A Huffin’ And A Puffin’ – New Mexico (GA43)

Mary is no longer available for RV traveling, but we remain good friends.
Because we have 4,000+ postings, I’ve invited her to continue posting entries on this blog.

I’m currently in my 22nd year of full-time RVing and my lifestyle is changing, For more info click Here

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The motorhome is parked at Thousand Trails Soledad Canyon RV Resort at Acton, California. I’m expecting to depart here March 27th.

 

 

Since my RVing life is changing (see above), I’m starting to re-visit previously visited places. So rather than constantly re-blogging past entries, I’ve decided to do something different.

 

 

In 2012-2013, Mary and I did a 682 day, 12,679 miles in the motorhome and 8,000 miles in the Bronco, circumnavigation of the United States, which I called The Great Adventure. I called it so because other than my oldest granddaughter’s high school graduation in June in Connecticut, I didn’t know where we would be going or when we would be there!

 

 

So, unless I do something really different and unusual warranting a new blog entry, I’ll be posting entries from that trip.

 

 

This entry was posted March 8, 2012…

 

 

 

Two days ago we departed Douglas, Arizona. We had another planned stop in the Chirichaua Mountains, but with high winds in the weather forecast we pressed on to our current location of Pancho Villa State Park at Columbus, New Mexico.

 

 

The first about 60 miles of the trip along Arizona State Highway 80 went smoothly as the winds from the south-southwest were acting as a tail-wind into New Mexico. However when we turned right and headed east on New Mexico State Highway 9…the 30+ mile an hour winds were for the most part hitting us near broadside for the next about 100 miles. Nothing out there to block the wind…

 

 

 

 

 

As always you may left click upon an image to see an enlarged view and then click once again to see an even larger view…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fortunately we arrived safely at Pancho Villa State Park about 2;00 PM and got settled in as the winds by then had increased to a steady 40+ miles per hour. The winds continued to huff and puff all through the night. Yesterday morning’s sunrise was cloudy and dusty…

 

 

 

 

 

 

As the day progressed the winds increased to about a steady 50 miles per hour with gusts to over 70 miles per hour. Despite the fact that I had managed to park the motorhome so that the winds hit us on the right rear-quarter of the motorhome…we still did a fair amount of rockin’ and rollin’. All day long…it continued. We are at the very southerly end of the park so as the wind rolled in over the open desert we got blasted with sand and dust all day long.

 

 

Here are some photos that I took that do not do the windstorm justice. If it were a clear day, Mexico can be plainly seen only three miles away. Not yesterday…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So we hunkered down and stayed in the motorhome all day. I did a lot of computer work, played some spider solitaire and read. Mary worked on her various projects. When we turned in for the night…the wind was still a huffin’ and a puffin’. It finally died out during the night and this morning things are peaceful and calm once again. It was quite a 36 hour-long experience.

 

 

Local area roads including Interstate Highway 10 all across the State of New Mexico and New Mexico Highway 11 from Columbus to Deming were closed for several hours yesterday afternoon. Wind gusts to 75 miles per hour were reported.

 

 

Winds of these type are somewhat frequent in the southwest as Spring approaches. Two years ago today, March 8, 2011, I published a Blog entry about another high-wind we experienced. It was quite a happening. You can read all about it by clicking this link…
http://wp.me/pDCku-1hV

 

 

Here’s Mary’s Blog entry for that day…
http://wp.me/pDCku-1hY

 

 

I think there is a song with the words “some days are diamonds, some days are dust”. Yesterday was a dusty one…literally. Fortunately they do not happen frequently!

 

 

 

TWO FOR THE PRICE OF ONE! MARY WROTE A MANY GREAT BLOGS…SO WHENEVER SHE PUBLISHED A BLOG POSTING THE SAME DAY THAT I DID…YOU WILL BE ABLE TO READ HER BLOG BY CLICKING THE BELOW LINK! DO IT NOW…!!!

https://otrwjam.wordpress.com/2012/03/08/bisbee-deportation/

 

 

 

 

I HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE PHOTOS.

 Yesterday was partly sunny and 74 degrees. Forecast for today is partly sunny and 63 degrees.

Enjoying nice weather is another joy in the life of a full-time RVer!

The red dot on the below map shows my approximate location in the State of California. You may double left-click the map to make it larger…

Enjoying 65-75 degree temperatures with low humidity most of the year is a primary joy in the RVing lifestyle!

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving”…Albert Einstein

My current travel rig is a 2006 Fleetwood 26′ Class A Motorhome and a towed 1986 Ford Bronco II, Eddie Bauer Model. This photo was taken in the desert at Slab City near Niland, California…

On October 27, 2012, I created a two-minute video titled America The Beautiful. The music America The Beautiful is by Christopher W. French. The photos, which I randomly selected, are from the states of Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Tennessee, Washington and West Virginia (not shown in that order)…are mine. Yup, That’s me standing in front of the Post Office in Luckenbach, Texas…Y’all!

Click this link to start the video. Make sure you have your speakers turned on and go to full screen asap.
http://youtu.be/FfZUzEB4rM8

If you would like to see my YouTube videos, click this link… http://www.youtube.com/user/JimJ1579/videos

There are more than 700 photo albums in my Picasa Web Albums File. To gain access, you simply have to click this link… https://get.google.com/albumarchive/110455945462646142273?source=pwa

If you have not checked out my Ramblin Man’s Photos Blog, you can do so by clicking this link…http://ramblinmanphotos.wordpress.com/

For more information about my books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust

All original works copyrighted – Jim Jaillet -2017

CHICOT PARK ARBORETUM

We read a forbidding weather report and the day dawned dark and cloudy. This squirrel outside our window didn’t seem to mind a bit.

We blogged, showered and breakfasted and got to the arboretum just as it opened. It is part of the park. The first raindrops had already started.

Inside, good displays, pictures of plants identified. Braille leaves like these and bird and animal sounds. Great stuff for kids and big kids. We took the trail maps and chose the shortest one.

I finely learned that this flower is a carolina jasmine. A woody, twisty vine.

The woods are gray and drab during the winter, but you get to see the “bones” of the forest.

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Bright, shiny leaves against the forest gray, draw the eye. A swamp magnolia.

White patches of christmas lichen. Named so because you can also find it in pink, turquoise, green and yellow. Sometimes on the same tree.

More of it  on this dead branch.

A toothache tree. So called because of the swelling bumps that develop on the bark. Double click to enlarge.

The swamp has  more mature cypress than Sam Houston Jones State Park, and less light on this moody day. The rain is stronger.

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The rain chased us home.

Shortly after we settled in, the skies dumped and obliterated the air, the ground, everything. It poured, hailed, and quickly flooded the area around us. We gave up on the idea of hauling our clothes to the laundry. We stayed in all day and read, edited pictures,  uploaded albums and took care of on-line chores. Not without jumping once in a while at a gunshot loud thunder-clap. It rained so hard,  several times I felt the ceiling inside the closets because I feared they must be leaking. Thankfully not.

RAIN, RAIN, GO AWAY!

Our planned trip to South Padre Island got dumped on ALL DAY.  That river is in front of the motor home.

The wind blew and blew. We braved the weather and took my bike to a bike shop. It needed a tire, the brakes adjusted and new derailleurs But, the derailleurs, he told me, will be just as bad in two months carrying it like we do without a cover. A problem to chew over.

The jack rabbits did their best to stay warm by curling up as tight as possible. This one took refuge away from the wind by backing up to a tree.

This one hunkered down in the grass and made himself as round and tucked in as possible.

It was a good day for reading and listening to the weather beat around the motor home giving us some unwanted rock n’ roll. The weather report is telling us we’ll be getting more of the same. With 100 percent humidity, it becomes hard to sleep at night as the temperature warms.

Even so, I don’t think it is a good idea to deal with climate change by salting clouds to reflect sunlight and heat away. It seems to me the more we mess with nature, without a clear idea of what can go wrong, things often get worse down the line. (Cloud salting is a new idea to help mitigate warming climate change.)

Harlingen, Texas – Day 1

Mary remains at home in California tending to medical and personal business issues. She has made her airline reservations to join me at Harlingen, Texas on January 3, 2013.

The motorhome is parked at American Legion Post #205 in Harlingen, Texas.

As always you may left click upon an image to see an enlarged view and then click once again to see an even larger view…

I always like to show the view from the dinette window…

I thought I would stay in Roma, Texas one more day, but I had finished with my business in the area, I had a poor and sporadic Internet signal and the temperature forecast was four degrees less in Harlingen than Roma, 84 instead of 88, those three factors made me move on down the road.

So I drove the motorhome the about 95 miles east-southeast to Harlingen, It was not a pleasant drive. During the entire trip I fought a 35 mile per hour with gusts to 50 miles per hour wind from out of the South which hit the motorhome broadside on the passenger side trying to push me into the next left lane. Since the wind was out of the South it was heavily laden with HUMIDITY! Consequently it proved to be a very tiring drive.

Today I’ll move into the Tropic Winds RV Resort about five miles away and expect to be there until January 10th. All part of my planned hibernation from the colder northern weather. We have a cold front coming into the area for a couple of days…high today is forecast at 67 degrees.

For today’s photos I’m going to show you the Old Roma area near the Roma Bluffs that overlook the Rio Grande River and Cuidad Miguel Aleman, Tamaulipas, Mexico on the other side of the river. You can read about Roma, Texas by clicking this Wikipedia informational link…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roma,_Texas

As always you may left click upon an image to see an enlarged view and then click once again to see an even larger view…

Enjoying old historic towns is another joy of the RVing lifestyle!

The red dot on the below map shows my approximate location in the State of Texas. You may double left-click the map to make it larger…

Enjoying 65-75 degree temperatures most of the year is a primary joy in the RVing lifestyle!

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving”…Albert Einstein

If you have not checked out my Ramblin Man’s Photos Blog, you can do so by clicking this link…
http://ramblinmanphotos.wordpress.com/

All original material Copyright – Jim Jaillet 2012
For more information about my three books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust

POSTING GLITCH

Yesterday, when I wanted to post pictures from Portland, the post managers changed the way pictures load. They never tell you about changes.  They just arbitrarily let you figure it out for yourself. Jim admitted having difficulty as well. He figured it out and helped me out. The new process created an extra step to load pictures, and your pictures no longer load in sequence, they always move to the top position.  Rather than improving the process they made it more difficult. We figure these guys want to impress the boss, or need to validate their presence as an employee so they suggest “improvements”. Hah! It would improve things if they’d get input from users first.

I have a hoard of bridge pictures. One of my brothers worked retrofitting and building new bridges for many years. He decided to move about the country and take pictures of bridges because many of them are replaced as roads expand and population increases. Now, wherever I go, I take pictures of bridges. This one brings you into Portland from the Southeast if I remember correctly.

And this picture tells a story. Makes you wonder if the quest was successful.

Pioneer Square in Portland is loaded with water fountains, water animal sculptures and fun. If you visit, don’t miss Pioneer Square.

It is raining outside. Supposedly we will get flood stage rains of 12 inches. Time to get out the rowboat or I’ll be stranded.  My car is in the Toyota Dealership 60 miles away getting a new battery pack. Supposed to be windy, too. Time to make flight arrangements back to the Motor Home.

CASTING OUR FATE TO THE SUN AND WIND.

This year, the Obama administration moved to streamline the development of large-scale solar projects on public lands by approving vast tracts across the West  identified as the highest generating potential with the fewest environmental impacts. These sites were identified after the results of an environmental impact report.  An area of 285,000 acres, with sites in Nevada, Colorado, Utah, California, Arizona and New Mexico are in the works.  Jim and I saw one of those massive solar plants  being built in New Mexico earlier in the year.  We wondered why it was out in the middle of no-where. We didn’t know about the way the sites were chosen. Anyway, net result is clean power and jobs, jobs, jobs.

When I had my solar installed, there was a handful of people installing under rigid inspections and rules to make sure there was no space for failure during the process. Now I could choose from 600 different solar producers and as many installers. The rigid inspection process is still that way. I’m investigating solar for a rental because costs have come down so far.

And, we get enough electricity from wind power for 13 million homes. The energy department predicts  that by 2030, we could get 20 percent of our energy from the wind, about as much as we now get from nuclear power plants.

But progress on wind power is in jeopardy because Congress  has yet to renew an important incentive set to expire at the end of this year. It is called the production tax credit, or PTC,  Without it orders for wind turbines are likely to stall, impeding our transition away from coal. The wind industry employs over 37,000 Americans, and we need to keep those jobs, jobs, jobs.

The PTC was instituted by the George H.W. Bush administration, a sensible policy where anyone who operates a wind turbine or solar biomass, or other type of renewable power plant that produces a significant level of electricity to the commercial grid, receives a federal tax credit of 2.2 cents for every kilowatt-hour of power it produces for the first ten years of its life. It got renewed by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act stimulus package of 2009.

Two Republicans, Representative David Reichert, and Senator Chuck Grassley have sponsored versions to renew it through 2016 in the house, and 2014 in the senate. Neither measure  has come up for a vote but it is already being heavily lobbied against by the fossil fuel industries.

As a political pessimist, I fear the worst, and hope I’m wrong.  Wind generation is actually competitive in price with the energy produced by NEW coal plants and in my opinion no NEW coal plants should  be issued permits until they can reduce industrial pollution to an acceptable level. Coal plants actually cause deaths from their mercury, soot and carbon emissions, not to mention death to fish in streams.  Wind and solar save our planet from tons and tons of carbon emissions, a clean air benefit for everybody.

THIS HEADLINE WAS IN THE WASHINGTON POST YESTERDAY MORNING:

Security lapses at nuclear site found before break-in
Security problems at Y-12 nuclear complex were identified in classified reports nearly two years before three activists broke into the facility where weapons-grade uranium is stored.
( by Dana Priest , The Washington Post)

After the Japanese disaster, and the huge up front government subsidies to build nuclear power plants (way over the small PTC tax credits), and proven vulnerability of nuclear power plants,  why would we as a responsible nation even consider building more nuclear power plants? The cost to run them  per watt exceeds that of wind and solar. The volatile nature of Uranium, its storage and no ability to render it harmless, are an ever-present danger. In a nuclear plant disaster, the cost to bring it back on-line, if it could be repaired at all, is billions.

If you add into the equation the affects of climate change on hydro power,  wind and solar seem like an even better bet. Check the link below.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/climate-change-challenges-power-plant-operations/2012/09/09/42b26b8e-f6a5-11e1-8b93-c4f4ab1c8d13_story.html

And, don’t get me started on fracking. What a dismal proposal that is. I hope you are listening Obama and Canada.