Dancing Through 2012 Summer

     It's been a jam packed summer & I've neglected my blog terribly.  As a result there's lots to include here, so I'll apologize if this is too long.   I mentioned Gary and our daughter Riki playing in the National Fallen Firefighter's golf tournament, but forgot to include that Gary won the men's long putt and Riki won the women's long drive.
      I told you in the last blog that our beloved Spicy had been ill, but we were still hopeful.  Unfortunately, after four weeks of force feeding him, his little heart just wasn't strong enough for him to recover and we had to make the tough decision to let him go on June 29th.  Those of you who have been there know how tough this is.  Thanks so much for all the kind words, emails, facebook sharing, cards, etc.  They really helped a lot.  Although we knew we'd get another dog, we wanted to give ourselves time to grieve and heal before jumping into another pup.  More on this later.
     We spent two weeks in the forest, one in July and this past week.  In July we were hit with almost daily thundershowers.  They seemed to hit right at suppertime each day.  Our trip this past week was a complete turnaround with only one rain storm, at about 3am one night.  We enjoyed the river with Gary's sister, Pam and her family.

Pam & Jim Cooking Breakfast

The Leffler Family

Joe and friend Julie with Hank

Chad missing his girls

On August 18th, we celebrated International Geocaching Day, by all going to visit the Fairy Forest Pot of Gold, a geocache located behind a campground.  It started about 10 years ago with painted rocks in a "Pot of Gold."  Since then it has been added to by hundreds of people and now is about an acre in size.  There is everything from small villages, to eyes in the trees, to waterfalls & lakes, to Stonehenge, and much, much more.  It is really amazing. I've included a few pictures, but they don't do it justice, since there is so much.

Gary at the Pot of Gold Geocache

Stonehenge in the Fairy Forest

     I have to include one last picture of Gary and Rusty relaxing.  In the background is the very low Bear River.   Of course, we enjoyed the sunshine, food, great company, campfire stories, and fun times.  Right behind where Gary is, we spotted a nice bull moose crossing the river, the next day.

     Summer is fair time in Uinta County, WY.  I entered 6 quilts and 2 pieces of jewelry.  It's the first time I've ever received all blue ribbons.  In addition my bracelet I learned to make at Escapade last summer won the Reserve Grand Champion Ribbon.  Needless to say, I was pretty proud.  The gals at a local quilt shop (R & V Quilt Shop) had asked me to teach a class, so it was exciting when the quilt I taught turned out to be a Grand Champion winner.

Escapade Crystal Bracelet

Grand Champion Quilt

      Gary decided to enter the Wyoming Senior Olympics this summer.  They were held in Cheyenne, Wyoming the first week of August.  The Wyoming Quilt Shop Hop was also going on, so I was able to convince Gary it would be fun to do the Eastern loop.  Because the Quilt shops are so spread out in Wyoming, they organized three loops.  You needed to complete one loop or 14 shops to qualify for entry for prizes.  Since we were in Cheyenne, the Eastern loop was the shortest (only 460 miles) to visit Casper, Douglas, Lusk, and Torrington.  We had gone through Laramie on our way over and were staying in Cheyenne.  We also stopped at Green River shops on the way over.  All together, we visited 11 quilt shops on the trip (four of them twice).  It was great fun seeing new shops and of course, I had to get some new patterns, kits, and fabric.  I think I'll have plenty to do this winter. 
     In addition to all the quilt shops, I arranged for us to get out yearly blood draws done while we were in Cheyenne.  We usually get this done in Evanston, in conjunction with their annual draws at the State Hospital where I retired from.  This year, the timing didn't work out, but since they have weekly draws in Cheyenne, we were able to get them done there.  It turned out to the morning of Gary's singles billiard tournament.  While I'd given Gary plenty of excuses should he not do well, he wound up a two time gold medalist, winning his age group in both singles and doubles.

Two Time Gold Medalist

      Like most of you, we also enjoyed watching the Summer Olympics whenever we could.  While in Cheyenne I wandered into a pet store and of course, ran into some puppies.  In talking with Gary, we decided we were ready to add another puppy to our family.  On August 22nd, we brought the cutest ball of fluff home.  He's an 11 week old male Shih Tzu.  We weren't sure of the a name, so I posted his picture on Facebook and asked our friends to suggest  names.  The favorite turned out to be the one we selected, "Bandit".  I think you can see why.  Other great suggestions included Zorro, Trooper (like a black and white patrol car), RoVer, Rider, Scamp and Cowboy. 

Bandit's first day home

Bandit drinking from the lickit faucet.

     Of course, the downside to a puppy is the housebreaking, chewing, etc.  He's so darn cute though that it's worth it.  He'll be anxious to meet all our winter friends in another month.  Hard as it is to believe, it's time for us to plan our trip South.  We plan on leaving Wyoming around Sep.10th.  We hope to make stops in Richfield, UT;  Lone Rock Beach at Lake Powell, UT;  Meteor Crater, AZ; and Scotty's Reservoir by Pinetop-Lakeside, AZ.

  The other exciting news from the Summer was receiving my Medicare card and information.  Since I will become eligible on Oct. 1st (turning 65 on Oct. 31st),  I called to make the initial appointment with the ankle surgeon and have it scheduled for 9:30am on Oct. 1st.
     I think that's finally it, so I'll just tell all our RVing friends to travel safe, so we can see you soon in AZ and to our WY-UT friends and family, we'll miss you, but look forward to seeing you again next summer.

Soon to be Dancing Our Way South................................

Hugs, Katy, Gary, Rusty, and Bandit too!

Dancing to Pomp & Circumstance.....

     With our grandchildren getting older, high school graduations will abound for the next few years, as we'll have six over three years.  After a short break, we'll start with college graduations. They are fun years though and it's great to see the grandkids recognized for their hard work and efforts.
     We started with Jentry's graduation from Herriman High School in Herriman, Utah.  It is a  new high school and his class was the second to graduate from there.   Jentry had many honors in wrestling, both in Alaska and this last year in Utah.  He was a regional champion but had the bad timing and misfortune of having appendicitis and going into surgery the day of the state tournament.  With 490 in his class, and at least 10 tickets each, they needed a really large place, so it was at the Maverick Center in Salt Lake City.  They made a neat entrance with the fellows in burgundy and the gals in navy blue, then walked down a red carpet to their seats.   It was an exciting night to be a part of!  Jentry's future plans include college in Salt Lake, & a mission for the LDS church.

         Because we were in Evanston we were able to attend choir concerts, awards banquets and the Awards assembly at the high school, the week before graduation.  Keegan received several honors including the top 10% of this class, with 4 years of a 4.0 GPA, a Marine Corps award for Scholastic excellence, department awards for outstanding college English, and Political Science, as well as honors for student council, National Honor Society, and Spanish Honor Society.   His sister Meghan (a Senior next year), received awards for 3 years of a 4.0 GPA, Highest PSAT score in the school, as well as highest ASVAB score, (military pretest).  Keegan had 172 in his class, so they were able to hold the ceremonies in the high school auditorium, with graduates getting 4-6 tickets each.   Keegan and his mom, Riki, kept a special surprise for all of us, until we saw the program at graduation. Keegan was a graduation speaker and spoke of taking advantage of every opportunity coming your way.  He did a great job!

     Riki had helped organize a post graduation party with 17 other Moms of Keegan's friends.  Most had gone to school together since kindergarten and wanted to go to each other's parties.  They rented the recently renovated Roundhouse in Evanston.  Each graduate had a table with pictures of them growing up and their awards displayed.  There was no limit to the number of family and friends that could attend and with 400 hamburgers, 200 hot dogs and side salads, cakes, and other desserts brought by all families, there was plenty of food for all. Best of all, the new graduates could celebrate with both their friends and family!

     Keegan's future plans include attending the University of Wyoming (Go Cowboys!!!) on a full academic scholarship;  Although he was accepted at several other colleges with scholarships, this was the only one offering a full ride.  The idea of graduating without student loans, was too appealing to turn down.  He'll be in the  honors program with special housing and registration status, majoring in engineering.  Besides all the graduation activities, we're staying busy with the seniors in town.  Gary's playing pool every morning and I'm in the water at the Rec Center for water aerobics and water yoga 5 days a week.  My back still twinges now and then , but is getting stronger and hurting less all the time.  Here's a shot of the beautiful pool in the Evanston Rec Center.  Seniors can get a pass for $39 for June, July, and August.  It's good seven days a week, includes all classes, and is only about a mile from us.

      The only downer we've had has been Spicy getting sick.  Spicy is the younger of our two Shih Tzu's, at nine years old.  We learned a year ago that he had a heart murmur and now a valve is not pumping effectively, leading to congestive heart failure.  We've been able to get the water off his lungs with medication and  stabilize the pumping, but he stopped eating.  After two weeks of force feeding special dog food with a syringe every 2-3 hours, we're still hopeful he'll regain hi appetite and start eating again.  I"m sure all our friends with pets understand how hard it is to watch one go downhill so fast.  Rusty at 14 continues to do well.  Here's Spicy in one of his favorite spots in our 5th wheel, over the heater vent.

     Gary and Riki joined the Evanston Fire Department team to play in the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation golf tournament in Utah.  These have become major fund raisers across the country.  Utah's is held at Thanksgiving Point, a beautiful course in Lehi, Ut.  We went down a couple days early and parked at the local Cabela's.  They have a huge parking lot, with dedicated RV parking, water, and a dump station.  We really enjoyed our time there and were able to find 19 geocaches in the area, to get to 2,401 total.

      It looks like we'll be staying in this area for the rest of the summer.  We'll be spending some time in the forest, camping with family, as well as the usual festivals, golf tournaments, quilt classes, etc.  Once again, if any of you are in SW Wyoming or Salt Lake City, Utah area, give us a call.  We plan on being here through the beginning of September. 

Dancing on down the road in Evanston........................
Hugs, Katy and Gary, Rusty and Spicy too!

Dancing toward Wyoming 2012

      After the usual packing of the Motor Home and "summerizing" of the 5th wheel, we were ready to head North.  We left on May 5th and drove through Phoenix (getting the worst part of the drive over on the first morning has some advantages), toward Flagstaff.   There is an area where the Saguaros are really thick, just before we climb higher and out of their growing zone.  It's as if there's one last chance to bid them good-bye.

     From there we climbed to Flagstaff, and at 7,000+ feet it is a climb.  When we stopped the temperatures were cooler and we looked forward to sleeping with blankets once more.  We decided not to use our usual stop at the Page Elks, but to instead investigate a new place we'd read about called Lone Rock Beach.  It's on Hiway 89, just across the state line into Utah.  Camping is allowed on the beach for $10 a night, but with our Senior Access Pass, it's half price.  There are restrooms, water, and dump available.  You can see our rig parked on the beach.  This was the night of the "Super Moon,"

and was it ever
beautiful, shining
bright over Lake Powell.  For those not aware, the moon was closer to Earth than usual and
appeared much bigger and brighter than usual.  Along with the others, we enjoyed a campfire on our beach.  With many small fires up and down the beach, it was quite a sight.   While unhitching the car, Katy suffered some muscle spasms in her back as she bent over.  There was no traumatic injury, but the spasms in the unusual position apparently resulted in a few pulled muscles.  We decided to rest a second day, hoping that would be enough to cure it.  Two weeks later, we know it's going to take a little longer.  It is getting better slowly but surely.  The good news is with the painful back, I don't notice the bad ankle nearly as much.

     From there, we headed further North, driving through Red Canyon and past Bryce National Park, where we visited a couple years ago.  We followed Utah Hiway 12 from Hiway 89 all the way East to Torrey, Utah, over the next several days.  We've been told it is one of the prettiest drives in the Western US and we are believers.  The first night was spent at Kodachrome State Park, just outside the town of Escalante and completely inside the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

 There are many sand spires or chimneys throughout the park and campground.  One of the theories on their formation is that they were geysers that solidified and then the outside softer rock, wore away leaving the spouts frozen in time.  I don't know if that's the most accurate theory, but it's the one I liked best.


 Driving about 10 miles outside the park, but still inside the monument, we visited spectacular Grosvenor's Arch.  If you look closely at the picture taken from a distance, you can see Gary standing at the bottom, wearing a brown jacket.  that gives you some idea of the huge scale of the Arch.  It's really magnificent.  I also included a more close up shot of the double arch at the top.

      
    Driving out of Escalante the next day, we came across this old pump, with an appropriate sign.  While it was red in color, surrounded by petrified wood logs, I couldn't resist playing with my camera phone to produce an appropriate toned picture for the time.

       The next day we headed for the Burr Trail.  One of the most intriguing areas is the drive over  "Hog's Back."  This 1/4 mile two lane stretch of road falls away on BOTH sides to spectacular drops offs .  Wouldn't you know it, someone in their infinite wisdom had placed a geocache there.  Gary was a lot more sure than I was, that there was room to pull over and park, just before we started over.  The stop gave us a chance to look at it closer, (not sure that was a good idea).   It was hard to take a picture of it, as I could only get one side or the other.  One of those things you just have to see in person.  Trust me, it was beautiful, although a little nerve-wracking.  Here's a shot of one side to give you an idea.

       We spent the next night at Duffrey's Mesa, a dispersed camping area on the Burr Trail.  We spent one afternoon exploring that area, although it would take much longer to really see it.  The next morning we visited the Anasazi State Museum in Boulder. After that we headed along the side of Boulder Mountain up to 9,600 feet and then down into Capital Reef National Park.  Of course there were some more geocaches along the way.  One particularly interesting one was placed by a photographer at a spot where there was an especially good photographic opportunity.  The container was an old Polaroid camera. 

     Capital Reef is a National Park we had been all around, but not visited.  It is beautiful red rock country with lots of vistas and a nice campground that is full most of the time.  We lucked out the day we arrived and got one of the last spots.  If you visit make sure you try some of the homemade pies for sale at a restored farmhouse in the park.  Later that night, several deer visited us.

     Finally it was time to head for Goblin Valley, where we were to meet Gary's sister Pam, and her husband Jim.  They had made reservations there several months ago.  It's a very popular park and difficult to get into without reservations. There is a lot of dispersed camping available about 10 miles from the park. 

    The next day we visited the Goblins, a valley full of spherically shaped rocks, many resembling mushrooms or ET.  Your imagination can run wild here, and create all sorts of meanings to the shapes.  Yup, there are geocaches here too.  This picture is of Gary, Pam and Jim returning from a hike through the Goblins to claim a geocache on the other side of the valley.

     While we were there, Jim and Pam wanted to show us an old cabin they had discovered.  Although we were assured there was a "good" dirt road, we took a more scenic route (at least I'm assuming that's why we followed the cow path for several miles), coming out on the correct road just a 1/4 mile from the cabin.

     After four days with Pam, Jim, and the Goblins, it was time to head further North to Price, Utah.  Gary had wanted to play the golf course there last year, but it was too hot at the end of June.  The last time he played there (1957), it was a nine hole course.  55 years later it is now an 18 hole Country Club.  He had a fun afternoon and shooting a 72 didn't hurt.
     One more night, and we headed for Evanston, WY.  Most of you know this is where we lived for many years and started our fulltiming adventure from in 2000.  Our daughter and son's families are still there, along with six grandchildren.  Our other four children, along with 12 more grandchildren live in the Salt Lake City area, only 75 miles away.  Gary has several great-grand children there as well. We are looking forward to two high school graduations in a couple weeks, as well as end of the year concerts and banquets.
     Gary has started playing pool with his buddies at the Senior Center and I've visited with quilting friends and signed up for a class next month.  I'm also looking forward to joining the senior water aerobics and water yoga classes as soon as my back feels better.
     If you are in the area, either Wyoming or Utah, give us a call.  It's easy for us to drive to Salt Lake and we'd love to see you. 
     Dancing in Wyoming for the summer................................
     Hugs, Katy, Gary, Rusty and Spicy

Dancing Back to Work!?!?

     We returned from Quartzsite to the Roost in time for our February Follies, a fun-filled week of activities, games, skits, meals, and our general meeting.  It's basically a fund raiser for the park.  This year was no exception and a great time was had by all.  I made my While Chile, which fetched a good price at our food auction and Gary bought Mary Stuart's spaghetti sauce (as usual) for a good price.  Gary coordinated the billiard tournament and then took first place in it, although dead-eye Dennis gave him a run for it.  He also won the golf tournament.

 This photo is all the chairpeople for the many, many activities of February Follies

  The highlight of the week was  Victor's Fashion show, when  men of the Co-Op strutted the runway.  All dollar bills went to the funds raised as well.  We do have fun, as you can see by Chuck, the Bachelor (note the rose), and yours truly with her dollar.  


 The next week was the health fair and blood draw.  You can see me cooperating with this task.

      Once again our winter season here had a surprise ending.  The Park Managers resigned earlier than expected and we were asked to fill in temporarily, until the park could go on summer hours.  I started training March 4th and Gary the following week.  As of March 18th, we were on our own, although the assistant managers, Nancy and Bob were always available for our questions and to help in any way they could.  We worked four days a week from Sun-Wed.  After the training, it turned out to be a fun seven weeks.  I enjoyed learning the computerized program for the front office, from site assignment to billing, for propane, electric, and rent.  Gary handled outside chores of maintenance, parking and cleaning.  I also got to learn some of the back office with quick books, thanks to Ken's patience.  Of course the fact we were working with Escapees meant most of our customers were among the friendliest people you could find.  We finish our TEMPORARY job May 2nd.  New managers have already been hired for next Fall.

      One of the expenditures of the park this year was to buy two pool tables.  While not new, they were of much better quality than the previous ones.  Gary and a couple other pool players did the searching and arranged delivery.  It was fun watching them being set up, as they come in sections and were glued together.  The pool players all liked the new tables and are looking forward to playing on them next season.
     Working has severely impacted my time to quilt, but I have beaded a lttle more.  A few of us gals made a beading sojurn out to shop for beads and of course have lunch. Here you see Bonnie, Gwen and myself checking out the beads.  Thanks to Carol for taking the picture.

     The weather has been great this winter, with many, many days in the 70's. and nights in the 40's.  Those coincidentally are my favorite temps.  We did have a couple cold spells and once again awoke to snow on Table Top, a 4,000+ foot mountain about 25 miles from here.  Now we're helping break records for the earliest high temps, as it was 100+ yesterday.  It is supposed to go back down later this week, thank goodness.

      The Saguaros are blooimg and although they're beautiful, it's also a sign it is time for us to head north.

     As friends started to leave for the season, get-togethers were the norm of the day.  We were fortunate to have friends Doug, Toni, Joan, and Ken over one evening with Ken playing guitar and all of us singing along.  Unfortunately wind, prevented a campfire that evening, but we had many fires on our patio throughout the winter.
      We attended a local geocaching event last week and picked up some new caches as well as meeting some of the local cachers and getting a chance to put faces to the names we see in the logs.  Leap day found 10 of us from our park caching out at North Mountain Park.  What better to do with an extra day of the year than geocache?

     Now our focus is on packing and getting ready to head North.  Please do not mail anything else to our Casa Grande address.  We plan on leaving here May 5th, heading north.   You can either use our SD address or Riki's address, 401 Twin Ridge, Evanston, Wy 82930.  We're going to boondock our way though Flagstaff, Lake Powell, Bryce, the Burr Trail, and Capital Reef on our way to meet Gary's sister Pam, and her husband Jim at Goblin Valley State Park in Utah.  They're our favorite camping buddies and we look forward to spending several days with them.   
     Graduations will the the start of our summer, as Gary's grandson Jentry graduates from Herriman High School in Salt Lake City on May 31, and my grandson Keegan graduates from Evanston High School June 2nd.  To our many Elk's friends, we say thank you, as Keegan was awarded a Legacy Merit scholarship from the Elks.  We don't have any set plans for summer, but are looking forward to visiting old friends and family.  If any of you get close to Evanston, Wyoiming, or Salt Lake City, Utah, please give us a call at 307-679-8818, or send an email and we'll meet for coffee.  We always enjoy showing our area of the country off, if you can stay a few days.
    

  This time of the year is always difficult.  Thanks to our many friends who remember us and send little notes.  Today would have been Robert's 46th birthday.  It's hard to believe we buried him 7 years ago today.   This picture is one I love, of the National Fallen Firefighter's Memorial at night.  It's such a peaceful scene.  You can see more of the Memorial at their website, www.firehero.org.

Dancing toward Summer, 2012,................,  Hugs, Katy, Gary, Rusty, and Spicy

Part II of Dancing to a Quartzsite Adventure

         One of the best parts of Quartzsite are the beautiful nightly sunsets.  They seem to get better and brighter each day.

         Part II of our Quartzsite Adventure started bright and early on Saturday, 28Jan, when we picked up new friend, Kathy,  AKA Cakelady to fellow geocachers.  We headed east about 50 miles to the start of the Eagle Eye Power Run, a series of 251 geocaches in a 25+ mile stretch of road.  It was a great, paved road, with little traffic.  We had been instructed to do the series heading north, so that all the caches would be on the right side of the road.   (All four tires must be to the right of the white line when stopped.)

Eagle Eye Formation

         It was a fun day, with Katy doing the majority of the driving and Gary and Kathy taking turns jumping out of the car to find the cache, log the find, and get back in.  While it wasn't a race, we wanted to keep moving quickly in order to complete the series.  We started with the first cache at 9am and finished the series at about 3:05pm.  That included a half-hour lunch break, and a couple of other short stops to walk the dogs.  Rusty and Spicy loved having Kathy in the back seat with them and were quite put out when it was her turn to jump out and back in the car.  That made no sense to them, but they put up with it until she stayed put for a while and Rusty could snuggle back up to her.  We even found two other caches on our way back to Quartzsite.

Kathy (Cakelady) & Katy

       The next day we moved our rig to the next rally site off of Plomosa Road, about 5 miles north of Quartzsite.  We registered for the Geocaching Bof Rally and enjoyed visiting with old friends and making some new ones.  Kathy was parked next to us, so Rusty and Spicy could keep an eye on their new friend.
        The Rally started with a "Z-circle."  This was a way to meet each other in smaller groups.  About 7 folks volunteered their rigs to be hosts and the others signed up to visit.  Our able coordinator, Sue,  assigned everyone a route to take and visit three rigs.  As no two people had the same assignment, we met new people in each rig and in small groups of  8-9 people, it was easy to learn about each other.  We brought refreshments to the first rig and left those there for the others coming later to enjoy, as we moved on to other rigs every 30 minutes.  When rally activities started the next day, we all felt among friends.

Gary logging a geocahe find.

          Several seminars were held the first day.  My favorite was "Caching with your Smartphone."  I learned so much about c:geo, a free app on my phone, that I can now use it with ease.  I had previously tried it, but been mystified about how it worked.  That afternoon Gary and I set off to complete the Sunkist trail, a series of 14 caches along the old dirt road to Bouse.  We capped the evening off with a potluck dinner and a program at the Pace Theatre.  This is a rig with a large white space where movies and/or slides could be shown through a computer.  We saw unique geocaches and learned a lot about geocaching.com.  
     Tuesday had been advertised as an official geocaching "event."  That meant other cachers in the area, besides Escapees could attend and take credit for the event.  We had about 40 other cachers join us for the day.  While most of these folks were also RVers, they were camped in other Quartzsite areas.  We played several games, including identifying geocaching acronyms, a poker run, and a great bingo game that had us all laughing as we searched for someone who had geocached in their pj's, had over 1,000 caches, solved 50 puzzle caches, drew blood while caching (I think all of us caching in AZ had done that), been stopped by the police while caching, and assorted other antics familiar to many of us.
         That afternoon the dogs were delighted to be invited on another cache run with Kathy to find the 12 SKP caches placed out in the desert a few miles from the rally site.  This was a real 4 wheel drive with many dips through washes, soft sand, and some mild boulder driving.  Our Honda did great and we found all the caches!  The public event ended with a dessert potluck and cake.  It was a big hit with all and several cachers expressed interest in  joining the whole rally next year.

Rally attendees enjoy a seminar in the sun.

       Wednesday we had more seminars and went for another cache run along the old road to Yuma.  Although this dirt road was more passable, we still wound up with a flat tire.  24 caches and one tire repair later, we headed back to the rally site.  We finished that day with another pot luck dinner, a great slide show, and a wonderful campfire.
      The next morning was full of hugs, as we all bid good-bye, until we meet down the road.   Gary and I left, heading back to the Roost at Casa Grande.  All in all, we had found 34 caches in Yuma, 253 on our power run, and 62 caches in Quartzsite, for a total of 349.  That didn't seem quite right, so I convinced Gary to stop for one more on the way home to get an even 350.  Our total now is 2,306.  If that sounds like a lot, our friend Kathy was rapidly approaching 5,000 caches and hoped to hit that before she left AZ.  Others at the rally had over 10,000 caches.
      Besides all the rally activities, Gary managed to get in three pool tournaments in Quartzsite, finishing 2nd in two of them.  Our new generator ran great and the weather was definitely the best we've ever had in Quartzsite with 1 bad day and the rest beautiful.
       We arrived back at the Roost in time for our a great Super Bowl party.  This was quickly followed by February Follies.  These are five fun-filled days of games, skits, casino night, raffles annual meeting, food auction, many meals, and more laughter than I can possibly relate.  I was one of three deputies, who along with our sheriff leveled fines on those not wearing RoVer's Roost shirts, nametags, or complaining in any way.

Katy contributes $1  .

       The goal of the Follies, besides all the fun, is to raise funds for our park.  This was easily done with approximately $6,000 being raised.  Gary wound up on the first place teams in the golf scramble and beanbag baseball.  He also organized and held billiard tournaments for the ladies and men, placing first in the men.   There was entertainment in the form of  skits, a beauty pageant you had to see to believe, and a kangaroo court.

RoVer's Roost  Clubhouse During Follies

        You can see we're not bored while wintering here.  We've had a great year so far and look forward to another 2-3 months before heading north again.  We'll be going North after meeting Gary's sister, Pam and her husband Jim at Goblin Valley State Park in Utah. With two grandsons graduating high school, one in Salt Lake and one in Evanston, we plan on being back there around the last week of May.
        Dancing through the end of Winter............................  Hugs to all, Gary, Katy, Rusty, and Spicy

Dancing toward Quartzsite Part I………..

     We left Casa Grande on January 18th, a little late for us, but Gary didn’t want to miss too many pool nights.  We headed toward Yuma, but HAD to make our first stop at Dateland for shakes and ice cream.  I had one, but Gary had to have two (one for the freezer) with a quart of their wonderful Date ice cream.   With our freezer properly fortified, we  headed on to Yuma.

     We arrived by noon and were lucky to get our favorite boondocking spot.  We went over for dinner with Wyoming friends, Dianne and Ray, who were staying at a local RV park and had delayed their trip back north to see us.  We had a great catch-up visit while Dianne fed us another of Gary’s favorites, rolled tacos from La Fonda’s in Yuma.  We capped off the day with a wonderful swim in KOFA’s pool and of course, the hot tub.

     Nights were cool, but daytime temps with wonderfully warm.  We spent the next day at their flea markets.  Friday was a wonderful day for both of us.  Gary played 18 holes of golf and I went to a great quilt show, put on by the Yuma quilting guild.  It’s hard to beat that for meeting both our needs and favorite activities, but we almost did it the next day with geocaching.  We found 34 caches, as we crept closer to 2000.  The dessert wildflowers were beautiful.  One of the last ones was called Yuma’s microcache.  Here is Gary checking the contents.  As will all our days in Yuma, we ended it in the pool and hot tub.

      That Saturday, our generator once again started giving us fits.  We’d had enough and decided with all the boondocking we do, we needed to get a reliable generator.  Sunday, we packed up and headed for Quartzsite and Boomerville.  After getting set up, we headed for the big tent, shopped, and brought a brand new generator back to our rig.  It sure has been nice having a reliable way to charge our batteries.

     We joined the Boomer’s Bof last Spring after attending one of their rallies at Lost Dutchman State Park.  It is a really fun group of Escapees, who stay active and share a lot of our activities.  This was our first time staying at Boomerville in Quartzsite.  There were a total of over 130 rigs that came and went during the two weeks Boomerville was set up.  Below is an aerial view taken from an  ultra light flying above our group.  These were taken each day and posted online.

     If you look at the bottom row of RV’s, there is a very small one just a little left of center.  We are just to the right and up a little from that one.  You can see our red Honda parked just in front of the class C.  The fire pit if above us, in the center of the RV’s.  You can see there is still lots of desert around us.  We are about 4 miles east of Quartzsite and a few miles in from the main road.  While it sounds like a long way, it only takes us about 15 minutes to get to the center of town. 

      Besides the shopping, Gary and couple other fellows went into town to play in pool tournaments.  Gary placed second in one of these.  We also set out to finally get our 2,000th geocache!  You can see Katy gleefully reaching up for it.  Of course, there were also pot luck dinners for all.  One night we watched an entertaining slide show about the Burning Man event in Nevada that a couple of Boomers had attended.  Their gathering of 50,000+ was something to see.  They all meet on a dry lake bed outside Reno for a week.  At a cost of $300 each, it had become so popular, that they have gone to a lottery system for tickets.  

      As I write this, Gary is playing golf in Blythe, CA with a group of Boomers.  We are getting ready to do a power cache run tomorrow.  It is located about 50 miles from here and is a run of 251 caches in a 25 mile stretch of road.  On Sunday, we’ll move to the Geocaching Bof Rally location, about 5 miles north of Quartzsite.  I’m playing with a new tool to write blogs, called Live Writer.  It will let me wrap text around, as above and hopefully get a little more creative with the editing.  We’ll see.

Dancing toward Part II of our 2012 Quartzsite Adventure……………

     Hugs, Katy, Gary, Rusty, and Spicy