LAST DAYS IN DEMING

This little desert ground squirrel was cavorting near the motor home just before I hauled my backpack out to the Bronco. It was leaving day for me, but Jim has friends in Deming I wanted to visit before I caught my train.

At the Hi Lo Ranch we spent a short fifteen minutes with Jim’s  long time friend Bob Gambol, who took his motor home to the Panama Canal and back with Jim and Bud Kuball in 2004.  Bob was just out of the hospital so we didn’t stay long.  Bob has  traveled  the world over with nothing but a back-pack, an interesting  story I’ll blog another day.

Jim agreed to supply lifetime pizza to a woman who edited his book on that 2004 trip to Central America and the Panama canal.  (She  prefers not to be named or pictured in our blog.)  Her little dog Pixie didn’t mind having her picture taken.

She took us to the Senior Center to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with two of her closest friends, Mary Berg and Pat McKay.  Pat is a person Jim and I  specifically wanted to meet-more on that tomorrow.

Since we both love museums, we went to the Luna County Museum.  We arrived  late in the afternoon and the museum is huge. The collections and variety are among the best we’ve seen.  From  many beautiful china cabinets, how do you pick one item? I  like unusual  the tea pots.

An excellent gallery of beautiful paintings.

An excellent collection of home-made lace.

A hand cranked bell wheel caught my interest, but even more their extensive bell collection.

Three cases of bells, I estimated to hold 1000 bells in each case, with bells from all over the world.

One of three beautifully designed church pews.  I couldn’t take it all in. I expect to return to this museum some day. And, I will post more pictures I took as well.

 

From the museum we headed for the local Moose Club which just happens to be near the Amtrak kiosk. I changed into my traveling clothes  and we had a beer in the bar. And, doncha know, we ran into two women full-time RVers Jeannie and  Leah both from  the LOW’s, a Singles  RV  Club, Loners On Wheels.  Jim had met them in the past at various functions shared with his singles club, the WINS.  They thoroughly enjoy the lifestyle on the road and handle their own rigs. Single women on the road amaze me.

Jodie, (missed her last name)  came whisking through the bar and gave everybody a kiss both males and females.  She is a happy distant cousin of Jodie Foster and looks a bit like her as well.  Jim delcared, “Wow, this is the friendliest club I’ve been to.”  Truth to tell, we find many, many friendly people on the road with wonderful stories to tell.

 

 

FROM COLD TO A SIZZLING 93

We left Murphys and spent the night at Thousand Trails Lake Minden, just north of Sacramento in the small town of Nicolaus. What a pleasant place. A cooling breeze across the lake and a green, private parking place. We listened to a chorus of bull frogs at night and slept like babies. It got cool enough to add a blanket, and then, and then we walked the lake in the morning, hit the road and arrived at the Redding Moose Club. Its 93 degrees outside and there is no shade here. What happened? The weather wimp is complaining big time.
Plus a relay switch keeps popping off giving us fits and starts on the water pump and the whole 12 volt system we use when boondocking.

The saving grace here is the friendly people you meet at Moose Lodge #1006.  Molly Smith has taken up the nearly lost art of tatting, something I tried  years ago and at which I failed. She showed me the basic steps and gave me some hints for practicing before starting a major project.

This piece is beautiful and will be a snowflake Christmas ornament when finished.

Her husband, Mark Smith is hoping to be the first Senator of the State of Jefferson. I’ve know about Jefferson, and heard the story before, but I didn’t know that the Redding Moose Club falls within the boundaries of the State of Jefferson.
Jefferson is roughly 100,000 square miles and uses up part of California, Nevada and Oregon. All of the work for forming this state was done years ago. The various counties involved signed and voted for it; the bill for establishing Jefferson got to the floor of Congress and was set to be voted upon December 8, 1941. It took an immediate back seat when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941.
But around Jefferson, hope never dies. You can read why on their website:http://www.jeffersonstate.com/

And here is a map from Wikkipedia showing the territory involved. If it had passed, the State of Jefferson.
would have been our 49th state.
We also found a couple who represent a different kind of road warriors. They,like us were at a shopping mall. Unlike us, rolling on wheels, they have a back pack and walk it.

QUARTZITE, ARIZONA, MECCA FOR GEMS AND FRIENDS.

Quartzite, Arizona is a mecca for gem and mineral buffs as well as RVers. The gem and mineral show brings about 100,000 RVers to this port. It is then followed by a huge tent show of RV accessories. Suffice it to say, town is loaded with road warriors from all over the U.S. and Canada.

Ever on the lookout for some oddball sign, I did a double take at an RV Proctologist sign. Hope it gives you a chuckle as well.

Arizona also has a number of nudist colonies and Quartzite attracts quite a contingent of nude RVers. This sign on BLM land warns you if you are sensitive to nudity. You may remember from a former blog the picture of Paul, the nude bookstore owner from Quartzite we met in January of 2009.

We weren’t interested in the RV or Gem and Mineral show this year, but Jim wanted to catch up with long time friends, Joan and Jim Belluomini, now westerners, but originally from New York. Jim was also in the nuclear power industry. He retired at 51 years old, just before the Nuclear Power industry pretty much collapsed, and he hasn’t looked back. The two Jims and Joan met in an RV caravan back in 1996. The Belluomini’s now enjoy Washington State as their summer home and wherever they wander,  as their winter home, but they are considering going back on the road full time. Its an addicting lifestyle. Part of the joy of RVing is keeping in touch with old friends and you often do it on the road.

Just as we turned into one of the BLM roads to meet the Belluominis, Jim did a double take as he spotted his old rig going by. He was more excited than a kid at Christmas. He sold his Suncrest in September of 2009, and there it was zipping by. He only had Ned Bedinger’s home phone number in his computer. Luckily, Ned’s wife was home. We arranged to meet at the BLM camp area called Dome Mountain.

Here is Ned with the Suncrest. Ned and his wife,  Jane were Peace Corp Volunteers in the 1960’s to the Phillipines. While there they explored Indonesia and Thailand, two place close to my heart. We enjoyed a beer and conversation. Ned invited us to his place in Washington later in the year.
The RV community is a friendly, engaging community.

WE MADE IT TO ASHTABULA, OHIO

If you like a good ghost story you might enjoy this one. Before we left Smethport, PA. we saw a sign to visit the old jail where the ghost of Ralph Crossmire appeared after he was hung by his neck until dead. We didn’t visit the jail, which is run by the local Historical Society, I believe, but I did go on-line and read his whole story. You can check it out at:     http://www.smethporthistory.org/king.street/jail/crossmiremurder/crossmire.htm

Smethport was a nice town, friendly and pretty with a good sized lake and park.

A huge flock of Canadian Geese make this lake their home. Above is a small portion of the lake and a small portion of the flock.

I walked around the lake on Goose Chasing Trail, appropriately enough. I saw along this wall of greenery on the trail many berry bushes and a huge plop of bear scat. Not a place to walk at night. The park had ball fields, several childrens playgrounds, tennis courts, a skate board area; You can fish and kayak, and sail boats and swim here. A huge barbeque area for group affairs plus many strategically located more private picnic areas with benches. I crossed two bridges over the water. For a small population of about 19,000 people, it was commendable. If I were to chose a place to live in Pennsylvania, this might be it.

Down the road apiece was this figure attached to a hunt and bait shop. Methinks the area is a great hunting, fishing and skiing area, judging from the mountainous terrain of the Allegheny Mountains. And, the main grocery here had better prices compared to what we were paying for items in Ivoryton and Dartmouth.

Yesterday, I attempted to get a picture of a snowmobile crossing sign and missed several of them. But, I finally succeeded after three tries on this stretch of road headed for Ashtabula.

Our journey was somewhat eventful in that a truck turning right pulled within inches of us at a stop light, then backed up and made the narrow turn. I was so transfixed I didn’t get his picture. Likewise when we came to a very narrow underpass. This one, pictured below, was lower than normal, but not so narrow. The transportation department gave plenty of warning that it was coming up. Twelve feet seven inches. The motor home is Eleven feet two inches.

Then, we stopped for lunch and a stretch at Union City and wondered what all the yellow ribbons were for? Maybe vets? Maybe cancer awareness? Its a local thing.

Signs we saw, but not in time to get a picture:
HOME OF FLAMETHROWER BURGERS
(That was Conneaut)
BLIND PERSON AREA
(On cape cod, we saw a DEAF CHILD sign.)
BUCKLE UP ITS YOUR LIFE ITS OUR LAW
SOULSHINES BETTER THAN A SHOESHINE
WORLDS STRONGEST REDNECK
That last one really has me curious. We saw it in three places in two small towns???
Life on the road is fun even whizzing by. We made it to Ashtabula.