Aztec Ruins National Monument

We got up this morning and packed up ready to go. Here's the entrance to the park we are staying at.

Ruins Road RV Park

Then we walked over to the nearby Aztec Ruins National Monument. We watched a 15 minute orientation video. It was well made, informative, and interesting, especially the interweaving of modern archeological perspectives and insights from current descendants of the ancient Puebloans who built this impressive place. Then we took a self-guided tour. The laminated spiral bound guide book was very helpful.

 This site is a UNESCO World Heritage Site as an extension of the Chaco Culture National Historical Park.

Some of the site has been reconstructed (particularly the Great Kiva), but 80% is still original construction.

Our trip today continued south on US Hwy 550, still angling southeast toward Albuquerque. Most of the route is through wide open empty desert. We stopped in Cuba, NM, for fuel. We passed through parts of the Jicarilla Apache Nation Reservation and the Jemez Pueblo. Hwy 550 connected to I-25 south to Albuquerque. Originally we had penciled Albuquerque in as our destination for tonight. Then we realized that the Balloon Fiesta is going on. How could we have missed the fact that we'd have an opportunity to attend the fiesta, which is definitely on our bucket list??? Everything in Albuquerque is booked solid, of course, so we continued east on I-40 to the small town of Edgewood. We're staying at the Route 66 RV Park there.

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On to Aztec, NM

We left Horsethief Campground this morning and drove to Archview Resort (at the intersection of 313 and 491)to use their dump station. None of the BLM campgrounds in the Moab area has water or dump stations, so we were glad to find a dump station nearby that was easy to access and only $5. Then we headed south. We were in three states today. We started in Utah, cut through a corner of southwest Colorado, and ended up in Aztec, NM.

The drive was not a particularly easy one, with lots of steep climbs and down grades, but we made it to our destination, Ruins Road RV Park in Aztec, NM.

The park is near the Animas River and has a trail along the river.

It is also very close to the Aztec Ruins National Monument. We walked along the river and over to the monument, but it was closed. We'll visit in the morning before leaving town.

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Hiking in Arches National Park

We ate breakfast and packed up for a day at Arches. A long line at the entrance station confirmed that we were not the only ones who had that idea. We stopped at the Visitor Center, where we saw that a ranger-led hike at Windows was starting in twenty minutes, so we drove there quickly, only to find a traffic jam at the parking lot. We were lucky to get a spot in the lower lot and hurried up the hill to join the hike, which had already started.

We joined the group at their second stop. The ranger was talking about the geological history of Arches, starting 300 million years ago with the deposit of a thick salt layer called the Paradox. He had artists’ conceptions of some of the varied landscapes that had been here in the past, and he had samples of some of the rock layers deposited during those periods. The group had to guess which rocks went with which landscape, a very basic introduction to the process of inference that geologists use in their studies.

After talking about the deposition of layer after layer of rock over millions of years, he introduced the idea that some forces had been at work to uplift the area, leading to the ascendance of erosion as a shaper of the landscape. Arches is on the Colorado Plateau, which stands on average about 5,000’ above the surrounding area.

North Window Arch

We saw the Turban Arch as well as the Spectacles (formed by the North and South Windows). A large tour bus pulled up and suddenly we were surrounded by crowds of Chinese visitors. During the day w heard a lot of visitors speaking German and other languages, letting us know that visitors were at Arches from around the world.

After the ranger talk was over, we drove to the Fiery Furnace Overlook. We could see the rows and rows of parallel fins that make this area a maze for hikers, who are required to have a permit to enter the area and are advised to go on a ranger led hike or with an experienced guide.

We drove out to Devil’s Garden to hike to the Double O Arches, passing Landscape Arch, part of which collapsed in 1991. The first mile of the trail, to Landscape Arch, is easy, but the next mile is a different story. We took this hike in 2010, so we knew something of the challenges. This time it seemed even more difficult, with some of the slickrock very slippery because of fine loose sand on the surface and some difficult rock scrambling.

Landscape Arch


The trail is marked by cairns, but they had been knocked down or blown away in sections, so it was easy to lose the trail. At one point as we hiked along the top of a fin, we didn’t see any cairns for so long that we were unsure that we were on the right path until a group including several small children passed us. The eight to ten year olds were very adept at rock scrambling, and we followed their lead for a while.

All along the route, amazing sights delight even while the challenges of the trail are daunting. We were happy to reach the Double O Arches, where we sat on a boulder to eat our lunch.

Double O Arches

The return hike was much quicker, even though we made a side trip to Navajo Arch. It was helpful that we had other hikers along much of the way, and we all helped each other find the way and figure out the best technique for climbing or descending the difficult parts of the trail.

Back at the trailhead, we drove out of the park and into Moab. We stopped along the way to check out Goose Creek Campground, where we stayed four years ago in the Excel. We rather expected to find that our Majestic would not fit in this campground, and it was quite clear we were right about that. Some of the trees had grown in the last four years and posed overhead barriers to taller rigs. We did see some larger units, but they were all motorhomes, which are much easier to maneuver into tight spaces than fifth wheel are.

Next we went into Moab and got diesel and found a pizza place for dinner, Paradox Pizza. The pizza was good, but pretty pricey and took a while to arrive. The manager stopped by and offered us a free dessert, which we thought was very nice of him.

After we ate it was dark, but we wanted to check out some possible places to dump our tanks in the morning. That was a discouraging process, with overhead branches, narrow roads, and other barriers making each of the possibilities seem unworkable.





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Canyonlands Island in the Sky

We moved this morning to Horsethief Campground just outside of Canyonlands National Park. We stopped along the way at a Shell Station near the intersection of Hwy 191 and Hwy 313 to add fresh water to our tank. None of the BLM campgrounds has water, so this station sells it for $1 for each 10 gallons. We planned to get to Horsethief early enough to get a spot. It's first come first served, and not all the sites will accommodate a big rig. We did find a nice spot, and it was even easy to get into.

After lunch we drove to Canyonlands Island in the Sky Visitor Center and got a map and advice on scenic viewpoints and hiking opportunities. We are lucky to have gotten into Horsethief evidently, because October is the highest visitation month for Canyonlands. That makes sense because the summer heat is quite intense here. We had a really lovely day today, sunny with a high near 70 and clear blue skies.

We did everything the ranger recommended. It was great, but made for a very full day. By the time we got home just after 7:00 p.m., both of us were tired and hungry!

Visitor Center Looking East

Mesa Arch

Grand View Point Rim Trail. Notice the substantial cairn marking the trail. It has a spike through the middle to stabilize it.

We stopped first at Mesa Arch and took the half-mile loop trail to the arch. You have to wait your turn to take photos there. Someone is usually up on the arch being photographed.

Next we drove to the Green River Overlook. The Green River forms the western border of the Island in the Sky district, and the Colorado forms the eastern border. Island in the Sky District extends to the confluence of the two rivers, but it takes a long hike starting in the Needles District to reach the Confluence Overlook. The Island in the Sky mesa tip is at the Grand View Point, which is the end of the road.

We continued to the Upheaval Dome, where we took the one-mile hike to the First Overlook. At least that's what we intended. Actually we missed the turnoff to the First Overlook and hiked to the Second Overlook. We stopped at the First Overlook on the way back to the parking lot. The view from the First Overlook is really the best.

Next we drove to the Grand View Point Overlook, which looks down on the Monument Basin, so named because of the tall spires and sheer walls created by erosion here. We hiked the Rim Trail, which is two miles round trip (out and back). It actually offers some great views to the south at the Monument Basin and beyond, and then unexpectedly you find vistas of the canyon to the north. Altogether a very scenic trail and well worth hiking. We encountered only a few other hikers on this trail.

Part way back I was surprised to get a phone call from my cousin Beth, reporting on Aunt Iris's condition. She's in the hospital with a partial bowel obstruction, which can be life threatening for an ostomy patient like her, but Beth reports that her mom is feeling better and may get out of the hospital on Monday. I was quite surprised to find that I had Verizon service out on the trail since much of the park has no service.

Out final brief stop was at the Buck Canyon Overlook, which offers good views of the eastern canyon. You can't see the Colorado because it has cut such a deep channel.

Back home we ate supper and then rested a bit before washing the dishes and packing tomorrow's lunch. We are headed to Arches National Park for the day tomorrow. Read more!

On to Green River

We packed up and got ready to move on again this morning. I went over to Smith's and got diesel and some groceries. We took a final walk around the neighborhood. It was later than usual when we pulled out, but we had an uneventful trip and arrived in Green River before 5:00 p.m. The first part of the trip was on I-15, but then we to US Hwy 6 through canyons with some winding turns and fairly steep grades heading southeast to Green River. Fortunately the steep grades weren't too long, and the winding curves not too tight and narrow.

We ate lunch at Spanish Fork Canyon Rest Area, which highlighted the role of the railroad in Utah. It even had a stretch of track and a locomotive.

We are staying in a large parking lot behind a Conoco station in Green River, with lots of noisy trucks. Fortunately none of them is very near to us. We will head to Canyonlands in the morning.

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Casino

When we turned on the TPMS this morning, Ken noticed that all the truck tires were low on air, probably partly because the weather has turned colder. We took the truck to Discount Tires. That's where we bought our tires, and they offer free air checks to anyone. We had to wait a few minutes because the tech was working on another vehicle. Not a problem, but once he started working on the truck, he ran into difficulties with the inside duallies. What with one thing and another, it was quite a while before the tires were aired up. In the process, they had to remove the outer wheels to get to the inner tires.

That delayed our arrival at Jeff's place, where we spent the rest of the day. We did a couple of loads of laundry. Jeff took us to the base to pick up some local beer (evidently it's difficult to get "strong beer" in Utah). He had a couple of errands to run, including getting his tires aired up too.

We stopped by our place to pick up the salmon and other supper fixings and then returned to Jeff's. He's been wanting to show us a movie he loves, Casino. Since he couldn't find his copy, he tried to get it on PPV from DirecTV, but that didn't work out, even after he talked to customer service for quite some time. But then, voila!, he located his copy, which we watched after dinner.

Sabrina had warned us that it was very violent--and it was. It was a compelling story, but for me the excessive violence was stunning and the general corruption rather sickening.

Jeff mentioned, by the way, that when he took Sabrina to the airport last night, it turned out that her flight had actually been on Monday night. They managed to get her on a flight an hour later. They had told us a story earlier about arriving at the airport a day early on her last visit. Next time we think they'll double check! Read more!

Quiet Day

I wasn't feeling great and the weather didn't look good for a drive to the mountains, so we decided on a low key day today. We took a longer morning walk, and stopped at Home Depot to look for a chain to secure the compressor to the side of the truck. It has a tendency to slide around while we're towing sometimes. We decided to use a carabiner to hook the chain to itself at the right length to stop the slide, which will make it easy to unhook when we want to use the compressor.

I took an afternoon nap. Jeff and Sabrina went out to a local Mexican restaurant for lunch.

We stopped on the way over to Jeff's for supper to pick up some vanilla ice cream to go with the strawberries we had cut up for dessert. Jeff made beef stroganoff for dinner. He demonstrated his process for making coffee: precisely measured and weighed to the gram in every aspect, and brewed over ice, because he doesn’t care for hot coffee. He uses a Chemex pour over coffee maker.

We enjoyed the dinner and the company. Jeff and Sabrina had to leave at 6:30 p.m. to take her to the airport. We stopped on the way home for some groceries and cold medicine.


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Living Planet Aquarium

Jeff and Sabrina picked us up this morning for a trip to the Loveland Living Planet Aquarium south of Salt Lake City. It's a smaller aquarium, but has some unique and interesting exhibits. When we arrived it was almost time for the next showing of a 4D movie called "The Last Reef." The 4D Theater shows movies in 3D, plus scents, wind, mist, and movement. The mist definitely impressed the kids in the audience! The reef program was well done, colorful and educational, and a plea for saving the world's reefs from ocean acidification.

Some of the highlights of the exhibits include an area devoted to Utah wildlife, including three active, playful river otters, and a colony of Gentoo Penguins in the Antarctic Adventure area.

After we left the aquarium, Jeff drove to Park City to the Wasatch Brew Pub. He likes Wasatch beers and had heard good things about this brew pub.We all enjoyed our meals and the beers we tried. Jeff and Sabrina both enjoyed the Jalapeno Creme Ale. Ken and I preferred the Evolution Amber Ale.

It was hailing lightly when we were walking into the restaurant, and a heavy storm raged outside for a few minutes, but the sun came out again. Sabrina drove home, partly through another heavy storm, but the sun broke through and displayed a double rainbow. Read more!

Visiting and Laundry

We had plans to visit the aquarium today, but I really didn't feel up to it, and Sabrina definitely felt worse. Jeff took her to the doctor's. She was thinking she might have a bacterial sinus infection, but they said it was most likely a virus and sent her home. She spent most of the day in bed, but later woke up and seemed to be feeling a little better.

We all had brisket sandwiches for supper and sat around watching TV and reading. Jeff had the Eagles/49ers game on. Later we watched "Madam Secretary," with Tea Leoni, which is one of Sabrina's favorite shows. It reminded me a bit of the West Wing.

Meanwhile, we did our laundry, just in time, because we were about to run out of essentials. Tomorrow we're going to give the aquarium another shot. Read more!

Jeff the Chef!

We went to visit Jeff and Sabrina this afternoon. Sabrina is feeling worse, but she came down long enough to say hi and get me a cup of tea and a blanket. I cozied up on the love seat in the living room, and Sabrina went back up to bed. Jeff and his dad played pool.

Jeff had been working on the brisket for dinner since last night, concocting his spice rub and marinade and massaging the rub into the brisket. This morning he injected the marinade. The brisket went on the grill to be smoked for eight hours. Meanwhile he made potato skin appetizers, which were delicious. He made asparagus wrapped in bacon and baked in the oven. He made a big bowl of spinach salad, using the chef's knife like a professional.

Sabrina and I joined the guys as Jeff was putting the finishing touches on dinner. Sabrina sliced the brisket. Everything was delicious, including the Argentinan Malbec. After dinner and conversation, Sabrina and I went to rest while the guys played more pool.

We stopped on the way home to walk at the Home Depot. It was chilly, and it rained all day off and on and just wasn't conducive to walking outdoors. Read more!

Pool and Resting

I am still under the weather. We took our morning walk (more like a stroll) and found the train tracks. It’s not just one set of tracks: it’s three. No wonder so many trains go through. Fortunately, they do not sound their horns, but some of them do shake the house.

This is our site at Circle L with a nice shade tree

This afternoon Ken went over to Jeff’s place while I took a long nap. Ken met Sabrina briefly, but she was suffering from allergies and went up to lie down. That left Jeff and Ken. They played pool on Jeff’s new pool table. Ken used his new cue stick, which he said worked quite well.

I’m trying to catch up on my blogging, but not having much luck. Our network seems to be crawling this evening.
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On to Layton, UT

We drove today from Heyburn, ID, to Layton, UT, where we are staying at Circle L Mobile Home Community. The sign says "RV's Are Welcome," and it looks like half of the lots are RV's, many of them permanent. We chose this park because it is only a couple of miles from Jeff's place. We were concerned that our large rig would be a problem to park in a mobile home park, but luckily we got a spot we could pull through, so it was relatively easy.

Mountains in the evening light

Jeff stopped by for a few  minutes on his way to pick up Sabrina at the airport. We'll get together with him tomorrow afternoon.

This morning, on our walk we picked a couple more tomatoes, so we had fresh picked tomatoes on our salad tonight.

I still have a miserable cold. Read more!

More Miles on I-84

We walked this morning at Country Corners and took advantage of the opportunity to pick some small apples, a few ripe tomatoes, and a couple of small (probably hot) peppers. The owners are really nice, and the park is immaculate.

For the third day in a row, we drove east on I-84. Actually I-84 is angling ESE right toward the Salt Lake City Area. Tomorrow we'll pick up I-15 for part of the drive. There's not much in the way of scenery for vast stretches of I-84.

We're spending the night in a small city campground, Heyburn Riverside RV Park, on the Snake River. It's well maintained, and it's adjacent to a city park with a great multi-use trail. Our site #15 is a paved and level pull-thru that looks like it was at one time a handicapped spot (next door site #14 is a handicapped site).

We really enjoyed our evening walk along the river. We didn't see much in the way of wildlife, just a couple of small herons flying overhead, but we did see walkers, joggers, and skateboarders. It's good to see people using a park. We came to a small, obviously rather new covered bridge over a small watercourse, and we saw a young couple sitting close together on a bench on a hill, enjoying each other and the view.

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New Time Zone

We finally crossed Oregon on I-84 today and were welcomed into Utah. We're in Mountain Daylight Saving time. Unfortunately, we lost an hour in the process.

I have a terrible cold in the head, with stuffy nose, irritated throat, headache and just generally feeling sick. I'm taking cold medicine, but the cold doesn't seem to have noticed much.

We are spending the night in a well maintained, attractive RV park near Caldwell, Idaho.

We will head out tomorrow on one more day of our journey to visit Jeff.

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On the Road Again!

We called Jeff at J & S RV Services this morning and explained our problem. He sent Jason, the technician who had worked on our brakes, out to diagnose and fix the problem. Fortunately, that is just what he did. It turned out that a bleeder valve had popped out on the passenger side front wheel, allowing the brake fluid to spurt out. Jason repaired the valve and refilled the brake fluid reservoir (the actuator) and we were on our way with no further brake problems today.

Well, almost. Our ABS system reported that the sensor on the driver's front wheel was dead. Jason has no experience with those things, so he wasn't able to fix it. We will have it checked when we are in Tyler. Meanwhile, our brakes still work--just not in ABS mode.

We ended up at a Pilot RV Park in Stanfield, OR. It is apparently the only Pilot RV park in the country. It's adjacent to the Pilot Truck Stop, but set back away from it.

Tomorrow we'll be moving on to the Boise area, on our way to visit Jeff in Layton, UT. Read more!

Leaving Portland, But a Very Short Trip

We had a great final morning with Chris and Anara. Chris made tender, fluffy scrambled eggs for breakfast. Afterward we took a final walk through Laurelhurst Park, a lovely place to walk. Then back at the house we loaded up everything and headed to  J & S RV Repair to pick up our Majestic. It took a while to transfer everything into the RV and get hooked up, so it was well after 1:00 p.m. when we got on the road.

We drove an hour, so it was time to switch drivers. We pulled off I-84 at the first Hood River exit and turned into a large dirt/gravel lot. When I walked around the rig to check on things, I saw a long arc of something wet on the ground trailing back from the front passenger side wheel, clearly a lot of brake fluid. The brake actuator reservoir reported that it was empty. A Walmart was .4 miles ahead, so we drove there and parked for the night. We didn't think it would be safe to drive farther.

Once it cooled off a bit, I used our new mechanic's creeper to get under the rig and look at the wheel. I couldn't see where the brake fluid was coming from, but the whole inside of the wheel and tire was wet with brake fluid, and there was a puddle on the ground. Tomorrow morning we'll call J & S and see what they say.

We don't know enough about how brakes work to know what happened, but likely it wasn't put back together right and a seal leaked or some fitting wasn't tight enough, who knows??? As you can imagine, extremely frustrating!!! But we are okay. No one got hurt, and we are sure we'll get it fixed one way or another. We are 53 miles from J & S. The Dalles is about 20 miles further east, but may be too small to have anybody that could work on something like our rig. We do have Coach-Net emergency road service, which will tow us to the nearest repair place equipped to do the work, but no telling where they might think that would be.

This is especially frustrating because J & S had the rig since August 18. Oh well.

On a more positive note, for supper we ordered pizza from Pizzicato Pizza, just a few hundred feet from home. It was delicious. Read more!

Chapman School Swifts!

Chris made his wonderful waffles for us for breakfast this morning. They were delightful, as usual. Afterwards he and Anara and I drove to the Apple Store in Tigard, about half an hour southwest of his house. On day 2 of the release of the iPhone 6, the line snaked down the block from the store. We walked right in, since we had other business.

I was there for an "out of warranty repair." Translation, dunking your iPhone in the Pacific is not covered by the warranty, but Apple will supply a new or refurbished iPhone for $269. Usually the SIM card is reused, but since mine was most likely corroded by the salt water bath, I got a new SIM. Fortunately, a Verizon representative was in the store, especially to deal with the iPhone 6 release issues, but he was also able to make the change to my Verizon account to put in the info about my new phone.

It was a great feeling to walk out of the store with my iPhone restored. Or almost. It wasn't until later that Chris suggested that I might want to restore from an iCloud backup. That worked like a charm. Very soon all my apps and settings were restored, except that I have to login to each one to start fresh with it.

Meanwhile, Chris had picked up new iPhone 6's for him and Anara yesterday. All was well, except that the numbers were reversed, so that Anara's number was on her dad's phone and vice versa. The Verizon rep was able to take care of that issue too.

This evening we packed a picnic supper and took a bus to Chapman School to see the famous Vaux's Swifts in their nightly return to the large chimney at the school to roost for the night. This phenomenon occurs each September as the swifts gather for their migration south.

The swifts gather around sunset, swirling around overhead. Crowds gather on the lawn to watch this fascinating process. Many picnic, and children slide down a hill on large pieces of cardboard. The Audiobook Society staffs a booth with information about the swifts.

Someone else besides the people knows the swifts are coming.  While we watched, a Cooper's hawk arrived on the scene, first perching in a tree and then landing on the chimney. The swifts back off, but they know they must find a roost. After a bit, the hawk chased some swifts, but we couldn't tell if it had actually caught any.  Read more!

Ground and Floor

This evening Chris treated us all to a performance of Ground and Floor, a Japanese play in the Time-Based Art Festival put on by the Portland Institute for Contemporary Arts (PICA). (Commentary on a previous performance can be found here.) The performance was entirely in Japanese, with English surtitles on a large white cross-shaped screen behind the characters. Unfortunately our seats were far enough back (and my eyes are weak enough) that I missed a great deal of the dialogue. However, the music and unusual posture and movements of the performers conveyed a great deal.

Earlier in the day, Anara accompanied me on a bus ride downtown to the Apple Store for my Genius Bar appointment. All went well. The Apple representative working with me looked the phone over. He took the SIM card out and noted the salt crystals. He agreed that I was eligible for an out of warranty replacement phone. All I had to do was pay $269. The catch was that they didn't have one at this store. I ended up making an appointment to go to the Tigard store tomorrow, where they were holding a phone for me.

The rats are living in the dining area while we are sleeping in Anara's bedroom. That means we have more chances to observe them being cute.

One of Anara's rats, lounging in their new striped hammock.



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Birthday Celebration

We celebrated my birthday again this evening. Chris and Anara took us out for a birthday dinner at Nuestra Cocina, a Portland restaurant specializing in the cuisine of central Mexico. We had to wait half an hour on the patio for a table, because they don't take reservations. Once we got to our table, we had all sorts of delicious and unusual dishes, including a salad of "Grilled cactus, spicy green salsa, avocado & cotija cheese " and "Poblano chile stuffed with braised squash & Oaxacan cheese." It was all delightful, as was the company.

Chris and Anara had picked out some thoughtful birthday gifts. One was a jar opener. He has one, and I commented to him that it worked really well and would help me with the arthritis in my thumbs. It's an OXO Good Grips Jar Opener, very handy.

The second present was a Wii remote, so Ken and I can play games together without having to switch the remote back and forth. Thanks, Chris and Anara!

We slept in a bit this morning, still jet lagging after our trip yesterday. Read more!

Last Day in Paradise

For our final day on the island of Kauai, we headed north. Our first stop was Kilauaea Lighthouse and Wildlife Refuge. Visitors can't actually go upon the lighthouse, but Kilauea Point is a marvelous place. From the overlook, you can see Crater Hill, where red-footed boobies nest.

Several species of ocean birds frequent the area, including Great Frigatebirds, who are the pirates of the bird world. They chase and harass birds who have managed to catch some food, scaring them into dropping the food. The Frigatebirds move in and catch the dropped food in the air. Outside the gift shop, a volunteer stood on duty, protecting a downy seven week old Wedge Tailed Shearwater chick, waiting patiently for its parents to return with food.

We drove on north, stopping at various beaches to explore. At one we saw an endangered Monk Seal resting on the sand, with signs warning visitors not to touch or bother the seal.

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We ended up at Kee Beach, at the end of the road, literally. A small cul de sac fronts on the lifeguard station for the beach beyond.

On the way home we stopped at Paradise Shave Ice. We shared a Honalei special, lime, cherry, and banana shave ice over macadamia nut ice cream. The ice cream was good, but we don't have to have any more shave ice--not our favorite.




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