Lovely Arizona, How We've Missed You!

After almost four months in San Diego it felt great to move on...first stop, a couple of nights in Yuma at my sister and brother-in-law's sweet little retreat. We made a quick trip into Los Algodones to get our teeth cleaned at our favorite dentist, Dr. Maria Fonseca, plus I got an excellent $5 haircut at Saira's.

A stunning Yuma sunrise.

Next stop, six glorious nights at one of our all time favorite parks: McDowell Mountain Regional Park. We LOVE the huge campsites, big views and terrific site separation at this park. And best of all is the miles and miles of trails through wide open Sonoran desert..

Mountain biking is sublime here. Long, gentle ascents on mostly smooth decomposed granite trails lead to swoopy, flowing, exhilarating glides downhill.

Another gorgeous Arizona sunrise.

Long gently ascending trails bring us to the rocky eastern face of McDowell Mountain.

We hiked the North Trail for the first time, an easy three mile loop in the northern section of McDowell Mountain Park, one of the few areas of the park that was not devastated by the enormous 1995 Rio fire when 14,000 of the parks 22,000 acres was burned.

Shall we dance?

There are far more saguaros in the north part of the park, spared from the 1995 fire.

We hiked the Scenic Trail one day and enjoyed the fantastic long distance views from the top of the ridge.

Notice the lack of saguaros on the hills beyond Hans, the small pocket directly behind him was spared from the fire.

One of two crested saguaros I've found at this park.

Another day we walked the Bluff Trail and had a surprise visit from a coyote...can you see it?

This lovely creature popped up over the edge of the bluff about 30 feet from us.

Rain on the way!
It's been a very dry winter and the 12 hours of light rain overnight was welcome.

Big vistas everywhere you look at McDowell Mountain Park.

Six days at McDowell Mountain Regional Park went by way too fast and we never even left the park! Onward to red rock country and a visit from a good friend...

Happy Rosie in her element!

Yuma, AZ to Boulevard, CA to San Diego

As we made our way back to our former hometown San Diego for the holidays, we spent a few nights in Yuma, AZ...for the second time this year. The lure of inexpensive dental work in Los Algodones, Baja California means we'll stopover in Yuma every time we pass through the area.

This was our fourth time getting our teeth cleaned in Los Algodones and the third dentist we have tried. We learned about Dr. Maria Fonseca from some Canadian friends who have been going to her for many years and have had a variety of dental issues addressed by her. The previous dentists we visited were not bad, but Dr. Fonseca was excellent and will get our repeat business.

Dr. Fonseca has a small practice with top notch modern equipment; it's just her and an assistant and the doctor does the cleaning herself. Hans' teeth generally need more extensive work than mine and she spent an hour cleaning his teeth, by far the most thorough cleaning we've had in Mexico. I also felt my cleaning was as good as any cleaning I'd gotten previously in the US...and it only cost $30 each!

We intend to return to Dr. Fonseca next March for our next cleaning and Hans may have some old crowns and fillings replaced as well. We'll be sure to update our experience here. Dr. Maria Fonseca gets our vote for excellent dental care in Los Algodones!

Happy Hans with super clean teeth!

Our stay in Yuma was brief but we had fun catching up with our friends Cliff and Sharon who spend the winter here, over pickleball and an excellent dinner. Then we moved on into California to a planned meet up with my parents in Boulevard at The Oaks at Sacred Rocks.

My parents camp with their church RV group on a regular basis at various parks around San Diego County. The November outing happened to coincide nicely with our entry into California. Though I failed to take any photos of the campground or the group meals, we had a very nice time during our three night stay at this beautiful and peaceful RV park.

We did, of course, manage to get in a couple of hikes. McCain Valley is a swatch of BLM land encompassing almost 40,000 acres of chaparral and granitic boulder covered hills in eastern San Diego County. There are two primitive campgrounds along this decent dirt road and a small area for OHV riding.

We drove a small segment of McCain Valley Rd and took the spur out to Sacatone Overlook. The spur road is pretty rough, high clearance only, so we drove about a mile then hiked the remaining mile to the fantastic view into Carrizo Gorge.

Carrizo Gorge from Sacatone Overlook.
The Salton Sea is visible in the far distance.

Center right in the previous photo is a segment of the San Diego and Arizona Railway, aka "The Impossible Railroad"
due to the logistical challenges involved in building it. 

A couple of derailed cars are visible on the far right.

McCain Valley Rd goes through some wonderful granitic boulder strewn hillsides,
we'll definitely spend more time exploring this area in the future.

Morena Butte has long been one of our favorite hikes in San Diego County and staying in Boulevard put us within 20 miles of the trail head at Lake Morena. Though Lake Morena has suffered mightily from the drought, it did have a little more water in it compared to when we hiked here last December with John and Pam.

We were pleased to discover that Lake Morena County Park campground has upgraded their electric sites to 50 amp and added sewer to some sites. This park is peaceful and beautiful despite the low lake level.

Lake Morena campground had more turkeys walking through it than campers!

Within the first half mile of the trail head we got a lake view and a view of our destination.
Morena Butte is the granite topped mountain on the left.

Horny toad!

View of the lake from the Butte.
The campground sits along the top right edge of the dry lake bed so it is no longer near the water.

Martin, Estella and Chelsea joined us on the hike!

There's lots of fun rock scrambling at the top...sometimes straight up!
Chelsea seems to be half mountain goat!

A little rain lately has perked up the yuccas.

Yesterday we arrived at Santee Lakes Recreation Preserve where we'll settle in for a month as part of our annual 2+ month stay in San Diego. It feels good to slow down for a while...blogging included, as we spend time with family and old friends and RVing friends who pass through town.

It will be interesting to see what El Nino has in store for us over the next few months!

We'll likely see a lot of these beautiful creatures during our stay at Santee Lakes.

And birds, lots of  birds!

Wrapping Up Five Weeks of Weird and Wonderful Austin

"Keep Austin Weird", the slogan you hear, and see, time and time again about this city we've just spent five weeks in seems to get to the heart of how Austinites feel about their city. It's big and bold and bustling. In the center of the city, art, progressive thinking and entrepreneurship seems to be the rule of the day. The average age of its population is approximately 34, one of the youngest in the US.

Austin is also one of the fasted growing cities in the US. The infrastructure, such as roads, have not kept up with the growth and the traffic is horrendous. Housing prices are skyrocketing, making the most desirable city neighborhoods unaffordable for many of the creative folks who make this city "weird"; something we've seen in other big cities (like San Diego and Portland, OR), gentrification tends to squeeze out those who gave the place its original flavor.

The surrounding suburbs are typical of most large cities, full of communities of similar houses, chain stores and restaurants...why does growth have to be so generic? A drive through the suburbs of Austin leaves you wondering what's so weird about this place???

One thing we wanted to accomplish during our stay here was to become Texas residents. Oregon was a good choice for us when we left California and started fulltime RVing, but going forward Texas will work better for us due to no state income tax.

We also discovered this week that the health care plan we'd chosen through the Oregon health exchange did not provide the full nationwide coverage that we thought it did, despite lots of research before purchase. Why are healthcare plans so complicated??? As of April 1st we will be on the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas exchange plan, with participating doctors all over the US, another reason why switching to Texas was good for us.

We've been busy since our last post...

This past week we had the pleasure of seeing our friends Zsuzsa (Z) and Tom, brand new fulltime RVers. We met them in October in Palm Springs where they were hoping to sell their condo and hit the road.

According to Murphy's Law the condo sold in the middle of winter and they had to travel to the midwest where they became South Dakota residents, purchased their truck, then moved on to Ohio where they took delivery of their brand new Bighorn 5th wheel. All that took a couple of months and these warm weather people withstood some pretty frigid weather in order to realize their dream!

It was so fun to see them enjoying their new home! They are currently making their way back to Palm Springs where they will finish outfitting their RV from their storage unit. They stopped in Austin to spend a few days with us and we went on two hikes together and ate a couple of meals together...we were honored to be their first dinner guests!

Z and Tom and their beautiful new home on wheels!

One of our hikes took us back to McKinney Falls State Park...
what's that we see hanging off the tree along Onion Creek?

A water moccasin!

Several Great Blue Herons were nesting along Onion Creek.

First dinner guests in the shiny new Bighorn!

Lately we've stuck close to town taking care of some business so our daily walks have been of the urban kind. Fortunately Austin has numerous creeks running through town with trails along them so it's easy to make a creek/neighborhood loop. We walked the Shoal Creek Greenbelt again, this time making it a loop through the Pemberton Heights neighborhood; it's full of fancy mansions, some dating back to the late 1800's.

A modern castle in Pemberton Heights.

There were many homes with columns in Pemberton Heights, these two seemed especially Southern flavored.

Another day we made a loop out of the Blunn Creek Greenbelt and the historic Travis Heights neighborhood, another wonderful old neighborhood filled with a mix of historic and new architecture and enormous old oak trees.

Blunn Creek.

Another castle!

We then met up with local friends Ashley and Lila to celebrate Ashley's 60th birthday and meet a few of his numerous siblings.

Happy Birthday Ashley!

Austin considers itself a "music city" and the month of March is jam packed full of musical events. The weekend following SXSW offers up the very unique HONK!TX. HONK is a festival of community street bands and was unlike anything we had seen before. Marching bands converge here from all over the country and perform for free for three days in public spaces.

These are not your typical high school or college marching bands, though many of the musicians may have gotten their start there. This is an eclectic mix of music lovers playing everything from klezmer and balkan to New Orleans style brass and reimagined popular music from the last 50 years.

We managed to catch a small part of the festivities and really enjoyed the lively music and the people watching. Many of the attendees don their most colorful and outrageous combinations of clothing, making this a feast of color and joy for the eyes!

The musicians are as colorful as the backdrop.

March Madness put on a fun, high energy show!

This past week we discovered pretty Slaughter Creek Preserve in South West Austin. This is an easy five mile loop hike through meadows and oak and cedar forest. The elevation gain and loss is minimal, dogs are not allowed, bikes do the trail clockwise while horses and hikers go counter clockwise. Even though you do hear some road noise and neighborhood noise, it still feels peaceful, especially on a weekday morning. If you want to hike here during rainy season check their Facebook page before you go to make sure the trail is open.

We were glad to have cloud cover the day we hiked, Austin has been warming up quickly!

Austin has been a busy and exciting stopover but now we're ready to slow things down a little. Tomorrow we move on to Fredericksburg where we are looking forward to small town Texas vibe as well as a little more nature in our lives.

A Few Nights in Yuma, AZ

Moving on after two months in San Diego, our first stop is Yuma, AZ for our annual dental cleaning in Los Algodones Mexico. Last year we had a decent experience at Bernal Dental Group so we decided to try them again (my review here).

Dr. Carlos Castaneda cleaned and polished our teeth for $40 each. We were each in the chair for about 15 minutes. He seemed to do a good job once again, but we both felt it was all just a little too fast and we wondered if the job was as thorough as it should be.

Leaving the dental office we noticed several hair salons soliciting customers and since I needed a cut and love a good deal decided to go for it. I couldn't even tell you the name of the salon or the young lady who cut my hair, but she did an excellent job for only $5.

Another bonus about our stay in Yuma was the opportunity to meet up with fellow RVers Sharon and Cliff. We have met up with these snowbird Albertans twice before and this time we enjoyed a delicious dinner at their RV. Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo. Discussing dentists with them we learned they (and a bunch of their friends) have been seeing Dr. Maria Fonseca for years so we may try her for a cleaning next year.


Campground Review: The Palms RV Resort, Yuma, AZ

Our stay at The Palms RV Resort in Yuma, AZ was a new experience for us, it's a vacation home/RV resort where folks own their lots and make lot improvements if they so desire. When owners are not there or the lot is not owned, they are rented out. We got a great deal with full use of the resort amenities for $25/night.

Site #262

There are 453 large lots that range from a nice concrete pad surrounded by gravel to sites with a small storage building and pretty landscaping to elaborate custom built Spanish-style houses with lovely courtyards. It looked as though about one quarter of the lots had not been "improved" in any way, and about one quarter had homes on them.

One of the small Spanish style homes.

The Resort had just about every type of amenity you can imagine for an Arizona snowbird destination (except golf) and the grounds were extremely well kept. Decent location about a quarter mile or so from the freeway. We heard trains in the night but no train whistles.

Rosie enjoyed exploring a new location.

We were pleasantly surprised that no one tried to sell us a lot upon check in. We talked to several lot owners during our stay and it seems most of the owners are Canadian snow birds. Many folks who built small houses on their lot no longer even own an RV, this is simply their second home.

Tomorrow we're off to our next destination: Picacho Peak State Park.