Old Tucson (Tucson, AZ)

2015/04/19 davidhobden@mac.com 3 Comments

On Saturday we went to Old Tucson. Another full day of activities! But this time, we had leave little dog ‘Coach’ in the Coach for the day.

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts ( HERE), we made plans with fellow Alpiner’s; Tom and Marilyn Anteau, to tour Old Tucson together. We met them by chance (and good fortune) here in the Agave Gulch FamCamp where they had just returned to – after being in Anchorage, AK. for the last few months. Tom graciously offered to drive, so we piled in his car and made the circa 20 mile trip.

Sign at the entrance to the parking area.

We were able to use another coupon from the booklet we purchased at the FamCamp office and got in for half-price. A reasonable $19 for a full day of fun and activities. Tom mentioned that it had been ~45 years since he was last here.

For those of you that didn’t know, (me included), Old Tucson Studios is a movie studio and theme park just west of Tucson, Arizona, adjacent to the Tucson Mountains and close to the western portion of Saguaro National Park. Built in 1939 for the movie Arizona, it has been used for the filming of several movies and television westerns since then, such as Gunfight at the O.K. Corral and Little House on the Prairie. It was opened to the public in 1960, and historical tours are offered about the movies filmed there, along with live cast entertainment featuring stunt shows and shootouts. (source Wikipedia)

We arrived just in time to join the first of the three guided walking tours that the park offers each day. Our guide was enthusiastic and informative. I had no idea so many films were shot in one place.

After our guided tour, we were released on our own recognizance to visit the many buildings or activities throughout the day guided only by the performance schedule brochure we received at the entrance.

Train station with armored stagecoach. Notice the “High Chaparral” sign in the background.

The first of many skits/shows throughout the day was “Sir William Wiley’s Miracle Elixir Show”, a ~30 minute presentation that was full of bad jokes and slapstick comedy… what fun.

Tom was pulled from the audience to play a part in the little show. His 5 minutes of fame…

Here’s Tom in action. He had to bang the drum on signal… and often the performer(s) would fake him out for everyone’s amusement.

Tom received his consolation prize – an ice-cold bottle of elixir (Root Beer) and was applauded for his efforts.

We continued on to explore the many buildings until the next scheduled performance.

Do you recognize any of these street views from your favorite Old Western Movies?

Here’s Stilla posing in front of the Town Hall.

Here’s Tom and Marilyn walking up the street… probably looking for a gunfight…

No explanation needed:

In the Grand Palace Saloon, we watched “Old Tucson – A Musical History of the Silver Screen”, to live singers. Nice.

Here, “Cookie” gave us a demonstration and informative dialogue on chuck wagons and campfires.

A gunfight skit provided for lots of entertainment. One of several throughout the day.

A western town isn’t complete unless it has a Sheriff’s Office and gallows, right?

Marilyn and Stilla sauntered around town, looking for trouble no doubt. Or are they looking for me and Tom?

Now join us for a little train ride around the town…

Click HERE for more on this miniature train.

We got off the train at the station opposite the “High Chaparral” movie set. Click HERE for more on this.

Building at the “High Chaparral” movie set.

And here’s probably one of the most-filmed locomotives in the world. The Reno.

This locomotive legend was almost destroyed in 1995 by fire. Click HERE and HERE for more information on this.

Here’s a nice shot of the stagecoach coming into town.

And another well-performed skit, complete with high-flying acrobatics and lots of explosions…

Some of the buildings to visit, weren’t buildings at all…

This Saloon-Keep gave us the run-down on saloons ‘back-in-the-day’. I don’t think I would want any of the whiskey or beer they served up back then.

How did the OK Corral get here? I thought it was in Tombsone.

We paused for a few minutes to check out the Bluegrass music playing at the Arizona Theater.

Chinese Alley:

And another skit; a re-enactment of the movie – “Heaven With a Gun“. Well performed.

And here’s another shot of the stagecoach leaving town…

Many of the buildings were chock-full of movie memorabilia and wardrobe items.

What a great place! Another “must-see” if you’re ever in the area. Hope you enjoyed the visit with us and the pics.

After departing the Old Tucson Studio, we took the scenic route back to the campground. We’re going to have to come back to check out the nearby Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. We hurried back to let our respective dogs out of the Coaches, where they’ve been cooped up all day.

Nice views from one of the pull-offs, eh? Once again, the pictures don’t do it justice.

Many thanks to Tom and Marilyn for taking us along with them to check out this very cool attraction. We sure enjoyed it!

Stay tuned to see what we’re up to next…

Oh, and by the way… little Coach did just fine again today all alone. We took him for an extra long walk once we got back 🙂

Arizona

Pima Air & Space Museum (Tucson, AZ)

2015/04/19 davidhobden@mac.com

On Friday morning, we decided to extend our stay here at the Agave Gulch FamCamp located inside the Davis-Monthan AFB. There’s so much to see and do in and around Tucson! We paid for an additional 3 days so we could try to soak in as much as possible. So that puts us out of here on the 21st when we will probably head over to the Escapees Park in Benson. From Benson, we can visit nearby Tombstone and maybe Bisbee. Then, we’ll start heading north to Colorado since the house still hasn’t sold 🙁

After paying $60 for an additional three nights, we also purchased a coupon book from the campground registration office with many half-price deals for local attractions. The coupon booklet cost $15 and we expect to recoup the cost with the savings from the first attraction.

We then jumped in the pickup and drove just outside the southeast gate to the Pima Air & Space Museum. We found out the museum is dog-friendly, so we were able to take little Coach along. We brought his doggie backpack along so we could carry him around when we’re inside the buildings.

With over 80 acres and 300 planes, the Pima Air & Space Museum is quite astounding. Click HERE for more information.

Here’s the entrance to the parking lot:

And here’s the entrance to the main hangar-type building:

We used our coupon booklet to get the half-price discount so the entrance fee was a palatable $15 for the two of us.

Now follow along on our tour… I took a lot of pics as usual, but I pared them down to the following favorites in order to give you a good sample of what’s here at this superb attraction. Hope you enjoy…

World’s smallest aircraft, the Starr Bumble Bee.

Here’s a Chief Warrant Officer Four (CW4) uniform on display (Vietnam era) that I found particularly interesting since I retired as a CW4.

The new Dreamliner 787 from Boeing is now on permanent display here. Click HERE for the news article.

There was even an exclusive separate hangar building for the famed B17 “Flying Fortress”. I really enjoyed all the “nose art” on display in this building.

One building housed all the space related items. They have a lunar module simulator and a space station docking simulator to play with. I landed the lunar module pretty hard… probably caused some damage 🙂

Unfortunately, the bus tour for the AFB “boneyard” didn’t allow dogs, so we weren’t able to go. It would have been an additional $7 and I’m sure worth it… but oh well, maybe another time. At least we were able to take little Coach along with us everywhere else today.

As usual, the exit is through the gift shop… one thing I thought was especially interesting is that they sell old aircraft parts. I wonder if they sell a lot of these items?

Authentic aircraft items for sale in the gift shop.

Dreamliner 787 items for sale in the gift shop.

Here’s a couple aerial view posters of the massive aircraft “boneyard” that were for sale. Click HERE for some more awesome aerial views courtesy of google.

If you like planes (and who doesn’t?) and have a day or two to kill… this is probably the most superb collection of aircraft in the world. I highly recommend this tour. Don’t miss this attraction if you are ever in the area!

We were pretty much beat after being on our feet all day, so we enjoyed a lazy evening and just kicked back in the Coach afterwards. I used the evening to catch up on the previous days blog. And now, as I write this… I’m still a day behind.

Today (Saturday) we toured Old Tucson, which is the old west town made famous as the location for more than 300 movies and TV shows. But, you’ll have to wait until tomorrow…. 🙂

Arizona

Davis-Monthan AFB (Tucson, AZ)

2015/04/19 davidhobden@mac.com

On Thursday the 16th, we left the “dirt farm” in Casa Grande and traveled the 80 miles to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson. We were sad to leave but made plans to get together again for a tour of Tombstone and maybe Bisbee sometime next week. My Mom, stepdad, brother, and Cheryl will drive down to meet us once we get closer to the area. But first we want check out the Tucson area…

I used the AllStays App for Military FamCamps on the iPhone which took me to the Davis-Monthan FamCamp website. From there, I clicked on the directions link which gave me the route through googlemaps. Click HERE if you would like to get the AllStays App for military FamCamps.

We arrived at Davis-Monthan AFB by 12:30 PM. Here’s the gate (below) that the GPS routed us to. We could see the campground to the right just inside the gate. However, as you can see from the photo below, we weren’t going to fit through with the barriers up. We turned the warning flashers on and walked up to the gate guard. He wouldn’t put the barriers down and said we had to turn around and go through the main gate. He offered to block traffic for us while we turned around. About that time, a nice lady that was going out the gate, stopped and came over to introduce herself. She was one of the campground hosts, and confirmed that we shouldn’t try to go through the gate, she had seen others try and fail. So, we disconnected our tow vehicle and did a three-point turn-around with the help of the gate guard. Oh well, another lesson learned – which is; Don’t just trust the GPS, always read the fine print on the website if directions are given, and in this case they were… I just didn’t read them 🙁

After going back around to the main gate without incident, we drove through the base to the campground registration office. We scored a nice site with full hookups for $20 per night. Click HERE for more information on the Agave Gulch FamCamp if interested.

After getting set up and settled in, we jumped in the Silverado and went on over to the BX to browse around. For my non-military readers; BX is short for (Base Exchange). If we were on an Army post it would be called a PX or (Post Exchange).

We made it out of the BX with minimal monetary damage, but then we went to the Commissary to stock up on groceries…

We took our commissary goodies back to the Coach and put things away. Then we decided to drive around and check out the base a little bit before it got dark.

According to my friend Wikipedia: The base was named in honor of World War I pilots Lieutenants Samuel H. Davis (1896–1921) and Oscar Monthan (1885–1924), both Tucson natives. Davis, who attended the University of Arizona prior to enlisting in the Army in 1917, died in a Florida aircraft accident in 1921. Monthan enlisted in the Army as a private in 1917, was commissioned as a ground officer in 1918, and later became a pilot; he was killed in the crash of a Martin bomber in Hawaii in 1924. Click HERE for more information on this cool air force base.

The most interesting thing (for me) about this air force base are the 4000+ aircraft from the Air Force, Navy-Marine Corps, Army, Coast Guard, and other federal agencies including NASA that are stored here for regeneration or recycling. The climate and hard caliche soil provide for ideal storage conditions. The nearby Pima Air & Space Museum offers docent-guided tours through the “Aircraft Boneyard” aka the Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group (AMARG). We plan on going there tomorrow.

Here’s a few pics we snapped while just driving around:

Don’t forget to click HERE to see some really cool aerial views of the boneyard, courtesy of Google.

When we got back to the campground, we drove through the different loops to check out the other sites. And much to our surprise, we saw another Alpine Coach. And we even know who it belongs to. Tom and Marilyn Anteau of Anchorage Alaska!

We last saw Tom and Marilyn at the Alpine Coach “Desert Rat Rally” in Quartzsite. They put their Coach in storage here on the air force base after the January rally and left for Anchorage… they had just flown back into town and pulled their Coach out of storage the previous day. It’s a small RV world after all, isn’t it? It was Tom, who first told us about this somewhat hidden gem of a campground. Thanks Tom!

We made plans with Tom and Marilyn to tour Old Tucson on Saturday. But meanwhile, tomorrow (Friday the 17th) we tour the Pima Air & Space Museum. I’ll do separate posts on those shortly… and yes, I know! I’m behind again on the blog posts 🙂

Stay tuned for lots of exciting pictures…

Arizona

Family Time at the Dirt Farm (Casa Grande, AZ)

2015/04/18 davidhobden@mac.com 2 Comments

It’s been a while since my last post. We haven’t been up to a whole lot, so I’ve been taking a bit of a break from the blog. We’ve been hanging out at the “Dirt Farm” in Casa Grande since around the 2nd of April enjoying some family time with my Mom, Stepdad, brother Steve and his girlfriend Cheryl.

We’ve been parked in front of Mom’s house moochingdocking off their recently installed 50 Amp power. Steve and Cheryl’s house is situated a little ways behind this house on the same ~4 acre lot that they have affectionately nicknamed the “dirt farm”, complete with chickens and ponies.

Here’s stepdad Jimmy working on a little dirt and rock garden in our front yard – oops.. I mean their, front yard 🙂 Jimmy is always busy doing something. Sometimes retirement isn’t easy.

Stilla and my Mom have been pretty good about going on morning walks. They’ve been going distances of at least two, and sometimes three or more miles. I even went with them once 🙂

Here’s stepdad Jimmy and brother Steve working on yet another project. I’ve been helping out as needed to “earn our keep”.

There’s a seemingly endless number of projects to get done here on the “dirt farm”. Here (below) Jimmy is putting in some pavers. I kept telling him they’re crooked but that’s how mom wants it 🙂

Here’s Jimmy at the checkout counter on one of our many trips to Home Depot or Lowe’s. I provided moral support and light lifting as needed.

Mom and Jimmy getting a section of dirt ready for some grass seed.

This is going to be a green lawn some day, I’m told 🙂

The back yard is slowly coming together. The fence keeps Mom’s cats from escaping when they use the “doggie-door”. I call this the “maximum security” area. The “minimum security” area is defined by the fence around Mom’s house where we’re parked, and it separates the two houses on the farm. The “general population” area is around my brother’s house where the ponies and chickens are kept.

Another backyard “maximum security” area view with some recently laid sod.

It hasn’t been all work around here though… we took some time to get in a little ATV’ing one day.

My cousin Dale and his wife Lisa from Denver came by to visit during the Easter holiday. It was great seeing them again.

Cousin Dale hasn’t been on an ATV in years… since the days they still made 3-wheelers! And it was Lisa’s first time. We took turns riding each of the three ATV’s so they could get the full experience. Steven’s quad (below) found some tumbleweeds… I wonder who that was?

Relaxing after a hard days ride 🙂

Lisa and Dale. Stilla and little Coach in the background.

Easter morning started out with my Mom finding some baby “Easter Bunnies” in the horse manure pile she was spreading out for her fruit tree orchard.

Awww… aren’t they cute?

Even our Easter guests weren’t safe from projects while they were visiting. Here we all are, picking up a pool for the ponies that brother Steve and Cheryl bought.

Somehow we managed to fit the round object into the somewhat square hole on the trailer and safely made it back to the farm.

Brother Steve and Aunt Kathy. Steve is describing how the “pony pool” will be positioned in the ground with “ramps” for the ponies to get in and out.

And here we are; out for another meal… something we did often during our time at the “dirt farm”.

We kept busy evenings playing games around Steven and Cheryl’s nice dining (aka game) table.

And sometimes we had “movie night”.

But alas… all good times have to come to an end 🙁 It’s about time to start heading back towards Colorado (weather permitting). The house still hasn’t sold, so we are going to go back to see what we can do. Besides, Stilla wants to check on the daughter(s) and grandson.

But first, we still want to check out some things in the Tucson area that we haven’t seen yet, so we’ll head down to the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base FamCamp. We’ve heard it’s pretty nice.

Goodbye “dirt farm”! And goodbye, Mom, Jimmy, Steve & Cheryl… thanks for putting up with us for a while! It’s getting too hot here anyway 🙂 Hopefully, we’ll be back before the snow hits up north again (wherever we are).

Next stop… Tucson! Stay tuned…

California

Rock Gardens (Imperial Sand Dunes, CA)

2015/04/03 davidhobden@mac.com

After leaving Hemet, CA, we drove back north to I-10. Then we headed east until Indio, where we picked up 111 south to the Salton Sea. This time we opted to go around Salton Sea on the east-side. We traveled the west-side on our way to Pomona a couple weeks ago. The east-side of Salton Sea was certainly more picturesque and we passed several campgrounds and recreation areas. Sorry no pics this time 🙁 But here’s a link to the Salton Sea Recreation area website, HERE.

After Salton Sea, which by the way, is touted as one of the world’s largest inland seas and lowest spots on earth at -227 below sea level, we turned east on 78 to go through the Imperial Sand Dunes.

We traveled this way back in February, I wrote about the Imperial Sand Dunes HERE. We turned south after crossing the dunes and skirted the east-side of the dunes recreational area until we landed at our boondocking spot that Mike and Donna Kuper told us about.

And here we are after ~200 miles for the day.

All alone in the desert again.

This is a rather unique spot with a “rock garden” that someone spent significant time building. It’s exact location to remain undisclosed… we wouldn’t want it to become too popular, right?

We enjoyed the evening desert air outside while I grilled up some bratwursts. Stilla made sauerkraut to complement our meal.

“Why can’t I have some bratwurst?” Little Coach seems to ask.

Little Coach enjoyed some run-around time, he really liked the wide-open space.

And how do you like the sunset views?

This was a nice overnight boondocking spot… thanks for sharing Mike and Donna. If anyone else wants to know where it is, just contact me directly.

On Thursday, we will be back in Casa Grande to spend Easter weekend with my Mom, Stepdad, Brother Steve and Cheryl. And we’re supposed to have some additional relatives show up… We’ll see!

And then, we’ll see what’s next…

California

Pool Time (Hemet, CA)

2015/04/03 davidhobden@mac.com 1 Comment

On Monday, after we said farewell to our Alpine Coach Association friends at the FMCA Rally in Pomona, we traveled a whopping 65 miles and landed at the Golden Village Palms RV Resort in Hemet, CA.

Urban Escape Vehicle parked next to Mike and Donna Kuper at the Golden Village Palms RV Resort.

As I mentioned in my previous post, we chose this destination because fellow Alpine Coach owner and friend, Mike Kuper is staying here with his wife, Donna. Mike blogged about this place @ FlyingtheKoop.com. We last saw Mike, albeit briefly, in Phoenix, AZ when I was getting a new inverter/charger installed. Before that, we were together at the FMCA Rally in Redmond, OR back in August. They did not attend the recent FMCA Rally in Pomona with us, but have been spending the week here before heading south to their next destination. We don’t know when our paths may cross again, so we thought it would be a good opportunity to see them again.

Mike and Donna Kuper posing in front of our truck at the Golden Village Palms RV Resort in Hemet, CA.

This park honors the Passport America discount for three consecutive nights. So we paid $50 for two nights and scored the spot right next to Mike and Donna. Now, it was great to be parked next to them, but the sites here are pretty tight. We couldn’t put the living room slide out all the way without hitting the hedge, and I couldn’t move the Coach over without driving on the concrete pad. The park office sent a maintenance guy over to trim the bushes but it wasn’t enough – I have a few new scratches now. In the morning, the park sent another guy over with a power trimmer that finally got the job done.

Here’s a picture with the slides in after the hedge was trimmed. With the slides out, the thorny bush and fruit tree were mere millimeters away from the paint AFTER trimming.

Here’s the view out our front window. Mike and Donna reported that all the spots were full when they arrived several days ago. Many of the Canadians that frequent this park have already headed north.

On our first evening, we enjoyed some time with Mike and Donna outside their rig. Donna used her Vitamix to make us a caramelized banana pecan ice cream treat. Yum!

Wednesday morning found us enjoying some time at the pool and hot tub(s). Nice 🙂

Here’s my view:

And here’s Stillas’ view:

We also spent some time at the pickleball courts as spectators. Mike and Donna have become quite the avid players… maybe we should take this up for some much needed exercise… 🙂

Here’s Mike in the yellow hat:

We also attended a small Farmers Market that is held each Tuesday at the park. There were only a few vendors, but we still found enough to spend some money on. We bought some peanut brittle; english toffee brittle; home-made salsa; a chicken quesadilla; and a half-dozen tamales.

We made a late lunch / early dinner out of the quesadilla and tamales. Yum again!

Later, Stilla took a bike ride around the huge park with little Coach.

Later that evening, little Coach seemed to have another of his epileptic type seizures. He threw up, then he was wobbly and disoriented, and became very lethargic. I watched over him as he just laid motionless in his little bed for quite a few hours. It was 2 in the morning before he started moving again. He jumped up and seemed like his old self again. I took him for a long, late-night walk.

We missed the opportunity to spend more evening time with Mike and Donna because we were on dog watch 🙁

But, little Coach is fine again now. He has had these “seizures” more than a few times now… the last time was when we were in Yuma a month ago, and before that was last year in Redmond, OR. We’ve committed to not let him eat anything other than his normal dog food and approved treats from now on.

On Thursday morning, with our time here already at an end, we packed up and moved over to an empty site to dump tanks. We had to do this because I couldn’t open the door to the sewer controls with the bushes up against the Coach on the drivers side.

We said our fond farewells to Mike and Donna and plugged our next destination into the GPS. Mike gave us a tip on a sweet boondocking spot that is halfway between here and Casa Grande. We want to be back in Casa Grande in time to spend Easter with my Mom and brother.

See you down the road Mike and Donna!

California

FMCA Rally (Pomona Fairplex, CA)

2015/04/02 davidhobden@mac.com

Once again; better late than never… There was so much to do and see during our time at the FMCA Rally that I couldn’t find time to update the blog. Between Thursday and Sunday – When we weren’t attending seminars, we were either visiting the vendors and exhibitors or driving the golf carts for the volunteer tram service. And of course, there was entertainment scheduled each evening in addition to our evening get-togethers with the Alpine Coach group.

Tuesday thru Friday seminars and events at the FMCA Rally in Pomona.

Friday thru Sunday seminars and events at the FMCA Rally in Pomona.

As expected; our Alpine Coach group met each evening for “Happy Hour”.

One evening, we even had Pizza! Here’s some pics of our group enjoying the Pizza:

We even paused long enough from our pizza to celebrate a birthday!

Here’s some of our group coming back from a fun, full-day of activities. Don’t they look happy?

This place was huge. Their website says that Fairplex is home to the L.A. County Fair, the largest county fair in the world. It’s a good thing we brought our bicycles to get around on. It took a long time to get around, even if you jumped on one of the trams or golf carts.

Here’s a view out the front window of the golf cart that I spent a couple 3-hour shifts driving around in. I was glad we volunteered to drive the golf carts for the handicap transportation service, it was fun.

Except it was no longer fun when my golf cart broke down on my last shift Sunday. We think the battery couldn’t hold a charge any more and the engine wouldn’t auto-start when you pressed the gas pedal. I had to get towed.

We took the time to snap a few pictures at the Railroad Museum and Display that is located along one side of the Fairplex.

And then, there was even a miniature railroad that we visited. This was really cool. The Fairplex Garden Railroad is the oldest and possibly the largest miniature railroad in the US according to their website.

If you look closely, you can even see a lizard that has taken up residence in the miniature Police Department building.

And the NHRA Motorsports Museum is located here. Unfortunately, we didn’t find the time to visit… maybe next time.

And here’s some more pics of our Alpine Coach group enjoying another “Happy Hour” get-together.

We also had other evening entertainment to enjoy. On Friday, western-music singer, Mary Kaye performed. And a really special treat; on Saturday we enjoyed Herman’s Hermits, starring Peter Noone.

Our final evening, Sunday; we were treated to a “Patriotic Night”.

All-in-all, it was a great Rally, however, I don’t think overall attendance met expectations and it seemed a little light on the quantity/quality of vendors from our experience at the two other FMCA Rallies we’ve attended in the past. But we still enjoyed our time here, especially with our Alpine Coach group friends.

Here’s Stilla showing off her goodie-bag of micro-fiber products that she won at one of the raffles. Go Stilla!

On Monday, we packed up along with most of the others (some left Sunday) and jockeyed for a position at the dump station. After taking care of the “dirty-deed” we headed east on 10, away from LA.

Since we still hadn’t decided where our next destination would be, I contacted fellow Alpine Coach Owner and friend, Mike Kuper. I knew Mike and Donna Kuper were staying nearby because I follow Mike’s blog; “FlyingtheKoop.com“. They are in Hemet, CA at the Golden Village Palms RV Resort. Mike told me there was plenty of room there, so I called the resort to check on pricing. They accept our Passport America (PA) discount, so it would be $25 per night. I reserved a couple nights and we headed that way after stopping at a TA to put $150 of diesel in the fuel tank; enough to get us to the next Flying J in Arizona where the fuel is cheaper. We want to be back in Casa Grande in time for Easter with my Mom and brother at the “dirt farm”.

Anyway, I’ll save all that for my next post. C U soon 🙂

California

Free Day (Pomona Fairplex, CA)

2015/03/31 davidhobden@mac.com

We’ve been super busy at the Pomona Rally so I got behind again on the blog… here’s what we did the day after we arrived. I’ll follow this up with a separate post summarizing the Rally for you.

Wednesday was basically a “free day” at the FMCA Rally since it doesn’t officially kick-off until Thursday; with seminars for attendees; and Friday with vendors/exhibitors for the public. So we took the opportunity to drive towards the beach to do some sight-seeing.

There are several organized tours that attendees can sign up for here at the Rally. I believe they bus you to the attraction and baby-sit you for the duration of their tour(s). At least I would hope so – for the prices they advertise for some of those tours! Anyway, one of the tours was for the luxury cruise-ship ‘The Queen Mary‘. We thought to ourselves; that sounds cool; why don’t we just drive there ourselves in the truck and then afterwards drive up the coastline? So we plugged it into our trusty iPhone and used it as a GPS to get there.

When we arrived at the Queen Mary we parked and walked up to the ticket booth. The admission price pegged out our value-meter. No wonder the advertised prices back at the Rally were so exorbitant. The $33 pp admission price was a little much for us and would require that we leave little dog “Coach” in the hot pickup truck and we certainly couldn’t do that.

We just parked the truck and walked with little “Coach” in tow along the harbor area while we snapped some pics:

There was even a Russian submarine next to the Queen Mary that you could tour. Here’s the entrance building and gift shop.

Here’s the submarine named the “Scorpion“. (Click on the name for more information).

After we finished our walk, we exited the parking lot and had to pay $5.00 because we went over the 30 minute “free” time-limit.

Then we headed north along the coastline.

And drove through the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

We stopped at a parking area next to the cliffs and did another short walk.

There’s lots of rules around here… we’re starting to see a trend.

We continued north along the coastline to Point Vicente Interpretive Center. We parked in the lot (surprise! no cost) and wandered around the center which was also free. 🙂

Whale sculpture in front of the Point Vicente Interpretive Center in Palos Verde.

Around the back of the center, many “whale-watchers” were on duty.

And we even got to see a whale from a distance. Stilla’s first one 🙂

Restored whaling boat behind glass at the Point Vicente Interpretive Center in Palos Verde.

The Point Vicente Lighthouse.

Stilla and I then took turns going through the Interpretive Center because there were no dogs allowed of course, and one of us had to watch little “Coach” outside.

Little “Coach” sure enjoyed the wide-open grass for a change.

This was a really nice place, and the interpretive center was very interesting… well worth the time it took to walk through.

We continued north and drove past Redondo Beach because we couldn’t find any convenient parking. It looked like a nice area.

Finally, we came to Manhattan Beach. We pulled into a parking lot and found a spot… of course it had parking meters 🙁

After we fed the parking meter, we went over to the pier and beach access point to find out that no dogs are allowed. So, we didn’t go out on the pier, but took the chance and carried him down to the beach. We made it there and back without getting any California citations.

I think this beach should be renamed as the “no fun beach”. It was pretty much NO to everything here… pretty soon they might not even allow people.

We snapped some pics of the beautiful sunset as we headed back to the Rally.

With all the heavy traffic on the freeways, we decided to get off near Hollywood and drive around a bit since we didn’t have to hurry back.

We drove down Beverly Blvd for miles and miles until we connected with a freeway again.

We got back rather late, but it was worth it.

Check back in for a summary of our activities at the Pomona Rally and then I promise to bring you up to date with where we’re at now.

California

Moving Day to FMCA Rally (Pomona Fairplex, CA)

2015/03/27 davidhobden@mac.com

On Tuesday morning it was time to say goodbye to the Valencia Travel Village and move to the Fairplex, formerly known as the LA County Fairgrounds in Pomona for the Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA) Rally.

It’s been a great Alpine Coach Association Pre-Rally thanks to our hosts/co-hosts; Tris and Carolyn Swan/Joel and Mary Langord. A great time was had by all. Many thanks to them for a superb and successful rally!

We got most everything ready to go on the previous evening after we returned from our totally awesome tour of the Reagan Presidential Library. We dumped our tanks, took on fresh water, etc., This morning – all we had left to do was load the bicycles.

I did an early morning walk with our little dog Coach and took a few pictures of the park. We’ve had a great experience here at the Valencia Travel Village. Too bad we didn’t find the time to check out the pool or hot tub. But, we definitely filled our time here with other exciting things; just see my previous posts for proof of that.

Here’s a picture of the pool directly across from our site.

The “Village Hall” where we had all our fine Alpine get-togethers.

Community fire-pit near the park office.

This is something new that I haven’t seen before. Have you ever seen an LED bulb vending machine?

The Market (General Store) located next to the office.

View of the pool area. Our Coach is directly on the other side.

Another view of the pool area.

And here I see the first Alpine that is leaving for Pomona… better hurry back and get ready to roll also.

We left the park by 8:30 AM and made the 65 mile trip without incident. Although, I’ll still complain once again about the bumpy freeways, the stop and go traffic, and the inconsiderate drivers merging onto the highway.

Here’s the entrance sign to the Fairplex.

And here we met up again with most of the other Alpines that were with us in Valencia along with a few new additions.

We all lined up in the “staging area” and waited for the few remaining Alpines that hadn’t arrived yet so we could all get parked together.

Meanwhile, we all disconnected our tow-vehicles and milled around.

Finally, after all the Coaches had arrived, we were guided to our parking spots.

There appeared to be a little confusion, but the volunteer parking guides finally came through and got us all into our respective spots. We have 30-Amp power from generators that are spaced throughout the lot.

So, here we are; ready for the 91st Family Reunion & Motorhome Showcase, nick-named “California Gold” where the 2015 FMCA Rally expects more than 2,000 motorhomes to gather.

We got set up and downloaded the bicycles to go check out the area. This place is huge.

At 2 PM, we attended a meeting for volunteers. Most of the folks in the Alpine group are going to drive golf carts to help shuttle the disabled throughout the Fairplex. This is the reason we are all here a couple days early before the event kicks off. I drew two 3 hour shifts. One on Wednesday and another on Sunday. However, I traded my Wednesday for a Thursday because a fellow Alpiner had already signed up for a safe driving course that conflicted with the shift he drew. I was glad to help out.

Tomorrow (Wednesday) we plan to take the truck and do some more sight-seeing around the area since there are no planned activities, plus my first golf cart shift isn’t until Friday now. On Thursday, we plan on attending some of the seminars that are scheduled to begin. The event officially begins on Friday when they open the gates to the public.

Stay tuned…

California

Day 4 – ACA Pre-Rally – Ronald Reagan Presidential Library (Valencia Travel Village, CA)

2015/03/26 davidhobden@mac.com 1 Comment

Warning! Another picture-heavy posting today – consider viewing on your computer or laptop instead of mobile device… todays destination was just too cool for me to be able to limit the pictures.

Author’s Note: Sorry this is a few days late, but it took time to sort and format the pics and meanwhile we moved to the Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA) Rally in Pomona with most of our Alpine Coach group and have been pretty busy. But more on that later – First, follow along now on our really neat trip to the library:

My new favorite day of the week (Monday) consisted of an awesome guided tour of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. We are now on day 4 of our Alpine Coach Association Pre-Rally which has not been disappointing in the least. Thanks again to our hosts/co-hosts (Tris and Carolyn Swan) & (Joel and Mary Langord) for a superb rally!

Here’s a copy of our Pre-Rally flyer:

Breakfast was on our own this morning, so everyone could carpool or convoy as early as possible to meet our 10:00 AM tour start-time.

Here’s the sign leading up the long winding road to the top of the hill where the library is situated. It took us less than an hour to make the circa 40 mile trip here from the Valencia Travel Village.

Route up the hill to the Reagan Presidential Library.

Road to Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. Building at the top of the hill in the distance.

Our group gathered in front of the Library and waited for the doors to open.

A full size statue of our late – great president greets visitors at the entrance doors.

We didn’t have to pay the $16 pp entrance fee. It was included in our rally package price.

After the doors opened, we all gathered once again on the backside of the building and waited for our tour guide(s). There was an original section of the Berlin Wall on display to keep us entertained along with a nice view.

View from the back of the building, looking West.

Our tour guide(s) arrived and invited us to take a self-guided tour of the automobile collection that was temporarily on display until it was time for our docent-led tour of the library/museum itself.

And was this collection ever cool! More cars… Yay! And you thought it would just be a visit to the library today 🙂

It seems that the Petersen Museum is being renovated and some of their cars are on display here until they reopen in December 2015. Click HERE for more information on the cars in the Petersen Collection.

Some of the pictures are out-of-focus due to the inadequate lighting in the display area and the “no-flash” rule. I’m sure it’s better at the Petersen Automotive Museum where they all originally hail from. We’ll just have to go back, eh?

And who doesn’t love the Love Bug?

Does anyone remember this one from the movie ‘Grease’?

No intro needed for this next one, right?

Is this a treat or what! And we haven’t even started the tour of the library yet…

We walked down to a lower display area for even more cars.

I wonder if he’d trade in the Alpine Coach for one of these? A ’56 Chevy. As most of you know, I sold my ’57 a couple years ago… it still hurts 🙁

They even had a gold-plated De Lorean.

I don’t think I remember hearing about this one before – According to the placard; Elvis shot this Pantera with his hand gun when it wouldn’t start.

After the unexpected treat of the superb car collection on display, our group gathered again at the front of the building. The tour guide(s) then broke down our ~50 person group into more manageable 8-10 person mini-groups. Our mini-goup tour started off by going directly to Air Force One.

What a view out the huge window.

Here’s looking down into the lower area. We’ll be having our lunch at those tables later.

And here we are before boarding Air Force One. No pictures are allowed at the entrance or inside the plane. The library contracts out to a photography studio and they take your picture for a price $$$ 🙁

Informational placard on Air Force One.

After our tour of the plane, our guide took us to the lower level under the plane. And guess what? More cars! These are a permanent part of the presidential library.

Nice personalized plate, eh?

Our next stop was Marine One on the lower level.

We got to tour the inside the helicopter, but again, no pictures allowed.

And then we got yet another special treat! We couldn’t help but notice that NASCAR legend, Richard Petty was also taking the tour today along with his entourage. I snapped a couple pics but was too shy to ask for an autograph.

Richard Petty in front of Marine One at the Reagan Presidential Library.

He took the time to do a couple pics and autographs for folks that weren’t so shy. For those few that don’t know who “The King” Richard Petty is… click HERE for more info from my friend Wikipedia.

Richard Petty at the Reagan Presidential Library.

We continued on our tour. Do you think Stilla was feeling homesick at the Berlin Wall displays?

And here’s Richard Petty again! Most of our group was so distracted that we weren’t paying attention to our tour guide anymore 🙂

Richard Petty had a few words with fellow Alpiner, Mary Langord. Isn’t she special? 🙂

It was really neat to get the opportunity to see and hear Richard Petty up close and personal. What are the odds that he’d be here the same time as our group?

NASCAR legend, Richard Petty at the Reagan Library.

And back to the library tour:

We got the opportunity to take pictures in front of the podium. Mary Langord looks like a natural orator, doesn’t she?

I even took my moment.

And then our small group waited for our turn in the Oval Office.

Exact replica of the White House Oval Office with many original personal items from President Reagan himself.

Too bad we couldn’t take turns sitting behind the desk 🙂

Finally, we made it to our catered lunch under the wings of Air Force One. And what a good meal it was, with good company.

Here’s Stilla with fellow Alpiner’s, Gary and Renee, enjoying lunch.

After lunch, most folks went their separate ways. However, since we were distracted by our Richard Petty experience, we (and several other couples) went back through portions of the library/museum. We just couldn’t get enough of this really cool place that honors it’s namesake, Ronald Reagan. So here’s a few more pics for you to enjoy as we did…

Stilla even got to go for a presidential ride-along.

Ronald Reagan’s personal belt buckle collection:

We finally found our way to the gift shop. Lot’s of cool stuff.

Hidden around the corner of the building, we stopped to view the F-14 static display. I think a lot of folks missed this.

Picture of the back side. The Berlin Wall piece is in the center foreground.

Memorial around back.

And orchard.

And a fond final farewell to my personal hero – President Ronald Reagan. What a great experience! This is one of the neatest and most informative places we’ve had the pleasure to visit in our travels.

We made it back to the campground to enjoy yet another fine get-together with our Alpine friends. We had a nutritious dessert and some pre-packaged breakfast goodies to take with us on our morning trip over to the FMCA Rally.

Here we are, (with full bellies), getting our final words of wisdom before we pack up and head out in the morning for our next destination.

Hope you enjoyed the tour today. I know we did!

Check back in for a recap of our trip to the Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA) Rally in Pomona… We have to get an early start in the morning in order to arrive in time to meet up again as a group so we all get parked together.

Urban Escape Vehicle .com

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FMCA Rally (Pomona Fairplex, CA)

Free Day (Pomona Fairplex, CA)

Moving Day to FMCA Rally (Pomona Fairplex, CA)

Day 4 – ACA Pre-Rally – Ronald Reagan Presidential Library (Valencia Travel Village, CA)

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