Cloudy, Overcast Saturday

It was cool and damp feeling when we got up this morning and it has been overcast all day. Since it was cool, I slept in and we didn't go for a walk until early afternoon. Forry walked with me for a while and then went back to Auntie Violet. I had been complaining a bit about having seen all there was to see at the RV park, but I have to take it back.

A couple of days ago I took the dirt road - more like a trail - behind the garbage dumpster. It leads along the outside edge of the park where there are half a dozen RVs that are stored there. But on the other side is the "back yard" of the more permanent RVs across the street from where we are parked. What I was surprised to see were all of the vegetable gardens. I've seen peas, corn, squash, broccoli, beans and lots of tomatoes - some in containers, some in those upside-down hanging pots and some planted in the ground.

But today I was looking up and happened to spot these --

They look like they are the kind of little tomatoes that grow in clusters like grapes. Some of them even look like they're almost ripe.

What I thought was interesting was the shallow hanging troughs they are planted in. I've always thought tomato plants were heavy feeders that needed lots of room for their roots. These plants look like they are happy and thriving. Guess I'll stop by off and on during the next week that we're here and see how they are doing.

A Foggy Day -- And a Walk

There are only a few RVs here at Indian Creek Campground.  The camp has a Halloween party planned for this weekend and then they will close for the season.  We are parked along the edge of the park and there is another parked at the end of the row.

At the edge of the camp is a field of corn.  There is still a lot of unharvested corn around.

Next to the corn field is a field of soybeans.  The leaves have all dried up and fallen off leaving just the stems and stalks.

I counted the pods on a couple of the stalks -- there were 22-24 pods on each one.  This picture isn't in focus except towards the back, but you can see the multiple pods --

As I walked around the campgrounds this afternoon, I came upon a pen with eight llamas. These two males were facing off and snorting at each other.

The campground also has a small pond.  There were a couple of canoes drawn up on the shore. It was pretty stagnant looking --

There were several elder berry bushes in the woodlot beside the campground --

We slept in this morning and woke to fog that didn't burn off until early afternoon.  I washed a load of rugs, read a couple of books and then took a long walk this afternoon. Forry spent most of the day alternately catching up on his Sudoku and taking naps.  I had bought some stew meat the other day along with a parsnip, a turnip and some small onions.  I also had a couple of small yams and some celery that I threw in the stew pot along with some leftover wine.  It smelled so good when I came back in the house -- and tasted great with some biscuits.

Sunday Evening

It's Sunday evening and we are sitting in the car on the top of the hill above the ranch. Not sure what is going on -- either the AT&T tower or my air card or something in my computer is NOT working right! But at least I have been able to get on line up here!



We've just returned from a VERY busy and full day. After church this morning, we went to lunch with Colleen and Dennis who quizzed us for a couple of hours about life on the road. They are pretty serious about selling their house and going full time RVing. Dennis has a pretty good little business going with his jewelry making (he makes a variety of bracelets, rings, earrings, etc. from old silverplate spoons) that they think may be enough to make fulltiming affordable.



Later on we went over to Michelle's house for her high school graduation party. It was a beautiful day to be out in the yard and enjoying Diane's catered dinner! Michelle is valedictarian for Ritzville High School -- we're VERY proud of her!

Quartzite Day Two

Greetings from the desert!

It's been a long day. It started with a 7 AM conference call. Now anyone who knows me is aware that I am NOT a morning person. I am a member of a Search Committee that is looking for a new Executive Director of Mennonite Church USA. Most of the other members are either in the mid-west or east coast, so they were well into their mornings already while I was just barely awake... But I think it went well as a first meeting.

The Alpine Coach Association had their business meeting this morning followed by a catered Mexican lunch. It was sort of funny to see a couple of hundred people sitting around in the desert in lawn chairs earnestly discussing by-laws. After the lunch -- which was suisse chicken enchiladas, pork taquitos, refried beans, rice, chips and fresh fruit salad -- they had what they called a "gearhead" session. Basically, it was an opportunity to share ideas, problems and solutions with everyone else. One fellow started it off with a horrendous story about insurance after an RV repair shop burned down with his coach inside. I bet everyone there went back to their coach and reviewed their insurance policies!

This afternoon Forry and I took the toad into Quartzite itself. We have heard so many stories about the area that we were curious to see it. If you think there are thousands of RVs parked in the desert out here, there must be twice as many in Quartzite itself! Every half block or so there is another RV park. Some of them are pretty nice looking with pools and fenced areas while others are not much more than a flat area with water and electric hook-ups. Then there are "RV supply" places where you can get fresh water and propane and dump your tanks. We went by this one neat house that had a iron fellow in a sombrero sitting on one end of a porch bench with his sweetheart on the other. (Unfortunately in the picture, she is hiding rather coyly behind the cactus.)

And yes, Sister Dena, there are flea market type stalls and shops all over the place. They have a really big Hobby, Craft and Gem Show the end of January followed by a Classic Car Show the first week in February. The big Sports, Vacation and RV Show starts this Saturday. The big shows are in a HUGE tent at the edge of town, but there are vendors set up anywhere and everywhere there is a little bit of space.

Besides being a haven for early prospectors, Quartzite is famous for having the US army and navy's only camel post. There is a large rock cairn topped with a copper camel at the cemetery commemorating Hi Jolly (the local pronunciation of Hadji Ali) the camel driver who came to the US with the camels from Arabia. Q is also famous -- or infamous -- for the owner of the local used bookstore, the Reader's Oasis. Paul Wimer has run the bookstore from the early 1990s. Things were a bit looser then and the town was a bit wilder. It's only been the last several years that Paul has been convinced for public decency to at least wear a nether garment. When we first came into the store, he was wearing just it and his hat. When I went to pay for my books -- and get the obligatory picture -- he had put on a sweater as he said "it's a bit chilly today..." (He's a lean scrawny soul, brown as a berry! )

So went our second day at Quartzite.