2020 Snowbirds

We arrived home this week from our "Snowbird" trip to the Southwest to avoid much of the Northern Idaho winter.  It was a great trip except for the last several days with the Covid 19 things really taking off.  We decided to head home a little early to be near family and doctors in case the worst happened.  Right now Mona and I have pretty much self isolated ourselves at Rose Lake since we, especially Mark, are in the higher risk groups. 

We left the first week of January.  Last year we left right after Christmas but realized that was too early for us.  It didn't leave us any time to unwind after the holidays.  This year was better although we could have left a few days earlier.  We went straight to our favorite campground along the Oregon Coast near Yachats, OR.  The weather wasn't great but it wasn't difficult for us inlanders to enjoy the ocean no matter what the weather.  

Harris Beach Near Brookings, OR

After Yachats we made our way south along the coast to Harris Beach State Park outside of Brookings, OR, another favorite spot.  We ended up staying a little longer than we expected since the front brakes on the truck were shot.  I had the Ford dealer in Coeur d'Alene go through the truck a week or so before we left.  They gave it a clean bill of health but clearly missed the front brakes.  Fortunately the Les Schwab dealer in Brookings was able to get us in the next day so it didn't delay us much.

From Brookings we headed south west towards Lake Havasu where we planned to spend a few days.  Along the way we came across two nice camping spots to spend the night.  One was Cowboy Camp, a BLM spot near the intersection of Hwy 20 and 16 in California, not far from Williams CA.  Sorry for all the detail but I want to remember where these places are.  The next was after a long days drive past Bakersfield and Tehachapi called Jawbone Canyon.  We were thinking on staying just off the highway next to the railroad tracks near Tehachapi when this rather sketchy looking man walks up and tells up about a better place to stay, Jawbone Canyon near the visitors center.  The guy turned out to be quite an interesting fellow, was part of search and rescue among other things.  We ended up staying in the parking lot since there was a rather severe windstorm that evening.  Both places were really nice, especially for one nighters.  Jawbone Canyon looks like an interesting area to explore so we may spend more time there next time.

Trail to Lake Havasu

We went to our favorite camping spot near Lake Havasu for a few days.  Unfortunately the weather precluded us from taking the kayaks out on the lake.  We did manage to get a few hikes in.  The picture above is a trail to the lake above the slot canyon we almost got stuck in last year.  Once again we met some interesting folks along the way.

Quartzfest

Mona was very patient and we stayed at the annual amateur radio event called "Quartzfest" near Quartzsite Arizona.  Older blog posts talk about that event.  Its a fun event for me, not so much Mona, so this year she took the truck to visit friends in Sedona for a couple on days, where she hiked, visited and got to eat Thai food, something Mark isn't too fond of.

Borrego Spring Campsite near Sultan Sea City

We spent about a week near Borrego Springs.  My Brother and Sister-In-Laws spend a month there every year.  After spending several days there we understand why.  It's a great little town with lots of hiking and culture.  Unfortunately, we always seem to be out of sync schedule wise with Gary and Martha and have missed each other.  We seem to be in the area around the end of January and they in March.  Someday we will make it work to be in the area at the same time.

Max, Diana and Mona in Playa Del Rey

The nice thing about Borrego Springs is that it is a little over an hour drive to Palm Springs where we were to meet up with my brother Dean and his partner Dennis for dinner.  Later we brought the trailer to a friends house near Palm Springs and left it there while we drove into LA to visit with Mona's son, Max and daughter-in-law, Diana for a few days.  We were there for the Super Bowl.  Max is a big 49'ers fan.  It was fun watching his emotions go up and down as the day went on.  Too bad that the 49ers decided to not play the 4th quarter.  What a letdown.

Then it was onto the Voyager Resort near Tucson for a month.  The Voyager is a lot like the resort in Yuma where we stayed last year except it is much larger and older.  The facilities were similar with lots of Pickleball which is why we chose it.  They tended to cater to a slightly older generation than us.  We noticed that the shows they had were mostly music from generations before us.  Mona has a pickleball friend who recommended The Voyager and I have an Amateur Radio friend who used to live down the street who also had many good comments.  Tucson though has a lot more going for it than Yuma.  Yuma has slightly better weather and there is a good kayaking area nearby but that's about it.
 

Sabino Canyon's 7 Falls Hike

Sabino Canyon Evening Bicycle Ride

Valentine's Day Lunch

 We did have a great surprise treat.  Mona's good friend, Delia Owens, (she's now famous for her best selling book)  called one day out of the blue and asked if, by chance, we were in Tucson.  She was giving a speech at a charity event the next day and wondered if we could get together afterwards.  Well Dah... It was great seeing her.  Mona later surprised me by taking me to lunch at the same hotel for Valentine's Day.

Kayaking Parker Lake almost on the Mexico Border

This was the only time we got the kayaks out this year.  We've pretty much decided not to haul them south with us in the future.

Hiking Madera Canyon Super Trail 

 

One day we went to Bisbee, an old mining town that has turned into a small artist and antique community.  It reminds me a little of LaConner Washington.  One of the businesses there recommended by a friend was the Bisbee Olive Oil Company.  The friends said hopefully we will be able to talk to the owner.  We did and he was quite a character with lots of stories.  One of the things he does is collect old record albums which he frames and has hung all over his shop.  We talked with him for well over an hour.

 On the way home from Bisbee we stopped at Tombstone.  It was late and most of the stores were closing.  It's quite the tourist trap.

An outdoor mall surround by gift shops in Old Town Tucson

Tucson has lot more outdoor activities available, bicycling and hiking as well as being a college town.  Needless to say, we liked Tucson a lot better than Yuma.

City of Rocks

Our Campsite in City of Rocks

We were a little sad to leave Tucson at the end of the month, but we had a wedding in Mexico to go to the first week in April and we wanted to spend some time in New Mexico visiting new places.   Once again our friends came through for us by recommending that we stop in New Mexico's City of Rocks State Park.  What and interesting spot.  It's like someone dropped a bunch of huge boulders in the middle of the desert.  We thought we would just stay one night but ended up staying three.  From here on we were heading northwest towards home.  It was also around this time that it became clear that we needed to be concerned about being exposed to the Covid 19 virus.  We began social distancing and either washing our hands or using Purell.

White Sands National Park

The White Sands National Monument was upgraded to a national park in December.  When we arrived in March, all the signs, literature, gifts, still said National Monument.  We camped at the Lee Owens state park nearby as the park has no campgrounds.  We had a great day in White Sands exploring, went on a nice hike and stayed around for the evening ranger's talk.

Along the way heading to the Northwest we spent the good part of one day at the Three Rivers Petroglyph Site.  There is a 3 mile hike that leads you up along a short ridge with over 20,000 petroglyphs.  It was really amazing.  There were spots where everywhere you looked you would see petroglyphs.  Surprisingly this isn't a national monument but administered by the BLM.

 We decided that even though the road to Chaco Canyon National Park includes some 15 miles of dirt road and that it had rained some the last few days, meaning the road would be muddy and slippery, we had to go there.  The truck slid around some on the way in, even in 4 wheel drive, and both it and the trailer got extremely muddy.  Chaco Canyon was truly worth the effort to get there.  It was amazing.  There were just a few visitors there.  I'm assuming the road conditions and people self isolating due to the virus were the main factors in there being so few folks in the park.  The area is such an interesting place.  When walking through the ruins you realize that there must have been quite the community there in the past to build so numerous and amazing structures.  We ended up spend 3 days exploring.  No need to worry about social distancing.  There was hardly anyone there.

 One day we climbed up to the plateau above the valley.  What and adventure.  The trail climbs rather dangerously up the cliff face and then enters this slot canyon about half way up, which you then squeeze and climb through to get to the top.

Once on top its an easy hike to some places where you can overlook some of  the ruins. 

 And another trail takes you some ruins, one not excavated, further up the plateau.  Then, we had to get back down the way we came up!!

Mona's for years has wanted to go back to Canyon deChelly.  Especially she wanted to take a tour down the canyon floor.  On the way there she started calling to reserve a tour for the next day only to find out that the Navajo Nation had just shut down the canyon floor to tours over concerns of the Covid 19 virus.  While the valley floor was closed to us, the canyon rim, administered by the National Park Service, was still open so we figured we would spend a few days in the Park Service campground and drive around the rim.  Wouldn't you know, when we pulled into the campground there were lots of places available.... the reason.... it was to be closed the following morning.  If we stayed the night we would have to be out by 8am.  It turns out that the Park Service had recently turned management of the campground over to the tribe and the tribe was shutting everything down.  There was however one campground, up on the rim, owned by a tribal member, which remained open.  To say it was rustic would be an understatement.  But it did allow us a few days to explore the rim and look down from the many viewpoints into the valley and at all the cliff dwellings.  Thank goodness we have good binoculars and telephoto lenses.  The above picture is Spider Rock which was near our campground of the same name.

It was so interesting to look down at some of the ruins.  Some of the cliff dwellings were very similar to Mesa Verde.  I don't think you could walk through the Canyon deChelly dwellings like those in Chaco Canyon or Mesa Verde.  Even from a distance it is hard to imagine how they were built and lived in them.

Mona spent some time among the Hopi and was anxious to go back and see a village or two.  The Hopi are very private and with the Covid virus even more so.  We did drag the trailer up to the top of one of the plateaus, a rather hair raising experience, and drove thru the village there.  How in the world they survived in ancient times up there is a true mystery.

Last year my daughter and her family were traveling around the Southwest and came upon the Lone Rock recreation site on Lake Powell near Page UT.  They liked it so much they spent most of their time by the lake.  We thought that since we were driving by on the way in we would check it out.  Like them, we ended up spending several nights.  Because of the virus, the Ranger we met said they were not collecting fees and with so few visitors, they were not enforcing the 14 day limit.  We told some friends who were coming home behind us about Lone Rock.  They stopped and also stayed more than the one night they had planned.  They however had to leave as the Ranger came by and told them they were shutting the beach down the next day.  I don't get it.  There were so few people there.  It was a great place to social distance and to remain isolated.

After Lone Rock we made a bee-line for home, only making a few stops along the way.  One was the grocery store in Kanab, UT.  We were really impressed with how they were handling things due to the virus.  They had toilet paper, but they had placed them in bags with 4 rolls each and you were limited to one bag.  Throughout the store they had signs up limiting purchases to one or two items.

Another stop was in Mona UT to get a picture of Mona in Mona

We spent the night in the Cabella's parking lot north of Salt Lake City.  There was a Cafe Rio that shared the parking lot.  It, of course, was closed except for take out.  I was struck by the line outside.  No social distancing there.  People were lined up like they were in a cattle shoot.

Well, that's it.  We have isolated ourselves in Rose Lake since we, and especially me, Mark, with my heart issues, have a higher risk from dying from the virus if we catch it.  Being isolated has made for a great opportunity to put together a blog.  Now what am I going to do??