Monday, March 14th

What a wonderfully enjoyable week we have spent! We spent five nights in Yuma with our close friends, Andy & Linda Clarkson, at their lot in the Foothills. We arrived on Monday afternoon to a spaghetti dinner that Linda had prepared. It was the first of several tasty meals that she prepared for us while we were there. Our plans were to stay three nights and then move on to Casa Grande for two nights at the Western Horizons park. We had so much fun with the nightly Pegs’n’Jokers games and the other activities/side trips that Andy and Linda convinced us to cancel our reservations in Casa Grande and stay in Yuma. The breezes were strong enough that we ate our meals in the “man cave” garage since their casita is being remodeled. All in all it was a wonderful five days.

We were able to go to the Arizona Marketplace (Yuma’s huge flea market) and purchase a couple of electrical adapters to replace the ones that had gotten burned while we were at the church. When one leg gets an electrical overload, it heats up the metal spade to the point of melting the rubber on the plug. I had two adapters that were burned and I was able to replace the ends with new ones and have reliable replacement cords.

Another accomplishment was getting the coach washed and waxed. Since my surgery I’m very hesitant to get up on the roof of my coach. I found an advertised service that came out to the coach, washed the roof and sides of the coach, and shined the tires. They left for a couple of hours and returned to hand-wax the whole coach with Meguiar’s wax. While they were at it, they threw in a wash job for the car. All this cost only $99!!! It was well worth the cost and the coach wax job is terrific!

We looked at several other properties in the Foothills, but still didn’t find anything that really got us excited. Clarkson’s neighbor is planning to sell his lot with a 570-sq.-ft. casita and plenty of porch/patio space. It would be a perfect lot for our needs, but it may be priced out of our budget. In talking with him, he said he’d come off his price and work with us if we wanted it. However, it would still be more than we can probably afford - or at least it would crimp our traveling adventures. Sadly, we will most likely have to pass on it.

We left Yuma on Saturday morning and drove all the way to Tucson. The rains that the desert have received gave all the short desert grass enough moisture to be green all the way. It was a pleasant change from the brown landscape we’ve seen so much. We arrived in Tucson around 12:30 and got parked with the rest of the Parking Crew. We were able to get settled in before starting work on Sunday morning.

On Sunday morning at 7:30 we had a Parking Crew meeting. We were given our instructions and location assignments and started greeting the arrivals. Since this is and RV resort, there isn’t any marking to do and we only take the attendees to their assigned site. It was an easy day with a steady flow of arrivals until 4PM when we shut down the entry gate. There was a volunteer dinner where we were able to see a lot of old friends that have worked these rallies with us in the past. We’ve had the chance to see and visit with the Ostranders, Griches, and many other close friends that we have missed over the last six months or more.

Tonight we are going to dinner to have a chance to get caught up before the rally starts in full swing tomorrow. It’s nice to be back on the move again and we’re looking forward to the possibility of another Habitat Build in Farmington, NM. The Build is still “iffy” until we get at least six coaches to confirm their participation, but we’re hoping. Since it’s in Farmington, we could be in for any kind of weather. Sorta makes it interesting…