Friends from Kamloops

On Tuesday, March 24th we had made arrangements with Ross and Diane Anderson to meet for breakfast. They were on a two week vacation and wanted to see and feel some warmer weather. As they had been to Yuma before, and knew we were here, we made arrangements to meet. They had popped around to our location at Yuma Lakes a few days earlier, and invited us to meet for breakfast. Wonderful we said & your on!! Ross & Diane at restaurant where we went for breakfast. We all had been to JB's before & knew they served a smorgasbord breakfast.

Ross & Diane at the motel they stayed at. Knight's Inn on 4th Ave

Marge & Diane with the pool as a backdrop

View down the row of motel units with their VW in the foreground.

We arrived at the motel they were staying at at the appointed time. It is an older property but very functional & I was surprised at the reasonable daily cost & the size of there unit. It had a very nice size living area and also a very large bedroom area, with a full bathroom off it. It came complete with microwave, fridge, coffee maker, & kitchen assessories. Also complete with morning complimentory breakfast. We had stayed in this motel ourselves a couple of years earlier.

Off we go for breakfast to JB's. We were there for nearly 2 hours, sitting around after we had our fill of breakfast. I'm sure the staff were wondering if we were going to now stay for lunch! We had excellent service with the refilling of our coffee cups and taking away our dirty empty plates, so we could saunter up to the food smorg & refill a new plate. We left there shortly after 11 am & went back to there motel. We hadn't finished our chin wagging and so on we talked till 3 pm. We now had to leave as we had another committment. We talked about every thing under the sun, but never talked about politics or religion. Excellent conversation we had. We left and they were leaving the next morning and headed to Laughlin, NV. Travel safe my friends!!

Grasshoppers & Butterflies

The motorhome front is just covered with smashed bugs!!!!

Covered!!

On the trip from Salome to Yuma Lakes CRA park we encountered many, many grasshoppers & butterflies. This must have been the day, Mar. 15th that nature exploded on us. The front of the motorhome is just plastered with smashed grasshoppers and Monarch Butterflies. Migrating north & thousands chose this route. Not good for them!!! Hundreds met there waterloo on that day, not only from my motorhome but by passing vehicles in general. I glanced at windshields of oncoming vehicles and one would wonder how they could see. Big yellow sploches covered the front of every vehicle we saw. And when we got to out destination, it took some elbow grease and lots of soap and water to remove the mess created from the front of the motorhome.

Wickenburg, AZ

Bob, Darleen, Marge & I drove over to Wickenburg, Thursday morning while we were staying at Salome. A most interesting day was spent in Wickenburg. The city is supported by tourists and many dude ranches in the area. We learned that the city is named after Henry Wickenburg, a german immigrant gold miner who was attracted to the area around 1863. We went to the information center which is housed in the old railway station. This building is the home of the Chamber of Commerce.

Chamber of Commerce headquarters housed in the old railway station. This is also the information center.

Henry Wickenburg, for whom the city is named.

Founder of the Vulture Mine

Old 761 Sante Fe Steam Engine.

The Jail Tree. As the town didn't have any formal jail, your sentence was served chained to this 200+ old mesquite tree

Mrs. Elizabeth Smith, built the Vernetta Hotel(now Hassayampa Building) which was located across from the rail station in 1905
Marge & Darleen sitting on a sculpture that is located in front of the Desert Caballeros Museum.

Bronze sculpture of a miner and his companion.

As stated earlier Wickenburg is a western town that is 55 miles west of Phoenix on Hwy 60 and the flavour is well represented here. We saw many pickups pulling horse trailers throughout the streets here. There are many individual shops that sell unique memorabilia, artwork and one of a kind crafts. There were many beautiful items there that we would have liked, but we don't have any more room in the motorhome to showcase these treasures. After lunch at The Mecca Restaurant & Cantina, of which had been recommended to us, and we weren't disappointed. We slowly walked back to where the car was parked near the old railway station. Along the way we browsed in many of the shops and stopped at many of the bronze statues that had voice recordings when a button was pushed. These recordings at the statues, such as the hotel owner & the miner provided some local insight to what life was like back a hundred years ago. For further information on Wickenburg visit the town website and click on the "bronze statue" link on the home page: http://www.ci.wickenburg.az.us/. Also the Chamber of Commerce is an excellent resource for information & upcoming attractions. http://www.wickenburgchamber.com/atractions.asp

Salome, AZ

Desert Vista RV Park
The dining room!

Soup Friday! Here we are enjoying lunch.
L/R - Marge, Darleen, Bob, Edna, Dick, Vern & Donna. The empty spot is mine.

We left Mesa and drove out Hwy 10 to exit 81. Leaving Hwy 10 we are now on Salome Rd. We travelled about 33 miles at a very leisurely pace and arrived in the community of Salome. At the intersection of Salome Rd & Hwy 60 we turned left and drove approximately a mile arriving at Desert Vista RV Park. The staff were very friendly and all of the parks guests also. Very nice park. We were here on our Coast to Coast membership which made the week we stayed, reasonable. On the Tuesday we went in Vern & Donna's vehicle and 30 miles east of Salome we were now in Aquila. Here each Tuesday they have a flea market on the side of the road and there were also many fresh vegetable & fruit vendors selling there products. We had lunch at the local mexican vendor, then returned to the park in Salome with our purchases. The park we stayed at is a great location if you have an ATV, or some sort of vehicle that travels well over open terrain. For people who like to quad etc. you can travel in any direction for short trips or trips that will take you some of the local mines, or just a fun day trip. Make sure you take water and a lunch, plus extra fuel. A shower is required when you return from your adventure. On Thursday we drove to Wickenburg along with Bob & Darleen(separate story & pictures). On the Friday of each week, the lunch special is eat as much soup and cornbread you would like for $3.50. The volunteer cooks made 6 kinds of soup & they were split pea & ham, Boston clam chowder, chicken noodle, turkey barley, cream of asparagus and California medley(vegetable). You could make as many trips as you would like to the counter, provided you cleaned & washed your bowl out between trips. I ended my trips to the counter after 5 times, only not trying the cream of asparagus. They were all excellent and no one left hungry! On Sunday morning we pulled up stakes and headed to Yuma.

Mesa, AZ and area

We had gone to Mesa, AZ for a couple of reasons. We stayed at Palm Gardens RV Resort (http://www.palmgardensonline.com/ ). We picked this park because of the area we were going to be in for travel and centralization. We had gone there for a wedding. The bride was from our hometown of Kamloops and we have known the parents of the bride for more than 30 years. In fact Maureen, the brides mom lived across the street in Vancouver and was friends of Marge's when she lived there as a child. The other reason was a friend of ours was in the hospital there and we also wanted to see him. So we spent 3 days in Mesa, and Palm Gardens Park is in the Passport America umbrella of parks. This was a gorgeous park with many amenities, but unfortunately we were not able to take advantage of. Would we stay there again, you betcha we would and the cost was really reasonable.

Ocotillo Golf & Country Club, where the wedding took place
Burt & Marge & the brides parents, Maureen & Bob Hickey.

The three days past all to quickly and we were off to Salome , AZ

Coolidge, AZ

Indian Skies RV Resort Entrance Sign

Club House, Office
View down one of the lanes with both United States & Canadian Flags Flying

Our motorhome in one of the pull throughs

Arnie & Maureen Boudreau at their winter home in Indian Skies Park

We left Wellton, AZ mid morning as we weren't in any hurry. We had programmed the GPS for Indian Skies RV Park in Coolidge, AZ and we were on our way. We got to the park around one o'clock, and after checking in we set up and went to check out the park & the amenities. We knew that the Boudreau's had been in this park for several winters and we had been informed at the office they were still there. By the time we located them, they knew we were in the park. Must have been a runner to their location & informed them we were there. We shook hands & hugged. We hadn't seen them in sometime although we both came from the same area of BC. Also, she had her brother & sister-in-law there. We chatted for a while then left. We went into Coolidge looking for somewhere to eat. We settled on Tag's Cafe. Food was good & the price reasonable along with a friendly waitress. Back at the rig and after watching some TV we were tired, so to bed. The next day we once again contacted Buzz & Mo and while there her company left to head to Vegas. We chatted some more and they had commitments so off we went. We walked past the clubhouse and heard music playing. Gotta check this out we say. Inside there was a gtoup of 11 people playing instruments and entertaining the residents that had come to hear the music. We stayed for an hour and even danced a couple of numbers. Fun, fun, fun. That evening we went to the clubhouse as euchre was the game that evening. Marge & I hadn't played it in a long time. We had a lot of enjoyment playing, although we didn't win any jackpots, we had fun! Thursday we have to leave as our time was up at Indian Skies. We had booked in there with Passport America. Good program and parks that are part of the program receive 1/2 of there regular daily rate. Off we go towards Mesa for a few days!