Jerome, Quartzite and Las Vegas

Today is Thursday,1-10-08, and we drove to Jerome, AZ for the day. Jerome is a living Ghost Town. The current population is 329, but at its peak it had a population of 25,000; therefore, it is considered a Ghost Town. The reason for Jerome’s existence is the discovery of gold, however, the main mine ended up producing 397,000 tons of copper, 221 tons of silver and 5 ½ tons of gold. Today it is a tourist town with many antique and artist gallery shops. There is a State Park in town with a museum, but it was closed for some construction work, so we will have to visit again some other time. You can not really tell from the pictures, but the terrain is so steep that mothers would tie ropes around their children so that if they started to fall down the mountain they would not go very far down the hill. Now that’s living on the edge.
\





















.

Cave Creek Regional Park has an old Clay Mine that Sandy and I hiked up to. We found out it was originally excavated for gold, but no gold was found so a lady decided to sell the clay sediment mixed as an elixir. It turned out the only thing it worked for was Dysentery, but that was enough to let her relatives reap the profits to this day.
In the afternoon we were sitting outside enjoying the weather and a covey of Quail were milling around behind us. They are always so much fun to watch as the scurry around.












On Thursday the we drove to Quartzite, AZ to see the Big Tent and RV show that so many RVers attend this time of year. The only available places to camp were all "dry camping" which means no hook-ups. It was extremely dusty where we parked because there were no paved roads. We went to the Tyson Wells Flea Market on Friday. We usually don't do flea markets, but we did buy a couple of thing. Saturday was the first day the Big Tent and RV Show was open, so we spent the day there. The whole area was something we wanted to see, but I do not we think we need to go back there again.




We left Quartzite on Sunday the 20th and drove up to Lake Havasu City on AZ highway 95 on the east side of the Colorado River. In Lake Havasu City we stayed at the Crazy Horse Campground. We ended up in the second row, but lucked out in that there were two open sites in front of us, so we had a fairly good view of Lake Havasu.



Lake Havasu City is where the original London Bridge was moved to. I understand that when it was rebuilt here it ended up about 100 feet shorter than the original length.






On the way up to Lake Havasu City we passed by the Parker Dam. Trucks and RVs are not allowed on the dam road, so on Monday we drove back down in our car to see what is the deepest dam in the world with some 235 feet buried in the ground.





















The Bill Williams National Wildlife Refuge is located just above the dam.







Today, Tuesday the 22nd, we drove up Highway 95 to Las Vegas, NV to visit with some former neighbors from Apple Valley. Later in the evening we went to the downtown area and quickly lost $65 between us in the slot machines. Fremont Street is covered with a large TV screen on which light shows are put on each hour in the evening.


Our friends, Dick and Shirley, came over early Wednesday afternoon to visit before we went to lunch and take in a show with them. We really had a good time reminiscing about the old days and friends in the old neighborhood. Earlier, they had given us a DVD of old videos of some of the gatherings we had in the past. It was funny to see the old clothes and hairdos (for those who used to have hair back then). For lunch we took in the buffet at the Rio and then went to Hooters and to see Bobby Slayton, a stand up comic and was pretty good.
The next day we spent walking around the casinos. It has been over 25 years since I was last here and has it ever changed. In the evening we went to the Bellagio to see the Cirque du Soleil show “O”. “O” comes from the French word “eau” for water, so the show has a water theme with a 25 foot deep pool that they perform with. It was a very good show and would recommend it if you get to Las Vegas. This is a show that Sandy and her girlfriends were coming to see on 9-13-01, but as you can guess from the date, their trip was cancelled. When they got rescheduled to come in November, they were not able to get tickets, so this was on Sandy’s list of shows to see. Here are some pictures standing in front of the Bellagio with a view of their fountains and a night picture of the Eiffel Tower at the Paris Casino.



Dick and Shirley have a jewelry shop here in Las Vegas, so this morning, Friday, we took the opportunity to visit the store. When we left the RV resort we noticed a huge column of black smoke coming from the Strip area. As we were driving up to see Dick and Shirley we stopped and took the following picture of the fire at the Monte Carlo Hotel and Casino. Thankfully no one was hurt.

After visiting with them some we went back to the Strip for lunch and went to The Mirage to see the Danny Gans show. He is “the man of many voices,” part impressionist, part comedian, and part singer. The first few minutes got off to a slow start, but then picked up and was well worth the time and $$’s to see.

Today, Saturday, was a day that we changed our schedule. Dick and Shirley had given us some free tickets to us at show Downtown, but yesterday while eating lunch(seems we are doing too much of that) at a buffet, we overheard some people talking about a show they had gone to and really enjoyed. Sandy asked them which show that was. It turned out to be the Cirque du Soleil show "The Beatles Love". Now, Sandy was a Beatles freak back in her early days, and even gone saw their concert in Minneapolis in 1965. Since I knew this, I had asked earlier if she wanted to see it and she said "no", however, after hearing the people talking about it we decided to see if we could get tickets. When we got to the box office all they had for this night's show was for the 10:00 show (too late for us), but they did have some single seats for the 7:30 show. We ended up with two seats in front of each other on the aisle and they turned out to be some of the best seats in the house. Another show to see if you are in town and like the Beatles. More $$$’s spent.

It’s been raining on and off all night. This morning, Sunday, they said Las Vegas had about ½ inch so far. Sandy is washing clothes and I am updating the Diary and Blog. After Dick and Shirley close their store today, they are coming by to take us out to the Palms for supper. Tomorrow we are heading back to Phoenix with a stop a Lake Havasu City for a couple of days.

Spent Christmas back home, now back to Arizona

Remember: you can click on the images to enlarge them.


It's time for a little update. As you know from our last post, we decided to go back home for Christmas and New Years. We had time to visit with some of our friends in Lakeville, Apple Valley and, most importantly, our families in Staples and Aberdeen. We also had a chance to visit with our friends at Fure Financial who are helping us to afford living this lifestyle.

We spent the 23rd, 24th and 25th in Staples with Dave's family. Glen and Becky had everyone over for Christmas dinner and it was fun to see our nieces and nephew with their families all at the same time. On the 26th we drove to Aberdeen to be with Sandy's family. Sandy's mom served a big meal for us and Sandy's sister, Cindy, and her husband, John. John's brother, David, also joined us. He had come from Ohio to spend Christmas with Cindy and John so it was nice to see him again after many years. Now we're going to have to hit the hiking trails to wear off some of that holiday food we ate.


South Dakota was very foggy and the trees were always covered with a beautful coating of frost. It looked just like a picture on a Christmas card.








We drove back to Apple Valley and stayed with our friends, Pat and John. We spent New Years Eve at their house eating fondue and playing cards with our friends, Donna and Jerry. On January 3rd Jerry picked us up at 5:00 AM and took us to the Minneapolis airport for our flight back to Phoenix.

Jane picked us up at the airport and took us to get our motorhome out of storage. Now we're back in our favorite spot in Cave Creek Campground. It's been raining quite a bit again the past week, so on Sunday the 8th, we went to the Cave Creek Museum for a few hours. This area has been the site of many mining ventures as well as cattle and sheep ranching. This is also where the Apaches made one of their last strongholds.






The museum has a large collection of Native American pottery dating back over 2,500 years.






After the museum we took a short drive up to the Spur Cross Ranch Conservation Area which was formerly a large cattle ranch. We just took a quick look to see if we should come back on a nicer day, which we will. On the way back we had to slow down to a crawl on the road. It seems the Coyotes around here don't have much to fear.(Foxhunter, maybe you need to make a quick trip done here to wake these guys up.) Foxhunter is my fishing buddy, Terry, and he may reply in the comment area to the Carp King, that's me--Dave.



Now that the rain has stopped the skies are clear blue. All this rain has made this part of the desert foothills so lush and green. This should make for beautiful wildflowers this spring!






We thought we would add something at the end of each of our Blogs. We will try to have a plants, trees or something of interest that we have seen. The first one is the Senita Cactus, AKA Old Man Cactus.

That's all for now.

Dave and Sandy