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

February 17, 2013 Lorraine’s Report

Hello from Pima County Fairgrounds in Tucson, AZ. Yes, it has been a busy week for us. We’ve had a lot of fun with friends, met some old ones and new ones. I’m tired tonight, so it must have been good for all of us.

Last week we went to the Chiricahua National Monument with Steve and Sandy. From this point here in AZ, they took Geronimo when he surrendered to his Florida Prison in St. Augustine, Florida. He was never allowed to go home, spending his days in that tiny, little cell, there far from his homeland. It was pretty awful for him; I just can’t imagine him never being able to return home, so sad for him and his family.

Our plans changed, with Steve/Sandy going up to see the fireworks that are being released for this 4th of July to Lake Havasu, AZ; we continued on with our original plans of being here at least a week in Tucson. It was fun here as Mark & Sue from Lake Charles, LA came and we spent quality time with them.

Mark has been helping Chuck with the TV, and I think they have it all figured out. When we returned from seeing them over at the Lazy Days RV Park, we found we had snow. It was quite cold and the snow had gathered up on the roof, so no TV that night. We watched movies that evening.

The Titan Museum was on the list of things we wanted to see, so we did. We went with Dave & Betty, friends of theirs from one of their work places. I found the museum site to be full of information! The gate attendant was a friend of Mark & Sue’s who worked in Adventure Land with them several summers ago, and he allowed Sue to fire the missiles at an unknown target. These missiles were a deterrent to the cold war and were our defense in case some else wanted to fire anything at us. It seemed to have worked, as nothing was ever fired at us, Thank God!

The restaurant we went to after the tour was in a small town in Toubac, AZ and I have to say it wasn’t very good. Besides getting the last table at 4:45, we waited at least an hour or more for the food, and they didn’t give you any chips n salsa, and my order was messed up, so Chuck ate it. I guess I didn’t need it.

Valentine’s Day found us headed to Mt. Lemmon where we toured the mountains that were kind of like what we saw in Zion, Arches and Moab National Parks. They had had snow, and it was really pretty, kind of high for Chuck, and Mark is still on his O2, but no problems.

We went to the Casino Del Sol for Valentine’s dinner. We weren’t the only ones thinking of going. There must have been several hundred people waiting in line, at least an hour and a half, and they ran out of the lobster! Oh well-the food was good! Chuck & I played a bit and about 15 minutes later, the gals came out of their offices handing out a single red rose to all the players.

Mark & Sue stayed over one day and we asked them to go over and meet Tom, his wife, Cheryl and Harold, one of their relatives who had a heart attack. Tom had worked with Chuck and they went full time on the road after us. We hadn’t met up with them but were close several times. I don’t think we were ever at their home in the Bellingham/Ferndale area but Chuck knew his dad before he met Tom. We went over to have lunch with them at the Lazy Days, then toured some newer buses.

We ended our time and came home. A short time after, we went over to see Mark & Sue, but they were in Tom and Annie’s rig, down the road and over. We visited a short time with them, then decided to go get some dinner. Mark had told us they hadn’t been to the In N Out for food, so we went there. Mark and Sue decided they liked the In N Out burgers.

It was nice to meet Tom and Annie, we hadn’t spent any time with them. They are on their 7th motor home rig and are enjoying America. Way to go!

Today we went to WM to get my prescriptions I didn’t get in Mexico. We went by Casino Del Sol, played a bit and then had buffet again for dinner. There was no line for this one Mark. People were just heading into the buffet shortly after we arrived, it was prime rib and such. Good buffet with a really good baker, everything was delicious.

Guess that’s it for me…until next time…

Lorraine

2/17/13 Chuck’s report

We are in Tucson at the Pima County Fairgrounds, the sites are tight but it’s only $100/week. We have full hookups, even got the last available site with 50 amp electric power. This is a first come, first serve place, they don’t take reservations, just show up and see what’s available. The gal at the front desk told us that they are going to add 50 new sites, hopefully within a year, that will be larger and have full hookups with 50 amps.

On Sunday we rode with Steve/Sandy to visit the Chiricahua National Monument about 30 miles East and 20 miles South of where we were in Benson. This is in an isolated mountain range, seeming to just rise out of the desert. They advertise it as a “Sky Island” because of it’s location above the desert. The Chiricahua Apaches, most notably Cochise and Geronimo, lived in this area until the late 1880 when they were moved to reservations in Oklahoma, New Mexico and even Florida.

Once again, during the great depression during the early 1930s, the CCC or Civilian Conversation Corps were used to build roads, bridges and trails throughout this remote area. Thanks to them, we now can drive our cars to visit the rock formations and such, much better than the trails and whatever were there before.

Monday morning we moved over here to Tucson, only about 30 miles away. Steve/Sandy had an offer to go to Lake Havasu to be with some friends to see the fireworks display put on by the major firework vendors in the country. I think it was for 4 nights, out in the desert and they shoot off and show off their full complement of fireworks. We were invited but decided to hold down the fort here in Tucson instead.

After we got set up and Lorraine got started on some laundry, we went out for a drive, stopped at a couple of places including Camping World. Camping World is at Lazy Days new place, they bought it from Beaudry RV when they went bankrupt. We met up with Mark/Sue who just got there, visited with them for awhile then went out for a nice dinner. It was dark by the time we headed back to our place and we were surprised to find the temperature at 31F and at least 1/2” of wet snow. In fact, the snow was stuck to our satellite dish and we couldn’t get any reception.

Next day was a re-stocking day for us, Costco, Wal-Mart and such. Lorraine was also finishing up on the laundry, I think she did 7 loads in two days. That’s one of the reasons we like having full hookups, laundry in the coach without having to go to a laundry mat.

Wednesday Mark/Sue moved from Lazy Days to the fairgrounds where we are. After they got set up, two of their friends, Dave/Betty, drove over and we followed them over to the Titan Missile Museum.

This is one of the Cold War silos that we had as a deterrent to a nuclear attack from the Soviets. I believe we had 54 silos across the US during the Cold War and they were decommissioned in the 80s when Regan was President. This is the only one still in existence and of course is not operational, in fact, the upper door can not be opened more than 1/2 of the way but we could see down the other side of the partially opened door. What history there is in this place!

During the tour, we were able to walk down to the 4th of 8 levels to the control room where we were treated to a simulated launch with bells and whistles going off. The controls are from the 60s era, almost the same as what we had when I first started working at the refinery in the early 70s, way before digital controls.

During regular duty, there were only four military folks in the silo at any given time, two officers and two enlisted. Each of the officers had a key and both had to be turned at the same time in order for a launch to happen. This was a “fail safe” way to make sure one wasn’t launched by mistake or by a rouge officer. Of course, there was a much larger support group who worked on and kept the missile ready for launch.

They did a lot of testing of these missile and they told us that of all the tests they had ran, 87% were accurately launched and hit the target. The others either failed to fire or didn’t hit the target for some reason. But that must have been good enough because neither us nor the Soviets fired the first missile during the Cold War.

After the tour we headed down to another touristy, artsy-fartsy town, Toubac. After touring the town, we headed on South a bit more to a Mexican Restaurant that Dave/Betty knew about. It opened at 5, we got there about 4:45 to find a large crowd waiting to get in. We managed to get in and get the last table then had to wait over an hour to get our order. They said it is like that everyday, they must be doing something right but both Lorraine and I agreed we have been to better Mexican places.

Next morning we all hoped into Mark/Sue’s car and headed out to explore Mt. Lemmon, climbing to over 9,000’. There is a ski lift on the top, at least that’s as far as we could go on Thursday. There is an active observatory up there too, used as an emergency radar tracking station if one of the Space shuttles would have to land at the White Sands Missile Range, plan C or D for landing one of these. The telescopes on the mountain are still used for astronomical research today.

After our tour was over, we stopped by to walk our dog then headed out to eat, we ended up Casino De Sol for our Valentine’s day dinners. We decided to have their buffet, it was seafood night. But lots of others had made that same decision as we had to wait in line for about 1 1/2 hours just to get into the place. And to add salt to the wound, they told us they had lobster but had served the last one just before we got seated at our table but they still charged us the full price, go figure.

Lorraine and I stayed behind to try our luck on the slots after dinner but should have left with Mark and Sue. Neither of us had any luck but they do have a deal where they will reimburse you with free play up to the amount you lose the first day. So at least we have a chance to recoup our losses on our next visit.

We were able to convince Mark/Sue to stay at least one more day. I had been in contact with a friend of mine from work, Tom and his wife Cheryl who were in town and we were trying to make a connection to see them. As it happens, one of the big RV dealers in town was having a free lunch for any and all who wanted to stop by. So we made a deal to meet Tom/Cheryl and her uncle Harold, at noon at La Mesa RV on Friday at noon.

We had a good visit, it’s been awhile since we’ve been able to talk more than just in passing. Sue and Cheryl found they had some things in common too so I think we all had a good visit and meal. After our visit, we walked through a few of the rigs they have for sale and once again we were unable to find any that would make us want to purchase something other than what we have now.

We then drove across the street to Lazy Days Camping World and RV Park. We were able to find one of a new manufactory’s RV, an Integra. These are made by Jayco who bought out the molds and such from Travel Supreme when they went bankrupt a few years ago. I’ve heard lots about these but this was our first opportunity to see one up close. I think if we HAD to buy a new one now, I would add these to our short list even though they are more expensive than a comparable Tiffin like we have now. But once again, we aren’t in the market for a new rig, we still haven’t found one that we have to have to replace ours.

After we returned to our rigs, we met up with another couple who own a Tiffin motorhome and belong to the Tiffin forum. We had met Tom and Annie at Quartzsite a few weeks ago but didn’t get to know them very well at that time. After visiting with them and Mark/Sue, we decided to head out to ---- yes you guessed it--- dinner.

Mark/Sue have never been to an IN N OUT burger place before so that’s where we headed. We all enjoyed our meal and visit, but I never asked Mark/Sue if they would ever go back to one of these chain restaurants however.

Yesterday morning Mark/Sue decided to leave us and head on East, they have a couple RV rallies they want to attend plus he has doctor visits in Texas too. Once again, we had a good time with them and were sorry to see them leave but as has happened so many times in the past, we hope to meet up with them again in the future. Here’s wishing Mark good results on his doctors’ reports. They are from Lake Charles, Louisiana and will be heading back there to visit with their family.

After they left, we took it easy around the coach for awhile, I might have even checked my eyelids for leaks. Later we headed out to pick up a couple of items from Wal-Mart and order some prescriptions from them too. Because we were “in the area”, we headed out to the casino we were at on Valentines Day to recoup our losses from them. And can you believe it, we both won back the amount we had lost plus a bit more. I was even able to pay back the money Lorraine had given me the other night too.

There is another casino in the same area so we decided to try it too, wanted to check out the restaurants and buffet there. We ended up getting two buffets for $20 so decided to try it. Can’t say it was one of the best we have been too but it wasn’t bad, the deserts were good for sure.

We have to find a place to stay for a next week, will probably just stay here at the fairgrounds as Steve/Sandy will be returning here early next week. After that, we will try out the RV park at Lazy Days, we have a coupon for two free night’s stay plus a free lunch. Seeing as how that is in a different part of town, we haven’t explored that area too much yet so will do that when we stay there. Tucson covers lots of area, I think it must be more than 10 miles across. The area we are in is on the very Eastern edge, not much around us and it takes a bit of drive to get to stores and such while Lazy Days is close to the middle of town with lots of things to see/do around there.

The weather has been getting a bit warmer each day, in fact it hasn’t even reached freezing at night for the last two nights. We have seen cooler temperatures when we were at higher altitudes of course, they said it’s almost always 20F cooler on Mt. Lemmon and that was no exception this time. Daytime highs are getting back into the 70s once again, still not shorts and sandal weather but getting closer.

This week I might have taken more pictures than Lorraine as I was rode in the front seat when Mark was driving and he drove when we went to Titan Missile and Mt. Lemmon. So the pictures may not be up to the normal standards but hope they get the “picture” across.

Driving up the Chiricahua National Monument. Deer just past the entrance to the park.