Benson - Christmas and New Years Eve

12/24/2018-12/31/2019

Monday and Tuesday – The last few days we stayed at the park. Dennis spent Monday (Christmas Eve) smoking a pork roast that we will be taking to the Christmas Dinner tomorrow. I volunteered to be a table host for the Christmas Dinner. One of my duties was to decorate the our table. Monday evening I met with another lady who will be at our table so we could decorate. It turned out that Barb and Jeff Mullen are from Shawano WI and are snow birds as well. Christmas Day we sat down with our table of 20 along with 7 other tables celebrating Christmas with a nice dinner.

Thursday – The weather has turned a little cooler with highs back in the mid 50's and some scattered showers. It has snowed in the higher elevations so I thought it would be nice to take a drive to see if we could find some snow so we headed to Mt. Graham. We traveled east on I-10 then turned north on Highway 191 to Swift Trail Junction. We then turned west on to Highway 266 which wound up the mountain. We reached snow at about 6000 feet, traveled up to about 7000 feet then turned around when the road started to become snow covered. It was a beautiful drive with a mix of fluffy clouds and peaks of blue sky. When we got back to Highway 191 we drove north through the town of Safford AZ. I saw there was Indian Hot Springs north of Safford. We went to check it out but apparently whatever was there is closed to the public. We drove north a little further on some dirt back roads then back to Highway 70.

Saturday – We went into Tucson to visit with Steve and Li. They are staying at the Lazy Daze/KOA Campground. It a lovely campground, nice sites with bushes and fruit trees on most sites. Its pretty expensive but was the only place they could find that had openings in January. We walked over to the adjacent Lazy Daze sales area to look at a their campers. Mid afternoon we were all getting hungry so walked over to the on site restaurant and had a bite to eat. After our visit, Dennis and I stopped at Costco and picked up a few things.

Monday – New Years Eve! When we visited Steve and Li they had a lemon tree on their site so we were able to bring a bunch of lemons home with us. I made Dennis' favorite pie....Lemon Meringue! I have not made a meringue pie in ages but it turned out great! Later in the day we both spent some time in the workout room at the clubhouse. In the evening we attended a New Years Eve party. We had a great time dancing with all our friends at the park to the music of Juke Box Junkies.

Where we are parked: SKP Saguaro Coop RV Park – Benson Arizona – Site 158. This is an Escapees SKP Coop park. Most of the sites are leased by members with several guest sites available as well. We were put on a lease holders site that has made their site available for transient guests. The lease sites are huge and many of them have a large sheds or casitas on them as well as a spot to park your RV and vehicles. Besides the many full hookup sites there are overnight dry camping sites as well. The cost is $20/day for Escapee members, $30/day for non-members. This is for a full hookup site including cable TV. We paid $375 for one month.

Mount Graham

Scenes from Benson

Benson Arizona

12/18/2018-12/23/018

Tuesday – Yesterday Dennis was invited to go along on a Jeep ride out in the bush. So today he was picked up around 8:15 and they headed south west of here. Dennis did not know exactly where they ended up but he enjoyed it even though it was very bumpy.

I spent the day taking advantage of full hook ups to catch up on the wash. I also took a bike ride into Benson. The ride was about 8 miles round trip.

After happy hour we headed into town with a group from the park to The Horseshoe Cafe for Taco Tuesday. Dennis and I both had pork tacos then shared a piece of Heath Chocolate pie. Yum!

The weather has been very nice with clear blue skies and temps into the mid 60's. The wind picked up in the afternoon and got kind of cool but still nice. It has been close to freezing over night but warms up quickly when the sun come up.

Friday – Today we took a drive. We wanted to go across the border to the Pink Store. We drove down to Agua Prieta and walked across the border and realized as soon as we started walking down the main street that we had the wrong town. The Pink Store is in the Mexican town south of Deming NM! Bummer! I should have consulted my blog from last year. We walked a few of the streets to check out the town but did not find anything interesting.

On the way back home we stopped in Bisbee, strolled through the town and had lunch at the Stock Exchange Restaurant. From there we drove west and drove through Sierra Vista.

Saturday – Saturday evening was the annual Brown Bag gift exchange at the park. Everyone brings a $10 gift in a brown paper bag. As your name is called you can either pick an unopened gift or steal an opened gift from someone. Our group brought lots of great appetizers to share. We had lots of fun. The evening ended with a snowball fight with fuzzy white snowballs.

Sunday – After spending several days at the park we needed an exploring day. Dennis did some research and found Cave Creek Canyon in the Coronado National Forest. It was a 2 hour drive east of Benson but was a nice drive. We arrived around noon, stopped in the visitor center then headed to the Southfork hiking trail. This park is popular with birders as it has many uncommon birds as well as neotropical migrant birds that show up at different times of the year. We did not see any birds of interest but it was a pretty walk along a babbling stream. We stopped at the Rafter G restaurant in Bowie for supper. Arrived home around 7:00.

Where we are parked: SKP Saguaro Coop RV Park – Benson Arizona – Site 158. This is an Escapees SKP Coop park. Most of the sites are leased by members with several guest sites available as well. We were put on a lease holders site that has made their site available for transient guests. The lease sites are huge and many of them have a large sheds or casitas on them as well as a spot to park your RV and vehicles. Besides the many full hookup sites there are overnight dry camping sites as well. The cost is $20/day for Escapee members, $30/day for non-members. This is for a full hookup site including cable TV. We paid $375 for one month.

JEEP TRIP

BISBEE AZ

HAPPY HOUR AT THE PARK

                                    
                                 CAVE CREEK CANYON - SOUTHFORK TRAIL

On to Arizona

12/16/2018-12/17/018

Sunday – We spent 5 days at Big Bend and still did not see it all. But today we left to continue our journey west. We went through the park to Study Butte then took 118 up to Alpine. We wanted to take 90 west to Van Horn but the GPS kept telling us to go through Fort Davis. We turn on 90 anyway and found out why the GPS did not want us to go that way. There is a low bridge on the west side of Alpine, 13'-7”. We have the height set in the GPS at 13'-10” even though our actual height is 13'-4”. We made it under with room to spare but it is good to know that the GPS is watching out for us! We did not know how far we would go or where we were going to spend the night. Travel weather and roads were good so we kept driving and made it all the way to El Paso. We stayed at the Sunland Racetrack and Casino in there parking lot RV park. It was very interesting to me as we were right next to the racetrack and in the morning we could see the horses being worked on the track. We traveled 346 miles today.

Where we are parked: Sunland Racetrack and Casino RV Park – 8 paved sites with water and electric - $15.

Monday – We got up quite early to get on the road as we decided we would try to get to Benson today. It had rained over night and remained cloudy and sprinkled a little as we drove. By the time we got to Benson around noon the sun was out and it was 59 degrees. We traveled 267 miles today. 

We tracked down our friends Jill and Ed Iteen and went with them to the clubhouse to the daily happy hour. It was like coming home as we were greeted with lots of hugs and welcome backs from our many friends we made from last year.

Where we are parked: SKP Saguaro Coop RV Park – Benson Arizona – Site 158. This is an Escapees SKP Coop park. Most of the sites are leased by members with several guest sites available as well. We were put on a lease holders site that has made their site available for transient guests. The lease sites are huge and many of them have a large sheds or casitas on them as well as a spot to park your RV and vehicles. Besides the many full hookup sites there are overnight dry camping sites as well. The cost is $20/day for Escapee members, $30/day for non-members. This is for a full hookup site including cable TV. We paid $375 for one month.

Big Bend National Park

12/10/2018-12/15/018

Monday – Moving day. Today we start our two day journey to Big Bend National Park. It is 310 miles to the park entrance then another 54 miles in the park to the campground we want to stay at. Too many miles for one day. Its been pretty cold most nights so in the mornings we have had to wear coats and gloves while hooking up. Well at least I do. We had plans to stay at Amistad Recreational Area Governors campground near Del Rio. Once there we drove through and did not find any sites we liked. They were small and not very level. So drove another hour and a half to an RV park in Sanderson. We arrived mid afternoon so we took advantage of the sunshine and sat outside for a bit. It was a very nice little RV park, however a little noisy as it was situated between the highway and the railroad tracks.

Where we are parked: Canyon RV Park – Site 6 – Full hook ups $30/day for a full hook up site including free WI-Fi.

Canyon RV Park

Tuesday – On to Big Bend today. There are long stretches of road out here with very few towns so we have been careful to keep the fuel tank as full as possible. There are a few fuel stations in the park but I am sure they are pricey. From Sanderson to the park border is 94 miles with one town in between. We stopped there for fuel then headed south on 385 to the park. It was early afternoon when we arrived at Rio Grande Village Campground. We stopped to talk to the host as we saw several sites with blank reserved tags. She directed us to the non-reservable area and the sites she thought would be suitable for us. We found a site and set up.

After a quick bite for lunch we visited a few spots in this area. We hiked the 2 mile Boquillas Canyon trail, checked out the Boquillas Canyon Overlook and visited the Hot Springs. We did not have our swim suits so may revisit the Hot Springs so we can take a soak. It is very beautiful here with many unique rock formations.

Boquillas Canyon

On the trail

Rio Grande River

Donkeys grazing across the river

Wednesday – First thing this morning was a “short” drive (35 miles) to Fossil Discovery Exhibit to attend a ranger led presentation on the dinosaur fossils found in the park. We learned that this park is unique in its fossil variety. From there we drove back to the Panther Junction Visitor Center and watched a short film about the park. By that time it was nearing noon so we headed over the the Boquilllas border crossing. There is a port of entry there. For $5 we were ferried across the Rio Grande then walked to a small Mexican village and had lunch. The restaurant owner spoke very good English and we chatted with her about her solar installation. We were not concerned for our safety for a couple of reasons. First it is 150 miles from the next nearest Mexican town so why would there be any illegal activity here? Second, this village is supported by the visitors coming from the park so they do not want any problems because that could jeopardize there lively hood. We checked out dugout wells and while on the nature trail met someone that knew someone that worked at Cray in Chippewa Falls. I told them Pam's name and they thought they had heard it from there friend. Who knows!

Just a little snack!

The ferry service

Crossing the Rio Grande

Lunch in Boquilllas

Boquilllas Bar

Visiting with the natives

Vintage transportation

Thursday – It was a cool blustery day today. We headed way to the other side of the park to see the Santa Elena Canyon. All park roads have no more than a 45 mph speed limit and the canyon is 60 miles from our campground so it took over an hour to get there. I have to say the drive was spectacular and diverse with lots of winding turns and elevation changes. Once at the canyon we took a trail into the canyon which required us to cross the Terlingua River. We got our feet a little wet crossing the river then ascended a path to access the canyon. There were some steps and rails but still a little scary in spots but worth the effort. On the way back we drove into the Chisos Basin which is also very spectacular. We stopped at the Chisos Basin Lodge for a late lunch and got a table by the window with an awesome view. There were several short hikes we could have taken but it was pretty cold and windy in the Basin with temps around 38 degrees. Back at the campground which was 3800 feet lower in elevation is was much warmer.

Approaching Santa Elena Canyon

In the Canyon

The Rio Grande River

Great Scenery

Friday and Saturday – We extended our stay so we could hike to some of the off road features in the park. Friday we did the Burro Mesa Pour-off, the Burro Springs and the Tuffs Canyon Trails. We also stopped at the Sam Nail Ranch. We noticed lots of birds in this area. I would estimate we hiked at least 5 miles on desert trails. We were going to leave on Friday but decided to stay one more day to go see Balanced Rock. This trail required a 6 mile drive on gravel road to the trail head then a 2.2 round trip hike. The first part of the trail was very level and easy but at the end we had to climb up about 80 feet on rocky boulders. Very fun!

Burro Mesa Pour-off

Hiking to Burro Spring

Tuffs Canyon

On our way to Balance Rock

Some of the terrain we negotiated

Careful!

We made it!

We have both really enjoyed this park and the weather has been great. Cool at night with frost some mornings but day time temps in the mid 50's to mid 60's. Great for hiking. We saw some wildlife including coyote and deer along with lots of birds. The highlight was seeing a Vermilion Flycatcher, a very colorful and beautiful bird.

Vermilion Flycatcher

Desert Flowers

Where we are parked: Big Bend National Park Rio Grande Village Campground – Site 64 – $14/day, $7/day with senior pass. Park entrance fee is $30 was waved with the senior pass. No hook ups, gravel parking pad with a grill and a bear box. No ATT cell service at this campground but some out in other areas of the park. Free Wi-Fi at some of the visitor centers.

Rio Grande Village Campground