Here we are, on the road: We’re in Yuma, AZ

Sunday Jan. 27, 2013 Lorraine’s report

Hello from Yuma, AZ. Yes, we did Quartzsite, and yes we made it through to the end, or at least we thought we had had enough and wanted to move on, a week without power, water or sewer is long enough.

Q was a lot of fun; we enjoyed visiting with good friends, Mark/Sue from LA, Steve/Sandy from Oak Harbor, WA, Rob/Norma from Pender Island, BC, Barb/Dennis from Squamish, BC and Richard/Patsy from Victoria, Texas and all the others to numerous to mention.

Everyone had a nice time, it was fun to see everyone, to share in the escapades and enjoy each others company. It was fun to go to the Tiffin Rally, but I didn’t get to meet everyone there, just too many rigs-there were about 25 to 30 rigs-that was before we moved over to RV America.

Thanks to Mark & Sue for trying to get us all together, but with dogs , we all have to be apart here in Yuma. Nice try though.

We will enjoy this week, going into Mexico to the dentist and shopping. For now that is all from me…Still not recovered from the after effects of the migraine I had yesterday. Until next time…

Lorraine

1/27/12 Chuck’s report

We had a great week camping with some of our friends who were at Quartzsite and it’s continued with five couples who came down to Yuma at the same RV park. Mark/Sue and Dennis/Barb are parked in a different area than Steve/Sandy, Rob/Norma and us as the three of us have dogs and they don’t.

Last Sunday we moved from parking with our Tiffin group to RV America group. We’ve been getting together with the RV America group since ‘08 and have made some good friends with them. Steve and Sandy decided to come over when we moved too.

The first spot we picked out was a little distance from the main group as we didn’t want to be near their camp fire plus we could get faced in the direction we needed to be able to watch football on our outside TV. So after we got set up we walked over and met with the group who were there. We hadn’t met any of these folks before, they were either there for their first or second time and we were not down last year to meet them then.

We had a couple of hours before the games started so we went over to the “big tent” to scope things out. There was way too many people walking the isles so we didn’t stay too long but returned back to the rig and watched the two football games.

On Monday morning we moved over to park near the group. After getting set up we went back into town to a different area, Tyson Wells, where we walked thru most of the isles. It appeared there were not as many vendors as in the past years and that turned out to be the case in most of the areas this year. It may be the economy or the increase in rents they have to pay the city, I don’t know. But there are fewer vendors in all the areas we went to this year.

Just about the time we were talking about heading back to the rigs, we got a call from our friends Rob/Norma who were traveling with Dennis/Barb from Canada. They wanted to get directions and it happened they were coming down the road we were at, just about 200 yards or so away. We gave them directions and met them as they passed by us, good timing.

They had to go to the ranger station, check in, pay then go to the dump station and take on fresh water before they would come back to where we were parked. We hung around the vendor area for a short while and as we were driving back we got another call from Rob who wanted us to guide them to where we were staying, good timing once again.

We met them and they followed us through the paths and through one gully and directed them to where they could set up. We had a good time visiting with them then left them to finish their set up. Soon they were set up and we all got together for our normal 5:00 Happy Hour with all the gals bringing food for all.

On Tuesday we headed back to the big tent, it was still crowded but not as bad as on Sunday afternoon. I wanted to pick up a couple of items and do some research on an new tire pressure monitoring system. There were four or five different systems for me to check out, none were the same as the one we’ve used for the past 5 years. The new ones gave pressure and temperature from each tire to the monitor in the rig. The one we had only showed pressure and it was time to replace the batteries in each sensor to the tune of $50 each. With 10 monitors, that would be $500 and all the new ones were cheaper to buy a whole new system, therefore the needed research.

They had systems with consumer replaceable batteries, needed each year or sealed versions that had to be sent back for battery replacement every 5 or 6 years for $20 each. They had sensors that allowed flow through them to add air when needed or others that required the removal of the sensor to add air.

Steve, Mark and Richard were considering buying a new system as well so I was also trying to get a discount if we all purchased a system. So with all that, I got some brochures so I could look them over back at the rig. Soon enough it was time for our 5:00 happy hour so once again we all set around and visited with each other.

The first person we met here 6 years ago, Mike, had been in Los Angles with his significant other, Linda, waiting for her daughter to deliver a new grand child. Mike said he was leaving to come to Quartzsite if the baby wasn’t born and Linda was to stay there to help out after. So Mike showed up a bit before the happy hour, got set up and found out his refrigerator was not working on electric or propane.

We had problems with our fridge earlier this year and ended up changing it out to a residential type. But before we changed it out, I had learned a bit about them and soon realized what the problem was, the recall he had completed on it included as box that would shut down all power if it sensed high temperature. There was a batch of bad boxes that were shutting everything down with a false indication and I knew how to reset the box. As soon as I got it reset, the fridge started working so they didn’t loose anything from the fridge or freezer. Mike was very thankful but that’s just what RVers do, help one another the same as Mark had helped us earlier.

After the happy hour and after the sun set, the temperatures started dropping enough that we didn’t stay outside for too long but separated into someone’s rig to play cards or just visit. Lorraine and I learned a new card game called 99 and played many of the old favorites too.

Next day it was off to the tent and other vendors once again. By now I had pretty well narrowed down the choice of the monitoring system and just had a few questions to ask the vendors. It wasn’t long before Steve and I had settled on the one we wanted. Mark and Richard decided to keep the systems they had and not buy a new one. So Steve and I made the best deal we could and bought ours. We ended up buying the TST system without consumer replaceable batteries.

That night at the happy hour, Mark kept us entertained by telling jokes. A few others around the circle told some too, a good time was had by all. Later, Lorraine and I went back to our rig and took it easy for the rest of night.

I hooked up the new monitoring system and got all the high and low parameters sets. Later I helped Steve set his up but it appeared he had two sensors that were not working. He returned the bad sensors back to the vendor and got two new ones. But even with the new sensors, his system wasn’t working right, he was about ready to return the whole thing and get his money back.

Friday morning folks started leaving our area and heading out. Steve needed to go back and get his system working right and we had a repairman scheduled to do some maintenance on our heating system so we told the others we would catch up with then in Yuma.

Steve finally got to the bottom of his problem, it appears they had two different versions of the same system and he had parts from both and they didn’t play well together. They gave him a whole new system, checked it out and set all his parameters right at their display area and everything worked as well as my system did, yea.

The repairman finished with our maintenance so as soon as Steve/Sandy were ready, we took off for our RV park here in Yuma. Mark/Sue got here first and had them save five spots together but like I said earlier, those of us with dogs had to park in the pet area so it ended up three here and two there.

Most of the places we stay have folks who will wash/wax your rig for you, Yuma is no exception. Plus we’ve found it to be cheaper here than other places. As we were returning from the check in, we saw the folks waxing a rig. We stopped and asked them to come over and talk with us about doing ours too.

The boss came over and soon we all agreed to have our rigs washed and waxed the next day. I called Mark to let him know and he already had them working on his, ha. But it was getting cloudy and soon it started to rain so they had to quit for the day without finishing his.

After we got set up, Sue invited us over to their place for dinner, Tortilla soup and desert. Lorraine brought over some chips and dip and once again we had a good time. Mark once again kept us entertained with exploits of his camping life. It was later than normal when we called it a night and headed back to our place but once again we had a good time.

It rained all night Friday night and was still raining on Saturday so the folks who were going to wash and wax our rigs cancelled. But they will get us either later today or on Monday, no problem for us.

Because none of us had to stay around because of the wash folks, we all decided to head out the Yuma Swap meet or Arizona marketplace. This is another place where vendors have booths set up and lots of RVers come by to check out their stuff. Once again the number of vendors was way down compared to earlier years. But there was still lots of the same things to check out. I think most of us found a few items we just couldn’t live without but no one came away overloaded.

After we left there, we stopped by the indoor swap meet but they had most of the same stuff as the outdoor one and their prices were higher too. Just about the time we were getting ready to meet up, Lorraine developed a migraine headache. She stopped, sat down and took her pills for it then we returned to the car to wait for Steve and Sandy. They followed us very soon after and we all returned back to our rigs. Lorraine went into the bedroom and laid down in the dark but her migraine didn’t get any better so she doubled up on her pills. Soon she fell asleep and when she woke up, her migraine was better but she was wiped out so we just stayed home for the rest of the night. She went to bed very early and got up at normal time, she had to be very tired to sleep that much.

One thing about being in the desert at Quartzsite without any hookups, the rig got dirty and the dirty clothes piled up. I think Lorraine has done 7 loads of laundry in the one plus day we’ve been here plus she’s dusted the whole inside of the coach. Guess it’s no wonder she’s so tired.

The weather had been getting warmer each day while we were in Quartzsite and on Friday it got up into the 70s before it clouded up and started raining. Saturday the temperature got to the low 70s and the rains stopped just before noon but it remained cloudy until just before sundown. The forecast is for warmer weather throughout the week, maybe even getting into the 80s with plenty of sunshine too, just what we were looking forward to.

We paid for a week when we checked in and are still trying to work out our schedule for the next couple of months. We may stay here for a full month as they have a monthly rate that makes it attractive to stay here that long. We haven’t spent any time in the Phoenix area with our coach so we want to got here and check out that area too. Plus there is always Tucson area to check out too, whew, lots of choices and decisions to make. But I don’t think we can make a bad decision, the weather should be good anywhere we go and who knows who we will meet. Ah, what a life!!!

Now to add some pictures and get this posted.

Sunrise one morning while at Quartzsite.