Tag Archives: RV

Winter Blast – Day 3 (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

2015/02/16 davidhobden@mac.com

Sunday morning found the Alpine SoCal family enjoying another continental breakfast courtesy of our fine rally hosts. Another warm and sunny day was on tap.

After our continental breakfast, coffee, and chit-chat… folks started heading off to begin their individual planned activities for the day.

As we headed back to our coach, we met a couple of our fellow Alpiners returning from their morning hike. Jack had returned to “The Crack” to conquer the route he had attempted the day before. I reported in my last post that Jack turned around yesterday when confronted with the dry waterfall “cliff” that I wrote about. This time, he reported that they had conquered the canyon and had basically taken the same return route that we did.

This park has some very neat trails, hopefully we can get the opportunity in the future to check out some of the others.

However, we had already decided to spend the day checking out the ATV trails on the east side of US 95 that we’d heard so much about. There was reportedly a massive network of riding trails waiting to be explored.

David Guhse took a photo of us – all geared up and ready to go…

We put little “Coach” in his doggie back pack and after a short drive through the residential area across from the SARA (Special Activities and Recreation Area) Park where we are staying, we soon hit the network of trails and were on our way.

Luckily, we had taken our hand-held Garmin GPS so we can find our way back by following our “bread-crumbs”. Otherwise, with the many forks and criss-crossing trails, we might still be trying to find our way back 🙂

Lots of beautiful desert scenery:

After stopping at a particularly difficult section – deep in one of the many valleys. We decided to stop to eat the lunch (sandwiches) that Stilla had packed for us.

We were soon joined by another couple that were out exploring on their Can-Am ATVs. They are also staying at the SARA Park to enjoy the fireworks. Since we also have a Can-Am ATV, we already had something in common. We chatted with them while we had lunch and they shared the location of a mine that they had just found.

They were also carrying along their own little dog, so Coach had someone to talk with as well, while we ate lunch.

After our lunch break, we followed the directions our new acquaintance(s) had given us and soon found the abandoned mine.

It turns out there were at least three separate mines in the immediate vicinity. We walked a little ways from the ATV to check them all out.

Here’s a few pics of some holes in the ground… in case you didn’t know what those look like 🙂

I dropped a rock into this one and never even heard it hit bottom.

More holes:

We used the GPS to keep us on somewhat on track but took an alternate route to get back near our starting point.

What a cool area… so much to explore… definitely have to come back here.

We made it back without incident with plenty of time to spare before our scheduled chicken dinner, also courtesy of our rally hosts.

Here’s some fellow Alpiners enjoying their chicken dinners.

Looks good, doesn’t it? Tasted good too!

After dinner, we had our general membership meeting to discuss old and new business. We successfully dodged (I think) being nominated to host any future rallies. Unfortunately, we just don’t know what our long-term plans are until we can get the house sold, and can’t afford to make any commitments just yet.

Alpine SoCal general membership meeting/session.

Our rally hosts (Nick & Ramona Escamilla) and co-hosts (David & Nicole Guhse) now officially get an A+ rating for their outstanding performance… after the meeting they broke out “make-your-own sundaes” with all the fix in’s.

Everyone crowded in for the dessert. No one was to be denied.

What a treat! I topped mine with the Snickers crumbles as well as the Butterfinger’s chips… yumm.

And what better way to enjoy our dessert than with some more fireworks!

Yes, it’s official… you can get tired of fireworks. After 4 nights – they were still spectacular but were wearing on us just a little. Even little Coach hardly noticed them at all tonight.

It’s been a great rally! A big thank you to our host(s), co-host(s), and all the great Alpine Coach Association members! Tomorrow morning everyone will be going their separate ways… see you down the road 🙂

Stay tuned to see where we end up next… even we don’t know.

Arizona

Winter Blast – Day 2 (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

2015/02/15 davidhobden@mac.com

Day 2 (Saturday) of the Alpine SoCal “Winter Blast” started out with another fine breakfast courtesy of our (so far) outstanding hosts (Nick & Ramona Escamilla) and co-hosts (David & Nicole Guhse).

Notice the Valentines Day motif. awww… 🙂

I heard about a nice hike located right here in the park from Jack Giddens. He and a couple others had attempted it the day prior. Sounded fun, so we decided to give it a try.

The trailhead is located at the entrance to the rodeo grounds here where we are parked, and since the parking area is so huge, we thought we’d get a head-start and drive down to the trailhead parking lot. There we broke out the doggy back-pack and my “sympathy” stick and headed on down the trail.

Coach was perfectly happy with the situation as you can see.

We stayed on the main trail and headed down the wash into a canyon.

I found some information online about this hike, click here and here for more info.

We paused for a flower picture because you don’t see flowers too often here in the desert.

The scenery was incredible.

There are trails all over these hills… see the people way up there in the pic below?

The canyon started to get tighter and tighter…

Even little Coach said; “Carry me again… Carry me…”

We meandered our way through the canyon, which by the way – I understand is called “the crack”.

Finally, we came upon this drop-off that Jack had reported about yesterday. It was like a little dry waterfall chute and was treacherously smooth. Oh, and did I mention it was definitely more than a ten foot drop… this is where Jack and his entourage from yesterday had turned around.

I wasn’t about to turn around after going this far, so I scooted down on my stomach while Stilla held me with my “sympathy” stick (cane). After I was a foot or two from the bottom the cane came apart and I plopped to the bottom. No harm done, just a bump on the knee. 🙂

Once at the bottom, Stilla lowered little “Coach” to me in his back-pack and then Stilla lowered herself while I held her feet as she slid on down.

Now we were committed… no turning back now. Hopefully, there’s another trail to get back out of here!

Next, we came upon a spot where there was no way through without getting your feet wet. I opted to take my boots off and my trousers had the zip-off legs. Stilla decided to trudge on through.

If you were able to stay (balance yourself) on the mini boulders it was only knee-deep.

We continued on… all the while, thoughts of that movie where the guy is trapped in a slot canyon and had to cut off his arm, was going through our minds…

And then, at last! We came back out into the daylight. What a cool canyon.

After coming back out into the open, we saw a trail on the right that went up and back towards the way we came, but this time above the canyon. We followed it up for this magnificent view of the Colorado River.

Then we stayed on the main trail heading back. There were several chances to go higher when the trail forked, bet we were careful to stay on the lower trail… finally we ended up back in the wash where we started before the canyon got tight.

And were we glad to see the rigs back at the rodeo grounds as we got closer to the parking lot 🙂

Nah… it wasn’t bad at all. An awesome way to spend the day… and we got some much needed exercise.

After we got back and relaxed a bit, it wasn’t long before it was time for the scheduled “Cowboy BBQ” sponsored by the park.

Here’s a view of the huge grill sending up some smoke and good aroma as we walked down to the lower parking lot area to partake.

Close-up view of the huge grill. Yummm.

We saved some seats for our fellow Alpiners as the line for the food grew longer and longer.

A band was in full swing.

Here’s a couple pics of our happy SoCal Alpine Coach group:

Good food, Good people, Good fun!

We walked back to the rig to get ready for the evening’s happy hour and fireworks show.

We passed by this mound of sand that was the center of activity for all the kids… and even some teens. They were having a blast sliding down the sand hill… Oh, to be young again, eh?

Another Arizona sunset reflected off the front of the Urban Escape Vehicle.

Then – We all gathered at our designated viewing spot and enjoyed each other’s company and the spectacular fireworks. Here’s a few pics that came out alright once I used the Canon instead of the iPhone. Of course, pictures can’t do justice… you have to see it in person.

There was music and announcements specifically for the fireworks extravaganza on the radio, but it was difficult to get tuned in for whatever reason. At one point, I went to the Coach and retrieved our old AM/FM ’57 Chevy radio that I used to take to car shows. After messing around with it for a while, we were finally able to get it tuned in and hear some of the announcements and music.

And finally, if you want to see some more of the fireworks… just click on the following video clips I recorded with the Canon. Hopefully, they represent a little of the better displays. Several of my clips wouldn’t copy over to the blog due to size. So these will have to do. Enjoy!

Stay tuned for more adventure tomorrow… we plan on taking the ATV out and checking out some of these trails in the area that people here have been telling us about.

Arizona

Winter Blast – Day 1 (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

2015/02/14 davidhobden@mac.com

Friday morning was the official start of our Alpine SoCal group’s “Winter Blast”! It’s at the SARA (Special Activities and Recreation Area) Park in Lake Havasu City. We’re here enjoying the 26th Annual Western Winter Blast Pyrotechnics Show. (Click on the links for more info.)

Here’s our official gathering spot, between the Host and Co-Hosts’ Coaches.

Our agenda for the weekend:

Although on Friday morning we didn’t “officially” have breakfast scheduled – most folks gathered in the morning to enjoy coffee and each other’s company. Here’s a group of our fellow Alpiners out walking their kids in the morning.

Here’s another shot of a row of elegant Alpines. 17 Coaches are in attendance.

We ended up at the end of a row with no one beside us on either side. A row or two away from our “gathering spot”.

Since we had time to kill until Happy Hour and Pizza this evening, we jumped into the Silverado and headed into town. The park is only on the southern outskirts of town, so we didn’t have far to go.

View of Lake Havasu coming into town from the south.

We stopped at a Polaris dealership that had a lot of cool looking off-road vehicles, ATV’s and such… it doesn’t hurt to look, right?

If you have about $30k burning a hole in your pocket – here’s a pretty wild looking new Polaris with a Ford engine you can spend it on. I thought I’d share a couple pics of this unique vehicle. Wonder how many they’re selling?

Looks like a fun “toy”… too bad we can’t afford any more “toys” now that we’re retired 🙂

Although difficult to read – the banner says; “Welcome to Lake Havasu City” under the blazing Arizona sun.

We crossed over the London Bridge onto the man-made island to see if anything changed from the last time we were here in January of last year for the Balloon Fest. Click on the London Bridge link for more info if you don’t already know about it.

We drove down onto the beach and hung out with little dog “Coach” for awhile. He was here last year too – wonder if he remembers?

The Lake Havasu water isn’t as clear today as I remember it from other times we’ve been here. Lots of green algae-like stuff floating along the shoreline. Still pretty though.

The town seems to get bigger each time we see it.

We also stopped at a couple of the lighthouse replicas that dot the landscape in and around Lake Havasu. I believe there are around 24 of these. Click here for more info on those if interested.

We watched folks out on their boats, either fishing or just cruising around. For a brief moment we thought about breaking out the inflatable sea-eagle raft with trolling motor that I carry in the back seat of the Silverado. Stilla squashed that idea… it was getting late.

Stilla is always on the lookout for German bakeries or such. So she googled locations in Havasu and came up with this place. It was more of a fast-food deli and didn’t have what she was looking for. We walked in and right back out.

After another quick detour at Ross Store, we headed back to the rally site.

We made it back on plenty of time for happy hour and before you knew it – our Pizza had arrived!

David is on the left, Nick on the right. Nick and Romana Escamilla are our fine hosts for this event. David and Nicole Guhse are our co-hosts. And what a fine job they have done so far! Although it is still early… we can’t give them a rating just yet, right? 🙂

The pizza and salad was fabulous… no one could complain, there were even leftovers for breakfast on Saturday.

And here are some pics of our fellow Alpiners enjoying dinner and each other’s company:

As it got dark, we moved the groups’ ez-up tent out of the way to clear the view for the evening fireworks show.

Another nice Arizona sunset.

Everyone moved their chairs to good positions for the evening’s fireworks show. I didn’t take any pics of the fireworks… you’ll just have to take my word for it – they were pretty awesome! The iPhone camera doesn’t do good night-time photos. Maybe I’ll break out the Canon for some pics later. We still have a couple more evenings of fireworks… wonder if we’ll be tired of them by then?

Little “Coach” did real well during the fireworks. He appears to have gotten used to the loud noises… especially if he’s carried 🙂

We did have a couple moments of excitement during the fireworks show on Friday evening. A couple of them shot way up in the air trailing flames, made slow arcs and came down in our parking area with big thuds. Fortunately, no big explosions and as far as we all could tell. no rigs were damaged. Whew… felt like Iraq again for a couple moments…

There were a few long intermissions between firework displays. At one point, I went back to the Coach and brought back my night-vision device to share with others and look at the stars. Here’s a pic I took with the iPhone through the night-vision at some of our Alpine friends sitting in their chairs.

And here’s another with Stilla and Nicole looking over the wall, waiting for the next fireworks volley. Pretty cool, huh?

We’ve been told that the Saturday and Sunday fireworks show are even more impressive… can’t wait to see… it’s been great fun so far.

Stay tuned for day 2 of our Alpine SoCal “Winter Blast” Rally… coming soon.

Arizona

On to the Rally… (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

2015/02/13 davidhobden@mac.com

Yeah! This post will get you caught up to date… here we go:

On Wednesday morning, we puttered around at the Elks Lodge in Parker until sometime around noon – did some more laundry, and topped off the water tank. Then we headed on up the road to meet our Alpine Coach group for the Fireworks Rally in Lake Havasu.

Here’s our spot in front of the Elks Lodge. This picture was taken after our neighbors had already left for the day.

It’s a very scenic drive up US 95 after the town of Parker heading into Havasu. Here’s a few pics to try and prove that claim… what do you think?

There are several scenic turn-outs (view areas) that can accommodate big rigs but we’ve been through here a few times before in the past, so we just cruised on by and snapped pics out the windows.

Here’s the entrance to the rodeo grounds. We turned off of US 95 just south of town onto the loop that surrounds the park.

We were greeted at the parking area entrance by volunteers or park employees that confirmed we were pre-registered. I had to put the Coach in neutral and set the air brake so I could jump out and step into a trailer parked alongside the makeshift entrance in order to check-in. We got a “welcome packet” of sorts that included info on the park and it’s activities along with local advertising flyers, brochures, etc.,

Then I was told to follow the guy on the ATV… he would direct us to our site. That’s him way-ahead of me in the picture below – I think he was in a hurry to get me there.

There are several tiered levels of parking areas here at the SARA Park Rodeo Grounds. We chased the guy on the ATV to what I think is the second level from the end – where he stopped to indicate our spot. Here’s a couple pics of the surrounding parking area:

According to this website; ” SARA (Special Activities and Recreation Area) Park is an 1100-acre park with spectacular mountain views and access to Lake Havasu. The park’s facilities cater to a wide range of recreational activities and also serve as venues for events such as the popular Winter Blast firework display, obstacle races and concerts throughout the year. SARA Park has a network of hiking and mountain bike trails, ballfields, dog park, rodeo and fairgrounds. Other activities include BMX and motocross racing, roller hockey, RC plane field and a shooting and archery range.”

The same website goes on to say in another paragraph; “The park is also home to Havasu 95 Speedway, an ASA-sanctioned paved oval track which is one of the biggest attractions in Lake Havasu City…”

Our parking site was on a slope and we couldn’t get quite level without the HWH leveling system telling me were maxed out on one or more of the jacks. The HWH display panel indicated an “excess slope” warning and one of the front tires was 4-6 inches off the ground. So I turned the coach around and moved over closer to one side in our allotted space and it leveled alright. We found out later that the fireworks are going to be behind us now… hmmm – might have to rethink this if we want to sit in the Coach to watch any of the fireworks out the front windshield.

The coaches and rigs continued to file in throughout the rest of the day and into the evening.

At last count… seventeen Alpine Coaches were in attendance!

After all the rigs had filed in, we found out by the end of the day that we are all alone… no one has the spot on either side of us. The other Alpines are mostly next to each other and are in the next two rows over from us. Oh well, we probably need the exercise anyway when we join the others for our scheduled activities.

We had an impromptu “Happy Hour” with our Alpine friends. There was lots of meeting and greeting going on. Some folks we haven’t seen for quite awhile – since St George, UT a few years ago even – others we saw as recently as the Desert Rat Rally in Quartzsite just last month.

On Thursday, we drove into town in the morning to pick up a few additional grocery items to get us through the rally and then we just kind of hung out at the park until it was “Happy Hour” time again. The rally doesn’t officially start until Friday but that doesn’t stop anyone from getting together. There was more meeting and greeting and then there was a small sample of fireworks after dusk. Most of our Alpine group gathered at our designated meeting spot between the Host and Co-Host Coaches… will post pictures later.

Little dog “Coach” did fairly well with the little sample of fireworks so far, but he wasn’t without problems… he appears to be limping now while favoring a front paw. We couldn’t find any stickers or thorns, so we have to assume he jumped off the couch and landed wrong or something like that when we weren’t looking. He’s already better this morning (Friday) as I’m finishing up this post.

Let the Rally begin! Stay tuned for more of our Alpine SoCal “WINTER BLAST” rally fun… coming soon. I’ll try not to get behind again for a while 🙂

Arizona

YPG (Yuma Proving Grounds, AZ)

2015/02/12 davidhobden@mac.com 1 Comment

Almost caught back up now with the journal entries… I’m only a couple days behind now 🙂

On Tuesday morning, we left the Coach parked at the noisy campsite behind the VFW post and drove the Silverado to the Yuma Proving Ground Museum.

Fair Warning – This post is picture heavy! As a veteran of 26+ years, I enjoy military history and equipment, therefore, I took lots of pictures.

These are the signs you see at the turn-off from US 95 to the Proving Grounds and Imperial Dam.

YPG sign on US 95 (taken later when we drove by in the Coach)

These giant cannons are on the west side of US 95 opposite the signs above… you can’t miss the turn to Yuma Proving Grounds with these landmarks! The “Atomic Cannon” was designed to fire a nuclear shell per this link @ RoadsideAmerica.com

Here’s another couple vehicle displays outside the main gate at one of the two base entrances.

The following tanks, vehicles, and other military equipment are located on the side of the road just a short way down from the US 95 turn. We parked and checked them out. No ID card or anything is needed to view these, they are open to the public… they are just off the side of the road and there is ample parking.

This is the museum entrance on the base located just across from the Fam Camp. It used to be the installation’s headquarters and is now called the Heritage Center Museum. (Click on the link)

We were going to stay at this Fam Camp but changed our minds when we were having too much fun down by Los Algodones. Besides – it would have cost us $130 for the week or $40 for one night.

You do need an ID card to gain access to the base which is the administrative side of this massive post. However, I assume they allow visitors with proper identification to get a visitors pass. Here’s another good link for more information.

It took us a couple hours to tour through the museum. You could easily spend more time here if you stopped to read all the literature or sit through the several recorded presentations.

Did you know that General Patton trained his tank corps here to prepare them for battle with Rommel during WWII?

And who doesn’t like Jeeps?

A couple cool pictures of vehicles being tested back in the day.

There were quite a few cool dioramas, I like dioramas… maybe it’s a not quite grown-up “guy thing”.

The original Installation Commander’s office has been recreated here with all the furnishings.

A couple more cool dioramas:

There was even an entire room dedicated to the cowardly terrorist attacks of 9/11. The video presentation was riveting.

Great museum – highly recommend it!

After our tour of the museum, we stopped at the mini PX and gas station to save a few bucks on fuel for the Silverado. Then we exited the base and headed farther down the road to check out the BLM sites in and around the Imperial Dam (Click link for more images) for possible future camping locations. Wikipedia has more interesting facts about the dam here if you’re interested.

The following pictures are of the Imperial Dam area. We saw many different long term visitor areas (LTVAs) and other nice camping spots. We might have to come back here some time in the future.

This guy was para-sailing… or is it para-surfing?

Typical signage seen throughout the area.

When we got back to the Coach parked behind the VFW post, we immediately got ready to roll on up the road. We weren’t going to spend another night here with the planes and trains.

We pulled into Parker, AZ (about 40-50 miles up US 95) and found the local Elks Lodge. They had 12 spots with 30amp and water for a suggested donation of $15 per night. We were packed in pretty tight – we couldn’t even put out the awning more than a couple feet or it would hit the RV next to us. Oh well, it was nice to have electric again. It’s been a while. Stilla loaded up the washer/dryer combo to get caught up on some laundry since we had hookups.

The Elks were having a lodge meeting and didn’t have anything to offer for dinner, so even though it was short-notice, we called some friends from Colorado Springs that we knew were staying at the Pirates Den Resort just up the road. They hadn’t eaten yet so we made plans to meet at the Black Pearl Restaurant located inside their resort.

“Greeter” inside the doors at the Black Pearl Restaurant located in the Pirates Den RV Resort, Parker, AZ.

We met Bob and Mary McCord and had an awesome BBQ rib dinner while we caught up on things. It was sure nice to see them again, it’s been several months since we saw them last in COS. They belong to the Family Campers & RVers (FCRV), Rolling Springs Chapter that we also belong to along with my Dad and Stepmom. We only get to see them during campouts or meetings.

After dinner we went over to their site and relaxed in their nice Coach. They recently got “upgraded” to a spot overlooking the Colorado River instead of being a couple rows back. Nice Coach, Nice spot! We called it a night, said our farewells, and headed back to the Elks lodge in downtown Parker. We’ll see you down the road Bob & Mary!

Stay tuned…

Arizona

VFW (Yuma, AZ)

2015/02/11 davidhobden@mac.com

Still trying to get caught up with the posts. Let me bring you a little closer up to date. But first, I forgot to mention in my previous post about the Yuma Territorial Prison that our neighbors’s (Don, Kevin, and others) invited me to tag along with them to the races Saturday evening at the Cocopah Speedway back in Yuma. I’m not sure why I forgot to put it in the post for Saturday… guess I better start keeping notes if I get behind. Anyway, what a blast! The speedway was well laid out, not a bad seat in the bleachers. Thanks for taking me along Don! Stilla opted to stay in the Coach with the dog and catch up on TV shows… her loss.

Here’s a couple pics:

We even had a beautiful Arizona sunset as the races got started.

Anyway, back to Monday… in the morning we folded up the chairs and patio mat, pulled in the slides, and raised the jacks to go to the nearby campground just this side of the Los Algodones (Mexico) border crossing. I don’t think it was more than a mile away. We just needed to dump and take on water. This campground charges $50 for a night. I’m assuming most folks that stay here are getting dental work done across the border but they probably pay the more reasonable weekly rate. We paid the $10 fee to dump our tanks and take on water. Then we stopped back at our campsite to say goodbye to our good neighbors from the last several days.

After saying our farewells, we hit Interstate 8 towards Yuma and then turned north on 95. There was a Barons gas station that Don gave me a tip about – easy in – easy out, and diesel was around $2.54 a gallon which was a pleasant change.

Since we didn’t have to be in Lake Havasu for the Fireworks Rally until the 11th, we decided to pull in to another boondocking spot (BLM land) located right next to the highway (95) and behind a VFW post. We still wanted to visit the museum at Yuma Proving Grounds since we didn’t stay at the Fam Camp there as previously planned.

Here’s the VFW post. The entrance to the BLM boondocking land is right behind the building. The post has a band playing almost daily from 2 or 3 until 5 PM. We stopped in for a refreshment after we got parked and settled. Unfortunately, the post didn’t have a kitchen… no snacks at all except for chips and pretzels behind the bar.

This tank is on display out front of the post.

Here’s a view of our boondocking spot. No hookups here.

Most of the rigs spaced themselves out pretty well from each other. We found what we thought was a quiet corner.

Here’s our spot.

Now, after spending the night here, all I can say is – avoid this spot at all costs if you want any peace and quiet. There was a plane, maybe a crop-duster, that continuously zoomed in and out around the area until late into the night. And the train tracks across the highway must be one of the busiest railways I’ve ever seen (or heard) to date. We had to keep hitting the pause button on the TV every time another train went by or the plane made another run, it was so loud. I can’t understand why anyone would stay here for more than one night when there are so many other opportunities to boondock along 95. We won’t make this mistake twice.

The next morning (Tuesday) we visited Yuma Proving Grounds and toured the BLM spots around the Imperial Dam area for future reference. I’ll put that in my next post.. until then, have a nice and quiet night 🙂

Arizona, California

Imperial Sand Dunes (Winterhaven, CA)

2015/02/11 davidhobden@mac.com 2 Comments

Almost caught up now… here’s what we did on Sunday:

We loaded the ATV back onto the pickup to go check out the nearby Imperial Sand Dunes that we had heard so much about.

The BLM website says this about the dunes; “Located in the southeast corner of California, the Imperial Sand Dunes are the largest mass of sand dunes in the state. Formed by windblown sands of ancient Lake Cahuilla, the dune system extends for more than 40 miles in a band averaging 5 miles wide (map). Widely known as “Glamis” and a favorite location for off-highway vehicle (OHV) enthusiasts, the dunes also offer fabulous scenery, opportunities for solitude, and a home to rare plants and animals.”

Google images has some really good photos… click here.

We took Interstate 8 for about 15 miles from our campsite near the Quechan Casino Resort and took the exit to the recreation area / ranger station. We went into the ranger station to get more information about the area. What we found out set the tone for the rest of the day… the fee to take the ATV or even our pickup into any of the dunes was $50 for a week. Of course, we’re told if we had bought our permit outside the dunes, it would only be $35 for a week. Only a few places to get the permit other than online. Oh, and also… if the ATV doesn’t have a current state OHV permit, well – that will be an additional out-of-state permit cost 🙁 And don’t forget – if you don’t have the proper size and color fluorescent orange flag on your OHV, you will certainly get a citation and fine, said the nice ranger lady.

So, after checking our “value-meter”, we decided it wasn’t worth it for just a day of riding on dunes. However, the ranger told us we could go down the side service road for a few miles to view the “plank road”… that didn’t require a permit. She also told us about a viewing spot (way up north) that is also free. We could drive up there and get a birds-eye view of the dunes from a hilltop. These were the only non-fee areas we could go. Ya just gotta love California, right?

Here’s a picture of the signs that surround the dunes at every access point… we saw these throughout the day.

So we left the ATV on the pickup and took the service road through the soft sand to look at the “plank road”. Here’s the information placard. And you can click here for more information on this “road”.

After viewing the “plank road”, we took the ranger’s advice and drove north on Blythe Ogilby Road. This north-south road skirted the dunes on the east side, until it meets State Route 78 which cuts through the dunes east-west. To the north of 78 is the North Algodones Dunes Wilderness Area where no OHV’s are allowed. To the south is the massive expanse of sand dunes that are designated for off-roading. Link here for more info on the dunes from my friend Wikipedia.

We took 78 to the Glamis Beach Store. We had traveled about 50 miles from the first ranger station we stopped at along I-8. The over-priced Glamis Beach Store even had a note on the their entrance door explaining why they were so over-priced… citing; distance, the short season, and the high electric bills, etc., You even had to pay $2 there to just use the restroom. Here’s a pic I copied from google images.

There were a few “vendor communities” set up along the highway to cater to the many off-roader’s camped at the designated BLM sites. I forgot to check on prices for camping.

Finally, we reached the “no-permit required” hilltop parking area that the ranger lady told us about. Here’s a couple pics. We’ll have to come back when we can stay awhile.

We continued west on 78, and passed through the dunes until we hit 115 south to the town of Holtville. We skipped a farmers market and small-town fair that was going on in Holtville and continued back to Interstate 8, then home. We had basically circled the entire dune area.

Hopefully, we can come back here with my brother and mom/stepdad sometime in the near future to spend a week. Although, we might have to save up some money to do so 🙂

That’s all for now folks… tomorrow (Monday) we start heading north to get to the Lake Havasu Fireworks Rally we signed up for starting on the 11th. Stay tuned…

Arizona

Yuma Territorial Prison (Yuma, AZ)

2015/02/11 davidhobden@mac.com

I’m still behind in my postings… have a few more days to get you caught up on:

On Saturday we visited the Yuma Territorial prison. Click on this link for more information about this attraction. And here’s another good link that has interesting stories about some of the notable inmates.

We jumped in the Silverado with our little dog Coach and arrived by 10 AM to meet up with Lloyd DeGerald, (the Aqua-Hot Service Rep), as previously planned. I mentioned in a previous post here, that I would meet up with Lloyd and his wife to return the special tools that he lent me to fix the Aqua-Hot last Thursday, and we would tour the prison together. As it turned out – the prison tour doesn’t allow pets, which unfortunately, is the case with almost all federal or state run parks or attractions.

Lloyd and his wife also had their little dog with them, so Lloyd’s wife volunteered to stay with the vehicles and watch the pets while we went ahead and took the tour. That was nice of her.

Here’s a pic of the sign at the parking lot entrance that I swiped from Google images. Click here to see some other more professional images.

And here’s some pics of our tour taken with our iPhones.

The sally port (entrance gate) to the prison.

View inside the courtyard after paying entrance fee. The Yuma coast-to-coast bridge in background.

Water tower with guard tower built on top.

Here’s what the main museum building looked like inside.

A well made diorama of the prison as it looked back in it’s heyday was on display.

Can you imagine being packed in these 6 person cells?

Hmmm… there could be a snappy caption for the photo below… but I better leave it alone 🙂

Here’s the archway leading to the cells.

We almost had the courtyard all to ourselves… I wonder if any of the prisoners ever experienced that?

We posed for a “selfie” in front of a portion of the old cells.

After our tour of the prison, we got back to the parking lot to relieve Lloyd’s wife from her dog-sitting duties. We were able to walk the dogs outside the prison walls and tour the prison cemetery.

Yuma Territorial Prison Cemetery with the prison in the background. Guard tower on top of the water tank is on the right.

Once we had seen all there was to see in the immediate area, we piled back into our respective vehicles and headed over to see a locomotive that is on display a few blocks away from the prison.

We had to compete with a wedding photographer for pics of the 1907 steam locomotive. Click here for more images of this locomotive.

After checking out the nicely restored locomotive, we said our goodbye’s to our new friends and parted ways. We drove through the historic downtown area but didn’t find anything that peaked our interest. So, we hit a fast food restaurant that shall remain unnamed and went back to our Coach for a quiet evening.

It was another good day. I would highly recommend this tour to anyone visiting the area… definitely worth seeing.

Stay tuned for our day trip to the Imperial Sand Dunes in CA that we did on Sunday…

Arizona

Valley of the Names (Yuma, AZ)

2015/02/10 davidhobden@mac.com

I’m still behind on my posts, trying to catch up… here’s what we did on Friday:

While boondocking just south of the Quechan Casino, our nearest neighbors, (Don and Peg), organized a day trip for many of the folks camped on our little hill-top overlooking the wash.

Don & Peg hail from Ohio and are no strangers to the area – they stay here during the winter months, and have done so many times in the past. A couple neat things about Don is that he painted his own Coach. A ’95 American Dream. It looks really nice. He is also an avid wood-carver. He showed us some of his work, ranging from walking sticks, wood stump bowls, wall hangings, and even intricate thread spool carvings. Yes, I said carvings made from old wooden thread spools. I haven’t seen that before – pretty cool Don.

There were six vehicles that took Don up on his offer of 4-wheel drive adventure. We followed Don’s Toyota through many a dry wash with the Silverado as Don took one shortcut after another. I was worried about the front plastic spoiler that dug in to the dirt a few times, but it survived alright. So did the hard plastic mud flaps, I was sure they were going to break off a time or two as the side-bars/steps scraped the ground. But we made it relatively unscathed. Now I have another excuse to detail the truck 🙂

The destination for the day was Valley of the Names. Click on the link for more information. Or here. The following excerpt I copied from YumAZone.com: “An odd site is found in desert north of Yuma. For over 60 years people have been bringing in rocks in order to spell out their names and other messages in the desert. While best viewed from a low flying plane, the site is accessable via 4WD vehicles. Remember that many of these messages date back over 50 years and should not be disturbed. If you want to write your own message, BRING YOUR OWN ROCKS and leave alone the efforts of others.”

Here’s a few pics of our trip to get there… as usual, the pictures don’t do justice to the scale of the holes, dips, twists and hills:

At one point, Don got out his saw to clear some of the brush that would have otherwise scratched the sides of our vehicles.

Some of the road was through a very sandy dry wash.

And there was even some sections that could be considered “super-highway”.

Here’s a view of the surrounding mountains in the area.

And finally, we made it! Here we are enjoying lunch that everyone had brought along.

Here are some samples of the “rock art”. They were everywhere for miles around us. After lunch we all drove around on our own to view the names from different roads which wound in and around the area. Again, the couple pics here don’t do it justice… it was very hilly in most areas… you had to be careful traversing the hilltops.

One gentleman, sorry – I forgot his name, had developed a home-made rack for his pickup complete with swinging lounge-chair. I had to put this picture in the journal. We all got to try out the unique chair – very comfortable 🙂

On our return trip, we stopped for a “Date Shake” at the Imperial Date Gardens. The shake was good. We also bought some cactus candy.

Here’s some members of our group enjoying their date shakes outside the retail store.

After our 4-wheel drive adventure, we peeled off and hit the local WalMart to stock up on a few things. We made it back in time for “Happy Hour” and later on the group had another campfire.

Stay tuned for the next post about our visit to the Yuma Territorial Prison on Saturday. And no, they didn’t keep us there 🙂

California

Sick Dog – Sick Aqua-Hot (Winterhaven, CA)

2015/02/09 davidhobden@mac.com 2 Comments

I have some catching up to do… Here it is Monday – and I haven’t posted since Wednesday! I think I’ll break it up into a few separate posts for easier reading.

Therefore, for this first post I’ll tell you about Wednesday and Thursday. I last posted on Wednesday morning and predicted that we’d just hang around the campsite, which is exactly what we ended up doing. At one point during the day, we did a nice hike around the area and then we joined our neighbors here at our boondocking spot around 4 PM for “Happy Hour”. This has clearly become a daily tradition with the six or seven rigs that are parked near us. Everyone brings their own beverage of choice along with a small snack to share. We took cheese cubes and pretzels.

After happy hour, our little dog, “Coach” had another “episode”. This is the second or third time he has had this “seizure” of sorts… he seemed disoriented and was wobbly on his feet and would just plop down on the ground… probably out of necessity, because he’d fall over if he walked any distance. All we could do was put him in his bed and make him comfortable. We tried to have him drink water when he could hold his head up steady enough. I watched him until about 3 AM, when he just jumped up and started to walk around again. Although, unsteady at first, he seemed to quickly regain his balance, so I walked him around the campsite while keeping a watchful eye out for coyotes. He drank lots of water and seemed pretty much fine again. Sure wish we knew what causes this… internet searches point to several causes, and we can’t afford seizure medication. One source says that if you start anti-seizure medication, you have to administer it for life – you can’t stop or it will actually trigger seizures and make them worse. We remember that he was chewing on some peanut shells during “Happy Hour” – maybe he’s allergic?!?

The first time he had this “episode” was while we were in Redmond Oregon at the FMCA Rally back in August. But that time, he threw up first, so we thought for sure he’d eaten something while we weren’t looking. He was fine in the morning after we watched him all night. The second time, was a couple months ago, when he seemed to have to throw up, but couldn’t produce anything other than foamy spittle… he just fell over and laid there until we picked him up. He was over that in minutes, which made us believe he had lost his breath coughing/throwing up and just got light-headed. He’s always had a strange cough, kind of reminds me of the kennel-cough that our previous dog “Elvis” had at times. For those that don’t know, we lost Elvis to a coyote in our back yard just before New Year in 2013-14 🙁 He was 8 years old. Little Coach is 2 years old now.

Little “Coach” at his favorite spot on the back of the couch by the big window.

With little “Coach” back up and running around like his usual self – on Thursday morning, Stilla jumped in the shower after turning on the diesel switch for the Aqua-Hot and quickly reported that there wasn’t any hot water. Huh?!? I went outside and confirmed that the Aqua-Hot exhaust pipe was cold. Yup, not working! I opened up the bay compartment to check the light panel.

The “Diesel-Burner Status” light and the “Pump # 3” light were on but the “Heating Status” light was not. I broke out my service manual which I had printed out from the resources available on the Alpine Coach Association technical library website. I keep this in a plastic document protector inside a plastic envelope stashed in the bay next to the Aqua-Hot system. I pulled off the Aqua-Hot cover and began troubleshooting with my multimeter. I did the voltage checks for the “control module” because it seemed like a good place to start. It checked out good on all the inputs and outputs except for one test that indicated replacement of the control module. But, the fact that the “Heating Status” light wasn’t on still bothered me, so I kept flipping through the manual and found the obscure note that indicated the tests I had just done, were only valid after ensuring that both the “Diesel-Burner Status” and “Heating Status” lights are on.

Since I already confirmed that 12 volts was present at wires 22 and 23 on the electronic controller, the book led me to the coolant sensor.

Electronic Controller with panel cover removed. Located on left side wall of bay.

While troubleshooting, I had to “fool” the switch into thinking the cover was in place by using the tool below.

And here’s the culprit. The boiler fluid “coolant” sensor wasn’t working. There was zero resistance between tabs on the sensor and when I jumped the two wires… the Aqua-Hot fired right up!

I remembered seeing an RV in the lower parking lot back at the casino that had a banner advertising RV Service/Repairs. I jumped in the pickup with manual in hand to see if he could help me locate a new sensor.

After playing twenty questions… the nice gentleman at the service rig concluded that my troubleshooting was sound and he gave me the number of an Aqua-Hot Service representative that was in nearby Yuma. I called him and quickly made an appointment to meet a couple miles down the highway at Arizona exit 2.

I met Lloyd De Gerald, a factory authorized service representative – He sold me the sensor for the low-low price of only $63. 🙁 He not only had the part on hand, but for an additional $50 deposit, he also had the special tool needed for installation since the new part had wires “pigtails” already on it, so you had to use a home-made special cut-out socket to install. After paying for the part and leaving a deposit, I went back to the Coach and drained a couple gallons of the boiler antifreeze into a bucket. I installed the part with no problem, Lloyd even teflon wrapped and pipe-doped the sensor for me. But then, I ran into the next problem. My Aqua-Hot doesn’t have the radiator cap on it like most(?) models. It only has a recovery tank… and well, you can’t fill it back up with the fluid I saved in a bucket through the recovery tank. I called Lloyd, who had another special tool for filling these type Aqua-Hot systems. So, I made another trip to meet Lloyd, luckily it was only a few miles away in Yuma (we’re right on the CA/AZ border by Winterhaven), and I exchanged the first special tool for the second, which is an RV water pump with quick-disconnects for easy hook up to my drain valve along with the battery clips to power it up.

While talking with Lloyd, I found out he and his wife, planned on visiting the Yuma Territorial Prison in a couple days on Saturday. As did we… so we made plans to meet up and tour it together… I could return his special tool to him then and get my deposit back.

Once back at the Coach, (and just before dusk – we missed today’s happy hour, I might add), I used the pump to put the boiler fluid back into the Aqua-Hot system without incident and it fired right up. Yeah! We can shower again!

Here’s a pic of the Aqua-Hot all back together again. This is both our hot water and heating system for the Coach. Although we haven’t needed the heater since we left Colorado, we still need our showers 🙂

We closed out our Thursday evening with a trip over to the casino for a bite to eat and to support the local Quechan Indian Tribe by leaving some money in the slot machines 🙂

Stay tuned for my next post… the neighbor’s invited us to tag along on a 4-wheel drive trip to the Valley of the Names on Friday. And then we visited the Yuma Territorial Prison on Saturday… Imperial Sand Dunes on Sunday… lots of pics…

Urban Escape Vehicle .com

Tag Archives: RV

Winter Blast – Day 3 (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

Winter Blast – Day 2 (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

Winter Blast – Day 1 (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

On to the Rally… (Lake Havasu City, AZ)

YPG (Yuma Proving Grounds, AZ)

VFW (Yuma, AZ)

Imperial Sand Dunes (Winterhaven, CA)

Yuma Territorial Prison (Yuma, AZ)

Valley of the Names (Yuma, AZ)

Sick Dog – Sick Aqua-Hot (Winterhaven, CA)

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