From Plomosa Road December 16th 2013

 

 

December 15th from Plomosa Road 16.6/1.7 (N33 53.206 W114 03.169)

Greetings from Arizona. To some, this lengthy summary of my travels may come as a shock if you are new to the list and may never have seen one before. To others who have endured these missives in years past, just keep the “delete” button handy.

The summer of 2013 passed with lots of activity, largely in the form of trips back and forth to Vancouver Island visiting my mother. She moved from her house to a residential building (Beechwood village) in Sidney back in early summer. Other than that, the Shuswap schedule didn’t vary a lot from other years when I golfed three days a week, got steadily worse, decided to ride a cart in mid-summer because of ongoing hip issues and spent the fall chopping firewood. Thanks to Joe and the crew who felled, hauled and stacked the tree that I would have been unable to manage by myself.

 

This year, the trip south was marked by cool weather, cool enough to convince me that plugging in, both truck and trailer at times, became necessary as temps dropped as low as 3°F (-16°C) at jackpot, NV.

I left the cabin on Dec 1st as usual, snow threatening and weather fairly mild. The deepest snow on my whole trip was probably in Salmon Arm with about 5 or 6 cms on the ground and slick roads. The last things I want to see are icy roads, since the trailer carries a lot of weight and responds poorly to its brakes on slippery surfaces. Most of the trip, however, was on good roads, south from me to the Omak, WA Walmart (N48 24 927 W119 30.449), always the first and last stop of my winter travels, then over the dreaded Blue Mountain Summit on I-84 to Farewell Bend State Park N44 18.503 117 13.467 on the Snake River where, for $17, I had a nice site under trees in a grassy campground. I had been a little concerned on Blue Mountain because a number of large semis were chaining up on both sides of the pass, leading me to think that they knew something that I didn’t. Conditions, however, remained dry enough though I was waiting, particularly on the eastern downslope, for patches of snow and ice that, thankfully, did not materialize. Plugging in is a useful benefit of paying for campgrounds as I can run a small electric heater, save a bit on propane and keep batteries topped up to operate the furnace fan if necessary. In addition, the microwave has power enough to heat a frozen dinner. These things are taken for granted once I arrive in the south where plentiful sun charges batteries via solar panels and I have no fear of running low on power.

 

This year, I sensed that the “house” batteries in the trailer were weakening (a ninth season was asking too much), so stopped at a Camping World in Meridian, ID (west of Boise) where they sold me a new set (Exide GC 135s, on discount with my Good Sam membership) and installed them for me. I reckoned it to be an easy day’s drive from Farewell Bend to Jackpot, NV and Cactus Pete’s world renowned dinner buffet. This was not to be as weather socked in completely just near “Bliss”, ID (not living up to its heavenly promise), snow started in earnest and roads quickly turned icy). On the I-phone, I found Hagerman RV (approx - 42 49.437 W114 53.690) not too far away and booked in. Hagerman is the gateway to Valley of 1000 Springs, along which waterfalls shoot out of the escarpment to join the Snake River below. The next day, only a short drive to Jackpot – I was glad to do this in daylight in clear weather rather than at night in a storm. At Jackpot, temps were predicted to become very cold and did, in fact reach 3°F (-16°C). The casino/hotel at Cactus Pete’s (N41 58.771 W114 40.405) allowed me to plug both truck and trailer in for free while I booked a room connected directly by warm elevator to the dinner buffet. I can live in the trailer with all heaters going at these temperatures but reckon to waste a lot of propane doing so and the lure of a nice shower after many dry nights was too much to resist. I forgot to mention that the trailer usually contains no water, just anti-freeze in the lines and tanks until I arrive at a point of the trip where I feel that it is safe to fill them without concern over freezing. This year, that was Lake Havasu City – even Vas Vegas was experiencing sub-freezing nights.

From Jackpot, it is about a 7 hour drive to Alamo, NV where, normally, I would camp at the Wildlife Preserve on Lake Pahranagat. This night promised record temps for Alamo at 12°F (-11°C) so once again I headed in to a park. In this case, it was the night of the new “Sound of Music” on TV with Carrie Underwood that caught my attention; Alamo RV (N37 21.850 W115 05.598) had cable TV, so I bit the bullet and checked in. Carrie, as always, was photogenic and the show was worth watching. However, Julie Andrews was missing and they used an obviously fake indoor mountain set instead of grassy meadows, so the show only gets 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Next stop – the Blue Beacon Truck Wash in Las Vegas (N36 12.840 W115 07.716). By now, the truck, trailer and bicycle on back were coated in a layer of road salt and badly in need of a scrubbing. I have been to this Wash before - easy to find just off the highway in North Vegas and they do an excellent job. Shiny again, I arrived at Lake Havasu State Park N34 29.671 W114 21.400 for a night to do a water fill-up and hit the Chinese Food buffet not too far away. Unfortunately, this latter had disappeared and the premises were for lease, so I hunted around, then plugged “Chinese” into the GPS and up came the Golden Corral just around the corner. A very worthwhile find, the Golden Corral has senior’s rates and is a very long buffet with all types of foods. The next day, after a shower in the Park facility, a very short drive (15 mi.) to Cattail Cove State Park (N34 21.299 W114 09.952) where friends Dave and Gail Lewis along with Gillian and Ian Wright were camped. Neither Lewises or Wrights plan to camp in the desert this year, seduced by the charms of easy power, running water and clean restrooms. I believe that Dave mentioned a State Park package of 7 nights camping for the price of 5 to make their camping a little more affordable.  Some brief socializing and then on to Plomosa Road the next day – with a stop in Parker at the Walmart for fresh supplies and an external hard drive for my computer. Back at Cattail, Dave had copied some movies and comedy shows from his computer to mine, these to show on nights when nothing acceptable appears on the dish or if Shaw Satellite fails altogether as had been intimated by their reps back in Canada. In order not to clutter my own laptop, the external drive holds a lot of data “on the side”, so to speak.

 

So far at Plomosa 16.6/1.7 (MM 16.6/west on the trail about 1.7 miles), I have seen Walt and Sue Brugger, camped two stone throws away, along with their entourage of friends, as well as Gerry and Heather Percy, who are camped at the west end of Plomosa Road but headed soon to the Yuma area. We have enjoyed reciprocal visits – me to jump start their car with my truck and cables, they to deliver clam chowder. We will likely meet up later in the winter, possibly at Q. RV Show time (Jan 18th). In a few days, Dec 19th, I am expecting the Michauds, Lyn and Linda to show up for a day or two and a quick expedition to Q.Temps here were chilly for a few days (45°/27°) but have now recovered to more seasonal norms of 70°/50°.

 

I was pleased to discover that my Shaw signal works fine with the exception that Canadian HD channels are absent. I can get the same channels in “classic” mode and all the US networks in HD. This might be an alignment thing with the dish or something else so a dish tweak on some quiet day is on the list. Bottom line – I get everything I’m supposed to get but some of it is not in HD (no point in complaining to Shaw or asking questions because, if I do, they will aim the death ray at my dish and that will be that!).   

 

Some of you know that I acquired a “Sleek” signal booster before leaving Canada. It works well at the cabin and also works down here in the desert. Sometimes, it takes a few minutes to get itself focussed but, once connected, it can raise my MiFi Internet signal from 0/1 bars to 2/3 bars, an excellent investment at Canadian Tire last Fall. I was having a little trouble acquiring signal but, after chatting with the Verizon guy who suggested that I should not only place the antenna on the roof (as it was) but also expand its base with some sort of flat metal plate rather than one small washer that I had been using. As it turns out, I have been collecting, over the years, a variety of shortbread biscuit tins given to me by my mother and containing the annual Christmas present of shortbread and Christmas cake. One of these tins, a nice red in Santa Claus theme now holds the “Sleek”. It had to be filled with rocks to keep it from blowing off the roof but seems to do the job quite well and gives the roof a festive appearance at the same time.