Author Archives: Carolyn

by Carolyn | May 4, 2022 · 10:24 am

MAY 4TH, 2022

It’s May the Fourth be with You Day – our day to get on the road and we are hoping for good energy forces to travel with us. “Life Is A Highway” and although we won’t be riding it all night long, we are excited to be in the travelling mode again.

Today we left Kartchner Caverns heading towards our next volunteer job in Hells Gate State Park, Lewiston, Idaho. We will travel at our favorite speed – slow.

Our season at Kartchner was especially busy this year. I jumped right in doing both tours while Doug trailed and drove tram. Then Doug took the Lead Guide course and was signed off on the Rotunda/Throne Room Tour. This was a bit of a surprise since he has always said he didn’t want to lead tours. As it turns out, Doug is an excellent guide and enjoys his tours.

I took a two week break from Kartchner in January to fly to Julie in Colfax, WA where she had broken a rib shoveling snow. I loved my special time with this energetic and loving family, even though the weather was cold and snowy.

I feel like I did more cooking than ever. I made baskets of biscotti at Christmas and experimented with many new recipes for appetizers. My little propane oven got a little harder to light the pilot but otherwise kept up with hours and hours of baking. I conquered the uneven bake with a ceramic tile, and I no longer burn my creations. I still count on my small crock pot for recipes like chicken cacciatore, meatballs and Thai chicken. I’d like to get back to bread baking – the only problem with that is we eat every crumb of every loaf (often smeared with lots of butter). I don’t cook much while we travel so this is a much-needed break.

Speaking of Christmas, we received a special gift from Amy and Julie which was a labor of love. For Christmas of 2020 we had received an assignment from them – for the next 45 weeks we would be writing the story of our life. Each week we received a writing prompt about some aspect of our life. We were then to write a brief story about it – perhaps what high school was like or what was our favorite vacation. Of course, we did this separately and we did not share our stories with each other. Once we finished (in November), Julie and Amy went to work editing, assembling, and illustrating what turned into a book. We thoroughly reading each other’s stories!

This year Ranger Nancy instituted Movie Nights. We all hung out together watching classics like Pirates of the Caribbean, Ghost Busters, Rocky Horror and Jurassic Park. Rangers and Volunteers shared a meal and a movie giving us even more time to socialize.

Doug and I had some great outings with family and friends. Lunches and dinners with Amy and Brodie (and we loved meeting his mother, Cindy), Josh, Liz and Sawyer, Sarah and Ann, Crystal and Sally, Kim and Steve, Jean and Bob, Rocky and Chris, and Terri and Bill. We said farewell to our friend Jase (Crystal’s husband) at his peaceful and loving memorial service.

The Gem Show with Sarah was a lot of fun this year after not being able to go the last two years. We are already planning our visit next year. We never buy much but we touch all the pretty rocks and talk and talk the whole day. We have to find something better to eat next year than the greasy curly fries!

Picking up Bob from his medical treatments in Sierra Vista on Mondays gave us time to share stories and enjoy his company during the drive.

There is always some project or event at Kartchner and this year we participated in two days of crafts at Cave Fest and a busy day doing outreach at Tucson Festival of Books. I won first place in the Pi Day Contest with a Key Lime Cheesecake Pie (by the way, thanks, Carol Mueller, for this yummy recipe!).

We enjoyed a community theater play called “Rumors” with Ranger Jake in a starring role. We went to two weddings! Our Ranger friends are falling in love and getting married, and we were thrilled and honored to have been witness to both of these loving ceremonies.

The furthest we ventured was to Biosphere 2; we had a picnic in Patagonia and tried for the first time and loved a Mexican restaurant in Benson – Mi Casa.

We took a road trip with Amy and Josh to nearby Texas Canyon and also explored the Amerind Foundation museum in Dragoon.

We socialized at many Flamingos – gathering at night, together, sharing stories of our tours and adventures, getting to know some new Rangers and Volunteers. This is what makes this lifestyle so rich and rewarding. This year, in spite of a long cold winter and way too much wind, we met and flamingled almost every week. With high winds, we rarely enjoyed a campfire, but hats, gloves, warm jackets and blankets made sitting outside together tolerable. We love each and every one of these remarkable people we call our friends.

We added something new to our list of volunteer experiences. Doug and I initiated a Nature at Night program on weekend nights in the Amphitheater in March and April. The Bat Talk drew in more folks, but the Campfire Safety with Smokey Bear had decent attendance also. With lots of help, this program is now entrenched and will continue over the summer. We’ll pick it up next fall when we return. We shared safe campfire practices and dispelled myths about bats to over 230 campers.

After almost a year of facilitating the Adopt A Bat Program, it is now in the hands of very competent Ranger. I will miss my daily checks to see the new subscriptions and make sure they all got their Welcome Email, Adoption Certificate and monthly email. The program by any measure is a success – over 840 subscriptions, from 43 States, Canada, Mexico, Europe, Asia, South America and America Samoa. I am most proud of the many classrooms that are adopting bats and learning about them.

I spent time revising and improving my tours. I love meeting my groups on the patio and getting them excited about seeing our beautiful caves. Once in the cave, their oohs, aahs, and wows make my day. I love the underground beauty Mother Nature has created and hidden inside the Earth and I never get tired of admiring Her artwork.

In December, Doug started mentoring in the Rotunda/Throne Room and was signed off as a Lead Guide in January. Since then, he has led many tours and enjoys taking people through the cave. Because he is now a guide, he does not get scheduled to drive the tram much anymore. He make take the class to lead tours on the other side of the cave when we come back later in the year.

We were excited to go on a staff and volunteer’s photo tour in the Big Room cave. We took lots of pictures and had a great time with all of our friends. Thanks to Ranger Nancy for organizing it!

We expect to return here in October. We are hoping for better weather next season. This year was so cold, rainy and windy that we never just sat outside. We miss the warm sunny days we usually experience in Southwest Arizona in the winter months.

This year our schedule was great. We worked full days on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. We worked hard – usually three tours a day plus our extra duties of opening the cave on Tuesdays and closing the cave on Thursdays. We came home exhausted but grateful that we can still do this.

Getting ready to open the cave pandemic style!

Our tours are either 1 hour and 20 minutes or 1 hour and 40 minutes. I estimate I did over 200 tours this season. This year due to staffing issues, we usually were alone on the tours without the benefit of a trailer. We are responsible for up to 20 people on each tour. Often being responsible means dealing with emergencies. Doug had a young girl faint and we both had to escort guests out of the cave for other issues. Each tour is only a ½ mile walk but includes inclines, and we are talking for almost all of the tour. So, we are proud our brains remember the information and we can still think on our feet and field dozens of questions each day. And while we are tired after a day of Cave Tours, we love that we can still do something we enjoy that is so physical.

As I write this driving down I-10 towards our first stop at Gila Bend, I take a long wistful look at the mountains we pass. I know the vision of the bare rock of these limestone and granite hills and the dry yellow grass spotted with bursage, acacia and mesquite will change in a few days.

We look forward to new adventures on our journey this summer but coming back to this high desert scenery always feels like we are “Homeward Bound”.

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Filed under Arizona

by Carolyn | November 8, 2021 · 12:26 pm

A Summer to Remember

Sometimes you just have to be flexible, and the last few months have brought busy times, family times and some problems with our RV. Consequently, we let our blog go unattended. This is an attempt to catch up with a relatively brief summary of June through October 2021.

When I was last writing this blog, we were about to leave Jim and Mary’s RV Park near Missoula, MT. From there we spent 2 nights at Liberty Lake RV Park near Spokane, WA. We stopped there to spend some time with Jodi and Ken, our son in law’s parents. A great dinner and conversation were enjoyed, and we spoke about the grandchildren we share and love.

It is primarily because of those grandchildren that we went on to our next stop: Hells Gate State Park, ID. We met with Jeff, the volunteer coordinator, to discuss us spending a few months there next summer. It’s the closest park to Jake and Julie and the kids. Jeff showed us around and talked about the interpretive work done at Hells Gate. We loved the Visitor Center, the view of the Snake River and decided this would be a good new opportunity for us. After a few emails, we agreed to be there in May 2022 and to stay until that August. Looking forward to learning some new insights into Lewis and Clark and doing some evening programming.

We did a quick trip to Plymouth Park, WA and then Cascade Locks, OR and finally on to McMinnville’s Olde Stone Village where we have often stayed. The Plan had been to spend lots of time with our kids. But things changed and we had to be flexible – Jake took a great job about 6 hours away. He is the Principal of Colfax Elementary School. Colfax is a small Eastern Washington town snuggled into the Palouse Hills. It is a great position, and they bought a house there. So instead of playing with our darlings, we spent most of our 6 days together, packing and then we saw them off to their new home.

July 1^st came, and it was time to start at our volunteer position at Champoeg State Park. Our site there was large and beautiful. We looked out at a lovely view and had great neighbors there. We met with our Supervisor Dan who oriented us to the Visitor Center where we would be working. Our schedule was great – two days on and 4 days off – giving us plenty of time to see Doug’s dad, Creighton. We loved hanging out with him, bringing him lunches and sitting around talking to him. We also took advantage of using his laundry.

My job was mostly inside the Visitor Center which had great displays of the history of the area from the Kalapuya Indians, the fur trade, the development of the first provisional government, and finally the epic flood that destroyed the city of Champoeg. I loved the history and sharing it with our visitors. We showed videos and sold items from the gift shop. The only annoying and stressful part of the job was the stupid register which had connectivity problems, often leaving our customers stuck at that register way too long. But other than that, I loved my job.

Doug’s job was much harder – the Visitor Center is famous for its historic 1860’s Kitchen Garden. Doug (or Farmer Doug, as we called him) spend many hours watering, mowing, hoeing, weeding, and harvesting this beautiful garden. Typical of that era’s gardens, we grew plants to eat, plants for medicinal purposes and plants for beauty. I am not a gardener, but even I loved to walk past the bright pink 4 O’clocks, through the hops arbor and down the neatly trimmed pathways to see the vegetables and flowers.

Doug and I also took on another job – we did a weekly Bat Talk in the campground amphitheater. We enjoyed meeting the campers, talking to the kids who knew so much about bats already and answering their questions. Most nights, a few Little Brown Bats swooped down on us to be the featured stars of the program.

We had a small family birthday party for Creighton who turned 99. With Doug’s brother Nelson and wife Lydia, Bev and Barry we celebrated by eating Dad’s favorite hoagies. We kept it small because of the virus but we had a great time and now are planning the big bash for his 100^th!

During this time, we got to see friends from Kartchner – Jim and Randa joined us for a long, wonderful dinner at a local restaurant. Then Rocky and Chris visited us in Champoeg and brought a delicious quiche for dinner. One of the best parts of our travels is spending time with our wonderful friends. We also took a day trip to nearby Silver Falls State Park.

Our July and August went well until one morning we heard chewing that sounded like it was coming from our bedroom closet. Doug discovered that a squirrel had chewed through the wires to our back-up camera! We had been worried about all those squirrels and this repair was costly and took Doug 3 days to fix.

We decided to leave our pretty (and free) campsite and escape any further damage from squirrels. We went nearby to a campground in Woodburn. From there it was a short commute to Champoeg.

On August 27^th we took our motorhome to McCoy’s Freightliner for routine repair. During the day-long wait, we hung out at Riverfront Park on the Willamette River in Salem. After a quiet nap in our car, we walked into town, had a really nice lunch and then toured the capital building. We spent the afternoon in our chairs gazing at the pretty river.

We went to pick up the motorhome and were totally shocked when the transmission light went on as Doug tested it in the parking lot. It obviously wasn’t driving well. The techs took it back into the bay, and then without any warning, we were homeless! It seemed right from that beginning that this wasn’t going to be an easy fix.

We had to leave Meriwether at the repair shop.

So, we went to Bev and Barry’s house that night. We had grabbed a few things from the motorhome – just our medicine and a few clothes. We expected to be leaving with a repaired home the next day. Well, that didn’t happen. Here’s where we had to be flexible again!

It was a transmission failure even though it is a fairly new transmission with low-mileage and regular maintenance. Nothing happens quickly in these situations – you have to get answers, and no one works on the same schedule. You have to wait until the right “experts” are on duty. Then you have to wait while the ordering is done. We needed a rebuilt transmission. Parts are scarce now. Technicians are even scarcer. One of our delays occurred while our newly rebuilt transmission sat in St. Louis. Then the transmission is on site and COVID swept through the Freightliner facility – 8 technicians were out of commission.

Our total time without our motorhome was 45 days. We spent about half of them at Bev and Barry’s beautiful new home where we had a private bedroom with a full wonderful bathroom. But best of all we had them to keep us sane and be great company for us. Our time there was peaceful, and we are totally grateful to them and their warm hospitality.

Most of this time it was impossible to know how much longer our homelessness would go on. But during one period we knew there was nothing for us to do so drove our car to see the kids in Washington. We’ve done this 6 hour drive a few times now and although the Columbia River Gorge is breathtaking, I mostly just wanted to get there and see the kids. Julie and Jake welcomed us and offered to let us live there forever. It was a special time with the kids, and we loved every minute of it. Sharing their lives, their meals, their playtime is precious to us.

Visiting Jake and the kids in Washington

But our health took a hit. The long drive caused a blood clot in Doug’s left leg which meant a trip to first Urgent Care and then the ER and medication and compression socks. Also, our darlings had a bad cold which, of course, we caught. By the end of our week there, we knew we were getting sick. But we were okay for a wonderful First Birthday party for Beckham and got to see Jake’s family.

We sadly left them, drove back to be near the motorhome. We had made arrangements to stay at an Airbnb in Sherwood. By the time we carried in our many bags, we were coughing badly and felt awful. We were happy to be isolated in a beautiful place, but we were really sick while we were there.

After that place we had reserved another place in Newberg – not quite as pretty but again all we did was binge watch TV and cough. It turned out that I had pneumonia and Doug’s cough lasted another month.

We recuperated and didn’t feel like we had any germs left, so we went back to Bev and Barry’s still “patiently” waiting to hear we could get back into our home. We got some good news with an actual date of repair. We took a few days off and went to Cape Disappointment, Lewis and Clark National Historic Park and Astoria. Our little cottage on Long Beach was just a short walk to the beach. The weather was cool and rainy, but I got to walk on the huge empty beach. We wandered around the little town of Long Beach, did some sightseeing; I ate a Dungeness crab cake, and learned more about Lewis and Clark. It was a good break for us.

Fort Clatsop replica at Lewis and Clark National Historical Park

Crossing the Columbia on the Astoria-Megler Bridge

View of Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center and Cape Disappointment Lighthouse

Great views of the surrounding area from the Astoria Column parking lot

We still had to kill a few days and we didn’t want to impose on Bev and Barry who were getting ready for their camping trip, so we went to a Travelodge for a few days. It was a peaceful quiet stay there, with decent breakfasts and some simple stuff we brought to eat. Doug had another medical issue – because of the pain in his leg, he seemed to have thrown out his knee so now he has a knee brace but that seems to be something that is getting better.

One of the worst parts of all this was being unable to meet our commitment to Valley of the Rogue State Park, where we were supposed to spend the month of September working with Junior Rangers and doing interpretive and maintenance work. Although we could have driven there, we had no place to live so had to renege on that. We are very disappointed – we hate to not meet our promises and we were looking forward to exploring that beautiful part of Oregon.

Then the day came to pick our home up. Our rig, Meriwether, drove fine and we only drove him a short distance to the Emerald RV Park on October 14^th. While there we got a bonus day with Dad and then went to get brand new tires put on this wonderful motorhome.

The rest of our trip was mostly one-night stays to get south to Kartchner Caverns. We stopped in Canyonville, Redding, Lodi, Coalinga, Boron, Needles, and Gila Bend. So very glad to pull into our winter home!

Now we are firmly ensconced in our site in the Lower Volunteer Village. We pulled in on Tuesday, October 26^th and happily went to our first gathering – a Flamingo – with old and new friends. We will be working three full days with a nice long four-day weekend. After our long homeless escapade, it was a relief and a pleasure to just be in our motorhome, enjoying all that we love about it, but also now camping in the familiar, beautiful state park.

Looking forward to working hard, meeting up with family and friends, getting to see more of the wonders of this area and enjoying the beautiful weather. Our gratitude to everyone who got us through this debacle is immense. We are very lucky in so many ways.

I would like to mention right here our gratitude and appreciation to Bob Tiffin, the CEO of Tiffin Motorhomes. Doug called him to tell him what happened. Bob immediately agreed to pay a third of our cost for the transmission replacement. And he did. We sent him a copy of the bill and a check was in the mail to us a few days later. Now this is amazing customer service! It was one of the reasons we chose Tiffin because we heard about this kind of remarkable service and now, we are happy to be recipients of it.

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Filed under Idaho, Oregon, Washington

by Carolyn | June 28, 2021 · 10:45 am

Adventures in Wyoming and Montana

BUFFALO, WYOMING

We were so excited to have a really nice weather day as we drove from Hermosa, South Dakota to Buffalo, Wyoming. We stopped at another Wyoming Visitor Center, this one just past the Vore Buffalo Jump. On another trip here we stopped to check out the Vore Buffalo Jump – a stop worth taking. This historic spot is one of many sites where native people herded huge bison herds over a cliff where they fell to their death. It was the women who organized these kills, positioned themselves near the fallen bison and eventually harvested the meat, horns, fur and fat from these giants to sustain their lifestyle. The story of buffalo jumps is an amazing look into the history of the plains and the way these creatures provided the natives with food, clothing, heat, and shelter.

It wasn’t long after that we pulled into Buffalo KOA. Just a two-night stay, but long enough to rest a bit, enjoy the weather and do the laundry. We were getting tired of sandwiches for lunch, so we tried Albertano’s Mexican Restaurant. Excellent enchiladas with a nice spicy salsa. We brought it back to our RV site and ate outside on the picnic table. Not too much wind but the cottonwood trees are shedding so we had to avoid eating the “cotton” that was drifting over us.

We drove over to Main Street and wandered around looking into the shops. We stopped at Lickety Split Ice Cream and ordered their licorice flavor. I had tried it there before and I was hoping Doug would like it as much as I did. He did!

HARDIN, MONTANA

It would be hard to leave the beautiful country scenery of Wyoming – if we weren’t going to Montana! We waved good-by to Buffalo and Wyoming. The new scenery included small streams lined with cottonwoods; the lovely Tongue River; a tiny cemetery; small, sheltered homes and cabins – all made the drive pleasant.

June 1^st found us in Hardin, Montana. Doug thought we should see something different than the KOAs we had mostly been staying in. For this stay he picked Grandview Campground. Our first impression was not good. I walked into the office to register, and I had to walk over messy piles of merchandise – clothing, souvenirs, grocery items – as well as scattered piles of paper. I get that they were about to paint this office, but it was a sty. The two little black dogs and a black cat were responsible for the paper all over the place. The owner was very talkative – I heard all about her trip to Ireland as a young woman with some very colorful details that were TMI. She escorted us to our site through two other sites that left us wondering how she could ever rent them. Our site was ok – gravel with a tiny concrete pad and grass. We did have a nice tree. And having great weather does make the place look a lot better.

We didn’t bother to unhitch for this two-night stay. Our neighbors pulled in the next morning and we had some quick friendly conversations. Later, after dinner, we invited them over to sit outside. Dehlia and Bill were from Brooklyn and Long Island. They were on a 6-week trip, one of many they have taken since they retired. They had great stories about their non-camping travels. We stayed out until dark enjoying their company.

While we were in this campground, we were able to video stream our niece Linda’s wedding in Las Vegas. It was a beautiful wedding – our bride was lovely, the groom looked great with his cap on backwards with his tux. My brother Dan sang the sang he wrote for Doug and I for our wedding – The Light of Love. We call it Lytle Love. And mother of the bride Lisa looked great and little dog Buddy was well behaved. It was such a great thing for us to be there virtually!

We left Grandview, thinking it really wasn’t such a rundown campground after all.

THREE FORKS, MONTANA

There was the same bucolic scenery as we drove to Three Forks. Purple sage and a few evergreens popped up here and there along the endless green grassy horizons. We got a glimpse of the Rockies again. You can’t miss those majestic snow-covered peaks that are sharp and almost perfectly triangular.

This part of the trip was along the Yellowstone River. To our right was the Absaroka Mountain Range which stretches about 150 miles across the Montana-Wyoming border on the western side of the Bighorn Basin. I like to crochet or read or do crossword puzzles as we roll along the highway, but when the view out all of our very large windows is this spectacular I just marvel and ooh and aah.

Our two-night stay at the Three Forks KOA included spending Friday at Lewis and Clark Caverns. We had been looking forward to this cave for a long time and we were excited to finally see it. We did the Paradise Tour – a newly established tour that allowed the tours to continue during COVID because this part of the cave is a large open room. I was glad to be able to do this tour. A week after touring through Rushmore Cave with its 412+ stairs was still making my knees ache.

This tour was a half mile walk to the entrance on a flat pathway with awe-inspiring views. We happened to be there on the hottest day ever, but being used to the heat, we were fine. We walked straight into a tunnel that was chiseled out by the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Depression Era. The tunnel itself is remarkable – lit just enough to give it the ambience of a tunnel but with plenty of headroom. It was a long walk through the gray limestone tunnel and then you are in the amazingly colorful cave.

This tour was different from many other cave tours. Only a very few stairs; no tight passageways; and big open viewing areas where even with about 15 people on the tour, we all had room and time to look at all the many formations. Usually, the time on the tour is spent going up and down stairs at a rapid pace to keep up with the tour guide and the rest of the group. I’m not a sure-footed goat by any means so I take each step carefully and somewhat slowly; and I often feel like I’m holding up the rest of the tour.

But Lewis and Clark Paradise Tour gave me lots of time to look at everything – large intricate columns, hundreds of stalactites and stalagmites. I saw a back plate shield, oriented popcorn, and some really cool popcorn with very large perfectly round orbs. The decorations were right there in front of us. The history of the cave is interesting. Luckily, the State of Montana took over the cave’s protection or it would have been mostly destroyed. The few steps inside the cave were carved by the CCC out of actual flowstone. As much as that is not ideal, it was fascinating to see the polished layers of calcite inside those stairs.

We can check this cave off our bucket list, and we give it high marks.

GREAT FALLS, MONTANA

June 5^th – our grandson Griffin’s 4^th birthday. We’ve been thinking about this active and sweet child all day long and hoping he is having a great day.

Montana, like Wyoming, also has really nice rest stops. These are not visitor centers but the views rival Wyoming’s. We stopped in Cascade County and this stop was perfectly placed between rocky mountainous hills.

During today’s drive Doug had to contend with some high winds. They were certainly a force of nature as we went through these dramatic canyons. Most of the drive was mountains, evergreens, giant boulders, and meandering rivers. We had the Missouri River near us for most of the trip, but for a short time there was the pretty Prickly Pear Creek just on the other side of the road shoulder.

We saw signs for Big Horn Sheep, so on this drive I stopped searching for the Elk that are always advertised and kept my eyes peeled for the Sheep. Saw nary a one!

Another two-night stay – this one at Great Falls KOA. Aside from an annoying check in time of 3 pm – on a Saturday! – the park is beautiful. The sites are very long – long enough for the biggest rigs we’ve ever seen and room to park those giant trailers those rigs tend to pull behind them. They are wide enough to have a large grassy space between sites – nice to not be anywhere near our neighbor’s sewer. There is an ice cream parlor, breakfast, a cute little train ride, a popular pool, and a big playground and even some live music. The cost here is outrageous, but we’ve seen worse in parks that are not nearly as nice as this. The camp store is well stocked, especially with huckleberry products. I couldn’t resist the huckleberry cheesecake popcorn.

Today, Sunday, June 6^th is the 35^th Anniversary of Our First Date – something we celebrate every year. We chose to go to the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail Interpretative Center. It is right next to Giant Springs State Park. This was certainly one of the finest Lewis and Clark centers we have visited. The displays were amazing. We have had the opportunities to visit many of the Corps of Discovery historic sites. This one, right on the Missouri River was an important one. At about this point in their explorations they were confronted with a devastating problem. Instead of one waterfall to traverse they encountered five in very difficult terrain. But the Corps persevered and with their strength of body and character portaged their boats and supplies up steep banks to get past the falls. Sometimes the portages occurred in deep snow and icy cold. Learning the details of their incredible journey is inspiring.

We took a nice walk down a path and then along the Wide Missouri. The weather was a little overcast and cool but that made for good walking. We had worked up an appetite so went into Great Falls to The Block and had sandwiches and homemade chips.

I took advantage of a Walmart right near our campground and loaded up on groceries. We had planned to have ice cream at the campground to put a nice ending to our happy day, but halfway through the store all I wanted to do was go home and put my feet up. I checked my steps and it seemed like I walked a lot more than 5,114 steps. I decided to buy Tillamook Mountain Huckleberry Ice Cream (we are in Montana after all) and stay in for the evening. A good day and a great start to our 36^th year together,

HELENA

We have never been to Helena and wanted to add another State Capital to our growing list. Helena turned out to be an interesting capital to visit. Our home base for our two-night stay was Helena North KOA.

We had a great time in Helena although the weather was still overcast and cool. We took the Last Chance Tour Train to see and hear about this historic capital city. Our driver/guide Kelly toured us through the streets and gulches of Helena, entertaining us with stories. We drove through the pretty hilly streets of the mansion district, saw the blocks of tall stone buildings owned by successful businessmen during Helena’s heyday. We got to see the diversity of the architecture – smallish houses in Craftsman, Tudor, painted Log Cabin and Victorian styles. St. Helena’s Cathedral and its beautiful stained glass competes with a giant spire on what is now the Convention Center. Old mixes with new everywhere. As we meandered up a curving street Kelly explained that it used to be a river gulch and that is why it took that shape. We even got a good glimpse of The Guardian of the Gulch – the old wooden fire tower. It was a pleasant hour-long ride up and down the steep streets.

In front of the Montana Historical Society

Before we stopped for lunch, we toured through Montana’s Capital Building. The Grand Staircase showed off colorful stained glass in the arched ceiling and the windows. The artwork around the dome featured the conflicts and mergers of the native people and the settlers. The pillars were Montana marble – a soft beige with silvery veins. We peeked into the Senate Chambers – also designed with beautiful stained-glass ceilings and windows. We saw the Liberty Bell – like other states, Montana received one to display. Altogether this was a great example of a state building representing its culture and history. We ended our morning at Planet Gyro for lunch – the first time in many months we ate inside a restaurant. We walked back up the hilly streets to our car and decided Helena and its harsh and crazy history was a great place to visit.

MISSOULA

We followed the Clark Fork river part of the way to our next stop which was Missoula. We stopped along and the way and took this picture.

We’re happily back in one of our favorite cities – Missoula. We are once again staying at the flower-filled RV park – Jim and Mary’s. Our pine tree site smells wonderful – lots of grass in this big site. It’s only a two-night stay again but we will make the most of it.

Except – RAIN! There were only a few moments after we settled in when it wasn’t raining so I got outside and took some photos of the pretty flower arrangements all over the campground. It then rained most of the night. We woke up to RAIN and it rained all day. We had hoped to do a little hiking and spend the evening in Downtown Missoula. But RAIN!

And that was the end of our visit to Montana.

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Filed under Montana, Wyoming

by Carolyn | June 2, 2021 · 11:34 am

Errands in South Dakota

We have a number of errands to do on this part of the trip. South Dakota is our home state – our official legal residence. We have an obligation to show up every five years to get our driver’s licenses renewed. We only have to show proof that we have spent one night every five years in this State to be a resident. It’s not much of a burden, especially since we love this State.

We are also planning to have a family reunion in the Black Hills in the summer of 2022. We will be looking at venues to hold this event. We also still have lots of exciting things on our South Dakota bucket list that we want to do. There are caves here to see and some attractions that our family might be interested in so we can check them out.

And we are very happy to have a few days of fun with Dan and Lisa who are traveling in their RoadTrek. They drove from Lauderdale-by-the-Sea to Lisa’s family in Illinois. Then they checked out some Geodesic Domes in Minnesota with the intention of building their own in New Jersey. It was only natural that we would meet up here in Hermosa, South Dakota. Then they are leisurely making their way to Las Vegas for their daughter’s wedding in early June. Eventually they will get back to their home in Florida. They love their travels. They are more adventurous than us – drifting from place to place, often without plans or reservations. Dan and Lisa have signed up for Harvest Hosts and have had some great experiences at these unique stop-overs. They should write their own blog about their travels!

Today is cold here at Heartland RV Park. Last night in Scottsbluff, NE, we had a bad wind storm before it got dark. It was worse here – lightning and hail. I’m looking forward to warmer temperatures tomorrow.

The road getting here was pleasantly not flat most of the way. Lots of rolling green hills dotted with some cows and a sprinkling of yellow wildflowers. There were some hills with exposed rock and deep chasms. The cows seemed oblivious to the overcast skies. We saw a sign for a Fiddle Contest in Crawford and I was wondering what that was like.

We finally saw signs of civilization as we neared Crawford. Driving along, Doug saw a snake coiled right on the highway. I missed it. For the most part, there were no signs, no nothing just grass from one side of the horizon to the other.

As we got to South Dakota we saw a glimpse of the Black Hills up ahead.

The resort we are staying in, Heartland, is one of the places we are thinking about for the reunion. We are doing our due diligence by taste-testing their breakfast tomorrow morning. We will also try their pizza. It’s too cold for checking out the pool and other child-friendly activities. The dog park is right in front of us and so far, that gets good marks from us.

The sites here are a bit tight and the ground is a little soft in some spots. But the staff and volunteers here couldn’t be more helpful. The laundry is clean and a decent price. The store has lots of convenience items as well as plenty of fun stuff to buy. They have an outgoing mailbox for my many postcards, and we were able to receive a package as soon as we arrived. So far so good.

It was great to spend the time with Danny and Lisa. Too bad the weather was awful. One of our days together we just sat inside our RV because the rain never stopped that day. Lisa got wet walking Buddy. Then the tornado watch turned into a tornado warning. The four of us and Buddy gathered up our important things, got into the car and drove to the Restroom/Laundry building behind the office. The Restroom side had glass doors, but we were able to sit in the tiny space between the wall and the showers. We met two other travelers, also with their 2 small dogs. Talking with them about their custom van and their travels helped pass the time. The threatening clouds turned into sheets of rain. When it let up and the watch was over, we went back to sitting around the RV.

On Saturday, Doug drove us to the Wildlife Loop of Custer State Park. It was a happy surprise that the park entrance was free that weekend. After another day of rainy weather, Doug drove us up Iron Mountain and down Needles Parkway. We ate lunch at a visitor center patio at Sylvan Lake and had a great day together.

One of the narrow and low tunnels on Needles Highway

On Tuesday, we said goodbye to Danny and Lisa after sharing breakfast. We left to go get our driver’s licenses renewed. It was a very efficient and pleasant experience. Our appointment was at 10:15 and we got there early. The text on our phones told us when we could come in the building. We filled out a few forms. Immediately got called to the window. Did the eye exam, signed another form, had our photos taken, and we were finished. We left before 10:15.

With that chore done for the next five years, we went into Rapid City. We walked around checking out the bronze statues of Presidents and found Barack Obama. He has one of his daughters with him and his corner is next to a pretty church. It was good to see him taking his place with all the other presidents.

We drove home through grassy hillsides. This part of South Dakota is just grass. We did see a life size statue in the middle of the field. It was the Madonna of the Prairies. Just a pretty statue sitting in the grass.

On May 26^th we spent the day looking at venues all over the Black Hills to hold our family reunion next summer. We ate our lunch near D.C. Booth Fish Hatchery, but we didn’t stop in. We have to finalize our summer plans for next year before we make a commitment to volunteer so we didn’t want to visit with our volunteer supervisor just yet. Lunch was just on the other side of the parking lot where we sat in the cold wind eating our picnic lunch and hoping the weather gets better!

We looked at campgrounds and RV parks in Lead (Wikiup Cabin Village), amazing rental homes on very steep roads on Terry Peak, a huge resort called Palmer Gulch, some local KOAs, and a rental building right next to Deadwood. They were possibilities and we went home to compare them. The drive home was a long, cold ride through dense fog.

The next day, Doug suggested we check out one more place – Spokane Creek RV and Cabins. We were excited! The owners had a workamper show us a few cabins. They were perfect. The price is right, the location is good, and the RV sites and cabins will accommodate our family. We can’t make the reservations until early next week when they open up for next year.

We figured out what we need in terms of cabins, we finished our Save the Date flyer, and we confirmed everyone’s email address. It is great that we found a place we are happy with and now we can start on all the little projects that will go into making this family gathering a happy time.

With that big chore done, we checked out another cave – Rushmore Cave. This one is pretty dried out. The tour was a good one – interesting speleogens and a few speleothems (formations). It is a cool cave to explore – very tight spaces, 412 stairs, including a ladder, and about a half mile of walking on a sometimes slippery cave floor. We enjoyed the new experience of this cave. There are also lots of adventures on here on Rush Mountain, but we weren’t interested in zip lines, rope walks, and some other crazy rides. When we got home I took some pain meds for my aching knees and arm. Maybe that was too many steps for me – not just the 412 inside the cave but another 100 up to the cave and then 100 down to the car. I am rethinking which tour to do at our next cave – Lewis and Clark. It makes me appreciate Kartchner Caverns – tram ride up the hill, no stairs, safe flat concrete pathways! We love these caving adventures but my bones complain.

Left South Dakota on May 30^th – finally had a really nice weather day!

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by Carolyn | May 20, 2021 · 3:18 pm

Colorful Colorado and a Little Bit of Nebraska

COLORFUL COLORADO

We left New Mexico for Colorado on Friday, May 14^th. It wasn’t long before we saw a glimpse of the Rockies. Another mountain range to enjoy but this one much taller and peaking through behind the foothills were the snow-covered mountaintops.

LEARNING HISTORY ALONG THE ROAD

We passed a sign for the Ludlow Massacre which prompted me to look into it. Not a good time for coal miners who were striking because of poor labor conditions during the Colorado Coalfield War in April of 1914. The Colorado National Guard attacked men, women and children in a tent camp. Twenty-one people were killed, including wives and children. It was thought that the attack on the strikers was orchestrated by John D. Rockefeller, Jr. who was a part owner of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. It was President Woodrow Wilson who ordered the federal soldiers to intervene. As a result of Congress investigating these events, the House Committee on Mines and Mining wrote a report that influenced the child labor laws and the 8-hour workday. The site is now a ghost town with a nationally recognized monument to those who died in the massacre.

We didn’t take the turn off to the Scenic Highway of Legends on State Highway 12. Someday we should wander through that part of the Rocky Mountains. Our friends, Jayne and Paul are working in La Veta and it just seemed a shame to get so close to them and not stop. But we wanted to get to our next stay in Colorado Springs KOA early enough to do some food shopping. So, we waved virtually to our friends and will keep in touch this summer.

Along a long stretch of Highway I 25 we saw some random objects that caught our attention. We are appreciative of these bits of folk art or whatever they are as they break up some of the monotony of the highway. There were the words “God is Real” painted on the back of a metal sign with a happy face on one side and a heart on the other side. Following that we saw a metal sculpture of a turtle and, in the field with no apparent plan, several US flags flying on poles. The strangest sight was an art gallery the size of a shed that was very close to the highway but had no other access road to it. A pretty herd of deer scampered along, and a few cattle grazed in the grass. This happened over miles and miles of grassland. Three wind turbines quietly captured a bit of a breeze. And then at a place that sold landscaping rocks, we saw a mini Stonehenge. All of this with enormous Pike’s Peak peeking out of the surrounding mountains.

It was a beautiful ride through this beautiful state.

Our campsite in this destination KOA park has a real patio, with a table and four chairs, a bench and a small Blue Spruce tree. After getting some food shopping done and finally filling our depleted supplies, we brought back some Burger King because we still have to fix the damaged propane hose, making cooking difficult.

We took advantage of the pretty patio and sat outside as the clouds that were threatening rain gave way to the sun. Our neighbors in the large Kamping Kabins have lots of loud children so we sat outside listening to their voices and missing our own noisy grandchildren.

CAVE OF THE WINDS

We have decided to add to our Cave knowledge by visiting as many new caves as we can on this trip. Our first was Cave of the Winds in Colorado Springs. This cave was discovered in 1880 by two brothers, John and George Pickett. They were exploring near a limestone archway and while there, their candles went out because of a small wind coming from within a cave. They thought it was haunted, but their tale brought other people into the tiny entrance. Others opened up more passageways until we have the current cave expanse, making it a worthwhile tour. We would never have entered through the tiny opening on our bellies and climbed down the still hanging rope ladder.

Our car climbed the long and winding Canyon Rim Road up to the Cave. We took the Discovery Tour – which is very popular. Fifteen people every 10 minutes go on this 45 minute tour. They also have a Lantern Tour which lasts for 90 minutes and seems like much more of a caving adventure.

Cave of the Winds is quite an operation – a huge gift shop, cafeteria, viewing areas and rides for the young and old daredevils – rock climbing, a 600-foot-above-ground Challenge Course, a Terror-Dactyl ride that shoots you across a 200-foot canyon at about 100 miles per hour with your legs dangling. There were tamer things to do like panning for minerals or sitting on the patio admiring the spectacular view of the gorge (our choice)

The Discovery Tour through the cave was plenty exciting for us. There were about 100 steps, some of them very narrow with low hanging rocks above you. The floor was often uneven but there were some handrails (called stalagpipes, ha ha). The path was winding and narrow and took you through many small rooms with many twists and turns. The mantra was “Right is right; left is lost.” Until you made a left turn at the very end.

The tour guides were young and seemed to all be just starting out. Ours had a great sense of humor and did a good job. There was a lot to see – mostly the gently eroded walls and ceilings and some notable formations. The color in the cave was gray – what you would expect from a mostly dry cave.

It was interesting to see how this cave developed and the form it took. It was a good tour to take – but when there are many steps and a fast pace, it is hard to see everything. We enjoyed it and were glad we went. Another cave on our bucket list!

MANITOU CLIFF DWELLINGS

These cliff dwellings were much more accessible than any others we have been too. There were a lot of stairs to climb (I was a little slow due to the higher altitude) but once you got to the main level you could walk (stoop) through lots of doorways into many rooms. The tiny rooms, the cliff itself, the common areas and storage areas were all right there to explore and touch. The preservation and rehabilitation of this site was a tribute to the Ancient Anasazi who occupied this cliff. The Native Americans who run it now have included two really excellent museums.

The only part that was a little awkward was the enormous gift shop. Like the pueblo cliff dwellings, it had many levels, many stairs, and rooms that led into each other. At one point, we didn’t think we could find our way out of the shop.

The Cliff Dwellings were very close to Cave of the Winds and that made a perfect second stop for us. It was definitely worth the entrance fee and all the stairs. We have seen many ruins and cliff dwellings. This one was the most accessible and we loved all the informative signs about the plants in the surrounding landscaping. I liked learning about the centuries-old uses of these ancient plants that thrive and bloom today. It was a really nice day for us. Then we took Sunday off from sight-seeing and stayed home. I got some laundry done; we ate breakfast at the Café in the campground and just took care of a few chores.

BOYD LAKE STATE PARK, LOVELAND

Our last stop in Colorado is Boyd Lake State Park in Loveland. Doug made the decision to drive right through Denver instead of taking the toll road. A toll road driving a large motorhome and towing a car is not just a few dollars for a toll. It would have been about $64. We went through during a lull in rush hour traffic but with the construction and the merging and still high speeds, I was pretty nervous. Doug seems to have nerves of steel when he drives, and he successfully navigated through this big city.

This time we virtually waved to Sylvia and Dave who live in Denver. We look forward to seeing them next fall.

One picturesque part of the trip was approaching Castle Rock. You could see the giant rock formation right along the highway. The cap rock on this butte is rhyolite – a rock that resists erosion. The formation at the top of a mesa really resembles a castle. Rhyolite is an igneous rock in which you can find stones that are treasured as gems like topaz. 58 million years ago a volcanic eruption covered this area, and in particular this butte, with 20 feet of rhyolite. This kind of rock has tiny vugs – little gaps in the rock that have trapped gases. The gases percolated over long periods of time leaving a hole. It is inside these vugs where translucent sparkling crystals form. It’s like a geode, but not encapsulated. Now I want to go rhyolite hunting!

We pulled into Loop E in our campground at Boyd Lake State Park – just electricity, no water or sewer so set up was easy. The park is grassy, and the lake is large and close by to our site. The sites are not that long but we just fit our rig and car. I had just finished the inside set up (pretty minimal when we are on the road) and it started to rain. It has been overcast the last few days. The thunderstorms passed us every night we were in Colorado Springs. But the rain definitely has hit us now. We are cozy in our home and the sound of the rain on the roof is pleasant. We’ll just stay in today and relax.

Maybe tomorrow we will take advantage of a nice walk to the lake; take a picnic lunch and sit on the beach. We do truly love beach sitting and we haven’t done that for a very long time.

We didn’t get to sit on the beach. We walked over to the beach to check it out. It was too wet, but it was a really nice walk. The weather cleared by the end of the day. We just relaxed which is a really nice thing to do, especially since we are on VACATION!

GERING, NEBRASKA

Left Colorado for a two-night stay in Gering, Nebraska. We still had a view of the Rockies far away on our left. The weather was sunny today after 3 days of rain and being overcast. The drive was peaceful – this part of Nebraska has a lot of green pastures with some grazing cattle. We drove for long distances and then saw the bluffs in the distance. We saw a large two-dimensional metal sculpture of a bison on top of gentle hill.

We stopped at the Southeast Wyoming Visitor Center. On our last visit there we loved the exhibits, but they are mostly closed due to COVID. We were able to get lots of information about the art, architecture and natural landscaping that went into building this beautiful visitor center.

We entered Nebraska – welcomed by a sign that said, “the good life” and saw three turkeys wandering in the field.

We have been here before and stayed at this beautiful Robidoux RV Park again. The sites are huge and grassy, level with concrete pads. We did run into something weird. Some of the sites here are head-to-head. We had been assigned one of them. We knew it wouldn’t work for us. We aren’t sure we are going to unhitch the car and the only way out of that site would be to back up. Also, there was a shared driveway next door and the truck in that site would have been blocked by our toad. So, we asked for and got a pull-through.

The weather is breezy and just the right temperature. I smelled the lilac bush before I saw it. Then, I took some photos of Scott’s Bluff from a loop in the campground. This large rocky feature is 800 feet above the North Platte River and has been a landmark for everyone – Native Americans, people traveling on the Oregon, California and Mormon Trails and anyone driving down the nearby highway. We visited up close last time we were here.

We’ll spend a restful night here among the beautiful clouds enjoying the views. Then on to South Dakota, our home state!

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by Carolyn | May 14, 2021 · 7:18 am

On the Way to Portland, Oregon by way of South Dakota

FIRST LEG: KARTCHNER TO NEW MEXICO

LAST DAYS AT KARTCHNER

Everything worked out for us and this year instead of heading through California and taking our usual route to the Portland, Oregon area, we are taking a thousand-mile detour to South Dakota first. We got our COVID vaccines, finished our doctor and dentist appointments and then decided that it is time for some enjoyable travel.

Last year on our trip from Arizona to Portland we hardly left the RV. Just pulled into sites and holed up until we got on the road again. The joy of traveling in an RV is that you sleep in your own bed, use your own linens, brush your teeth in your own sink, and use your own shower and toilet. And we cook our own food which we eat at our own table. When we pull into a rest stop, we turn off the engine and stay in air conditioned or heated comfort. It is the perfect way to travel during a global pandemic. Except that pulling into new campgrounds, seeing people ignoring masking mandates and social distancing is unpleasant and scary. So, last year we would just un-hitch and go right back into our sanctuary.

The safety and convenience of RV travel has become way too popular. It gets harder and more expensive to find campground sites. Even in the best of places, seeing unmasked folks coming out of campground laundries kept me washing clothes by hand this entire last year. Finding ways to dry them without being able to hang clothes outside was a bit of a struggle but better than rubbing elbows in a hot humid crowded laundry room with unmasked people.

Last year’s trip to Portland and the return trip back through the same campgrounds was not fun. This winter at Kartchner Caverns was great but we look forward to a little extra scenery for our summer season. We began planning early and decided to take care of some business in our home state of South Dakota. That made it easy to plan our trek through New Mexico, Colorado, Nebraska – then the Black Hills of South Dakota – swinging west to Wyoming, Montana, and Washington and finally to the Portland area.

We did have some concerns for a short time at our jobs in the Caves. The AZ Governor eliminated the mask mandate, and the director of AZ Parks issued a directive that we could not require masks in the Caves. It was obvious that neither of those two understood the atmosphere in the Cave. And we became very worried about entering the Cave with strangers who would possibly be unmasked. The Cave has a great oxygen level due to its size of about 2.5 miles. But that air comes in through a grapefruit-size hole. The air exchanges about once every 3 to 5 days or something like that. That means the air in the Cave is still – no breeze – and aerosols just hang in that humid environment for hours. Understanding this made us, and other volunteers, reconsider what we had thought was sufficient safety conditions. We stopped going into the Cave for a while. We did other jobs that didn’t expose ourselves so much until we were two weeks passed our second vaccine. We also observed that most people took the staff’s recommendation to wear a mask and only a few people went through the Cave without one. Once we felt better about our safety, we resumed our usual tasks.

By then other volunteers had left for the season so we picked up lots of extra hours. Our lives got busy, but we love our jobs, so it was fun. I am now a Lead Guide for both the Rotunda/Throne Room tour and the Big Room tour. Doug loves driving the tram and we both enjoy trailing other tours. We continued our extra duty of Opening the Cave a day or two a week and occasionally a shift at the Gatehouse. Doug and I put some Earth Day bat crafts together and although the participation was minimal, we felt good about promoting Earth-friendly crafts on Earth Day.

My work with the Adopt A Bat program has been simplified with Doug’s expertise at automating it but subscriptions still keep me checking at least twice a day. We did a little extra social media posts for Earth Day and wound up with 54 subscriptions over a 4-day period. I’ll maintain the program remotely over the summer and see what happens when we get back to Kartchner in the Fall.

We also continued our weekly Flamingo gatherings of volunteers and sometimes Rangers. Those weekly get togethers cemented our friendships during this difficult year when we all needed companionship. So, the final weeks flew by and we left on Friday, May 7^th after a wonderful last Flamingo.

LORDSBURG, LAS CRUCES – HATCH!

After working so much, we immediately felt like we are on vacation!

Doug planned two short driving days to make sure our motorhome, Meriwether, and our towed vehicle, Lewis, were on their best behavior. We spent our first night at the Lordsburg KOA in New Mexico. It was a quiet night with almost no one else in the campground. Doug took care of a few things and relaxed. I painted some rocks to leave along our trip stops. (I never take or leave a rock at any State or National Parks or Natural Recreation sites, etc.) It’s just fun for me to paint something pretty and put an inspirational quote on a rock. I like to think of them as bringing a smile to someone and don’t we all need that in our lives?

The scenery into New Mexico is iconic desert. We stopped seeing saguaros and started seeing yuccas dotting the desert landscape. As we drove past my favorite rocky scenery in Texas Canyon in Cochise County, I vowed once again to put The Amerind Museum in Dragoon back on my list of must-dos in the Fall.

During that part of the trip – less than an hour from our starting place – I started to crave a Green Chile Cheeseburger. My mouth knew we were on the way to Hatch, New Mexico!

We traveled along I-10 and passed a sign for the biggest Pistachio, which we had seen in Alamogordo. The signs along the road point out that there might be “zero possibility”. That means you might not be able to see anything due to dust storms. We were lucky and the wind wasn’t too bad.

After a relaxing afternoon and evening, we took our time leaving Saturday morning. Can’t get to the next campground too early! Our second day of driving was also short. We got into Las Cruces KOA, ate a quick lunch, unhitched our car and took an afternoon drive right to Hatch. We didn’t want to delay getting our roasted green chiles.

The road from Las Cruces to Hatch is picturesque – lots of farms and pecan groves. Then you see the mountains. South of Las Cruces are the Tortugas and the Organ Mountains, which were in the distance. We traveled through the Picacho Peak area (same name as a favorite park near Tucson). Getting closer to Hatch we went through beautiful mountain peaks on all sides of us.

We found a place to purchase frozen roasted green chiles and bought 10 pounds of them. I’ll pack them into portion-size bags and re-freeze them. That should last for a while. We also bought a new ristra – our old one from Hatch was dusty and faded. And we got some Mexican oregano – we make sure it’s properly labeled because it really does look suspicious in its little baggie.

This time I got my Green Chile Cheeseburger at Sparky’s – supposed to be the best. There were lines at the window and lots of folks at socially distant picnic tables in the large blocked off parking lot. Everyone was masked and polite. I ordered the burger with wedge fries and a side of green chile queso.

It was painful to ride home with that delicious burger and its incredible smells, but I did it. I quickly made a vegetarian turkey-style cutlet for Doug which I covered in green chiles, of course. I shared the potatoes and queso (perfectly hot and spicy!) I heated up my burger and yum, yum, it was worth the wait! I’m writing this just an hour or so later while my tummy is still smiling with satisfaction. It was certainly worth the 35 miles each way we drove for this amazing New Mexico treat.

We once again visited the little western town of Mesilla where Billy the Kid went to jail. The town plaza seemed familiar and we quickly realized we had been there 4 years ago. We strolled around the craft market at the plaza and went in a few of the stores.

BERNALILLO

Traveling the way we do, often on two-lane highways, we get to know the land better than shooting down the bigger highways. Neither of us is good at figuring out what is sprouting from the ground on the farmed land. We take wild guesses – and we will never know if that stuff is kale or onions. We do recognize pecan trees and we saw many of these well-tended orchards. We like to play music and sometimes the perfect song comes on in the perfect place. But on our trip from Las Cruces to Bernalillo that didn’t happen. At one point, Elvis was singing In the Ghetto as we drove through miles of uninhabited desert.

We did get to see lots of mountains. Some of them had the familiar limestone striations and even the balso quartzsite ridges like our Muffintop in the Whetstones. Some of these mountains are sandstone and you can see the different erosion patterns. Near Las Cruces, the Rio Grande was a large expanse of sand. It is used in that area for ATV driving. No water at all – just miles of tire tracks in the dry sand. But then as we drove along the Sacramento Mountains, the Rio Grande became the Grand River it should be.

We pulled into the Bernalillo KOA and stepped back in time to 1997. We spent time here in our pop-up trailer with Amy and Julie. It was our trip from New Jersey to the Southwest and back again. Bernalillo was the turning point for me. It literally was where we turned to head home, and it was where I officially fell in love with the Southwest. My last moments in this campground on that memorable trip were spent with our video camera taking pictures of the clouds as my voice broke narrating how much I didn’t want to go home.

It has been an enduring love for me. The Southwest holds my heart and I never tire of the brown rock-exposed mountains, the clear blue sky and the fresh hot air. This New Jersey girl really set her roots down on this part of the continent.

The campground seems about the same, but different owners. The sites are close, but we have a patio site. This upgrade is simply a square of artificial grass just big enough for a small picnic table with a little room for our chairs. We have a short pine tree which litters the ground with little round pinecones. I think it’s a Pinon Pine. There are lots of shedding cottonwoods here too. The temperatures are much cooler here – mornings in the 50’s and midday in the 70’s (maybe the low 80’s). There is a new addition to this campground. On the other side of the wall there is a ramshackle beer brewery, the Kaktus Brewery, that also serves some food. It wasn’t open our first night, but I will keep checking. The menu is intriguing: German pretzels; Curry Wurst, Affogato (sea salt and caramel gelato) and a selection of pizzas with some really unusual toppings. Looking forward to tasting something different.

ALBUQUERQUE

We did make a quick trip to Old Town Albuquerque on Wednesday, May 12^th. But the day started out at Stewart and Stevenson’s transmission repair facility. Doug thought he found a transmission fluid leak and this place was nice enough to get us in to check it out. We had to be there by 7:30 am. I followed Doug in the car, got lost on the crazy interchanges in ABQ but finally got to the facility. We were entertained by another couple who are on the road too. They told us stories of camphosting, Viking Cruises and tornadoes in Missouri. The time in the waiting room passed quickly and we weren’t there long – the news was good – no problem. So, we hitched up, drove back to our campsite on the other side of ABQ, had a quick lunch, watched a really bad (good?) Godzilla movie and then headed to ABQ for an afternoon in Old Town. We stopped in a few of our favorite stores, checked out a few new ones and sat on a bench. Doug has not been feeling great – a bit of a stomach problem. We decided it had gone on too long, so we stopped at Urgent Care. Then to a lab for tests. Hopefully we will get this under control.

We got home and Doug thinks there is a propane leak – not in the tank but in the hose. We have to leave tomorrow morning – we will just not use the stove until we get that checked out. It will be a quiet night of rest and hydration for Doug. At least we have a microwave so we will not starve.

The Kaktus Brewery with the cool pizzas doesn’t open until Thursday so we will miss out on their gourmet pizzas. I am consoling myself with the thought of all the calories I didn’t eat these last two days – no German pretzels, no Mexican food in ABQ, no yummy pizza. Oh well, I’m sure we will find something fun to eat when Doug feels better!

On to Raton. Pronounced “Rat Tone”.

RATON

Just one night in Raton. The ride was a little longer today – over 200 miles. No more desert. It was at first mountains covered in Rocky Mountain junipers and pinon pine trees with an occasional Blue Spruce in the Sante Fe Forest. We saw the flat tops of mesas mixed with more pointy peaks. Then we hit a very long expanse of grazing lands. Not many cattle to be seen but miles of yellow-green flat pastures. We stopped for a quick lunch at a rest stop.

The Raton KOA is an oldish style KOA undergoing some building construction. The sites are much larger than the newer KOA’s where you practically touch your neighbor. These sites are also very long. Not much to comment on – dusty gravel but level sites with sparsely placed tiny trees. But nice owners and a perfectly fine stop for our one night stay. We didn’t unhitch – just hooked up electric and water and pushed the slides out. We are set.

New Mexico proved to be the best in mask wearing. Every store, outside and inside, even just walking through the campgrounds, people wear masks. The signs say “by order of our governor” and it seems that New Mexicans are proud of that. We’ll have to see what other states do. For sure, this is a complete change from Arizona.

Next stop: Colorado Springs.

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by Carolyn | March 10, 2021 · 8:16 am

Our Five Year Full-Timing Anniversary

We have been living in our RV full-time for five years! Our official anniversary is January 13^th. It has been the best decision we have ever made. We love our lifestyle of living simply, enjoying our families when we can and experiencing the joys of traveling and exploring this amazing country. Once in a while, we check in with each other to see if we are still okay living this way. The answers every time have always been: we wouldn’t change a thing. We love doing this!

It’s been a cold winter here in the Whetstone Mountains. At about 4600 feet of elevation, we often get a little sprinkle of snow. This year we saw the ground covered for a day or so and lots of white on the mountain we call Muffin Top behind us. Snow like this is just pretty and because it’s so rare we all enjoy it. And we even had a snow day when the Cave Tours had to close because the tramway was icy.

But I’m writing this while our neighbors in Texas are suffering with catastrophic cold weather conditions, leaving most of them without water, without electricity, without food, gas and horribly without heat. We wish for them the warm days coming in our weather forecast.

We are only two months into 2021 and maybe because 2020 was such an awful year, we thought 2021 would be like a beautiful sunrise – the dawn of a new era.

The tragic seditious takeover of the Capitol on January 6^th shook us to our core. Seeing a Confederate flag and anti-Semitic themed shirts parading through what is a sacred space to us was horrifying. For me, it was the nightmare that I worried about for the past five years. It isn’t a great feeling to have a nightmare come true. But Democracy won. Biden’s in office and the news is mostly good. My obsession of watching CNN every day is starting to ebb – the virus is still awful, but vaccines are coming; there seems to be an end in sight. Schools are not all opened yet but there is some hope that they will be soon. Businesses are open and slowly, very slowly, the world seems to be edging towards a new and maybe even better normal. I no longer wake up with the fear that something terrible happened in DC while I was sleeping.

For Doug and me, the first two months of this year have been fine. We are able to continue working in the Cave because the precautions taken here help keep us safe. But we also take our own extra precautions. Now we wear two masks – a K95 and a cloth mask over it. I’ve been doing tours through the Cave – talking for 1 hour and 45-minute tours – with two masks and not having any problems. Guests can hear me, and I feel safe. We also help with the extra sanitation of the handrails and often wear gloves in the Cave.

At work we feel in control, but we are still washing clothes by hand. The drying becomes more difficult on cold days that are overcast and we often bring them in damp. We hang them on a tripod dryer in our shower. They are always dry by the next morning. So now no public laundries.

Grocery shopping is almost exclusively done by curbside pickup. Our order is usually correct and complete with an occasional surprise. But it keeps us out of harm’s way in the stores. Unfortunately, our local stores do not enforce their own mask mandates and only about half of the customers are even attempting to wear a mask. There is a lot of bandanas and masks below the nose here.

In spite of all our precautions we were exposed, but we tested negative. Yeah, masks!

I love doing tours – it’s a chance for me to show off our beautiful cave and I love to see our guests become entranced with its wonders. Their exclamations of awe at the magnificence of Mother Nature’s underground artwork are thrilling to hear.

Doug is enjoying driving the tram and trailing tours. Recently he was able to trail my tour and doing that together was a great experience for us.

We are catching up on doctor and dentist stuff as we usually do when we are in Southeastern Arizona. All is going well.

I was in a Golf Cart accident, but I survived with only the tiniest cut on my arm. The Golf Cart was driven away, after the Maintenance Crew cut it out of the mesquite tree, with only cosmetic damage. I was incredibly lucky. I kept a piece of the mesquite tree that almost got me as a reminder that my Guardian Angel still has plans for me.

We have had a few cheerful outings with friends and family. We had bagels with Amy and Brodie at a Tucson park. Jayne and Paul came with us on a great day in Bisbee where we once again enjoyed the food at Santiago’s. Jean, Jayne and Sylvia and I spent a perfect morning at the Mini Time Machine Museum in Tucson, followed by lunch at Beyond Bread. Our Friday night Flamingo gatherings are weekly warm moments with our fellow volunteers around a fire.

Kartchner Caverns is part of 2021’s celebration of the Year of Karst and Caves. There is a greatly reduced number of guests allowed on tours because of COVID. A total of 60 guests are allowed on tours each day. In non-COVID years we see anywhere from 450 to 650 people per day at this time of year. This year, though, we enhanced our on-line visibility with weekly social media posts. This keeps Kartchner Cavern’s presence more viable even with restrictions and keeps us an integral part of Karst and Caves.

On January 23^rd, Kartchner Caverns State Park launched its Adopt A Bat program. I’ve been very much involved in getting this program off the ground and it did just that – it went off like a bat out of hell! Over 100 people from 20 different states adopted bats within the first three weeks of the program’s existence. All ages are involved and lots of classrooms and homeschoolers. It’s plenty of work for me but our mission of getting out information to help protect bats makes the world better. Doug is doing the hard background work of turning this into a much more technically savvy enterprise. I don’t know what I would have done without his help.

We have had some sadness. First our friends Jayne and Paul lost one of their dear basset hounds. Sweet Abby had gotten old and had some problems, leaving Sammi behind missing her sister. Then Jean and Bob had to put their Bear down. Bear was an adorable loveable little guy we often walked with his much more rambunctious brother Rusty. Soon after losing Abby and Bear, our daughter Julie had to say good-bye to her pretty little dog Rosie. Doug and I always tried to give Rosie a little extra love and peace when we visited. Rosie lived with lots of worries, fears and nerves but she was our little darling.

We are planning a small, safe and socially distant outdoor gathering to celebrate Sawyer, Josh and Amy’s birthdays in March. So that is fun to look forward to.

There are a few subtle signs of Spring here in the desert. No giant azalea bushes bursting into pink and white blooms. No tall trees leafing out. But we will have pretty wildflowers soon. The mesquite, palo verde and ironwood trees get first yellow and reddish fuzzy stuff and then teeny tiny green leaves. The cacti – prickly pear, saguaro, cholla and barrel – will all start to get their flowers and fruit. A little color in our brown dusty desert is always a welcome sight.

Right now, our plan is leave here by the end of April. We are heading to the Portland, Oregon area where we will again spend time with family. We were putting off making a decision on our end date here because we were trying to get our COVID vaccines before we left. It was a struggle to get appointments, but I’m able to get mine at the University of Arizona and will be done on March 21^st. Doug just scheduled his appointments at CVS so with that in place we can make definite plans for the future.

Since we can leave by early May we decided to head to South Dakota. Our driver’s licenses are expired, and we have temporary permits due to COVID. We are planning a leisurely trip to our home state, stopping in Rapid City to get our licenses. While there we will tour through areas we haven’t seen yet. We love South Dakota and the trip there through New Mexico and Colorado is just beautiful. Maybe we will even get to stop in Hatch, New Mexico and stock up on green chiles!

When we leave South Dakota, we aim the RV for the Portland, Oregon area. Another beautiful trip through some of our favorite landscapes. We hope to spend time in Montana again in the sweet town of Missoula.

We are scheduled for a new volunteer job at the Visitor Center at Champoeg State Park for July and August. We are waiting to hear how the park is doing after a devastating windstorm took down many trees. If the Visitor Center is open, we will do Interpretative tasks there. If it is closed, we will help with maintenance and tending the historic garden. We will work two days on; four days off. We are looking forward to being there.

Champoeg State Heritage Area Visitor Center

While at this job we will be helping out with Doug’s dad, Creighton. Dad turns 99 this August but lives on his own with a little help. Doug’s sister Beverly and her husband Barry take care of things for him and visit him often. With us in town, Bev and Barry will take a long overdue vacation in their RV. And we will be near Julie and Jake and our three grandchildren. Time spent in this area is always busy and we just love the family connections.

We just took on another position at Valley of the Rogue State Park. This one is just for the month of September. This area, around Medford, OR and the Rogue River is beautiful, and we have a lot of new experiences to look forward to there. We will work 5 four-hour days at this job. We will still have plenty of time to explore, especially since we don’t know anyone in that location.

Waterfall at Valley of the Rogue State Park

Then we head back to Kartchner Caverns for another busy winter in the Caves! What is not to like about a life like this? New people coming our way; new adventures to enjoy; lots of family time; and back to our winter home with friends and family. We are so lucky!

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by Carolyn | January 1, 2021 · 3:27 pm

Fall at Kartchner Caverns

2020 IS OVER!

We love being back at Kartchner Caverns. This volunteer job meets our needs. We are spending the winter months in beautiful Arizona. Yes, the mornings and evenings here at almost 5000 feet of altitude in the foothills of the Whetstone Mountains require jackets, long pants and even socks! But the skies are usually bright blue with plenty of sun. The middle of the day brings warmer temperatures.

We are close to our children and grandchildren but the COVID virus numbers here are outrageous, so we don’t see them much and only outside for short periods of time. That’s hard – being so close and not spending time with them. But just being nearby feels good.

Our work here is satisfying. We only work 20 hours a week – 3 full days. Doug drives Tram, and does Gatehouse, Portal and is working on some major projects with the Cave Unit Staff. I just got signed off to be a Lead Guide on the Big Room Tour, and I work at the Gatehouse, Portal, and Front Desk. I am also working on the soon-to-be-introduced Adopt A Bat Program.

Adopt A Bat mascot that Amy created for us

Both of us are facilitating a new communication tool for staff and volunteers: Cave Solutions. Questions and issues come in; we forward them to appropriate supervisors and then publish the answers and clarifications in an email publication called Cave Solutions.

The safety precautions taken at this park make us feel safe – at least as safe as anyone can feel these days. The Park requires masks, social distancing, hand sanitizing. The tours are limited to only 6 people at a time. With so few guests on a tour, the big open spaces in the cave give us plenty of room to keep apart.

We continue to do most of our grocery shopping using curbside pick-up. I am still having difficulty shopping this way – forgetting items and not being able to concentrate to get the order right. Doug is much better at it. Sometimes we can’t get the pick-up time we need. Sometimes we can’t get the items we need. But for the most part it is a convenient service. We sit at our table in our home while we use the app to order our food. We drive about 20 miles to Sierra Vista, pull into a spot (usually at Walmart) and someone comes and loads the groceries right into our trunk. It works and I try to get better at it – it is absolutely worth the effort.

Our friends here at the park wear masks, respect our safety and concerns so we still have a social life – outside, of course. Most of our fellow volunteers have dogs so someone is always walking around and it’s easy to have a conversation. That is a huge benefit.

We are trying to do something fun one day a week. We took a trip to Apple Annie’s in Willcox. It was a nice day right before Halloween. We grabbed some great sandwiches from their Country Store and ate them on their patio. We only saw a few other couples there. The produce area was a little more crowded, but we were the only ones in the freezer while we picked out some beautiful fresh veggies – the variety of peppers were delicious.

On the way back we stopped at Texas Canyon. The rocks there are incredible – huge boulders in strange positions, bizarre shapes. We’ve seen this area before and it always is a great place for photos and reflection.

Texas Canyon along I10 east of Benson, AZ

We recently finally ventured into the Nature Conservancy’s Ramsey Canyon Preserve. A place we have been meaning to visit for a few years. We hiked through a colorful woodsy area which runs along Ramsey Creek, a tributary to the San Pedro River. Living in Southern Arizona doesn’t often give you the beauty of crisp walks through brilliant fall colors. But this lovely place gave us the pinks, reds and yellows, the tall, white-barked sycamores next to the smaller pink-leaved maples. One of the Arizona Sycamores on the trail dates back to 1760. We were even graced by a small herd of white-tailed deer. The Preserve is famous for butterflies and birds. We will definitely explore this place again – we would like to hike the full trail next time.

We decorated our RV for the holidays – first Halloween and Thanksgiving and now Christmas, Hanukkah – and Festivus. Colorful lights and banners and just a few treasured ornaments bring us holiday cheer. Our tiny tree blinks on and off and our stockings are hung on our fireplace. We don’t know if we will see family this holiday season, but our hearts are comforted that they are staying healthy during this awful pandemic. We trust that our future holidays will be spent together, and we will look back at this rotten year knowing that we survived together.

We look forward to 2021 – it will be hard to overcome the bad, the sad, the anger, the pain, the economic devastation and most of all the knowledge that our world has lost so many souls. We look to the next few years to recuperate and rejuvenate. We hope our future brings us in contact with some of you and that we rejoice together in health and happiness.

We lost people that made our lives better: C.T. Vivian, John Lewis, Ruth Bader Ginsberg. We lost people that entertained us: Jerry Stiller, Alex Trebek, Eddie Van Halen, Kenny Rogers, Sean Connery (my heart broke!), Olivia de Havilland, Max von Sydow, Fred Willard, Kirk Douglas, Orson Bean, Kobe Bryant, Wilford Brimley and Little Richard (and, of course, many more). And while we mourn the loss of these lives, these faces that were so familiar to us, the heaviness in our souls, the grief that is impossible to deal with, is for the millions of victims of the global pandemic. Our world is bereft of the good, the talent, the skill that we lost when these lives were ended.

We embrace the love our family has shown and especially celebrate the very wonderful event in our 2020 – the birth of Beckham Daniel. If I focus on his chubby cheeks, his deep soulful brown eyes and his drooling gurgling, the Year of Horror recedes into the black night where it belongs.

Adios, 2020 – we will look back on you as the Year That Will Live in Infamy.

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by Carolyn | October 8, 2020 · 11:26 am

Traveling Back to Arizona – Carrying Lots of Love in our Hearts

Eleven weeks spent near Portland, Oregon. Two weeks of quarantine and nine weeks being joyously close to our sweet grandchildren. It’s hard to leave. This is what we are going to miss:

Hanging out with Jake and Julie

Admiring their parenting skills and glad we are the grandparents

Eating meals together (and all the ups and downs that entails)

Watching millions of jumps on the trampoline

Going on neighborhood walks

Junior Ranger adventures

Endless games of Candyland and Twister!

Cuddles on the couch with breakfast cookies

Sleepovers

Backyard fun

The enthusiastic greetings we received EVERY DAY!

Preschool in the Playroom

Learning new songs that will NEVER leave our head (Hi, Ho, the Merry-o, to Rhyming Land we go!)

Paisley singing and dancing non-stop

Griffin moving non-stop

Griffin’s messy face (messy, mischievous and so beautiful)

Paisley playing with her teeny tiny toys

Griffin racing his cars and building space shooters

Coloring, painting, green and pink sandcastles, playdoh…

Peas on the floor

The cheesy smell of Goldfish we go home at night with

Rosie (the dog) hiding from all the commotion next to us

Easy peasy laundry

Backyard poop patrols

Paisley and Griffin bestowing so much love on us!

And then the incredible pleasure of holding our darling Beckham – his adorable little body snuggled tight against our shoulders. Those big soulful brown eyes staring into our hearts. His chill relaxed outlook on life. The awe you never get over of a new life entering the world and being a part of you.

And…

We’ll miss spending time with Doug’s 98-year-old father, Creighton and his sister Bev and brother-in-law Barry. We love being with them.

But…

We had good news that makes leaving a little easier this time. We have a volunteer position at Champoeg State Park, which is close by all of our Pacific Northwest family. We will be working as Volunteer Hosts in the Visitor Center/Museum/Garden next July and August! Our first job with Oregon State Parks and one we are very excited about. This means we are putting off our volunteer gig in the Black Hills of South Dakota for another year, but we think that is best while the virus is still so prevalent.

This new job at Champoeg will give us plenty of time to see everyone since we will be working 2 days on and then 4 days off. Champoeg is a beautiful park with a fascinating history that we can’t wait to explore further. It’s nice to have a plan for part of next summer.

For now, we are on the road – staying at the same sites we hit on the way from Arizona to Oregon. These days of travel are simple: breakfast; prepare the RV to get on the road; ride for a few hours; lunch – usually at a rest stop in our RV; ride some more; get to new site by around 3 pm; set up RV; rest; dinner; tv; projects; sleep. It will be about 8 days of this. All one-night stays except for once when we will spend 2 nights. No rush. Keeping safe. Wearing masks. Staying to ourselves.

We will be at Kartchner Caverns on October 13^th and will quickly settle into our home there in the beautiful Whetstones. Muffin Top here we come!

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by Carolyn | September 18, 2020 · 2:05 pm

Beckham is a Blessing

Doug and I feel profoundly lucky to have been able to experience the joy of another grandchild. Grandparents out there – you know. You know the joy and excitement; the wonder of a new life that is connected to you; the sharing of more love; watching your children grow and expand to handle their new responsibility. You know. But you also know the worry that creeps in. The fear. This tiny life is so fragile. And the world has so many pitfalls and dangers.

So, we opened our hearts and tightly tucked in the love of our new Beckham Daniel Tucker. He was born at 10:15 pm on Friday, September 11, 2020. Julie’s water broke before 6 am that morning. Her previous births were fast so we moved quickly after we got the call, jumped out of bed, threw on our clothes, grabbed our already packed bags and drove carefully but as fast as possible the 40 minutes to her house. Julie and Jake were calmly waiting. No contractions – but they left for the hospital anyway. With fires everywhere, we were all concerned about detours and strange traffic patterns.

Paisley and Griffin got up about an hour later and greeted us with smiles and no worries that their parents were gone. Jake and Julie had prepared them well. We went through their usual routine: a few hours of pre-school, playtime, meals, a nice nap and then bedtime – a little too much playing and talking before they finally fell asleep but no tears, so it was good.

Big Sister Paisley made a card for her new brother while waiting for him

Beckham was taking a long time to arrive, but all seemed well. Finally, he was born. It took another hour or more for photos. Skin time with Mommy and Baby was much more important. And then the photo of the sweetest butt we have ever seen.

A few more hours and we heard that Julie and Beckham had had their final test, and both had good blood sugars. Julie could eat normally again; and Beckham was a very healthy 8 pounds 1 ounce and about 21 inches long. They settled in for hours of much interrupted hospital “non-sleep” and convinced the nursing staff to let them go home as soon as possible. They left the hospital a little before 10 pm on Saturday night.

Nana was holding Beckham seconds after he came home

Beckham has round chubby cheeks; a little bit of dark hair; a perfect baby face and body. Oh, he is adorable and very chill. But, you know, they are always chill in the hospital. They are chill for a day or two when they come home and then they get all charged up and start to really be the babies they are going to be for months to come. We don’t know yet the personality, the quirks of this baby. We just know how cute and cuddly he is.

Paisley and Griffin greeted him the next morning. They were both a little shy at first but warmed up after a few hours. Rosie, their neurotic dog, who had been wandering around the house for two days looking for Julie, saw them come in with another baby! Oh no, she thought, more trouble! Paisley is sweet with Rosie. Griffin loves her – a little too hard. And now another little guy. Poor Rosie.

So here we are with our seventh grandchild. Our fifth grandson. Our lucky number seven.

This child needs to be lucky. He needs to get all the blessings we can pile on him. He is blessed to be welcomed into a loving home with two wonderful parents, a sweet older sister, an active fun older brother. Grandparents, Great-Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Friends – a whole bunch of very loving people surrounding him. But this child, all children born now, need more than the usual amount of blessings.

A LOVE LETTER TO BECKHAM FROM HIS NANA:

This child was born on September 11^th. A day of remembrance, of sadness, of the memories of fear. He comes on this day, but he represents the world after 9/11. For him, please, let the horror of that day be some foggy knowledge that is the underpinnings of the spirit of America that lived in the days that followed – patriotism and pride and hope.

This child was born during the worst pandemic this world has seen. Even his hospital experience was unique. He won’t be meeting most of his family for a long time. Photos taken during the days before and after his birth will feature masked people. Headlines on the day he was born speak of death by COVID. For him, please, let his life be about health.

This child was born while we gather and protest so that Black Lives Matter. And WHEN Black Lives Matter, we will make sure all lives matter. For him, please, let this unrest bring the equality our country has always professed to have. For him, let it be.

This child was born during the most divisive period in our nation’s history. Our nation is suffering under the worst leadership crisis it has ever had. We are seeing the evil side of humanity on the news every day. Beckham will only be about 7 weeks old on Election Day. For him, get out and vote for love, not hate. Vote for all those little children who will have to live with the consequences of OUR actions. VOTE!

This child was born during an economic downfall. Life ahead of him will be affected every day because of this mess. For him, let’s do what we can to bring strength back into our economy.

This child was born while our Home, Our Planet, Our Earth, is suffering from neglect and apathy. For him, and all his playmates and all the children of the world, let’s get off our asses, and work hard to fix the problems we have caused. For him, climate change will not be a future problem. For him, it’s now.

This child was born while the whole west coast was in flames. Wildfires are all over his home state of Oregon. We read that the air quality in the Portland, Oregon area is THE WORSE IT HAS EVER BEEN. This child cannot go outside. His new lungs are not allowed to breathe the ash-infused atmosphere. He won’t see or feel the sun or a breath of fresh air for a while. Nana can’t push him around the block in his stroller! He is lucky he lives in a comfortable, beautiful home with plenty of love and attention, but this tiny guy is missing out on the world! For him, please, let the rains come; let the fires die out; let the forests heal; let the air clear. For him, let him breathe.

Beckham is a blessing to all of us. To him, and all the little lives entering the world now: Hang in there! You are not alone. We love you. We will be your champions, your superheroes. We, your loving grandparents, and the whole collection of relatives and friends will be there for you. We have screwed things up but it’s not over yet and we are not done yet.

Your life is going to be wonderful. Your birth year of 2020 is already being denigrated as the worst year ever. Let it be your worst year. Get the worst over with right away.

Beckham, your tiny body is the promise to all of us that Love will keep us together and Love will overcome hate and Love is all there is.

For you, Beckham, all our love, our prayers and our hope. For you, little darling, Nana’s heart is overflowing with love!

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Author Archives: Carolyn

MAY 4TH, 2022

A Summer to Remember

Adventures in Wyoming and Montana

Errands in South Dakota

Colorful Colorado and a Little Bit of Nebraska

On the Way to Portland, Oregon by way of South Dakota

Our Five Year Full-Timing Anniversary

Fall at Kartchner Caverns

Traveling Back to Arizona – Carrying Lots of Love in our Hearts

Beckham is a Blessing

Where are we now?

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