Getting my Just Deserts

Odometer 54464
Trip 0 miles

Ocotillo leafing out

The Ocotillo in the desert here are undergoing a transformation.  After a substantial rain, the plants quickly sprout lush green leaves and go into a growth spurt.  As the water dries up the leaves will drop off and the plant will become dormant again.  These green cycles can last weeks or even months.  Spring and Summer the cycles often terminate with beautiful spray of red flowers at the tips of the stalks.

Ocotillo dormant- no leaves

While dormant, those unfamiliar with the Ocotillo, often mistake it for a dead plant.  This is true for many desert plants, which look like dead sticks until the proper conditions for growth come around again, and life flows into the stick-like branches once more.




Mark and I were exploring in the desert again today and I noticed this very interesting looking saguaro.  It must have taken a very long time to grow this very tortured looking shape

Tangled Saguaro Cactus 

Mark and I drove out to look at an F-84 crash site that Mark had located last summer, one that we had searched for unsuccessfully two winters ago.

1988 "Tin Top" Suzuki Samurai

Time to break out the ultimate desert transport, Marks Suzuki Samurai.  There are a lot of these Suzukis in Ajo because they work so well on the narrow rutted roads.  A little over 200,000 of these vehicles were imported to the US between 1986 and 1995.
The Samurai has a 1.3 liter, 4 cylinder engine that churns out 63 horsepower through a 5 speed gearbox.  The best ride comes from dialing in the hubs on the front axle, and selecting low range- 4 wheel drive.  The Sammi will crawl along easily over any terrain all day long,without throwing the occupants all around.

F84 crash debris

Since Mark has already been to this site, the trip was mostly for me, and it was easy to know when we had arrived at the crash site.  This site has a fair amount of debris scattered over a large area.
There are actually two impact areas, this plane hit and skipped before coming to a stop, which may explain the quantity of interesting finds.  (I took about 60 different photos- I'll not bore my readers by posting).

This is a good piece to study the riveting style

Today's hike in the desert was just what I needed, warm weather, fair skies and a slight breeze.  Add in the excitement of a find of this magnitude and I am very happy.  As I've said before the fun is in the finding, and all we take are photos.  Leave this where it is so that others can share the excitement of finding it just as we have.




Your Traveling Friends

Jeff and Joan

Ahh Ajo!

Odometer 54464
Trip meter  0


Wow- what a moon!

The clear skies over the Sonoran Desert gave us the opportunity of a lifetime to see the Super Moon clearly as it rose above the horizon tonight.

Super Moon photo by Jeff Smith

Of course I was scrambling to figure out how to operate the SLR after a long absence.  I searched in vain for he tripod that I am sure I packed away somewhere.  The shot ended up being handheld braced against a picnic table.  Oh-Well.

Our Ajo site photographed by light from the Super Moon

I was on a roll so I decided to do a shot of our motorhome illuminated only by the moon.

Ajo Plaza

Desert selfie-  Getting the GPS tracker set-up before our trek

One of the reasons this is my favorite place is because I get the opportunity to hunt for lost aircraft crash sites with my buddy Mark.  Mark is a bloodhound when it comes to finding old, long forgotten crash sites.  Mark operates off the crash reports that were filed by the AAF at the time,  however the data is not always transcribed accurately, and Mark has a second sense about what is trustworthy and what is likely not to be.

The major debris from and early AT-6 crash near Ajo, AZ

Mark took me on an easy hike to an AT-6 crash site near town.  These sites are the proverbial needle in the haystack.  Even with good GPS coordinates, if you aren't careful you can walk by without seeing the evidence.  We have been told by some of the long time residents of the area that the larger structures like, engines, landing gear, wings and fuselage were either hauled off or buried.  The flash floods that ravage this area from time to time, have also buried or carried off some of the evidence.  We take lots of photos and study the parts to be able to identify similar parts and structures when we find other sites.  To be allowed access to the gunnery range is a privilege, and we sign a pledge not to take souvenirs, and we take that promise very seriously.

Some of the parts we find are remarkably intact, like the clockworks shown here.  (probably not a clock however)

Remains of an instrument at the AT-6 crash site

Solar charging setup

Near the crash site Mark and I discovered a damaged solar panel and charging base for a two-way radio.  Nearby were also empty water bottles and some canned food.  It's probable that the set-up was used by a spotter who guided illegals through the area.  It looks like the Border Patrol may have damaged the equipment to keep it from being used again.  Mark and I climbed the nearby hilltop and walked the ridge for a short distance.  There were a lot of water bottles and food cans and wrappers in evidence, Most of them showing a lot of age.                                                                                                                                                                We had a wary guard watching us.  This guard was a wild burro, who kept its distance.  As we approached the site the burro snorted loudly from his perch above us on the hillside.  Later as we descended the ridge the burro had moved out on to the valley floor and again snorted and stomped as we passed.            Great first hike for this season.

Your Traveling Friends

Jeff and Joan

Old Familiar Roads

Odometer 54464
Trip 459 miles

Pahrump, NV to Needles, CA
202 miles

Shortly after I had finished my breakfast this morning I heard a very slight knock at the front door.  One of our neighbors from the RV behind us introduced herself and asked what my plans were for dumping our holding tanks.  I should back up a moment and say that yesterday afternoon as I was hooking up the utilities I found that even with my extension hose, the sewer connection was just too far out of reach, missed by 2 feet.  I reasoned that we would just empty in the morning.   Once we were down off the jacks, and before we left, we would back up 3 feet and connect up, and do the deed.
She and I had a good laugh as I explained all this to her.

This RV park has several spaces like this one, where the utilities are all well behind the parking area for the RV.  Pretty unusual because the sewer hookups are typically along side the RV space.  We have a main hose which is 15' long and an extension that adds another 8' or so, meaning that this sewer inlet was about 25 feet behind our outlet bay.



Joan and I were off to an early (for us) start today.  Up at 7 AM, Packing up at 8AM, tanks empty and pulling out at 8:30.  After a few minor adjustments, lights are working on the car and we are off...  Our plan was to drive east on Hwy 160 to Las Vegas and skirt the southern edge of the city, catch Interstate 515 south which soon splits into US 95 to Laughlin or US 93 to Kingman.

While transiting the south corner of Las Vegas a passing gravel truck, chucked a rock at our nearly new right hand windshield.
We searched for a chip and thought for a moment that we had dodged the proverbial rock.  By the time we turned onto I- 515 we saw the trail of an advancing crack.  We were just sick.  We'd had this glass for little more that a year.  I suggested finding a glass shop to drill the crack and inject it with a filler.  Joan called all around and couldn't find a shop in the Bullhead-Laughlin area that would even answer the phone.  In order to save time and not backtrack, we decided to find a hardware store and get a glass drill and crazy glue- see if we could get some more miles out of it before the crack was up in our field of view.

We had agreed to stop in at a friends vacation house near Needles to check on it for them, so we took 95 south through California, then took the bridge over the Colorado River to our friends house.  The gate lock was frozen tight and no amount of penetrating oil or taps with a hammer would loosen it up.  I took out the trusty zip wheel and cut the lock off, allowing us to park comfortably in the side yard and hook up to power.

Honda towbar pin

When I unhooked the car we were chatting with one of Dave's neighbors and I did something very stupid- I placed the pins that attach the towbar to the car on the part of the towbar that stays with the car- rather than putting them into the towbar arms like I have 100 times before.  As we drove to the hardware store to get the glass drill and superglue one of the two pins fell to the street in downtown Needles.  Remarkably, against all odds, the other pin stayed on the towbar all the way there and back.  It wouldn't be until the next morning when we went to hook up, that I would discover the horrible mistake I'd made.

Meanwhile, drill in hand we tried three separate holes before we got one to stop the crack at the very end.

We drilled the crack to keep it from running

We did some needed fix ups on Dave's cottage and turned in for the night.  The next morning after breakfast, we closed everything up, moved the motorhome out to the main road and using the new lock we bought, locked the front gate behind us.  Joan moved the Honda up to the motorhome and I stared down in disbelief as I saw one pin balancing on the towbar and one GONE!

Towbar pin lies in the street

I was in shock!  "Quick! we have to re-drive our route to the hardware store and find that pin", I screamed.  Joan, being more of a realist, says no way we're going to find a hitch pin in all of downtown Needles.  "Humor me" I yelled as I jumped into the right hand seat of the Honda.

Joan drove as slowly as traffic would allow, we covered the first 1/2 mile of the trip, across the Colorado on K street, Right onto Needles Highway, and BAM!  There it was- our pin lying in the street!  I dove out and scooped it up, nearly kissing it with joy!

Okay, a little melodramatic, but I was not wanting to use my backup pin, purchased in Eureka, Montana, in 2004, the last time I pulled a similar stunt.  Back then we purchased a farm implement pin of a similar diameter but much longer, from a tractor supply before we found the original pin.  That time I had put one pin in the towbar and one pin in the car.  While out driving around I looked down and was certain I had lost the one pin- it wasn't until we got back to the motorhome that I discovered the other pin was there.

Needles, AZ to Ajo, AZ
267 miles

With all this excitement we didn't get underway until 9:45.  We headed east on AZ 95 which swings south along the east bank of the Colorado all the way to Parker, AZ.  We had a hasty lunch stop of about 15 minutes, and pressed on to AZ 72 which took us south and east to interstate 10.  Once on I-10 we hustled 80 some miles on to Buckeye, where we turned south once more on AZ 85 which took us on the final 84miles of this journey to Ajo, AZ

We arrived in Ajo at about 4:30 PM, topped off the diesel tank and checked into Shadow Ridge RV Resort

Your Traveling Friends

Joan and Jeff

Pahrump

Odometer 54005
Trip 133 miles


Goldfield, NV to Pahrump, NV


Short trip today.
I hate to bore you more with the umbilical, but we had hookup problems again this morning.  The socket on the car finally failed also.  We decided to go ahead and drive to Pahrump and look for a replacement.  The kit we bought last summer from the tow bar manufacturer came with replacements for the wire and both sockets, but we'd had no problems so I didn't feel I needed to replace those pieces.  I brought one socket with me, and left the other socket lying on the workbench back home.
That came home to roost today.

We checked into the Nevada Treasure RV Resort on the outskirts of Pahrump and hooked up the motorhome.  There is an RV store in Pahrump- of course it's on the other side of this very long stretched out city (12 miles away).  The RV center did not have the socket, however we were able to get one at an auto parts store, and it is now installed in the car.  Hope it works when we hook up tomorrow morning.

The Nevada Treasure is a high end resort, however they have a few normal spaces for overnighters like us.

The exclusive spaces have nice pavers all around, a grotto of trees and a thatched roof huts for you to entertain in.  Some even have outdoor kitchens.  That's all above our wants or needs.

Your Traveling Friends

Jeff and Joan

Goldfield, NV

Odometer 53871
Trip meter 190 miles

Weed Heights to Goldfield, NV

Up at the crack of 8 AM we were ready to leave by 10 AM, not a personal best, but maybe close ;->)
We said our good-byes to Mark and Carrie who were busy collecting leaves from under the big trees surrounding the club house and laundry.  As we performed our light check on the toad we discovered that, hmm.. the turn signals weren't working.  What a surprise!  At least this time, re-seating the plug in the socket of the car got things going- we are off.

We took Alt 95 again, this time it was straight east over to US 95 at Schurz, and then south on 95 past Walker Lake and into the town of Hawthorne, NV.  Hawthorne is home to the Hawthorne Army Depot,  THE largest depot in the world.  (their sign says so).  Their mission is to receive, renovate, maintain, store, and issue ammunition.

There are hundreds of square miles and thousands of buildings and bunkers out in the desert just across from town

There is also a Ordinance Museum on the main street in Hawthorne that I will have to come back to.  Joan found the idea a major bore, so on our next trip I'll have to find something else for her to do while I check this out.

Glass Bottle House

We continued from Hawthorne 97 miles to Tonopah, and then another 26 miles south of Tonopah to Goldfield, NV to where we decided we'd spend the afternoon exploring and spend the night in a local RV Park.

We've blogged about Goldfield before in these pages, but we still felt like we hadn't seen it all yet.  We got set-up in the Goldfield RV park, and headed off on foot to see more of the town.  The late season has the sun setting here around 4:30 PM because of the tall hills just west of town.  We were able to see a lot of the town before it got dark enough, and we were hungry enough, that we thought we should head back "home".

We saw several of these bottle houses, where old wine and beer bottles were used to cut down on the amount of mortar needed for walls, plus it added light to the interior, and insulation to the walls.

Historic Home in Goldfield, NV

 This wood frame house has a bronze badge and number from the Historical Society but unless they do some restorations, it is not going to be standing much longer...

Early fire engine in Goldfield, NV

This early fire truck had no badge on it, and
I'm not savvy enough to know the year and make.

Subway stair covers in Goldfield

You just have to ask- how did these stair covers get here and from where??  Not a lot of subways on the West Coast.

The Goldfield RV Park  Goldfield, NV 11/2016

All by ourselves in the RV park.  There were 3 spaces available out of 10 total in the park

the others had "out of order" signs on them.

Tomorrow on to Pahrump...

Your Traveling Friends

Joan and Jeff

Weed Heights, NV

Odometer  53840
Trip Meter 163 miles


We still can't shake the gremlins in our electrical umbilical cord that operates the lights on the back of our towed car.  We wake up to a beautiful morning in Susanville and are ready to pull out and get on the road at 9:30 AM.  The turn signal lights on the car are not working with the motorhome.  Hey!, at least it's not raining I tell myelf as I take out the tote bag of hand tools and the mechanics cushion mat.

On close inspection it appears that the electrical contact pins in the socket on the motorhome are pushing out the back of the plastic socket.  We have brought a spare with us and it appears that now would be a good time to install it.
After about an hour or so Joan and I have the new socket installed for a temporary fix.  Temporary because I do not like the rats nest of wires that is at that location, the wire size is too big, and instead of  6 wires there are 8.  With two wires clipped off and the other 6 installed we test and it works!
A temporary repreive until I can re-do it correctly, but for now we can hit the road.  I'ts now 11:15 AM

We take US 395 all the way to the Nevada border and on to Reno.   Neither of us enjoys gambling however we find much to like in Reno.  Today we are not tempted and we do not stop to shop.  Instead we cruise down 395 to Interstate 80 east.  Only a short hop on the Interstate to Fernley where we can take Alt 95 south to Yerington where we will check into the Weed Heights RV Park.

  We are both unexpectedly tired after our late start and Joan found this interesting RV park during an internet search.  It's on the site of a former Anaconda Copper mine (deja' vu for those who know Ajo, another copper town)

We received a very warm greeting from the park hosts, Mark and Carrie, at the check-in area.  We paid the incredibly low price of  $22.50 for a full hook-up site after they assured us that they could find a space for us.
Once settled in we took off on foot to do some exploring.
The open pit mine was started in 1951, and was open 6 days a week until 1978 when it was closed.

Annaconda built a complete town with housing for 450 employees, along with the infrastructure that it would take to mine about 1.8 billion pounds of copper.  The open pit is a half mile across and 800 feet deep.  The water in the lake is 450 feet deep.
When the mine closed in '78 the housing was turned into rental units and at this time we guess that over a half of them are currently occupied.  The name Weed Heights (which brings a snicker in this day and age) comes from the name of the Chairman of the Board of Anaconda at that time Clyde E. Weed.
Tomorrow we will try for an earlier start and hope to make it to either Goldfield or Beatty.

Your Traveling Friends

Jeff and Joan

Heading South- Southern Oregon & Northern California

Odometer 53677 miles
Trip Meter 165 miles


We decided to take the coastal route, at least for the first couple hundred miles.  We were all ready.  Really!  Stayed overnight in the coach in the driveway, car hooked up, wake up and hit the road.  Not so fast!  Now all of a sudden the turn signals on the car are not responding to inputs from the bus.  Grrr!  It's a brand new cable- we tried it out and it worked great yesterday- now what??  An hour of testing this and that, a phone call to my good friend and fixer Mike and they are working again- not really sure what made it happen- but taking my luck where I can get it.

It's been raining all night and it's still raining- off we go.

The Southern Oregon coast is beautiful, especially this section from Port Orford to Brookings.  Rain not withstanding, we are thoroughly enjoying this.  The windshield is like a gigantic HD TV- no even better than that.   We get to watch the scenery slide by.

Once we get to the Oregon border we cross the Smith River bridge and slide into a redwood forest with tall trees flanking both sides of the road for miles and miles.  The sky is getting lighter and there are occasional streaks of sunlight!  By the time we get through Crescent City, the sky is a pale blue- much better!

Stretches of Highway 101 from Crescent City to Arcata are under construction and there are many places where the traffic is down to one lane metered first north then south by traffic lights.  The road bed clings to the hillside (cliff side) high above the surf breaking on rocks below- until it doesn't.
When the road slides out it's Caltrans's job to pin it back in place.

We arrived in Blue Lake at my sister's house at around one in the afternoon and, as usual, we set up in the street below her house (it's not a busy street)
Phebe had lunch ready and we had a very good time eating and talking well into the night.  Sometime in the late afternoon the rain we left in Port Orford caught up to us again and it rained most of the afternoon and night.
We woke up Sunday to a light over cast and the sun was shining before we were hitched up and ready to leave.  After a delicious breakfast in Phebe's kitchen, we fussed with the electrical cable to the toad car, and finally got all the light working.
After too short a visit, we said our good byes and headed east on Cal 299 east towards Redding and the I-5 corridor.

California 299 climbs almost immediately, going from sea level to the top of 2,263 foot high, Lord Ellis Pass.  The scenery is just incredible, especially now with the bright golden madrones, alders and birches augmenting the dark green firs, redwoods, and pines.
did I mention that the skies were cloudless and the sun was warm, streaming through the windows of our motorhome?  We no sooner descend Lord Ellis than we start to climb Berry Summit at 2,803 feet.  Welcome to the Coast Range.

Entering Willow Creek, CA on Hwy 299

We descended the pass, down into the small town of Willow Creek, CA, elevation 610 feet.  We have explored here before, and as much as we would enjoy doing so again, we are heading over the Sierras and into Nevada before turning south, and winter is already late for these parts.  We decide not to press our luck any farther.

Trinity River

Just out of Willow Creek, we pick up the Trinity River and follow this ribbon of tumbling ice blue water all the way to Weaverville.   The scenery proves too much and we just have to stop to take photos and check out the flora along the banks of the river.









Climbing still we chug to the top of the 2,888 foot high Oregon Mountain Summit and descend into the small town of Weaverville

Weaverville, CA

Weaverville was founded in 1850 during the California gold rush, and has had to re-invent itself several times to survive.  After the gold bust,  Weaverville became a logging community,  and now with the decline of the wood products industry, it has become a tourist destination.  The downtown has been re-vitalized with motels, coffee houses, restaurants, sports outfitters, and boutique stores.  Whatever they are doing, it's working- this is an amazing little town to visit.  We came and played while on our 'Rivers Trip' in 2005 when we took our then motorhome a 1995 Safari Trek, down the Klamath River, up the Trinity River and down the Mad and Eel rivers, and back up the Smith River.

Between Weaverville and Redding we climbed the Buckhorn Summit at 3,213 feet of elevation and descended down into the big city of Redding.  We hustled east through Redding, crossing over Interstate 5, and joined Cal 44 still heading east towards Lassen Volcanic National Park and the town of Susanville.

These first passes and summits were just warming us up for this afternoons introduction to the likes of Eskimo Hill Summit at nearly 6,000 feet.  We are very lucky that the weather has been warm and the snow has held off,

or we would not be taking this route.   

In 2012 we were in this same area on our way south from Medford, and we stayed in the Hat Creek RV park just up the road.  Today though we are still fresh and we have decided to continue on into Susanville for the night.

Susanville is down around 4,200 feet of elevation and Weather. com says that the overnight temps are well above freezing.  When we arrive at the Susanville RV Park the temperature is a pleasant 67 degrees and the sun is shining.  We have stayed at this park a few times in the past and it has always been a pleasant experience.  The sites are generous sized, level concrete drives with grass in between each one.  The utilities are clean and modern, and the laundry is large, clean, and inviting.  We set up the motorhome for the night and are eager to take a long walk and explore a little of downtown.

Good wifi and almost nobody in the park, we decide to stream some video, and after TV and popcorn, we tuck ourselves off to bed.

Your Traveling Friends

Joan and Jeff

Getting Ready to Go!

Odometer:  53512
Trip Meter 248 miles


A few facts about the weather in our hometown.  Port Orford has had an average rainfall of 117.9 inches, which is 201% more than the average nationwide.  Most of this rainfall happens in the months of October through May.  June through September are typically sunny and dry.  
This October has been exceptionally wet.  We usually expect around 5" of rain in October- this year NOAA has recorded over 17" of rain for our fair city.
I share this not because we hate fall and winter here, I mention it because it really impacted our plans for maintenance and improvements to our home on wheels.



On the up-side, the Pacific storms did give us some great surf viewing down at the port.

One of the projects that we wanted to get accomplished was to find out why our main power awning would only deploy a few inches before it would jam up, and threaten not to re-stow itself.  The project got bigger when we discovered that the awning fabric was all crunchy and tearing in some strategic places.  Thanks to YouTube, and several internet forums, Joan and I decided that with a little help we could disassemble and reassemble the awning ourselves.  We measured the old fabric and got online with Tough Tops to order a new one, then, between major rain events, we started the disassembly.


We removed the motor from the end of the awning tube

 Removed the old awning fabric...

When we removed the motor from the end of the roller tube we found a loose screw that was the reason for the awning seizing up as the motor and tube rotate around each other.  It was easy enough to re-install the screw (and tighten up the other two remaining screws).  I used a dab of silicone caulk to ensure they didn't fall out again.

The new fabric arrived and with the help of our neighbors we got it installed.  One job done and ten more to do.

The next project was to replace our aging electrical umbilical cord from the motorhome to the toad through the tow bar.

Nothing looks amiss here does it?  Believe it or not, this old crusty plug was working flawlessly and with the new one the turn signals keep dropping out.  When we are stationary for more than a few hours I will need to dig into the socket on the car, as I suspect that is where the trouble lies.

One last project was to install our wifi antenna on the motorhome.

 

We elected to remove the old CB radio antenna which we have never used, and to use that existing hole in the roof to pass the Cat 5 cable through to the overhead cabinet where the TV/DVD equipment lives.  Well, apparently, the CB antenna was put on with the roof during manufacture,  because the nut holding it in place was above the carpeted ceiling above the driver's seat.  To get the nut loose I had to pull down the  ceiling covering (I call it "carpet") in one of the adjacent cabinets [middle picture] and then use a 4" hole saw on the 1/8" plywood ceiling to get a "hand hole" to the area above the ceiling.  I could just barely reach the nut with a box-end wrench to get it off.  The rest of the install went fairly well.  I sealed the wifi antenna and cable penetration with Sika construction caulk.
A little Dan Tack aerosol contact cement fixed the 'carpet' back to the ceiling covering my 4" hole beautifully.  The cable runs inside the coach through the cabinets over the windshield and down the passenger side to our dining table, where we installed the Mini router, and plugged it into an adjacent 110V outlet.

Next we turned our attention to the care and feeding of the kitty cat that powers our rolling home.  Our Cat 330hp turbo-diesel takes a whopping 19 quarts of oil with each oil and filter change- and it's time to do that now-

Three more quarts and another filter change and the Onan Quiet Diesel genset is good to go for another 6 months too.  It's a good time to crawl underneath from one end to the other to look things over and hit each Zerk fitting with some grease.



 The final bearing that needs to be greased is only accessible by taking the bed completely apart and lifting the steel covers underneath.  This is the infamous fan bearing, which often gets overlooked


There are more projects, but they will have to wait, because it is now time to winterize the house and finish loading the bus.

This summer we added water and waste lines out to our motorhome pad and when we did, we also incorporated drain valves into all the major plumbing lines in the house, that allow us to very quickly and easily shut off the water to the house, and drain all the hot and cold water lines both in the house and out to the yard hydrants.

I still have to manually drain the water heater with a garden hose and then crawl under the house to open up the low-point drain valves.  The valve shown in the photo to the right, has polyester mesh over it to keep insects from crawling in the open valve and nesting.  The red flagging tape alerts that the valve is still open and must be closed before restoring water to the house.

Then finally...

Almost before we knew it- we had done it again- we were ready to go.  Let's get on with the winter of 2016/17 !

Your Traveling Friends,

Jeff and Joan