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

March 9, 2014 Lorraine’s report

Howdy folks, thanks for stopping by. Yep, we are still in Yuma, but our time here is ending soon. Good thing! I’m wanting to move on, you know, like ready to explore new things, new places, etc.

So this week found us buying a new car. Our Saturn was a bit older. It is as old as our coach, a 2007 Allegro Bus and the Bus has 77,000 plus miles on it. So our Saturn had the 77,000 being towed on it as well as the 99,000 more we put on it driving it here and there. We have been all over this nation, to Alaska and back. I loved that car, but it was time to trade it in on a new car. While this car is a bit smaller, Chuck was able to get a new back up camera, plus most of the options from the old car. I guess the gas mileage and other features will more than make up the difference, I hope.

I need to tell Norma when I went in for a pedicure and the gal there said the last person didn’t put on a top coat, and that made the nail look bad and feel nasty; they peeled and looked awful. I went to another place this time. She did a great job, so when/if they get back to Yuma, we’ll go there for pedicures. Just saying.

One day we went to meet up with a bunch of people from Lewis & Clark. There are several that are in this area and we were invited to lunch with them. It was at Da Boyz Restaurant in down town Yuma, and they had a street fair going on, so of course the GPS couldn’t get us directly there. We parked and walked on over to it. We had the Marilyn Room. What a bunch of pictures they had of Marilyn Monroe. She was pretty, but what a life she had.

On Friday night, they had Midnight at the Oasis, where 900 cars came into town for a car show. What a show!! Of course we wanted to watch the cruise. It was fun! So many cars, but they didn’t cruise, the people were not going slowly, they kept up with the traffic; and cars on the left lane didn’t stop at all, they just rolled on by, heading home or whatever.

So that’s it for me…Have a good week everyone..

Hugs,

Lorraine

3/9/14 Chuck’s report

Another good week in Yuma! We are sort of settling into doing one thing a day, don’t want to overdo it and get tired. Besides, the weather is too nice to miss setting outside and just enjoy.

Monday we went to the casino for their special prime rib dinner and of course played the slots for awhile too. This time I managed to walk away with some of their money, just about broke even between us. And the dinner was good too.

We also got a call from the Chevy dealer, he had found a car at a dealer in Phoenix that met all of our needs and wanted us to come by and talk with him. We told him we would come by the next morning to see what he had in mind, after all, we had just come to conclusion that they couldn’t find one and we would wait until we got back to Bellingham before started looking again.

Tuesday morning we headed out to meet some members from Lewis and Clark, the FMCA chapter we belong to. They had set up a meeting place at Da Boyz in downtown Yuma. We found the place but there was a street fair going on so we couldn’t follow our GPS directions but managed to find a way around and got there, in fact, we were the first ones there. But soon there were 7 couples, most from the Pacific Northwest but one from Illinois who spends lots of time in Oregon. We had a good visit and everyone seemed to like the food too. In the past two years we have been able to meet with Lewis and Clark folks in Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, Ohio and Tennessee and every time we get together we have a good time.

After lunch we stopped by the Chevy dealer. Sure enough, the car he found was the correct color and set up like we wanted, not sure why it just showed up. My brother works for GM and I can get an employee type discount through him so the price of the car was fixed and all we could haggle on was the trade in value. I tried to get the same trade in the other dealers offered but didn’t quite get there, close but missed by that far. So we got ready to leave and the sales manager came by to see us, surprise, surprise. He asked what we were looking for, price wise and managed to meet it.

So after we test drove another one from their lot and discussed it some, we agreed to purchase the new one if they would truck it over from Phoenix. Of course, they wanted assurance that we wouldn’t back out of the deal and I didn’t want to make a firm commitment without seeing it first. Finally they agreed, they would have the car delivered the next day and we could see it before signing any papers. Small victory but I felt I won that round.

Wednesday Lorraine had an appointment to get her hair done so dropped her off and came back to the rig. I started taking stuff from the Saturn out in prep for trading it in, boy we carry lots of stuff in the car. I then drove over to pick up Lorraine and while I was there, the salesman called and told me the new car was in and we could come by and see it. So after Lorraine was finished with her hair appointment, we drove to the Chevy dealer.

We checked the car over and sure enough, it was equipped the way we would have ordered it from the factory, well, almost, it did have two options we wouldn’t have gotten. So once more back to the haggling table we we agreed to split the price difference of the two options. They also agreed to pay some of the cost to set it up for towing behind our motor home.

So long story but we are now owners of a 2014 GMC Terrain, silver in color. It isn’t set up for towing yet, we get that done Friday. And we don’t have all the paperwork we need to send to South Dakota for licensing yet, should get that finished this week. But the Saturn is gone and we are driving the Terrain, so far, we like it. It is smaller than the Outlook, it has two rows of seats vs three in the Outlook so we won’t be able to carry as many people with us went we are with a group. A few times we’ve had two other couples ride with us when we were out “exploring”, we won’t be able to do that anymore. But besides being smaller, we like most of the rest, especially the better gas mileage and less towing weight too.

Thursday we needed to return to the dealer to finish some paper work. We also stopped by the indoor swap meet to pick up our second set of chairs we had redone/recovered. They sure did a good job on these too, replaced the rivets on the swivel joints same as the other ones.

Friday I took Lorraine over to a nail place to have her toes done. Last time she had them done was with Norma at Wal-Mart and the didn’t have a good experience, said they treated them like cattle. This time Lorraine was really pleased with the service and the job they did. Later we went to find a place to park and set up our chairs to watch the oldies car cruise, part of Midnight at the Oasis car show in town this weekend. They have over 900 classic cars and they were cruising along a route from 4:30 to whenever. We found a nice spot and get set up about 3:15 or so and waited for the show to start. Sure enough, just after 4:15, the cars started going by and didn’t stop until after 6:00. Sure were lots of nice cars. I had to call our friend Dave in Minnesota to let him know what we were doing, we have gone to the BIG car show there and every time we are at a classic car show, I sort of compare it to the one there. So far, none are even close in size to that one but I like to see the cars anyway and this cruise was certainly nice, especially with the nice weather while we were sitting out.

Saturday we went to the book stores at both the market place and the indoor swap meet, once again, trading some of the books we’ve read for some different ones. Lorraine has been reading for the first time since her stroke 15 months ago and so far has finished three books, yea. She wanted to get some books to continue with the series she has been reading and we found another series for her to start too.

We knew there was a Good Sam rally going on at the fairgrounds so we drove by to see what was going on there but didn’t find much other than about 30 rigs parked, no vendors or anything going on. We were in the area of one of the local casinos, so Lorraine wanted to go by there for awhile. We were there just over an hour and once again I managed to leave with some of their money, Lorraine said she had fun.

Once again, the weather has been really nice. We did have a little bit of rain last Sunday but every other day has been nothing but blue skies. Well, not exactly, a couple of mornings there were some clouds and Friday evening there were clouds while we were at the cruise but no rain. And the temps have been back to the high 80s with the low only getting to the 50s, pretty nice.

Our travel plans stay the same, in about 10 days we we will head towards San Diego for two weeks. I have been wondering if we might be ready to stop traveling but after being here for just over a month, I’m sure getting itchy feet and ready to move on. So guess that answers that question, no I’m not ready to stop yet, to much to see and do yet.

I’ll go through the pictures we took this week and pick out some to add here then get this posted.

We met some Lewis and Clark members at De Boyz for lunch in the Marilyn room.