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Sunday, December 29, 2019

Christmas Day, the day after, and the day(s) after that!

I can't believe how fast the days are moving. Actually to be factual......the days are exactly the same length......24 hours......but as we get older the days 'seem' to get shorter. Maybe it's how we use the available hours. Anyway, here I am trying to catch up on the blog posts.

Wednesday, December 25
Of course we started the day with phone calls home and set up a couple of Skype calls with the Gkids. Sounds like everyone is doing fine and Santa found his way to all (the good ones at least!) All our group of friends here at Pilot Knob have kids and grands at home and we all miss them.

Our park is just across the border in California. The station at the end of the access road sells fuel for nearly $2/gallon more than Yuma just a few miles down the road in Arizona.

The start of a nice Christmas morning sunrise. I wanted to get a walk in early today.

The California Highway Patrol station across the Interstate from our park.

A long-legged photographer.

Desert art!


Mid afternoon we all convened over at the Clubhouse for Christmas dinner. The Park puts on the dinner and charges $10/person. Wow, what a feast! Turkey, ham and all the trimmings. Pumpkin pie for desert. Washed down with wine we brought.


What a feast!

Good friends to share Christmas dinner with.....John, Gayle, Bill, Pat, Cheryl

.......and more good friends....Ken, Kim, Bob, Jo-Anne, Deb, Tom.


And a beautiful sunset to cap off a great Christmas Day!


Thursday, December 26
An early morning stroll netted this amazing sunrise over Pilot Knob.




Red glow off the clouds to the east of Pilot Knob

Imperial Sand Dunes all illuminated in the morning light.


We decided to head back down to Los Algodones Mexico to get Cheryl new lenses for her glasses. She brought her prescription with her from Canada and based on recommendations from Bob and Jo-Anne and others we decided to give Meyers Optical a try. New bifocal lenses for her old frames with transition (auto tinting) glass was $100 and they were ready in less than two hours. Wow! We barely had time to shop and eat before it was time to pick up her glasses. Not only that, she says I look better with her new lenses! I should have bought her new lenses months ago!!

Nothing like a fishbowl sized Margarita at 11 Am to start the day off right! 

A hearty lunch.

Not too busy today. It was raining pretty steady by the time we left.

Entertainment. He was much better when he sang in Spanish.
Back at Pilot Knob it was almost time to head to Happy Hour. You do not want to miss these!

Bill and Pat hosted HH in their beautiful Mobile Suite. (that's Bob waving)

Not the best sunset we've seen, but it'll do!


Friday, December 27
Bill stopped by to see if I wanted to watch him do a few circuits with his nice foam Timber plane. Sure I did! The open desert makes for a pretty good flying field as long as the wind is calm. He managed a short flight until the battery gave up and the breeze was almost too strong anyway.

Pilot and co-pilot

Bill doing a pre-flight inspection.

And she is off!

A great landing


We had a lunch date with our neighbors and friends from Gull Lake back at home. They have a place here in Yuma. We saw them a week or so ago but wanted to have one more visit before we head down the road. We may not see them again before we all get home in April. So we met at the Golden Corral. This is not a good spot to go if you are trying to lose weight but we kept the portions reasonable and were able to walk out without assistance.

Next stop was the Yuma Palms Mall. We heard about a great deal on towels so we stopped and picked up a few.

We have such a great time at our Happy Hour gatherings back at the park we hate missing them but tonight it just wasn't going to work out. By the time we visited all the stores and then buy groceries the sun was setting as we got home. We still had laundry to do so that took up the rest of the evening.




Beautiful crescent moon and Venus just above the fading sunset.


Saturday, December 28
Bill stopped by this morning as he was heading out to do a bit of flying. It was very calm this morning and you definitely want to take advantage of that. It doesn't last long before the breeze picks up.

Bill doing a bit of inverted flight.

Ken taking the controls. I can see an RC plane in his future!

Another successful flight

Tom came by to see the action.


I spent most of the morning online with Rogers. They have a pretty good promotion for a 20Gb data plan that includes all the US and Canada. It's $105/month and I'm supposed to be able to get the same deal for Cheryl's phone for $90 more. So that would give us 40GB of data per month and we could get rid of Roam Mobility (our US cell provider) and our Verizon Hotspot that costs about $90/ month for 15 Gb. I still don't have it all straightened out but at the end of the day we'll have higher data for less money and only one bill, not three.

Bob prepping his Lake Erie Walleye. He had a secret recipe......which he shared.

I think it was coat, dip and re-coat if I remember correctly.

Ken the fry-guy and Bob the fish-guy.

We had a great time in Bob and Jo-Anne's beautiful Redwood trailer.
Somehow we all forgot to look outside for a sunset tonight. We must have been distracted!
It's been a great couple of weeks here at Pilot Knob. A fun group of folks to hang out with. We've had some good laughs, shared stories (and maybe the odd lie) and thoroughly enjoyed getting to know these folks better. Hopefully we'll meet up with these folks again at Quartzsite.

We hate to leave but other adventures await so we pull out in the morning heading for Ramona, CA.

......and that was Our View From Here!

Tuesday, December 24, 2019

Christmas Eve in the desert

Tuesday, December 24
We spent a relatively quiet day with only a few chores to do. The day was pleasant but windy again. No rain though.

The biggest and best event of the day started out about 3 PM with an extended Happy Hour over at Kim and Ken's place.......just behind us. The plan was to have a few snacks then have a more complete meal as the afternoon wore on. Everyone brought a contribution. LOTS of food, plenty to drink and of course GREAT company.

The appies were a meal by themselves!

Another table full of food! Some awesome deserts too!


Even though many of these folks we have only met a couple of weeks ago and some even tonight, we all share common interests and have become good friends. All of us have children and Grand Kids that we miss, especially at this time of year, but we offer each other support and understanding and enjoy each others company in lieu of our own family. Actually they become our family even if just for a little while. Even though we come from different backgrounds and locations we find ourselves here together in the desert enjoying each others company. What an great lifestyle we share.

A great group of friends. From left: Tom, Deb, John, Cheryl, Kim, Gayle (Pat's sister), Pat, Bill, Ken, Bob, Joanne.


So as you all gather with family and friends this Christmas whether you are home or away from home, enjoy each others company, eat, drink, be merry and enjoy this festive season and celebrate life. As a wise man told me recently......it is incorrect to say you only live once, in fact you only die once but you live every day. Make the most of every day you have.

Merry Christmas to all our family and friends....near and far!

A very nice sunset tonight.

As with most Arizona sunsets.....just wait a bit longer and it gets better!

We all like to catch the perfect sunset. Joanne, Deb, Kim and Pat.....all looking for the best shot!


.....and that was Our View From Here!




Monday, December 23, 2019

A drive around the area, and a Christmas visit

Sunday, December 22
This beautiful sunrise got me out of bed and out for a walk. So pretty. Worth getting up for.





A bit of a road trip today. We started by heading toward the Colorado River and wound our way north to Imperial Date Farm. We've visited here a few times in the past but this was our first for this season. We bought some dates and some date loaf. So good!


Lots of lettuce growing.


The nets around the date bunches are to catch any dates that may fall off during wind or rain events.



The Cloud Museum is just down the road. I gotta stop there one day.




Next was a trip into Yuma for some groceries then out of town on the I-8, past Pilot Knob and on to the Imperial Sand Dunes. We stopped at the Plank Road display. It reminds me of the roads built over the muskeg in northern Canada to keep the trucks from sinking into the muck. The Plank Road was used over the sand dunes from 1916 to 1924. It must have been quite a sight to watch old Model T cars and early trucks to transit across the dunes on that wooden road.

Folks bring their rigs and sand toys out to the dunes.

These huge dunes are the location for many movies including Star Wars and the latest Jumanji movie.


The dark band is the US/Mexican border

The Plank Road preserved inside the barriers to keep the dune buggies and quads out.

They used the plank road for just over ten years prior to a more permanent road was constructed.

Remnants of the original plank road.

Sand and wind erosion evident on the planks.

The border wall across the desert.



Next was a drive up Ogilby Road north from I-8. This was new territory for us. We drove a few miles north to the old ghost town of Tumco. We wandered around a bit but we hope to make it back here this week to walk through the mile and a half trail.

Ogilby Road heading north from I-8.

Lots of mining activity in the hills. Many abandoned mines.

Huge Ocotillo cactus.



The site of the abandonded gold mining town of Tumco, and acronym for The United Mining Company. The town was all but abandoned by 1905. 

Tailings and mine equipment from Tumco.

Back at Pilot Knob we enjoyed a HH over at Tom and Deb's.

From left: Ken, Tom, Deb, Cheryl, Bill, Pat, Kim.


Back home, time to get supper going so out comes Mister IP. He makes a great stew. Tasty too!

Saute the meat, then pressure cook for 20 minutes. This was cut up Chuck Roast.

Natural release of the pressure for 10 minutes, then add the veggies. Potatoes, turnip and carrots.

Pressure cook for 8 minutes, then natural release pressure for about 5 minutes. Camera lens is steamed.

Tasty stew!!


After supper I needed a walk, so I took some pictures of the various rigs and their lights. A lot of work has gone into some of the displays.

Our laser lights

Tom and Deb's. Beautiful Nativity scene on left is projected. Nice!

Ken and Kim have a colorful display. You have to see it live to watch the dancing lights.

Bill and Pat have their flag pole illuminated. Lots of projected light too.

From around the neighborhood.


Ours....one more time.


Monday, December 23
We stuck around the park today. We had chores to take care of in the morning. Then we got together with the group to join a video call with our good friends George and Suzie (Our Awesome Travels). George has some health issues that prevents them from coming down south this year. We all miss them and certainly enjoyed our video chat.

Part of the group watching the video chat.

Suzie and George. So nice to see and hear them live.

It was just too darn cold and windy for an outdoor Happy Hour today, so after pretending we could tough it out we all headed into our trailer to enjoy a drink, snack and good discussion. It started to rain which helped us justify it was wise to convene inside today! (pics below stolen from Pat!)

The dip.

Part of the group. I'm sure we had room for a couple more.

The rain quit and the sun started to shine. We got a very nice sunset to end the day.





......and that was Our View From Here!