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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BigRigBible.com

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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BigRigBible.com

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Southern California Sun - Weeks 023-024

A Warm Hello from the South,
For the last two weeks we have been in Southern California and Arizona.  We have been accessing Weather.com each day to determine where to spend our next nights.  After we left the FMCA rally in Indio, we spent a couple of free nights at the Two Springs RV Park in North Palm Springs.  From there we went to Quartzsite Arizona and then on to Yuma.  At each location we met up with friends from previous travels.

We spent a few days with our friend Sheryl at Outdoor Resorts Motorcoach Country Club in Indio.  We first met her there in November.


We returned to Motorcoach Country Club as we were given a half price coupon at the FMCA rally.  It is so beautiful, too bad it costs $300,000 to buy a lot and $4,200 (01-2007) a year for home owner association fees!








Ellen and Sheryl got their exercise out in the sun.


Each winter Quartzsite AZ has an enormous flea market with hundreds, perhaps thousands of booths.  Up to 250,000 RVers visits Quartzsite during the 9-day RV show.


At Quartzsite we reconnected with our friends from Zion Utah, Jerry and Judi.  We met them in Zion, saw them in Atascadero and then again in Quartzsite.  We stayed in Quartzsite two extra days to be with them.


Our next door neighbors have been traveling for a couple of months in their 5th wheel.  Ben and Sid stopped at the Westwind RV Park in Yuma, AZ for a few days.  We met them on Tuesday and ending up staying for eight nights.  We enjoyed the sun, the food, shuffleboard and the spa.  And we spent a few days with them shopping.  On Wednesday, we drove to El Centro, California and back.  In El Centro Pete took the 45 foot motorhome driving test and received his Class B Non-Commercial endorsement.


The nine hole golf course at Westwind RV Park.


Ben, Sid and Ellen


Next week we will stay a few more days as the weather is a little colder in Green Valley AZ, where Pete's sister Donnalee lives.  We will head off to her house soon.

Love, Pete and Ellen
By Pete . Ellen Mattson