Category: On Our Way

I try to have all the stuff I put up on this blog be from one week ago… meaning it is old news by the time you read it.  That hopefully gives me a bit more time to sort through stuff and  get it ready to post. (I know it may not look like it… )

But I have to mention the Coronavirus and our travels.  Back a long time ago, (Last week), we were still traveling, and spent time at the Grand Canyon.  Already people were somewhat afraid of each other, so we kept our distances, but there were still lots of people around.  We hiked most all of the South Rim of the canyon, and took tons of pictures.  There were places the dirt/mud trail was only a foot from the edge, and it was hard not to think about how far down the bottom was!  Here are a few of the resulting photos…

 

I can’t remember when we were here last, but it was too long ago!  The views are literally breathtaking!

 

The first afternoon we were hiking along (Can you call it hiking when the trail is pretty much flat??) and a storm quickly rolled in from the west.  We got a bit of rain, then some very tiny hail!  It passed pretty quickly too, and left us a beautiful rainbow! If you have good eyesight, you might notice a second rainbow too. It was also interesting that the rainbow seemed to be the edge of a bubble – with darkness excluded from the bubble. (Maybe that’s where we should live now… in a bubble with the darkness excluded!)

 

Have you ever been fortunate enough to stand taller than a rainbow?

 

The bright blue of this beautiful bird doesn’t show up too well here.

 

More odd birds…

 

Speaking of odd birds, check out these insanely fearless folks literally living on the edge!

 

A brightly colored helicopter flew up from the bottom of the canyon and pretty much right over us, carrying a long skinny parcel at the end of a long line.  From a distance it looked like it might be a stretcher, like maybe it was a rescue of some sort.  But if a sick person was in that basket, instead of inside the nice helicopter, he’d be getting sicker yet, because the basket was spinning slowly.  We decided it was lumber or building supplies.  Then the ‘copter dropped his load somewhere on the South Rim, and flew back for more.  We watched several trips, sometimes with a box, sometimes a bag or two.  We figured that’s how they take the trash out of the bottom of the canyon!

 

 

On the day that we were planning on driving out of the Grand Canyon area, we woke up to find two inches of snow everywhere!  Snow sneaks up on you very quietly during the night, so we were certainly surprised.

 

We’ve never seen the canyon in the snow, so we decided to drive the almost an hour trip back to the canyon and check it out.  Turns out there really wasn’t any snow in the canyon, but we did see another rainbow!  You will have to look closely at the next two photos to find it.

 

Only the end of a rainbow in this one. (Good eyes, Ashlyn and Bryan!)

 

Crazy photo man… carrying a tripod 10 miles in hopes of a tiny bit better picture!

 

So back to the world now… I know all you have seen grocery stores looking like this.  I’m putting these pictures up to document the craziness of this pandemic world.  I’ve never seen stores like this.  These were a few days ago; it will probably get crazier before it gets better.

 

So from the Grand Canyon we went to Death Valley (I hope that’s not an omen!) and an old ghost town that I fondly remember visiting as an 11 year old.  So next week you will see Death Valley, and the week after that – who knows?  Pictures of us hiding from viruses?  Stay tuned!

 

 

 

Tucson, Arizona

Our “campground” in Tucson was literally a small city of aluminum and fiberglass homes.  Some with wheels, some with the wheels removed or hidden… in other words, lots of “mobile homes” that aren’t really mobile anymore.  But there were still tons of RV’s: there were more than 1,000 units total in this place. It was all very nice, but a bit too much like a city!

There was even a large scale model train setup!

 

Brauers

The Tucson SDA church is pastored by long time friend Jim Brauer. A really wonderful “Grace Filled” church!

Jim and Janell came to our “house” Saturday evening.  We had a nice dinner and a great time catching up.  Jim told me about the Kitt Observatory, so we headed up there next…

 

Kitt Peak National Observatory

Space exploration was all the rage in the 1950’s… and the need/desire for telescopes to investigate the heavens was huge.  All the country’s telescopes were held by universities or privately.  Many European nations had national telescopes, so it was time we (the USA) got one!  This mountain peak about an hour outside of Tucson, Arizona was chosen for the dry weather, high elevation, distance from light pollution and many other reasons. The first telescopes were built here in the late 50’s and early 60’s.  Now there are twenty some telescopes on the peak.  We spent a whole day touring the fascinating telescopes!  There are great night tours, where you could see more than just pictures of what these scopes record, but the tours are booked up quite a ways out. On our next trip through this area we will reserve long ahead to include some super star gazing!

The only sad note is that I seem to have lost all my “real camera” pictures of Kitt Peak.  Sigh.  So you get a few iPhone pictures…

This is the view from the 4 meter telescope.  It is currently attempting to create a 3D map of the visible universe!  It can run a spectral analysis on up to 5,000 stars every 15 minutes; this would previously take individual astronomers years! With this analysis they can decide the composition of the star, and its distance from us and the direction it is moving. The goal is to have all the stars in the northern hemisphere mapped in a 3D model within 5 years… and then to continue with the same apparatus in an observatory in Chile to do the southern hemisphere.

The names of all the telescopes are on this map… too bad you can’t read them!

Inside the massive dome of the 4 meter telescope.

 

This is inside the 2.1 meter telescope, the first major optical telescope on Kitt Peak.  One fascinating thing about this instrument is how they “fine tuned” it: they shoot a laser light into the night sky, and create a “false star”. They then analyze its image.  Since they know what it should look like, any interference from the atmosphere that distorts the image can be corrected, giving more accurate images of everything else.  Pretty cool.

The most unusual telescope is the McMath-Pierce Solar telescope.  Its design is quite unique – one of only a few in the world.  It was created for spectroscopic measurements of the sun, and can see farther into the infrared than any other scope in the world.

Below is a model of its construction: a tall pillar holds three mirrors.  These mirrors reflect the light down a long shaft; two hundred feet long above ground, and three hundred feet below ground.  The light is then bounced back up to the mid point, where it is sent sideways through prisms to create a spectrograph 70 feet long!

This is looking up at the junction of the tower and the 200 feet of above ground shaft.

This is from the midpoint, looking up and out to the sky.

This is looking down from the midpoint, to the mirror on the bottom of the shaft.

This is the control room for the Solar telescope.  There are some computers that help align mirrors and things… state of the art, for 1960.  All of 64K memory!

Here is a spectral image just displayed on the wall.

This massive Solar telescope is now decommissioned.  It will soon be converted into a museum.

 

This is taken through a heavily filtered scope looking at the sun.  You can see a solar protuberance on the top left.

 

Our last night in Tucson we had dinner in a cute little Mexican cafe called Seis.  Yes, six.  The name came from 6 very special dishes they are proud of.  Or something like that.  Anyway, the food was really great and the open air dining a lot of fun.

 

Next stop: The Grand Canyon.  Stay tuned!

 

 

 

Caprock Canyons

This Texas State Park has so much red in the canyons you might think you’re in Colorado!  You can drive or hike – plenty of areas to explore.

 

Some ancient Indian artifacts are on display, including this arrangement of Bison skull and many mandibles.

 

In the early 1800’s, North America was home to between 3o million and 60 million bison!  Professional hide hunters began “The Great Slaughter” from 1874 to 1878, almost eliminating the whole number!  Mary Ann Goodnight urged her husband to rescue some of the few that had missed extermination, and they grew that herd to over 200 head.  That herd has grown, and is now the Texas State Bison Herd.  They roam the Caprock Canyons, including the campgrounds.

 

A bit hard to see, there are six bison behind our motorhome on the lower right.

 

Here is a poster from the 1920’s encouraging people to “Cut Straight thru the heart” of the fertile South Plains…

 

Bison aren’t the only critters around; we saw several sharp looking Road Runners.

 

Adjoining the campground is a prairie dog village.  Dozens of the little squeakers pop in and out of their holes.

 

 

Ending our time at Caprock with beautiful sunsets.

 

Roswell, New Mexico

The “Roswell Incident” occurred in 1947, when a whole host of folks say they saw a saucer-like craft crash land outside of town.  Many people claimed to have picked up scraps of strange metal and other debris.  When taken to the authorities, all the samples vanished, and were replaced with scraps of weather balloons.  Many claim they were threatened with death if they told what happened that day.  Some mysteriously disappeared.

Roswell is now a focal point for all things UFO… with the centerpiece perhaps being the “International UFO Museum.”  (Should we be concerned about the U-Haul in front of the UFO Museum?  Are U-Haul trucks really alien spacecraft in disguise?) (Just getting in the spirit of things here…)

 

Inside are scads of reports from those who saw or were involved in evaluating the wreckage.  It’s enough to make you believe in the whole UFO thing, if you are the type to believe in it… whatever…

There are also lots of props from UFO or other science fiction movies.

 

This large exhibit played spooky music, flashed colorful lights, and blew fog from the spinning disk.

 

This is a replica of an ancient South American tomb lid.  There is a legend that describes possible nav systems, braking and acceleration controls, oxygen system, and symbols for planets and space travel.  The Mayans seemed to have it all figured out.

 

Big Blade!

If you ever want to make your motorhome feel like it’s not so long… watch one of these huge windmill blades going around a corner!  Three blades, about six support cars blocking the highway intersection as they SLOWLY crept around the corner.  These blades are about 120 feet long, making some corners very difficult.  I’ve always wondered how fast the tips of these blades travel when in operation.  Turns out at a typical 10 – 20 rpm, the tips speed along at about 120 mph, but in heavier winds may hit 180 mph!  That explains the frequency of bird strikes… some studies say that wind turbines kill about 300,000 birds annually… but the same study says cats kill over 2,000,000,000!  That’s two billion!

Faywood

Faywood Hot Springs in New Mexico has several fabulous soaking pools.  It was a popular stage stop in the mid 1800’s, at time even sporting a 50 room hotel.  It burned down, (Very Hot Springs?) and the site has gone through many more changes, resulting in a very rustic “back to nature” feel now.  For privacy reasons I didn’t take pictures of the pools, but there were other interesting features.  Below is a “Stone Circle”, which certainly won’t steal tourists away from Stonehenge, but is still interesting.  I couldn’t find out about its origin – Native American or Cowboy?

 

Another puzzle is the Labyrinth, just a path spiraling around and around till it arrives at a rock in the center, where people have donated lots of little treasures.  Or junk.  No clue as to the origin or point of this feature either.

 

We had no Bison here, but there were a few crazy loud Peacocks.  This one walked between our car and motorhome, and around the front.  There is a mirror-like panel in the front of the motorhome, placed at just the right height for peacocks to admire themselves in.  And boy did he!  After a while there, he walked down the length of the coach looking at his reflection in the chrome trim strips at the bottom of all the storage doors.

 

 

After the sunsets, the stars were absolutely incredible!  I had to try some night photography, and now you have to look at some!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, last week I PROMISED that I’d have lots of good pictures up from our South American trip.  Then we made a last minute decision to make a trip from Houston to Denver and catch the Rocky Mountain Dental Convention… So a lot of the time I thought I’d spend sorting pictures was spent relocating!  But Dear Wife Cherryl did a lot of the driving so I did get to spend some time sifting through pictures, but I’ve had the last two days in meetings so I’m no where near done.  But if you’d like to see the partially done work, it will be in a special page for the whole South American Adventure.  Click HERE to jump to it.  Maybe next week I’ll have it done!

This blog is just for the trip up from Houston.  We broke it into a few relatively reasonable drives-  Monday we drove to see our Son-in-Law’s parents in Keene, Texas and had a good evening with them.  Then a couple more hours down the road and spent the night in a rest stop.  When we opened the refrigerator first thing in the morning, a large glass casserole dish (Full of yummy enchiladas), fell from the top shelf to the bottom glass shelf and the glass exploded!  Not the dish, but the glass cover over the bottom drawer.  What a mess!  It is obviously safety glass, and shattered without leaving huge jagged glass shards, but little pieces went everywhere!  Took quite a while vacuuming and sweeping repeatedly.  Have you every vacuumed out the inside of your refrigerator?

 

We spent another night in a little almost abandoned campground in New Mexico.  The sunrise was pretty in spite of the spartan landscape.

 

Every once in a while we have to put fuel in our moving house, and it’s easiest at the truck stops.  Here we are playing with the big guys:

 

As we drive, we can keep an eye on our “Toad” vehicle through the rear video camera.  With the son coming up directly behind us, I thought the view was nice, so I’m sharing it here:

 

Here is a view of our present campsite.  Cherryl took this after a short hike up to the top of a little hill in the park.

 

Here is the famous “Peeping Tom Bear” looking into the Colorado Convention Center.  Some of the meetings were fun and others barely tolerable.  That’s the way it goes!

 

Then we got to have dinner with longtime friends (and former hygiene team member) Debbie and Mike.  It’s been a good, but busy week!

We spent a couple of days with good friends Jeff and Marilyn in Gulfport, Mississippi.  They have lived out of their RV for about 3 years now!  We had a great time with them – camped side by side: (OK, I was really taking a picture of our rig.  But theirs is next door!)

 

I was really hoping we could dine in this elegant establishment, but the timing never worked out…

 

Jefferson Davis Home

We enjoyed a nice long walk 😉 to the last home of Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederacy.

 

This carriage is the last he rode in… posthumously.  It is decorated with rifles and cannon.

 

Inside the house is restored to as close as they could to the period.

 

 

A ways behind the house is the cemetery, complete with the tomb of the Unknown Confederate Soldier.

 

A sign announcing “Snake Crossing” got my attention!

St Michael church

This church in Convent, Louisiana has been there a while… we were told many slaves and their babies were buried there.

Poche Plantation

Just down the street from St Michael’s is the Poche Plantation, which just happens to have RV sites on the back of the property.  So now we have lived on a plantation! (for a couple of days…)

The “Big House” was built in the 1870’s, after the civil war, so no slaves toiled here.  It faces the Mississippi River, but there is a huge levee between it and the river.  In 1929, the government was going to build the levee to control the river, and told all the homeowners along the river that they would have to move their homes or demolish them… at the homeowners’ expense!  The owner of this home fought it because of the beauty of the home, and the government paid to have it moved back a safe distance from the new levee!

Again, it is furnished to the period, with many original pieces still remaining.

 

I enjoyed the kid’s rocking horse in the playroom.  (Enjoyed LOOKING at it… they wouldn’t let me try it out)

 

The crystal balls on the bottom of the chandeliers were very popular… ask me sometime for a couple funny stories regarding these.

 

 

The wallpaper in the dining room was very unique, and in bad shape.  The owner talked to manufacturers all over the states and Europe, looking for a similar pattern.  Finally a French company said they didn’t have a similar pattern; they had the original!  They had been the original supplier to the mansion!  They recreated the wallpaper, and that now adorns the walls. It is unusual in that the pattern does not repeat… and there are unique colorful birds here and there, but only one of each bird in the room.

 

Poche Plantation at night:

 

Oak Alley Plantation

This is a magnificent antebellum plantation on the other side of the Mississippi.  It is justly famous for many reasons, but most obvious is the namesake walkway through the oak trees to the entrance of the “Big House.”

Ironically, the owners were told they would have to cut away many of the oaks when the levee was to be built.  Power or Prestige prevailed, however… they moved the bank of the river so the Oak Alley would remain undisturbed!

 

 

Photography is not allowed in the house, but this is from the front balcony looking out through the Oak Alley.

 

All along the levee were preparations for bonfires, a Christmas tradition along the river.  This one is just opposite the gate to Oak Alley.

 

There used to be 20 slave cabins… now there are 6 that have been reconstructed and furnished.

A tour guide said that the half-moon cutout on the outhouse door indicated it was for the women.  A complete circle, a full-moon, was for the men.  I’d never heard that before.

Lake Charles

A nice lakefront walk houses a small marina and a large park, including a kid’s playground with a climbing house that looked three stories tall!

This represents Captain Johannes Goos, who settled here in 1855 with his wife and seven children.  He was a lumber miller and shipbuilder, and used some of his ships to run the Union blockades during the Civil War.  He built a hospital, and took care of both the Confederate and Union soldiers.  A very good guy, so he gets his statue in the park.

 

A walk further along the lake revealed many beautiful homes… maybe today’s version of the plantation “Big Houses.”

 

Just in case you think all homes in this part of the world look like plantation “Big Houses”, here are a couple of structures near our Poche Plantation grounds, complete with “ladies room”…

 

OK, here is the second picture I’ve posted from inside a Wal*Mart.  This little robot thing was slowly sliding down the isle, with a bright light shining on the rack adjacent it.  It must have been recording shelf content for restocking or inventory purposes.  So what would happen if it approached a person? (Me). It stopped, and turned around and headed elsewhere.  Funny thing; it encountered me again!  I had the poor thing moving all around trying to avoid me.  If this Wal*Mart is poorly stocked, it’s my fault.

 

Houston, Texas

So here we are in Houston.  We have a nice site, with the nose pointed right at a little lake.  From inside the motorhome you can’t see any land in front of us – just water.  We can pretend we are still living on a boat.

We’ve seen a heron, many coots, and a couple of turtles enjoying the lake.

 

You may notice we have sun covers over the wheels and tires, and over the windshield and front windows.  We are planning on leaving Fudge Ripple here for a bit, while we explore some places we’ve never been before.  We have a huge adventure planned, starting Sunday evening.  I’m hoping we will have sufficient internet coverage to keep posting at least a few pictures for the next few weeks.  So come back next week to see where a ten hour flight south can get us!

 

(The sunsets on our little lake have been fabulous!)