No Pictures?

Not much to talk about this week--and less to post photos about. Wednesday we met Ron and Barbara and Diana for lunch at Kneaders. Good food and good conversation. But would you believe that 3 bloggers met for lunch (Barbara, Diana and I) and no one took a picture? Oh well, it was a good get together even without pictures.

A week or so ago, our neighbors Jack and Kathy said they were having a painter come to do some work on their house. We said we really needed someone to paint some of the exterior trim on our house. Thursday the painters came and made estimates of the cost of our paint jobs. By 9 am Friday their were working at Jack and Kathty's and by the end of the day they had painted the trim on 3 houses on our street. Today they painted 3 or 4 more places and others are expecting them to come on Monday. It looks really spiffy on our street!

The painters are very careful and neat. We didn't see any drips or spots and they didn't put the dark paint on the light stucco--all without any masking. They do a really good and professional job. Thanks!

Lunch With Friends

John and Dave have been friends since childhood and we were glad when we moved to Gold Canyon to learn their winter home is less than 2 miles from ours. Each winter we see them 2 or more times. We got together Wednesday at a nearby Mexican restaurant. We talked non-stop for a couple of hours, catching up on each others' lives over the summer.

It is good to have friends from many years ago. It is always good to meet up with Dave and Alice.

Hiking and Eating

Spring has definitely arrived in our part of Arizona.  Friday we walked from our resort to the backside of Silly Mountain.  The poppies are blooming.

We have had above average rain and the desert is really green.  It's not often we see the ground this color here.  It is so nice.

After our walk we met our friend David and Alice and their daughter Teresa (I hope I spelled her name correctly) for lunch at Janie's Burrito Café in Gold Canyon.  We enjoyed the food and the time with friends.

Water Birds with Friends

Yesterday, we walked through the Gilbert Water Ranch with Rose and John, looking at all the birds enjoying the ponds there. This week we have had wonderful weather--not too hot and not too cold--so it was a good walk. We saw lots of water birds:

There were mallard ducks--posing for a picture

showing off his colors

and a young one with some color on the wing

The black necked stilt is pretty

and so is the American avocet.

We ended the outing with lunch at Kneaders in Mesa on our way back to Superstition Views.

It was a fun morning.

Music and a Meal With Friends

Saturday, we met our friends Ellie and Bill for lunch at the Music Instrument Museum in northwest Phoenix.  I have been wanting to go there for several years and by the end of our visit both of us knew we would return, probably more than once.  The Cafe Allegro in the museum was a great place to enjoy lunch and talk after exploring just one part of the facility.

Bill and Ellie have been there several times before and Bill was anxious to see the special exhibit on Stradivarius.  I know nothing about violins but I do know the name Stradivarius.  The exhibit told us a lot about Cremona, Italy, where he worked and about what made his violins so special.  We learned a lot about how violins are made.  This is a viola, which is a little larger than a violin.

This one is a violin.

The decorations put on violins is very detailed, including strips of design cut into a thin layer of wood, then covered with ebony to fill in the thin grooves.  The same process is use to make the black lines along these edges, then small pieces of bone are put in the larger groove.

We saw stringed instruments--or lutes--from several European countries.  Some are small and simple, others even more richly decorated than the violins we saw in the Stradivarius exhibit.

We also saw this huge guitar--apparently the largest ever made.  These levers are how the strings are depressed.

There are steps to allow access to the levers.

Here you can get a better idea of the size of the instrument.

Each visitors is given a set of ear phones.  When you get fairly close to each exhibit, maybe 5 to 10 feet away, you can hear the music being performed and/or an explanation of what is shown.  Here are Bill and John listening to one of the displays on violins.

We only visited the special exhibit and the section on European instruments.  There are other areas on other continents.  There was no way we could see everything at one time, so we will definitely return.

Thanks, Bill and Ellie, for getting us to finally see this wonderful museum?

Good-bye Lunch

When you live your life traveling from place to place, spending the winter here in Arizona then traveling in our home on wheels the rest of the year, we say, "good-bye for now" regularly. Monday, we had lunch with friends Barbara and Ron as they prepare to travel for the summer. We won't be leaving for a month or so.

Barbara suggested we eat at Rubio's Seafood Restaurant. We had never been there before, but it was a very good idea. I had been hearing about fish tacos for years and doubted I would like them. I was sure wrong there. I loved the salsa verde shrimp taco and will definitely plan to go there again. John had a steak taco plate, but even he liked my shrimp taco.

We probably won't see Ron and Barbara until fall, when we all return to Arizona, but it was good to have one last lunch with them before we part ways for the summer. Don't we all look like we enjoyed our lunches?

Lunch and Good Conversation

Dave and Alice have been spending their winters in Arizona for 11 years or more. Since we bought our house in Superstition Views, we are only about 2 or 3 miles from their winter home. I thought they didn't come down till after Christmas. However, when they received our Christmas letter last week and realized we were in Arizona, they called and asked when we could get together. They have been here since Halloween. Dave and John have been friends since childhood and it was so good to see them.

We showed they our new home, then walked over to the Cactus Grill and brought our lunch back to the house. A good three hours later, we were still talking. We hadn't seen them since a hike last spring so we had a lot to catch up on. We look forward to seeing them again, soon.

Visiting Friends

Years ago, before our younger son was born, we lived in the same trailer park as Larry and Betty.  When our son Doug was born 46+ years ago, Larry and Betty's son Robin came over to see the baby.  Larry and John worked together on the Boulder Police Department.

We have kept in touch over the years and have seen them regularly (about once a year) over the past decade.  We kept that contact up yesterday when we met them for lunch.  We talked and shared for almost three hours before going our separate ways.  It was good to catch up and share our lives with them. Hopefully, we will see them again in Arizona this winter.

Yikes! No Picture

Yesterday, we met blogger/volunteer friends for lunch at the Grand Casino in Hinckley, MN. We were staying in the very nice RV park at the casino and they drove over from their home in Wisconsin. Eric and Kathy were volunteers at Santa Ana NWR in Texas, where we volunteered in 2012. They like to do many of the same things we do in their free time--we ran into them at a very cold, rainy BBQ festival in Texas. And Kathy also blogs about their life.

We really appreciated their taking the time to drive to see us in Hinckley and we had a good time talking about volunteer positions, RVs and traveling. By the way, the Grand Buffet at the casino is very good. And the desserts are to die for.

Just before we met them, I remarked I really had to remember to take a picture of them so I could use it in this blog. But as they drove away and we walked back to our RV, I realized, "Oh no, I didn't take a picture." You'll just have to check out their blog to see what they look like. Maybe next time, I'll get the photograph.

Today we are in Albert Lea, MN. As we drove south on I-35, just as we were passing through the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, our phone rang. It was John's brother, Tim. We took the call over our Onstar system in the truck, so it was a hands-free conversation. It was good to talk to him, though a little stressful at times for John, who was driving. Thankfully, the traffic wasn't too heavy.

Lunch with Old Friends

Last week we met friends for lunch in Gold Canyon. John has known Dave and Alice since high school. Since they winter in Arizona, also, we get together once or twice each year. We met them in front of the Red Sage Restaurant in Gold Canyon. But, lo and behold, the restaurant is closed and sports a large sign reading "restaurant location available." So, it was on to plan B.

We drove a few blocks to De La Cruz Mexican Grill. The food was OK and we visited for over two hours, seated on the outdoor patio. After the rough start, everything went just fine--until a bird sitting in the overhead tree pooped on John's head! We decided it was time to go home. We plan to see them soon.....no poop!

Crossing New Mexico

Last Sunday, we left Homolovi Ruins State Park and headed east into New Mexico. We spent one night in Gallup at USA RV Park. It is a good place to stay for a night or two, especially when you want 50-amp hookups. Monday it was on toward Santa Fe. We have stayed in two different commercial parks there, neither of which we liked. This time we tried Cochiti Lake Corps of Engineers campground a few miles southwest of the city. We really enjoyed the park. It wasn't very full and we had a really nice site.



There is a pretty no-wake lake nearby and we had a good view of it from our RV.



We saw one unusual RV in the campground. I expected some young hippie-types, but this morning I found the occupant was a gray-haired senior woman and her dog. Who would have thought?



The visitor center had a really good map explaining where the water in the Rio Grande River comes from and what causes flooding downstream. Cochiti Dam was built after Albuquerque suffered severe flooding in the 1950s. We wished we had understood more of the river's origins before our time as interpreters at Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge along the Rio Grande in Texas last year.



We really liked that campground and will probably stay there again, either to visit Santa Fe or as an overnight stop between Denver and Mesa. But there isn't much to do there unless you boat or visit Tent Rocks National Monument, which we do not intend to do. (See previous post.)

We did drive into Santa Fe for a very good Mexican lunch at the LaFonda Hotel on the plaza. The hotel has interesting painted glass panels around the restaurant and other locations near the lobby.



There are murals on several walls.



This is what our burrito plates looked like before we attacked them. John had the beef and I had the chicken filling.



We were able to walk up to the mezzanine level and see the restaurant from above. As you can see, it was very busy at noon Thursday.



The trip to Santa Fe and good food helped get us back in harmony with our world.

Today we left there and drove to Raton where we found another great campground. We are staying at the NRA Whittington Center which has two full-hook-up capgrounds. The sites are level and very large. We have a great view of the pinon-juniper landscape here and we have been able to watch a small herd of mule deer. There is almost no one here right now. It is a great place to stop, just 10 miles from Raton.



Tomorrow we are headed north, back to Colorado after nearly 7 months in Arizona and New Mexico.

Interesting Foods

Wednesday we were running errands in Phoenix and needed somewhere to grab a salad or sandwich for lunch. Cairn (our GPS) led us to the Town and Country Mall near 24th and Camelback. We thought Trader Joe's might have a salad bar. They didn't, so we grabbed a sandwich at Blimpe's. On the way, we checked out an interesting farmers' market sponsored by Pinnacle Farms.



It was not the normal, ordinary farmers' market we are used to seeing. Look at all those tomatoes above.

I wish I remembered if this was a turnip or a beet or what. It is a watermelon whatever. Isn't it interesting?



There were carrots of various sizes and colors.



Beets that were white and others that were golden.





This little girl had a normal, orange carrot and she knew it needed to be washed before she could eat it.



These apples were about the size of crab apples.



Look at these oyster mushrooms.



We could have ordered grass fed beef, Arizona range lamb or cage free chicken parts. I wonder if happy, free chickens taste different than those from Sanderson Farms?

Lunch with Friends

Thursday we met our friends Marcia and Bob at BeDillon's Restaurant in Casa Grande, a city about 20 miles from where we are staying in Coolidge. Marcia and Bob are spending the winter in Gold Canyon, a community east of Phoenix. We got to know them when we all were attending the Church of the Transfiguration in Evergreen, Colorado. They still live in that community. From Christmas letters we knew all of us were spending the winter in Arizona. It was so good to spend some time with them.



BeDillon's is located in an old house off the beaten path in Casa Grande. They serve Mexican themed dishes like Mexican lasagna and fish tacos, as well as American standards like French dip sandwiches. We enjoyed our meal, and even more the three hours we spent talking.

The restaurant has a patio and cactus garden. It is wonderful.



Even more amazing is a small museum. Really, I think someone cleaned out the barn by putting items in old display cases where the public could see them.

These gourds hang at the entrance to the museum.



These are very old stone tools, including arrow straighteners.




Is this an espresso machine made of copper?



Aren't these baskets and small items woven of horse hair pretty?



These are hand-made carpenter's tools. John's grandfather made his own tools and they looked like these.



Someone collected campaign buttons. The only ones I recognized were from the 1960 presidential campaign between Barry Goldwater (of Arizona) and John F. Kennedy.



These are identified as Hohokam game balls. We know they played ballgames in the Hohokam villages, so that may be a correct description.



We are so glad Marcia and Bob introduced us to this delightful place.