Not The Painter

November 3, 2023 – Day 36 Today was a driving day. We’ve been enjoying the sunrise skies so we got up super early, right before sunrise. But we were also up early to get a jump on the day for the drive to San Antonio, NM. This was taken at 6:06 AM. It turns out the desert sunrises are pretty boring a lot of the time. We were as surprised as you are. The lack of clouds means no colorful clouds in the sky. Only the horizon, as we see above. The camera didn’t catch the glow of the sun very well. What the sky lacks for color the surrounding…

November 2, 2023 – Day 35 We chose Kartchner Caverns State Park as stop on our return home because we had liked Carlsbad Caverns so much on our last trip out west. We were really disappointed as we pulled into the park in the dark only to find a big sign that said “All Tours Sold Out.” After unhooking the Jeep, then leveling the RV and putting the slides out. Susan quickly got online and was able to book tours for the 2nd. The sign must have been for the day we arrived. (susan here: I call it the “fun house”! It will never stop amusing me how you can…

November 1, 2023 – Day 34 We said goodbye to family and Phoenix, stopping in Peoria which just north of town to meet up with our friend Jay for lunch. We had planned on a half day drive from that point. Lunch was great, we bid goodbye to Jay and hit the road. And then we hit Phoenix traffic. We aren’t sure exactly how but lost half an hour with traffic. Back to the title of the blog, 7 Miles to Empty. When we drove to Phoenix we knew we had a Pilot with RV lanes on the way out of town. After a few hairy experiences both with the…

October 20, 2023 – Day 22 Today we will reach Phoenix, AZ! Goodyear, AZ actually. It’s a small city to the west that’s a suburb of Phoenix. Our home for the next 12 days will be here. As with last year, we won’t be blogging our adventures here. We’re visiting family. We’ll just enjoy our time here. November 1 is the beginning of our adventures heading back to NH. The good news is that it was particularly uneventful travel day. The road started out pretty much as expected, but the distant mountains were very hazy. We had seen haze in the sky the previous night, it made for a great…

October 19, 2023 – Day 21 We had thought we’d go to Flagstaff and explore there. On the list were the Lowell Observatory and Walnut Canyon plus anything else we could squeeze in. As the early morning unfolded we realized that we needed to go back to the Petrified Forest. The first place was back to the Blue Mesa loop since we wanted to see it fully lit. We also figured out that “road” we had previously seen was, in fact, a short 1 mile trail so we wanted to do that as well. The Blue Mesa loop is in the Petrified National Forest which includes the part of the…

October 18, 2023 – Day 20 Only half a blog today. We met up with our good friend, Jay, who drove out to meet us, tried to have lunch at the Flatbed Cafe only to find it closed, took more selfies “Standing on the Corner” then headed back to the coach for some catching up in the comfort of the AC. In the late afternoon Susan and Paul head over to the Little Painted Desert County Park. It used to be an Arizona county park but was abandoned some time ago. It was only about 20 minutes north of the campsite. We had planned to go there some morning, but…

October 17, 2023 – Day 19 Remember back to when you were a kid. It seemed that the cartoon hero was always encountering quicksand. And sometimes, years or decades later, you finally realize that quicksand really isn’t that big a hazard that you made it out to be? (Sorry if you still thought it was…) Would you look at that! The Hopi settled next to the Little Colorado River. The river is presumably the source of the quicksand which we couldn’t investigate because of the fence. Not to mention the unstable banks and the quicksand! Safely past the dangers the signage warned us about we made the short hike to…

October 16, 2023 – Day 18 Homolovi State Park is a good radio destination. Paul played radio for 1-2 hours each morning that we were there, and about an hour in the evening. He logged over 200 contacts including Japan, Australia, Indonesia and even Antartica! While we’re at Homolovi assume Paul is doing radio stuff at least once a day. Morning was beautiful. Susan captured this excellent photo. As luck would have it there would be no other opportunities as the leaves were falling off and the tree never looked that good again. We headed into Winslow AZ for brunch. Winslow AZ is a tiny town, along Route 66. It…

October 15, 2023 – Day 17 Paul wanted to title today’s blog “Clifford and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” after the classic children book with a similar title. But the book is about a whiny kid and the day wasn’t that bad. Oh, it was probably our 2nd worse travel day ever so far (Day 1 of the Stuart trip tops this one.) The day started off so well. We woke up just before sunrise. This is more difficult than it sounds. The bedroom of the coach is purposefully dark and the mattress is better than our one at home. (Note: buy a new mattress for home once…

October 14, 2023 – Day 16 This is the big day, eclipse day! Paul probably checked the weather forecast every two hours. He’d fall asleep then wake up again, grabbing his phone. Still, 0% chance of clouds. We got up and just relaxed. Paul setup his iPhone on a tripod for a time lapse movie. He didn’t expect to see the disc of the sun, just the surroundings darken. (Fast forward, it is pretty boring, it didn’t get nearly as dark as he thought it would.) First contact between the moon and sun was a few seconds before 10:18AM. Paul first noticed a disturbance in the top of the sun…