Sky City, Heading Home and Winter Weather

03-26-2018 thru 04-01-2018

Monday – Today we visited Sky City Cultural Center and the Acoma Pueblo. This pueblo is one of the oldest continually inhabited settlements in North America. It was built on top of a sheer-walled, 367-foot sandstone bluff and is believed to have been inhabited since around 1150 A.D. There are around 250 dwellings that make up this community none of which have electricity, sewer or water. A few people live there full time but most live is other nearby communities with all the modern conveniences. It was interesting to learn that only the females of the community can own property and that property is passed down within families.

This is also the site of the San Esteban del Rey Mission, a Catholic mission constructed in 1629-1640. Both the Mission and the Pueblo are Registered National Historic Landmarks and are also on the National Register of Historic Places. The tour cost $22 and lasted about 1.5 hours.

San Esteban del Rey Mission

Later that day we drove to La Mosca Lookout on Mt. Taylor. The view from the lookout was not that spectacular as it was partially blocked by trees. The Lookout is around 9500 feet and is in a Ponderosa pine forest. The gravel road was pretty well maintained and did not cause me any heartburn until Dennis decided to continue climbing and the road got narrower. Then it started to snow so I said that's far enough. I am having visions of a flat tire, on a mountain road with no cell phone service. Not!!

Tuesday – We left the Casino early in the morning and headed east. I put Tucumcari NM in the GPS. At that point we will need to make a decision as to head up Hwy 54 or stay on I-40 going straight east. I checked the wheather to the east of use and it looked like they were getting lots of rain and flooding so Hwy 54 it is. It rained overnight at the casino and as we proceeded east we ran into intermittent rain and snow showers. And also a stiff east to south-east wind. We bucked the wind all day and only got 8.9 MPG. Electric hookup in a gravel parking lot for $15.00. Not too bad.

As we are driving I asked Dennis what he thought about trying to make it to Chippewa Falls for Easter. He was all for the idea. I looked at the weather for Sat. and Sunday and boy is it going to be cold. Highs in the 30's and lows in the teens. Brrrr!! We will have to winterize the camper before we get there.

Wednesday – We didn't get on the road until almost 9:30. I think we are still on Arizona time. Our goal today was Lyons, KS where we stayed on the way down with the camper. On the way we found out Jim and Bonnie had left Apache Junction yesterday and were a few hours behind us. We got on the phone with them to see if we could meet up with them but it seemed unlikely. They were too far behind us. Oh well we will have to get together with them back in Wisconsin. The drive to Lyons was uneventful and we arrived late in the afternoon. I drove the last 1 hour and backed the camper into the site.

Thursday – Another long but uneventful drive. We had some tail wind and the sun came out for most of the drive. Our destination is Lakeside Casino in Osceola Iowa. We heard from Jim and Bonnie. They were only an hour or so behind us and they were going to try and make it to Lakeside Casino tonight as well. They arrived about 2 hours after us. That evening we went to the casino to enjoy the buffet. It was BOGO. The

food was some of the best casino buffet food we had all trip.

Friday – Dennis winterized the camper in the morning then we said good-bye to Jim and Bonnie. We called my brother Steve before we arrived to get his take on parking at the farm where my parents live. He said it will probably be too soft. He has a nice solid driveway and lots of room so we headed to his house and parked the camper. We turned the heat on for keep things inside from freezing has they are expecting some snowy and cold weather over the next few days. My parents were surprised when we walked in the door. However my mom said she had an inkling we might show up for Easter. Sheila and Henry arrived around 6:00. We have not seen them since the first of December. My did Henry grow!

Saturday – Woke up to several inches of snow. The forecast for the foreseeable future is highs in the 30's and lows in the teens and on and off snow. Why did we come home so early?

Sunday – Happy Easter!! We went to my aunt Balla's house for Easter dinner and visited with all the relatives. They are predicting more snow for Monday afternoon so we plan on heading home in the morning.

Where we are parked: Sky City Casino RV Park – Acoma Pueblo,NM – site 17 - 42 full hookup sites. Nothing special but nice place to stop with reasonable rates right off of I-40. Regular daily rates: $15-$22.

Where we are parked: Rita Blanca Park – Dalhart, TX – Site 4 – 20 sites – electric only.

Where we are parked: Lyons Campground – Lyons, KS – Site near the playground – 16 sites – electric only. Water and dump station available.

Where we are parked: Lakeside Casino RV Park – Osceola Iowa – Site 1C – 47 sites with full hook ups. Open all year.

Where we are parked: My brothers house.

One National Park, Two National Monuments and a Flat Tire

03-19-2018 thru 03-25-2018

Monday – After breakfast the wind was light enough so we played Pickle Ball for about an hour. Not sure when we will find a court again so want to practice before we leave. Dennis wanted to take the back road to Oatman so off we went. This is gravel road that you can access off of the Bullhead Parkway. The road was very wash boardy and bumpy. We were about 2 mile from Oatman when the truck tire sensor notified us that one of our tires was low on air. Ah oh! We both got out of the truck and sure enough I could hear a hissing noise coming from the front tire on my side. We drove a little ways forward to find a flat spot on the road. Only took about 30 minutes to change the tire. Would have been quicker but had to find out where the jack and tire wrench was located. Anyway we were on our way and made it back to Bullhead City to the Walmart. We had purchased the current tires at Walmart with road hazard insurance. They told us they could not fix the leak. Bummer. We could buy one tire to replace it but they had over 50,000 miles on them. After getting some prices and some discussion we decided to get a whole new set of tires. They ordered them and told us they would be delivered to the store tomorrow. We plan on leaving on Wednesday so we wanted to get this taken care of.

Ah Oh!

Tuesday – In the morning we played a little pickle ball again but the wind started blowing pretty hard so we quit. I took the bedding to the park laundry while Dennis waited for a call from Walmart. They called about 12:30 and he headed down there to get into queue to get the tires mounted. Good thing we are retired as it took about 3 hours before they were finished with the job. These are a different brand of tire from the old ones and we were concerned they would be noisy but they turned out to be just fine.

Wednesday – Moving day. After being here for two weeks I was getting antsy to move on and to head for home. We packed up and were on the road by 8:00. Pretty early for us as most of the time we are just getting out of bed. We wanted to get out of the valley before the wind kicked up. Our destination today is a free camping spot at a museum at the south end of the Petrified National Forest Park. It is about a 300 mile drive so a little longer than we would like. We stopped a few times along the way to get gas and take a potty break. About a half hour east of Flagstaff we stopped at the Twin Arrows Casino to take a break and get a bite to eat. Dennis signed up for a players card as they had discounts for anyone with a CDL license. He got $24 in casino credits which he played and won $10. With that and an additional $3 discounts we both ate at the lunch buffet for under $10. Sweet! We made it to our destination around 3:00, got parked and relaxed for the rest of the evening. We are camping at a Crystal Forest Museum and Gifts at the south entrance of the park and its free.

San Francisco Mountains north of Flagstaff

Thursday – An awesome day at Petrified Forest National Park. Holy cow! What a beautiful park! We spent all day at the park stopping at the various pull-offs, overlooks and took most of the trails. The longest being the Agate House and Long Logs trail which was about 2.5 miles. In addition to all the petrified wood the scenery is spectacular. The Blue Mesa and Painted Desert areas were particularly beautiful. Layers of sedimentary rock eroded by wind and water exposing vibrant rainbow of colors. The view over the painted desert is very surreal. Something that has to be experienced.

PETRIFIED FOREST NATIONAL PARK

Friday – Moving day again. Today's destination is Grants, NM and El Malpais National Monument. We decided to avoid I-40 and take some state highways. It ended up to be a very stressful day for a few reasons. From our Museum campsite we headed east on Hwy. 180 toward St. Johns and Hwy 93. The road was very hilly and Dennis had the cruise on. About 20 minutes into the drive the check engine light went on. Ah Oh! Now what? We drove to St. Johns and stopped for gas. After starting the truck again part of the warning light went out. Later when we turned the truck off again everything cleared. We think it had something to do with having the cruise set going over the hills and towing the camper. At St. Johns we proceeded north on Hwy 191. OMG! This road was HORRIBLE. Lots of dips and bumps and it went on for miles. Eventually we turned onto Hwy 53 east which was better. Around 1:00 we stopped at the El Morro National Monument Visitor Center. We decided to keep going to Grants and come back to this monument tomorrow. By now the wind had picked up and was blowing us around a bit. We ran into a sand storm just outside of Grant. Finally we made it to the El Malpais Visitor Center. We had lunch in the camper then went into the visitor center. We asked about access to the Joe Skeen BLM Campground with our 35 foot rig. They thought the length limit was 50 so we proceeded east on I-40 to Hwy 117. The campground is about 10 miles south of I-40. I was worried about the arroyo that you have to cross going into the campground. That was not an issue. However the campground road was littered with huge potholes and was very bumpy. We found a nice campsite but since it was so windy we were eating dust while setting up. We needed to fill one of our propane tanks and drove back to Grants to get it filled. While there we went to a restaurant for supper and stopped at Walmart to use the WI-FI. It was a pretty stressful day so we went back to the camper and relaxed for the rest of the evening.

Saturday – More awesome geography today! We started the day by driving back to El Morro National Monument. This park features over 2,000 signatures carved into a sandstone bluff dating back to Pueblo times. It is also the site of an ancient ruin on top of the bluff. We took the 2 mile Headland Trail which included the Inscription Trail at the base of the bluff. We proceeded up the Headland Trail and climbed the 250 feet to the top of the bluff. It was very neat walking on the rocks on top of the of the bluff. At least I thought so....I don't think Dennis was a thrilled as he does not like heights.

El Morro National Monument

 

We left El Morro and headed east and stopped at El Calderon trail head part of the El Malpais National Monument. This 4 mile hiking trail takes you past lave tube entrances, collapsed lava tubes, a bat cave, a lava trench, around a cinder cone, across a lava flow and on a portion of the continental divide trail. We did the whole loop but were pretty tuckered out by the time we were done. We drove back to Grants, stopped at Walmart to upload the 50 photo I took. We headed back to Hwy 117 and stopped at the Sandstone Bluffs Overlook and visited the La Ventana Natural Arch, one of New Mexico's largest natural arches. Whew! We would have liked to go check out the Lava Falls area but we were beat. Time to go back to the camper for a shower, supper and some REST!

El Malpais National Monument

El Calderon trail

Sandstone Bluff

La Ventana Natural Arch

Sunday – Right before we went to bed Saturday night, Dennis looked at the weather and saw they were predicting high winds later in the evening. We went to bed but about 15 minutes later he asked if I wanted to leave and get off the bluff we were on. I was a little concerned about being up there as well so we hooked up and headed down the road about 30 miles to Sky City Casino. We parked in an empty lot next to the Casino overnight then moved to the Sky City Casino RV Park in the morning. After our busy day yesterday we spent the Sunday resting at the camper.

Where we are parked: Crystal Forest Museum and Gifts Shop - Holbrook, AZ – No hookups – picnic shelters – no toilet facilities. Nice place to stop for a few nights while visiting the National Park. Free.

Where we are parked: Joe Skeen BLM Campground - Grants, NM – 10 sites – No hookups – picnic shelters – pit toilets. There is a large drainage ditch going into the campground. We made it with our 36' fifth wheel. The road into and through the park is very rough with lots of pot holes. There were only a few sites big enough for our rig.

Where we are parked: Sky City Casino RV Park – Acoma Pueblo,NM – site 17 - 42 full hookup sites. Nothing special but nice place to stop with reasonable rates right off of I-40. Regular daily rates: $15-$22.