Friday, October 25, 2013

Free camping in San Diego - week 031

Hi to everyone,

 One of the greatest things about traveling in an RV is that you can stop anywhere you want to and stay for as long as you want.  That's a good thing.  We left our motorhome in San Diego for repairs before we went to Hawaii.  They took our service requests and ordered parts before we left.  Unfortunately, not all of the parts are here yet!  Prior to this stay, the longest we stayed anywhere was eight days in Yuma, Arizona with our neighbors, Ben and Sid.  We will have "camped" in the RV service over 20 days!  If we were not fulltiming, this might have been a frustrating time.  But for us, it is great.  We have a nice parking spot with no neighbors.  We have electrical hookup and can dump and get water whenever we need it.  The lot is alarmed and gated. And it is free!

 However, it does not leave much to write home about.  We did find a few pictures that we missed last week.

 This was the view from church on Maui.


 There were about 70 people at church with us.


 A final photo on the way back to our suite to pack to go back to the mainland.


 This is the world's largest Banyan tree in Lahaina Village on Maui.


 This has been our "campsite" for the last two weeks.


 Ellen next to the Star of India in San Diego Harbor.


 We visited Uncle Bob and Aunt Glenda at their new home in Bradbury CA.


 We also met up with cousin Bob and Barb in Carlsbad CA.  Bobby drove us up to see the Prowetts.


 Pete, Emily and Chad tore Emily's dash apart trying to fix her dash fan.

Hopefully we get a new windshield this week and get back on the road.  But we are so thankful for the time to spend with Emily, Melissa and Chad and we are thankful for the free and nice place to stay. God is good!

 Love, Pete and Ellen

By Pete . Ellen Mattson
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Wednesday, October 9, 2013

Wowee, Maui - week 030

Aloha friends and family,
On Sunday we boarded the Aloha jet for Kahalui, Hawaii.  Pete, Ellen, Melissa and Emily headed off to the Marriott Ocean Club in Ka'anapali on the West Coast of Maui Island.  After settling in, we headed off to the huge pool and relaxed.  During the week we swam in the ocean, played water volleyball, enjoyed the sun, walked the mile long beach, shopped, ate, watched a video, snorkeled on the Molokini "Island", watched the whales, toured the new timeshare models, played on the waterslide, took island drives, took pictures and just plain relaxed.  You could enjoy a 7-day trial with an included rental car for about $700.00.  Email us, if you like and we will submit your name, address and phone number to Marriott.  Besides the room and car, you will need round trip tickets and food.  While it is not cheap, it is an amazingly beautiful place to vacation. You must schedule a 2-hour timeshare tour.  But they are not pushy and it is one of the best things we have ever done.  We have been to Hawaii four different weeks and every week is as good as the first.

 See for yourself!  These are photos of the resort, Marriott's Ocean Club on Ka'anapali Beach.


 The girls look great in Hawaii.


 Molokini was a crescent-shaped "venting cone" for the Haleakala volcano.  This was on our trip to Molokini.


 Snorkeling at Molokini was great.  Below Melissa is holding a Pencil Lead Urchin.


 The whale sightings were phenomenal as well.


 This humpback whale was up close and personal!


 There are a lot of different ways to enjoy yourself here.

Ellen and Pete drove the narrow road around the Northwest section of Maui.  While the road was only as wide as your car, the traffic was two way.

At the end of the road you reach the Iao Valley just west of the city of Kahalui.


 Well, that's it for the week.  Rested and relaxed we headed back on the jet to San Diego.  We left our motorhome for repairs.  When they are done, we will, for the third time, head off for the East Coast.  Mahalo for your interest.

 Aloha, love, Pete and Ellen
By Pete . Ellen Mattson
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Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Arizona to Paso Robles - Week 028

Hello from Paso Robles!
We enjoyed a week of visiting Ellen's aunt and cousins in Arizona. All of them blessed us with wonderful hospitality. 

So far we had only traveled 600 miles from home.  So we came home for a visit with the family before continuing our trip to Florida.

Aunt Betty Lynn, Ellen and cousins Don, Bob , Barbara, and kids Heather and Donovan. Heather a high school senior, Donovan home on leave from the Army.


Bob, his son Cory, and Pete after an outstanding BBQ chicken dinner at Don's house.


Bob, Ellen, Kerry and Dennis at Dennis and Kerry's shop.


Dennis, Kerry, Aunt Betty Lynn and Bob as we head off to lunch.


Waking up to the sunrise in Avila Beach. 


God's mercies are new every morning. 


We will be in Paso Robles until Thursday or Friday morning and then head to San Diego for a visit with Emily and Melissa :-) 

We are very thankful for our family and friends. Thanks for staying in touch with us.

Love, Pete and Ellen

P.S. We are still reviewing the proposed names for our mascot.

By Pete . Ellen Mattson

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Thursday, July 25, 2013

Arizona Everywhere - Week 027

Hello again from Arizona,
Each day Ellen accesses www.Weather.com and figures out where to go next.  And the answer keeps coming up as Arizona!  We left Pete's sister Donnalee and our Atascadero neighbors, Ben and Sid in Tucson.  Donnalee and her friend Don are off to Costa Rica.  Ben and Sid headed back to Atascadero.

We headed to Cave Creek, northeast of Phoenix.  We stayed a couple of days at the Cave Creek Recreation Area.  Here we created and mailed out 106 invitations to all the Phoenix-area high schools.  While the basketball season has ended for most Arizona teams, we are hoping that a few gung-ho coaches are preparing for next year.  We invited them to come to our RV park or set up a meeting at their school.
Our GPS showed a road from our campground to the town of Cave Creek.  It turned out to be a horse trail.


This is Cave Creeks Frontier Town.  We had lunch at Crazy Ed's Satisfied Frog.  Then we rode our bikes back to camp.  Total ride was about 20 miles.


In Mesa Arizona, we met up with Jon.  Jon has been our Atascadero friend since the 1980's.  Pete and Jon went to Promise Keepers in Fresno.  They have been meeting for breakfast every month since 1994 until Pete and Ellen left on this trip.


Pete's sister, Donnalee, won two tickets to the Verde Canyon Railroad.  It is a 4-hour train ride from Clarksdale to Perkinsville and back.  Here is a picture taken from the train.  The train track runs along the Verde River.


This Road Runner came to visit us in Perkinsville at the end of the train ride


Our tour guide, Bryce, told us stories about the area as we rode in the sun in the open air car.


Leaving Clarksdale, we headed south on route 89A.  There were no signs saying "No vehicles over 40 feet", so we headed up the mountain to about 7,000 feet.  The motorhome had no trouble going up the very steep hills.  We, however, were a bit panicked about the fact that the roads were narrow and there was no shoulders and many rocks trying to autograph the coach.  This is the town of Jerome, totally built on a hillside.


Another view of the twisty 89A on the way from Jerome to Prescott Valley.


We stayed a night in Prescott Valley and then settled in for a week in Phoenix.  We went the the Goodyear Senior Rodeo.  All of the participants were from 40 to over 70 years old!  This bronco bull rider was 68.


This Brahma bull  riders were 50 years and older.  Yee haa!




Sunday we went to Calvary Chapel Goodyear and visited with relatives.  More on the visits next week.


You may have noticed our new mascot.  This was a gift from Ben and Sid for helping them empty their wallet of unneeded cash. What do you think his name should be? We were thinking of:

1. Speteo (pronounced Speedo)
2. Kokopetti (pronounced Ko-Ko-Pee-tee, similar to the Southwestern United States image Kokopelli

3. Ben-Sid-cle (pronounced BenSycle)
4. Your idea?

 Please email us with your votes.  We will announce the winner next week.

Have fun, stay warm,

Love, Pete and Ellen
By Pete . Ellen Mattson

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Sunny Arizona, Yuma, Casa Grande, Green Valley, Bisbee, Tucson - Week 024-025

Hello from mostly sunny Arizona,

Our intention is to send out a weekly email.  But I guess we were having so much fun that it was last Thursday before we realized that we did not send out last weeks.  "We're sorry, we are not going to apologize, that's just the way we are ".  (Thank you Paul for the quote).

As you might remember from our last email, we met up with our Atascadero neighbors, Ben and Sid, and went shopping with them.  We helped them to pick out a motorhome to replace their 5th wheel.  Funny, they ended up with a Monaco Diplomat, the same MH that we have.

Here are the before and after pictures.




Highway 8 leaving Yuma, AZ.


The road on the way to Casa Grande, AZ.


Palm Creek RV Park in Casa Grande, AZ (recommended)


The sunset in Casa Grande.


Rainbow in Green Valley, where Pete's sister, Donnalee lives in the winter.


We spent two days at the Cowboy Poetry and Music Gathering, in Sierra Vista, AZ. yeehaw!


Pete and Donnalee, BBQing and bonding, in the sunny yet breezy afternoon at the Cowboy PMG.


A rare car on the lonely road to the mountain town of Bisbee, AZ.


Bisbee, where almost all of the houses are built on the hills (like The Hollywood Hills!  Not!!!)


We met up with Ben and Sid again in Tuscon.  Here is Sid explaining why they love their Ralph Lauren Dilpomat.


Downtown Tucson's Unisource Energy Tower. 


Don and Donnalee invited us on a car rally with the Tucson British Car Registry club.  They told us to bring a classic convertible.  Ellen brought the closest thing we had!


A few of the cars in the rally.


Pete's sister Donnalee in Don's Jaguar at the end of the rally.


Oh, we also need to mention that Pete and Ellen visited 12 of the 26 high schools in Tucson, showing off USA GameTracker.  As we continue our marketing we will hopefully gain name recognition as we move sloooooowly on towards Florida.

See you next week!

Love, Pete and Ellen



By Pete . Ellen Mattson

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