, catching up on housework, correspondence and other paperwork. 

Went to the museum about this small war in our history, found it closed for lunch, but other travelers told me they were going to Palomas for lunch at the Pink House, just three miles away, across the border. Great idea, sounds like fun, glad I have my passport card along. The Pink House would be hard to miss, even in a dense fog. What a great place, a good concept well executed. It is a shopping heaven for Mexican crafts. I did a little gift shopping, fueled by the free margaritas they kept offering me. When I was done shopping, I went into the adjacent restaurant for some guacamole and chips, and to listen to the live music.  

 

A nearby table of seven saw me sitting alone, and Barbara came over to invite me to join them.  How nice, I picked up my stuff and moved right on over. Except that they were way ahead of me in margarita consumption. Fortunately Barbara was the designated driver. They were from El Paso, and they regularly drive over to Palomas to go shopping and have lunch. Friendly, nice folks, its amazing, they're everywhere!

Came home, ate dinner, stowed for tomorrow's early departure, and went to bed, having had one more margarita than I should have :-)  

  

Phoenix, Again!

Had an appointment last Friday, on my way back from Quartzsite, at Champs Family Automotive to fix the Tracker right rear axle seal, an ongoing problem not related to the I-10 accident, and diagnose and repair a vibration that occurred while stopped in Drive, also unrelated to the accident. Probably motor mounts. Fine. Bring it in early Friday, have the car back on Saturday, then take off South and East.

Except that on Saturday afternoon after the installation of new motor mounts, the vibration in the car was ten times worse than before, totally unacceptable. It was hard for this woman to say, no, that's not right, I'm bringing it back, but I did. We'd talk on Monday. Off to White Tank Mountain campground, discouraged, for the weekend to contemplate my schedule of driving to Austin.

On Monday morning, Champs gave me a deal. They wanted to keep the car until Friday. They would replace the motor mounts again at no charge, and if that didn't fix it, and it was the next possibility, the torque converter, they would only charge me for parts, not labor. Parts for a 2000 Tracker are scarce, and have to be overnighted in for timely repairs. How could I not agree. I went back to the motorhome subdued and still discouraged. If it took until Friday to do the repairs, I was going to have to haul a** to get to Austin before my friend arrives there to visit for President's Day weekend.

I spent Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday morning without a toad, getting around only in the motorhome, doing other errands and stocking up. Wednesday at about 11 am, my phone rang, and it was Champs, my car was ready. You could not have wiped the smile off my face. When I got there, it was immediately obvious as I turned the engine over that the pesky vibration problem was solved. I can't believe I had been putting up with this vibration all this time.

Apparently there are frequent enough "bad" batches of motor mounts. Champs sent for a second set of motor mounts that solved the problem. I have to give a big shout out to Champs Family Automotive. They did right by me big time, and fixed everything to my satisfaction, at no additional charge. I'm happy to recommend Champs  if you need auto or RV repair in the Phoenix area. They have a lift big enough for the Lazy Daze, and have a thriving RV service and repair business, as well as automotive and diesel service.

I was relieved that I'd be able to get to the Benson USPS office for a General Delivery pickup of my motorhome registration tags. I was able to leave Phoenix Thursday morning, heading for Benson. An uneventful drive, an immediate stop at the USPS, mail retrieved, and I was back at the Escapees Saguaro Co-op RV park for Thursday night. I had a friend to visit there, and they also have the best laundry room I've ever run across. I'd be on my way early Friday morning.

Well, not. I had lots of things I wanted to do. Clubhouse shower while laundry was washing, a good cleanout of my black tank, fill up with water, check and air up the tire pressure for ten tires, and the real time consumer, make sure my toad Surge Brake cable was properly adjusted. I wasn't going to leave until I felt that it was exactly how I wanted it, neither too tight to apply the toad brakes continuously, even slightly, nor too slack to allow the cable to flip forward, get caught, and cause the problem I had before. Oh, yes, and another call to the TPMS company for tech support to be sure I had all ten tire monitors operating as expected. And, gotta get gas. All this meant that I left the RV park about 1:30 in the afternoon, facing a 200 mile drive to my destination for the night. Which drive is the subject of my next post.

But, by golly, I was going to take my time, make sure everything was operating correctly, be deliberate and careful in my hookup procedures, because I'm heading into a new phase of my travels. Terra incognita. I'm going where I've never been before, in so many ways. I'm living in a new time zone, an alternate universe. Home is now exactly and only where I am right now. And it is a good place.  

Two weeks at Quartzsite.

Quartzsite,  what a strange place. It is a pop-up city in the middle of the desert.  It is dry, everything is dusty and mineraly. The topography is only somewhat obscured by all the RVs, cars, trucks and ATVs scattered randomly over the landscape. There is clear evidence that water flows everywhere, just not now. Washes and gullies of all sizes course randomly. The jagged rocks of the hillsides become smooth river rocks in the washes. The sand gathers in sand bars just like at the beach. Sandy rivulets alternate with a rock-hard aggregate of well, rocks, and dirt, almost like concrete. I think they call it caliche. There are frequent road signs warning "Do not cross when flooded." If the Dept of Transportation had to build a bridge over every wash, they'd run out of money quick. Instead, there's just a dip in the road providing a path for the water, and if the road washes out, its cheaper to fix the road than to build and maintain a bridge. This is all very fascinating to a coastal person.

It is dry and dusty and gritty. Even though I don't wear shoes into my RV, there is fine dusty dirt everywhere. The pet dogs upon being petted, puff out a cloud of dust. They seem to be very happy playing in the silty soil, chewing on sticks, and don't mind a bit plopping right down into the dirt when told to sit. It must be doggy heaven. They will all get baths when they get home.

The big RV show was big. Lots of vendors of all kinds. Thousands of RVers walking the tent, attention captured by skillful barkers, dogs in strollers, people riding carts. The big diesel pusher lifestyle seems to appeal to the older, more sedentary crowd. The companies actually selling RVs were all selling the giant rigs, motorhomes or fifth wheels. Very few little RVs in sight. Big, big, big.

On the periphery of the big tent is Kuehn Rd and Tyson Wells. Here there are many tool and suppply vendors under small tents or canopies. Everything is dusty. Almost everything is cheap, cheaper anyway. T-shirts, leather goods, jewelry, niche products like the GrillGuard, RV repair vendors, they all blurred together after awhile.

The Lazy Daze gathering was held at La Posa West, a section of the LTVA that was within walking distance of the big tent or Kuehn Road. At its peak, there were 35 Lazy Daze rigs gathered in an area off of Road 532. People came and went, so the total number of rigs must have been quite a bit more than 35, maybe 50 rigs all together. People were busy going to and from the tent deciding what to purchase. TPMS system pros and cons were debated extensively, and quite a few systems were purchased, encouraged by my experience with the Tracker front end blowout.

The nightly bonfire.

I love rocks.I can totally relate to "The Long Long Trailer." Twelve of us took a hike up to Crystal Mountain in the Kofa National Wildlife Refuge. It was rocky, nothing but rocks. Wierd rocks.

I was very glad to have my hiking poles. You are allowed to take rocks from this mountain. Getting them back downhill is the issue. You can find quartz crystals here. I found two little one. Very cool.

I'd like to see the wash at the foot of the hill when it has water in it.That, however, can be a dangerous pastime.

 
More rocks, and a tiny little barrel cactus that found its niche, and my foot for size comparison. This climb and descent was all rocks. I was glad I was with a group.

I tested my new GrillGuard with some chicken wings and grilled ratatouille. Glad to have the wind break to cook behind. Also cooked the tenderloin steak from the UofA Meat Lab. It was delicious. Vegans were coming back for seconds.

Our encampment finally got down to about six rigs, widely spaced little castles of solitude. I headed back to Phoenix for final (I hope) Tracker repairs, leaving only five Lazy Daze rigs to enjoy the quiet.