Southern Cross Mine

We have been very busy doing lots of different things. Denny's  cousin, Larry has been here before, so he knows lots of people.

Last Thursday, Dec. 15th, we went on a hike with 9 people.  Traveled about 15 miles and then turned off  onto a dirt road. It is, by far, the worst road we have ever been on. Larry was driving. It was only 4 1/2 miles, but took us about an hour. Deep, deep ruts and hilly.  After fianlly getting there, we hiked about a mile and saw 3 mines.

You can see how far we hiked from the cars. This wasn't even to our destination. WHEW!

You can walk from the front of the cave all the way thru

This was the front of the main cave. The light is from my flash, but it is really pitch black inside. I walked all the way in. A tad scary, couldn't see where I was going

 

Sky was beautiful. After a while, there wasn't a cloud in the sky. That's how it has been here most of the time.

Overview of the area.

Christmas at Big River

This Christmas is a little different for us.  Because we are spending Christmas with Larry and Joyce, we have met alot of people and done  alot of activities. By Christmas, we will have done 6 potlucks, 3 for dinner and 3 for snacks and 2 white elephant gift exchanges. Busy, busy, busy.

We bring some Christmas decorations but not many.  Storage on an RV is limited, so I don't want to take up a lot of space with things that won't be up for  long. We did buy a new artificial  Christmas tree. It is about 2' high, white flocking with red poinsettia's.  One strange thing I have noticed.  We haven't seen any places that sell real trees. I know Parker is very small, but we didn't even see any in Lake Havasu, which has around 42,000 people. We got lost, so we even saw more of the city than we had planned. No real Christmas trees.  Can't believe that everyone uses an artificial one. I'll just show you our new additions.

Our new tree

New poinsettia.  Pot says " Dear Santa, Define good"

Saw this Santa on our walks in the morning. Looks like he likes this mode of transporation better than reindeer

 This Santa Claus greets you as you enter the park. On the right edge you can see the water. The road leads to the boat ramp

I DID IT, I DID IT

In an earlier post, I told you that I walk with Larry at 7 AM for a 2 1/2 mile walk.  He went to Phoenix for a few days to see his grandson.  Who, oh, who was I going to walk with?  As I have gotten older, my will power has disappeared.  I knew, tho, that if I didn't walk, I would never hear the end of it from Larry. THAT was my incentive. I have walked 2 days now. I'm so proud of myself. The only concession I do is wait until daylight.  When we leave,  it is still dark.  I really didn't want to be walking in the dark, so I have been starting about the time we usually get back.  It has taken every bit of will power I have to get out the door in the morning. I really enjoy it after I start walking, but getting out the door is another matter. This morning, I saw a bobcat. YIKES!  I had heard that there is one in the hill right beside the park, but hadn't seen it yet.  It came off the hill, looked around and went back up. 

View from back of casino

Yesterday we went saw the new Sherlock Holmes movie starring Robert Downy, JR. It is very good, but very violent. We didn't realize there was a movie theatre here until we were talking to some people.  There is one at the Casino. Parker is in the Colorado River Indian Reservation. We don't gamble so we had never been there. Before the movie, we wandered around the casino.  Certainly alot of people there. It is so smokey  that, even if I gambled, I can't imagine spending much time in there.

These are a few views from the park. We are located on the Colorado River.

This was taken on our morning walk. It has been very foggy in the mornings. Of the group of 3 RV's in the foreground, ours is on the right.  Larry and Joyce are on the left.

The weather is warming up. It has been in the low to mid 60's. Christmas Day is suppose to be 66 degrees, the next day, 69. Can't wait. Might even be able to put on carpi's and flip flops. Yeah!

WARMER WEATHER--KIND OF

Traveled to Parker, AZ, but we actually staying in a campground in California. The only thing that separates CA and AZ is the Colorado River. Parker is located on the AZ. side. Even tho Big River RV Park is on the CA side, it goes by AZ time. All of the parks on the Colorado do this.

When we first got here, the weather was much warmer than Cottonwood. We were even able to sit outside and enjoy the sun. It was 75 degrees. Something happened and we are going thru a cold spell. Every time California has bad weather, so do we. If it is sunny in LA, we are sunny here. If it rains there, it rains here.

We came here to spend the holidays with Denny's cousin, Larry Frink and his wife Joyce. We are usually by ourselves at Christmas, so this will be nice to be around family.

 

This is a sunset I took in Cottonwood. Beautiful

 This is a sunrise at Big River. I went for a walk in the morning about 7 AM

We went to Parker's Electric Light Christmas parade. For a small town (about 2000 people), there were a lot of floats.  I thought this one was so cute. The outhouse was made from air mattresses. Santa kept going in and out. Not sure how the driver could see thru all the lights.

Quite the big rig

After the parade we were going to go to the Senior Center. Besides having Santa and Christmas food, they were having a sale of See's Candy.  Denny's all time favorite is their peanut brittle. I think all 2000 people were in the line to get in. It went out the door and down the block. Decided peanut brittle wasn't worth the wait.

I'm trying to  keep up  with exercising.  Larry walks 2 1/2 miles every morning at 7 AM. It is a tad early for me, but I'm committed. I have gone everyday.  We also walk about 1 mile in the afternoon.  I'm also taking a digital photography class at the park.  Hoping to improve my skills.

Bye, Bye Cottonwood

December 6, 2011

We have been in the Cottonwood area for 5 weeks, staying at 2 different parks. Lots to see and do. We really like the area and will definitely be back next year. Here are a few photo's that I wanted to show you.

The trees in all of their fall splendor

I think a majority of travelers have dogs.  This dog was next door and I thought a bit spoiled.  The owner would move the chair to the sun, carry the dog and put it in the chair. Repeated this every time the sun moved. Never saw the dog on the ground unless it was walked to do his business.

Saw alot of houses built into the cliffs. This house isn't near anything. Think of the logistics of building the house and even just going to get groceries.

 Thought it would be fun to see a small town Christmas  parade. Most of the floats were driven by tractors. Thought we should get in the Christmas spirit

Before the parade. I thought this little boy was so cute, all lined up to watch the parade and jump up for candy. You can see how everyone is bundled up for the cold.

 Those kids skipped rope all the way thru the parade route.  See how dark the sky is getting. Just after I took this photo, the sky turned black. and then it started snowing. Had a high of 44 degrees, but went down to 37. We decided it would be a good day to stay inside a warm RV.

I took this from inside the truck while Denny was inside a store

 On to warmer weather,  I  HOPE

YIKES, IT'S SNOWING

Today there was a Christmas Parade in town. I thought it would be fun to see a small town parade. Yesterday and last night it  rained constantly. Still raining this morning, so we decided not to go. By the time I got done exercising, the sun was coming out and the clouds were going away, so off we went. BAD DECISION. After it started,  the sky was looking very, very dark and getting chilly. All of the sudden, the wind started and the leaves were going around in a circle. It was so cold we finally left. Never did get to see Santa!  We were going to get diesel and go back to Old Cottonwood for a little shopping and olive oil tasting. Before we finished getting diesel, it started SNOWING. It was coming down so hard you could hardly see. We decided it wasn't a good day for touristing, so back to the RV we went. When we started, it was 44 degrees, but quickly went down to 37. BURRRRR.  It was only raining back at the campground. It has rained ever since we got back with a little hail thrown in. Now, it is SNOWING AGAIN. We feel like we are in Washington. I bet it hasn't snowed in the lowlands, so we have worse weather than you. We travel in the winter to get out of weather like this. We are now down to 34 degrees!

Jerome Mansion

Saturday, Nov. 26th

We decided to go to Jerome again today to see the big mansion because it is only open on the weekends. It was built in 1916 by James Douglas, the owner of the mines. It is 8700 square feet and cost $150,000. That was very expensive for those days,  think of what that would compute in today's dollars. It is big, even in today's standards. Can't imagine what the towns people thought back in the day. Most lived in shacks

Partial view of the front of the mansion. Stamp mill used in mining is on display in the front yard.

This central vacuum system was found in the basement. It served the whole house.  Can't imagine having one in a house built in 1916. Most people don't have them  now.  Mr. Douglas was way before his time.

Notice how bright blue this rock is. Can't see it as well, but the top is bright green. This is Azurite  (green) and Malachite (blue) from the mines.  Beautiful colors

I gave up on downloading more pictures. These took me several hours. There were a few things on display that I wanted to tell you about. I know everyone thinks their taxes are high, that is nothing compared to what I read at one of the displays. In 1929 they stated a 3% sales tax on a 10 cent item. Seems a tad high

In 1860, they imported round bottom bottles from Ireland. It  protected the cork form drying out and forced peole to drink the whole thing before putting it down.  People drank alot faster and bought more that way. Seems the tavern owners were pretty smart.  Had never heard of this before. I took a picture of it but gave up showing it to you.

The mine was built directly under Jerome. Over the years, because of blasting, lots of buildings have been destroyed from  sliding down the hills.  I would have hated to be in one that started sliding down . YIKES Look out below!  In fact, the town is still sliding down. A few inches a year.  No wonder Mr. Douglas built his mansion outside of town. He was no fool.

COWS, WINE BARRELS AND BIRDS

Our campground was about 2 miles from the main road. Every time we went in or out we saw cows on the side of the road. A few times we had to stop to let the cows cross.  Their mother certainly didn't teach them to look both ways before crossing the road. There was also some No Trespassing signs. The cows must not know how to read either.  They wandered everywhere.

I'm sure most of you know about the painted pigs in Seattle. They represent Rachael, the pig, at the Public Market. They are painted by local artists and placed all over  the city,  to be auctioned off  for charity. Here, they have painted wine barrels. They are also painted by local artists to be auctioned off  for charity.  Wine Tasting is big in the area so wine barrels are a logical choice.

A few days ago, a beautiful bird entertained us for quite awhile. There is a tree right outside our window. He was on the tree, then he would fly to the window and back. Sometimes he flew into the window. Ouch! He kept this up for a long time, then we didn't see him. We thought he had flown away somewhere.  After a while, I noticed him perched on our window. He stayed there for a long time without moving. . I think he was looking at his own reflection. He was fun to watch.

The bird was pecking at the tree looking for bugs. Very colorful

Cottonwood, AZ

November 12th

On Saturday, they had an art festival called "Walkin' on Main".  I like to go to the local functions and see how other people live.  Our friend, Lynn Ausen, has a cousin, Muriel Bostrom,  who lives here. We met her for lunch, wine tasting and looking around. It is fun to know someone local.  We had a great time.

As you can probably tell by some of my postings, I love history.  Everywhere we go, I usually buy books that tell about the history of the people that lived in the area.  These kind of books aren't usually on my Kindle.  I am now reading about a young girl that was captured by the Indians in 1851. She was held for 5 years and was able to be bought back by her brother.  This book was written in 1858. I have never read a book published so long ago. It is a very hard read. I didn't realize how elaborate their language was back then. Alot of sentences are 70-75 words long, with several comma's and semi colon's in between.  Sometimes it makes it hard to understand what you are reading.  The sentence is so long you forget the beginning. You could make several sentences with one of theirs. Sometimes the girl, Olive Oatman, speaks  in her own words.  The language is very elaborate and cumbersome.

Our truck has never had to have an Emissions test. We never gave it a thought even tho we left so early. It is due in November and we get it before we leave.  This time it required a test. Oh No! What to do, what to do!  Since we don't have a printer, we had Darin download the paper we need and send it to us. We had to get it notarized that we are out of state.  We did that and sent it back. They want to send it to you where you are living at the time, not to your house. We wrote our new address in Cottonwood, but also wrote our Renton address for the registration. Got it the other day and they changed our registration  address to General Delivery, Cottonwood. Seems like someone wasn't paying attention. That won't do.  We will carry our notarized paper with the registration to show the correct address.  Of course, I can't get thru on the phone.

The weather is getting better. We have had to keep our water running some nights because it gets down to 29 degrees. The days have only been in the mid 50's.  Sweatshirt weather. Today it is getting in the mid 60's. About time.

Jerome and Tuzigoot National Monument, Jerome AZ.

November 11th

Today we decided to do a little sightseeing. We went to Jerome, which is only about 10 miles from here. It was established in the early 1800's.  It is an old mining town built on a hillside. Amazing how they built it on such steep hills. In the 1950's the mine closed and it went from a population of 5,000 to 50 people.  It has become a haven for artists. About 450 people live there now. Fun town to see and explore.

Overview of town, hard to see but the hill is fairly steep

View of the mining pit. In the far right, you see a large building. It was built in the 1880's  as a single home, 8000 sq. ft.  Large even for today's standards.

You can tell how steep the hill drops off beyond the wall

Before we got to Jerome, we went to the Tuzigoot National Monument. This is the remnants of  a ancient Indian village around 1000-1500 BC.  There are no doors. People went from one room to another on ladders.  Amazing site.

This is an inside room that was rebuilt to show how they lived. When the site was first excavated, they rebuilt alot of rooms. Most have been removed. Now, they just want to show what is excavated, not rebuilt.

Can you imagine living like this? I think not.

Sedona, Arizona

November 4th, 2011

We traveled to Cottonwood, AZ on Oct. 2nd. It is about 100 miles north of Phoenix. It is a good central location to visit alot of sights, Sedona, Jerome, Prescott and many more.

Day before yesterday, we went to Sedona, the area of red rock cliffs. The drive was beautiful, the contrast of the red cliffs, yellow fall foliage and blue sky was awe inspiring. The drive took us up Oak Creek Canyon, almost back to Flagstaff. It is one of those All American Highways that I mentioned earlier. There are thousands of scenic drives in the US, but only 27 All American Highways. They are so beautiful that it is a destination all in itself.

This is an overview of Sedona.

Between 2 campgrounds, we will be here 5 weeks. Since we left, we have been hustling to see the colder areas that we have never seen before. Now that we are down in AZ, so we plan to do alot of relaxing and revisiting sites we have seen since 1996.

Sedona red rocks

When I took this picture I was at the top viewpoint of Oak Creek Canyon. You can see in the distance 3 levels of roads, which we came up on. It's a long ways down.

I tried to download more pictures, but gave up.

Back to the Red Cliffs Area, Hurricane, Utah

This is called an Antelope Canyon, where the sides are so close together you can touch. We tried to go furthur up but the mosquitoes were too thick.  This is Jim, the husband of a couple that I was hiking with.

When we were in Hurricane, we did quite a lot of touristing besides seeing  Zion. The Red Cliffs Area was just down the road from us. We met some nice people from South San Francisco that I went hiking with. This is the most beautiful  tent camping area I had ever seen. All along the road there were very well kept tent areas. Too small for RV's.

This time of year you see so many flowers in bloom and turning colors

Since I have caught up with the blog, I'm trying to go back to places that I couldn't upload any pictures because it took so long. It doesn't take quite as long, but still very slow

Four Corners

When we left Mesa Verde National to go back to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, we passed Four Corners. It is the only point in the United States that 4 states meet each other. They are AZ., CO., New Mexico and Utah. Of course, we had to stop.The exact point is where the four lines intersect

Historical Kingman

This is the oldest living thing in Kingman. This mesquite tree is over 200 years old. The  branches are held up by braces.

Bonelli House, built in 1915.  He had electricity in the house long before anyone else.

Can't remember the year of this clock,  but besides telling the time, it  also tells the day, month and year.

Notice the hinges on the step that the guide is standing on. It opens up and lets in cold air from under the house. It was their air conditioning. The husband had all sorts of innovations  in the house.

The courthouse was built in 1915 for $80,000.  In my blog about Oatman, I put in a picture of a hallway that led to the honeymoon suite of Clark Garble and Carol Lombard. This is the courthouse where they were married. Hard to imagine. You would have thought they would have been married in Los Angeles, in front of all their friends.

Back in the day, women had to make everything in the household. Here is the ingredients for  lye soap from the Bonelli House. Just had to include it.

Soap:  5 lbs of grease (any waste fat)

1 can lye, dissolved in water (use enamel or iron pot only)

1/2 cup borax

1/2 cup ammonia

I won't put in the directions, but looking at it certainly makes me glad I live now, not back then. Can't imagine using lye, ammonia and borax on your skin