Oregon coast and a covered bridge or two

Yes, it's us, back again after all these months that we have spent with family and friends around Washington.  We camped with the family and the girls hosted a great 70th birthday party for Dick at Lincoln park in Seattle.

Now we are slowly heading our way back to Arizona for that winter sun.  We are currently on the Oregon coast and our trip started by leaving Westport Washington and then heading to Long Beach Washington where we hunkered down for the big bad storm with winds to 75 MPH.  We made it from there in the wind as far south as South Beach Oregon. 

Here are a few pictures a day or two after the storm with the ocean still boiling.

 

 

Walking the beach yesterday we ran across this strange formation, where the waves had washed out the dirt between the rocks.

Not man made, thank you Mother Nature.

In another part of the beach we found shell fossils in the rocks.

What a mess with all the kelp that was torn from the ocean and deposited on the beach in huge piles.

This gives you a typical example of the size of the piles.  CC could care less but she did have a great time running circles on the hard packed sand.

I guess this is one way to exercise your dog on the beach?  (Not for us, thank you.)

We took several forest service roads going East from the ocean and headed up into the mountains for a few hours where we found two of Oregon's covered bridges.  If you drive through this one it goes another 100 yards and the road ends in someone's home in the woods.

Turning around and driving several more forest service roads we found the second covered bridge that was rebuilt just a few years ago.  With nice fresh paint.

We headed back west in time for a nice walk on the beach again.
With a few clouds we bid you a fond farewell as the sun prepares to set over the Pacific Ocean for another day.  (Reminiscent of another of Dad's pictures, girls?)

We plan to head east on Monday and would like to spend a few days at Modoc National Forest Obsidian Mines to see how much obsidian we can get in the basement.  Any thoughts on a place to camp in that area?  Southeast area of Goose Lake in Northern California.


To be continued...

Still heading north, Arizona to Utah to Idaho

We are still heading North but taking our time and trying to remember that we are still professional tourists not just travelers.  After our last blog we spent one night at Chinle Arizona and then to Goosenecks State Park in Southern Utah where we spent 3 nights 1000' above the San Juan river.  Dick was not able to to get the coach and the river in one frame.

 

 

 He did get a picture from inside the coach looking down where you can see the river on the right and left of this shot.

Looking over the edge we saw a lot of trash that, let us say, blew over the edge.  Dick got out our ladder to go over the edge with garbage bags and cleaned up most of the area that he could safely do.  He needed to take a break and view the boats on the river.  If you go back to the first picture you can see where he went over the edge.  Or not.

Taking a ride one day in Glenns Canyon National Recreation Area near Goosenecks we got to a point where we were sure there was not a road.  Can you find our Jeep in the lower right corner?  We did make it to the end of the road about 15 miles to a beautiful small spring and valley.

A view of Monument Valley Arizona/Utah off in the distance.

From Goosenecks State Park we headed to Horsethief Campground on BLM property just outside of Canyonlands National Park.  We spent 3 nights there dry camping, rockhounding, visiting friends in the area and playing tourist.  A view looking down into the canyon.

A little away from the edge to get a shot of us for our kids.

 

From Moab area we headed to southern Salt Lake City because we had electrical problems with the Coach.  We contacted GENERAL RV CENTER Draper Utah and they told us they would would find a way to check out our problem the next morning (Friday).  We figured that they would have to order parts and we would be stuck there for a week or more.  They did a great job finding and fixing our problem in a little over an hour and it cost us less than $150.   Great job General RV center.

 

We got out of there in time to travel over 200 miles to find our favorate camp site empty and waiting for us.  We stayed 5 nights at Angel Creek campground in the Ruby Mountains.  Just a beautiful place to sit and relax before heading North again.



From there we needed to dump tanks and do laundry so we headed to Hagerman Idaho where we spent two nights and did a little sightseeing.  We decided to take a ride at this park that was just being completed.  Dick on the horse...

And Jackie decided to ride one of the sheep.

 

To be continued...

Sunset Crater N.M., Wupatki N.M. and Walnut Canyon N.M.

It was finally time to start our trek North to spend the summer in Washington State with our family.  We plan a slow trip with lots of sight-seeing on the way.  Our first stop was Williams Arizona at an RV park.  Nothing exciting there so only one night.  Looking over the maps of the area Jackie found 3 National Monuments that we have not visited and with a little more research we found Bonito Campground just outside of Sunset Crater N.M.  It was a forest service campground with only dry camping but paved roads and lots of trees.  We backed into site 10 figuring this would give us the most sun (solar) during the day and then spent three days hiking all three of the N.M.

 

Our first stop was Sunset Crater N.M. where it had erupted sometime between 1040 and 1100.

 

The side of the mountain and the surrounding areas for miles is now all cinders.

But there is also the remains of lava flow.  Nasty, nasty with all sharp edges, don't want to fall here.

Jackie peaking around a large flow of lava.

Wupatki N.M. consists of several areas of ruins dating back to around 1100 AD.  Our first stop was at Wukoki Pueblo.

 

Then it was off to the Visitor Center and a tour of Wupatki Pueblo with over 100 rooms and thousands of people living in the area at one time.

 

Our last stop was Walnut Canyon N.M. where the dwellings were located both on the upper surface and also along the cliff.

 It was over 200 steps down to the Island Trail--we were just a little sore the next day!

A lot of the canyon walls had very unique erosion that just had to be photographed.

These were three great National Monuments, not to be missed.

To be continued...

North Ranch SKP park and Arizona desert

Yes, we know, it's been awhile so here goes with a more pictures to keep you happy.

Lets back up and at least tell you where we have been the last several months.  November was spent in Pahrump visiting family and sharing Thanksgiving with them.  Then a week or so in Vegas.  Most of December was visiting friends in Yuma, thanks Joy and Mel for the great stay and sharing your Christmas with us.  It was then off to Quartzsite for most of January with friends, camping at two different locations.

 

But the big news is that in mid February we purchased a lot at North Ranch Escapees Rainbow Park just 4 miles south of Congress Arizona.  We will use this as a jumping off place in the winter to visit a lot of central and southern Arizona.  It's only 100 miles from Quartzsite and about 200 to Yuma and about 135 miles to Tucson.  While the park is in the middle of nowhere there is a lot to see and do in the area (read:  rockhounding and photographing). 

 

It's tight but we can get a second rig where our jeep is parked for short stays and can run  30 amp, water and can use our Sewer Solution for dumping, so come visit us, RVing friends!







 

We did a few thing around the property to make it ours and feel more like home, but most of the landscaping was done by previous owners.  Guess that's part of why we purchased it.

  

It's nice to finally get Dick's rocks out of the basement of the rig and into the shed, must be 500 pounds lighter.  We got all settled with a barbecue and camping chairs and then...

 ...it started to snow.  Must have stuck around for all of 2 hours and then it was gone.
 

Lots to see in the area and here is just a picture of the hills with lots of Saguaro Cactus.

Spring finally came to the desert so Dick had to get some pictures to share.

These are Easter cacti.

This Saguaro in the park is estimated to be over 400 years old.  That's a little older than Dick who just celebrated his 70th Birthday.



Love the contrast between the red and shades of green and yellow.

 



Spring in the desert is beautiful with an unbelievable range of colors.

 

 



Just about made this guy into pizza but he stopped on the other side of the road to check us out.

This was our first guest that came to visit.

And this was our first overnight guests that came to visit all the way from the big apple.  Andrienne and Vittorio, thanks for sharing your time with us and hope to see you again real soon.

 

To be continued...