Flagstaff

After an uneventful drive from Monument Valley to Flagstaff, we decided to take a day off before beginning the long trek back to Texas.  This is as far west as we will travel on this trip, and we think a break will be good preparation for the long driving hours ahead of us.  Besides, Flagstaff is a  nice town, nestled among forested mountains at 7,000 feet elevation and, therefore, relatively cool—especially at night.  I cannot stress enough us Texans' appreciation for a cool climate in the summer.

We are at the J&H RV Park north of town on U. S. 89, an older park that is well kept and appears to be popular with older folks.  The owners make a big deal out of potential noisemakers; I was asked twice if we had dogs (allowed) and three times if we had motorcycles (not allowed).  What I’m inferring from this is that older folks don’t put up with much noise, and I guess we fit right in, because we don’t like noise, either.  Anyway, there is a cost to all this quietness—forty dollars a night at this park, even with a Good Sam discount!  Cost doesn’t seem to be a deterrent, however; the park was full both nights we were here.  It is located adjacent to a busy highway, but we didn’t notice any significant noise from traffic.  Perhaps the owner doesn’t allow that, either.

We explored the old downtown area, which was surprisingly vibrant, with a lot of young people hanging out among many mom and pop shops and restaurants.  Understandable, I guess, considering this is the home of Northern Arizona University.  We had intended to tour the old Riordan Mansion, a 13,000 square foot circa-1900 residence built by one of the founding families of Flagstaff.  Unfortunately, the house and grounds—now a state park—are closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.  We’ll just have to catch it next time.

Foodies that we are, we were delighted to find a couple of good restaurants.  We had Cajun shrimp tacos—perhaps the best ever—at Salsa Brava and some killer Thai food at Swadee Thai restaurant downtown.  I highly recommend these if you are in the area.

We did a little window shopping, Sandy at a women’s apparel store and me next door at Best Buy but, to my amazement, neither of us bought anything.  (I felt Sandy’s forehead, but she didn’t appear to have any fever.)  In Best Buy, I marveled at a new Samsung LED TV display; I guess this is the successor to plasma and LCD in the manufacturer’s unending quest to increase the high definition of television sets to the point where the TV image is sharper than real life!  Frankly, I think it already is.     

In the late afternoon, we decided to drive to Sunset Crater, located in a national park just north of town.  I didn’t know much about this now-extinct volcano, and I was surprised to learn that it erupted only a thousand years ago—very recent, in geological terms.  There was a very nice visitors’ center, where we perused the highly informative displays regarding the eruption.  While we couldn’t drive to the top of the crater, a paved road took us past the base of the cone, where we were shocked to see how little vegetation had returned to the lava flows and cinder cone after a thousand years!  If asked to guess how long ago the eruption took place, based on what we were seeing, I would have offered maybe ten years as a guess!

I’m including a few photos below, but they really don’t show the dramatic sharp edges of the lava rock and the total absence of erosion that I would have expected after a thousand years.  Compared to the lava flows of, say, the Hawaiian Islands, many of which are millions of years old and completely overgrown with vegetation, this really underscores the shortness of a thousand-year span in geological time and the mere blink of an eye that we humans are here.  (I don’t need too many reminders of the brevity of life; time is passing ever so much more quickly as I get older, and I’m really not all that happy about it.)  However, now that they are getting so good at replacing body parts that wear out, perhaps 60 years old will be the new 40, who knows?  Sandy is doing so well with her new knee, she may rival the Sunset Crater in still looking young when she gets all the rest of her parts replaced!  (I can't figure out if that is a compliment or not; I'm sure she'll let me know.) 

  Sunset Crater, as seen from nearby lava flow.

Lava rock shows little erosion and little vegetation, even after 1,000 years.

Photo doesn't reveal the length of the lava field--more than two miles and 100 feet thick.

The cinder cone looks much as it did 1,000 years ago; note the pieces of lava rock that pelted the area.

Irrepressible life:  From the devastation springs a wildflower; this plant is growing from the cinders through a thin layer of straw.

Monument Valley

After leaving Durango and the delightfully cool mornings in the San Juan mountains, it is a relatively short distance westbound on U. S. 160 to a jarringly abrupt change of scenery.  In the short 42 miles to Cortez, Colorado, we were finished with mountains and looking ahead to a foreboding and bleak landscape, almost devoid of vegetation.  We were a little uneasy leaving the security of Cortez, because we weren’t sure we would be seeing civilization again, based on what we were seeing ahead of us.


We decided to eat lunch at Cortez, stopping at a tiny mom-and-pop diner named Popillo’s.  I had a Navajo taco with some extremely tasty green chile sauce on top, and Sandy had a burger and fries.  All of it was cheap and delicious.  We sort of lingered over our meal, probably due to a subconscious uneasiness over what was “out there.”


We finally mustered our courage, and I took special note of the amount of diesel fuel showing on the gauge.  It was nearly full, as I had refueled in Durango, and I had already calculated that I should have plenty of fuel to reach Monument Valley.  Nevertheless, Sandy questioned me several times about the fuel supply, nervous Nellie that she is about such things.  After several reassurances, I finally talked her into giving me the keys.  (Not really.) 


Since we were about to enter no-man’s land, we decided we didn’t have enough provisions!  I should modify that to, “we didn’t have enough JUNK FOOD provisions.”  Now bear in mind that Homer’s refrigerator and pantry contained sufficient foodstuffs to take us to Monument Valley even at wagon train speed, but we were very uncomfortably low on carbs!  A stop at a local corner mart solved that problem, as I picked up a collection of favorite “sin” foods and, for Sandy, a glass of iced tea large enough to fill a wading pool.  With this in mind, I felt lucky that Homer’s restroom was following along behind us. 


We past by the Four Corners area (where the states of Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and Utah join at their respective corners), but the actual marker was not accessible due to construction.  This wasn’t particularly bothersome, because we had visited this place before when Mindy was a kid, and we took her photo lying at the four corners marker with her hands and feet all in different states. 
After four corners, the landscape became even more barren, with the ribbon that was Highway 160 stretched straight ahead as far as the eye could see.  There was no cell phone signal, of course, and Sandy was getting increasingly fidgety.  She turned toward me, her eyebrows a little higher than usual, and said:

“Do you suppose there are any buzzards out here?”
“Why do you ask?,” I replied.
“I was just wondering how long our carcasses would last for identification purposes.”

Bless her heart; Sandy really hates desolate, isolated spaces, and she is a trooper for enduring all she does to satisfy my wanderlust.


After what seemed like a week in suspended animation, we finally reached Kayenta, Arizona and our turn onto Highway 163 to take us to Monument Valley.  We filled up with fuel, of course, and I thought Sandy would hug the diesel pump at any minute.


After refueling, we set off on the final leg, and it wasn’t long until the unmistakable buttes of Monument Valley appeared before us, instantly recognizable from countless photographs.  This was the fulfillment of a bucket list item for me, and there truly is nothing like “being there.”  The movies and photos just don’t due justice to the grandeur and breathtaking vastness of this area.  Of course, one has to appreciate the clear desert air that allows the impossibly long vistas, resulting in unrealistically long travel times to reach a point that you can clearly see 70 or 80 miles ahead.

We pulled into Goulding’s campground in late afternoon, with the Mittens (famously named buttes) clearly visible from our spot in the red sandstone hills.  I don’t know how the Gouldings were able to assemble such an enterprise as they have here for tourists, but they are about the only game in town other than the Navajo tribal facility, which isn’t nearly as significant.  If you can think of an enterprise that would be used by tourists, there is a Goulding name on it:  Goulding’s Lodge, Goulding’s Restaurant, Goulding’s Campground, Goulding’s Tours, Goulding’s Grocery Store, Goulding’s Car Wash, even Goulding’s Airport.  This family simply has a gold mine here.


The famous formations around here are what’s left of vertical sandstone rock areas that have eroded more slowly than the softer sandstone shale areas around them.  This erosion has been taking place over tens of millions of years, and one day, they will finally be gone.  (Don’t worry, Bubba, it won’t be on our lifetime.)  These formations are said to constitute the most photographed landscape in the world.

Of all the photos I took, the two above are my personal favorites.

We had a nice steak dinner in Goulding’s Restaurant overlooking the valley, and afterward, a nice Fourth of July fireworks show.  

Goulding's Restaurant overlooks Monument Valley.

Only foodies take photos of their meals. (This was quite good, and we don't apologize for being foodies.)

Lucille just had to get into the act.  She's pretty fetching, don't you think?

View from Goulding RV Park at dawn

A view of our parking spot with Lucille and Homer in the foreground

I can’t help remembering the countless photos and movies I’ve seen with this area as the backdrop, and it’s hard to believe it’s taken me so long to see it for myself.  I am truly humbled with gratitude that God gave me life, eyesight and a perfect companion with whom I can behold what must be some of His best handiwork.

Train Ride to Silverton

If you are a railroad buff (or even if you’re not), taking the narrow-gauge rail trip between Durango and Silverton, Colorado is not to be missed.  It is one of the truly iconic train rides in the country, the railroad having been in business since 1882.  The ancient coal-fired steam engines are throwbacks to an era unknown to the last three generations or so of Americans, and the fact that these 1920s relics are still operating reliably is an engineering wonder.  Parts for these locomotives have been nonexistent for decades, so the Durango and Silverton Railroad rebuilds them or manufactures new ones themselves in their state-of-the art shops.

I had ridden the train in my childhood, so my memories of the trip were very hazy.  Sandy had never experienced it at all, so Bubba invited us to meet them in Durango and make the trip with them today.  He made reservations months ago, and if you intend to take this trip, you need to do the same.  Don’t bother to show up on the day of departure and expect to get a seat.


We were to meet at 8:00 a.m., to arrive at the station and get parked in time for the 9:00 a.m. train and, almost as amazing as the locomotives, Bubba and his group were on time! 


Sandy had been a little nervous about the trip, as she has some degree of acrophobia and feared the train would be negotiating hairpin curves overlooking deep chasms, a situation that would be very uncomfortable for her.  Unfortunately, I didn’t remember enough about my childhood ride to offer her much assurance that the route wouldn’t be a challenging in this way.  However, as the train made its way up the Animas River valley, it became clear that there would be no hairpin curves overlooking deep canyons, except for a short stretch near Rockwood that was relatively benign but simply too picturesque for her to be apprehensive.


The vast majority of the route followed the Animas River, a gorgeous clear stream cascading over millions of rocks and through calm eddies, as well, making its way south to Durango and beyond.  The water flow is substantial enough to offer a good ride to countless rafters and tubers, and such an adventure seemed really appealing due to the picturesque setting in the cool mountain air.

Typical scenery en route to Silverton
The train travels quite slowly, taking three and one-half hours to reach Silverton, a charming old mining town at 9,300 feet elevation, at which point a layover of a couple of hours was provided for lunch and sightseeing before returning to Durango. 

Main Street in Silverton
A popular option for riders is to omit the return trip in favor of a much faster bus ride.  We chose the bus for the leg back to Durango, and we’re glad we did.  The road trip was through gorgeous mountain scenery, and the driver, who gave an excellent touristy narrative, pointed out that the San Juan Skyway, a part of which is the route between Silverton and Durango, is one of the ten most scenic drives in America.  We would have to agree and vowed to return sometime to make the entire 126-mile trip.


Is this train trip one that I would do again?  Probably not.  Once you get past reliving the rich history of the railroad and the novelty of passenger travel on a steam train, the trip is really little more than spending three and a half hours looking at the Animas River at the bottom of picturesque, but not dissimilar, canyons.  I think one hour would have been enough.


After our return to Durango, we drove about ten miles north to Hermosa and visited Honeyville, a purveyor of honey, jams and jellies and other novelties since 1950.  We got quite a few samples before deciding on six jars of tasty, but rather expensive, honey butter and jellies.


We then came back to town and toured the Durango and Silverton Railroad’s museum (free with your trip ticket), housed in the old roundhouse, still in use by the company to perform maintenance on its rolling stock.  We enjoyed this interesting exhibit and then walked to a nearby Thai restaurant (named the Sizzling Pot, I think) for what turned out to be some really second rate food.  We won’t be going back to this one.


Returning to the RV park, we stopped by Bubba’s trailer and spent a couple of hours sitting outside chatting with the group.  We laughed a lot and finally broke up the merriment as the warmth of the day yielded to the growing coldness of the night mountain air.


It was a good day--a very good day--and tomorrow we will be leaving for Monument Valley.

Cool Colorado

It was a beastly drive to Durango from Clovis--some eleven hours to travel the 430 miles, including fairly long stops for fuel and lunch and another shorter stop to make a sandwich to eat while we drove.  Lucille’s computer showed 12.9 mpg, which I thought was quite respectable.  I’ve paid between $2.79 and $3.28 per gallon for diesel, usually around $3.08 in this area.


We hate driving such long distances but, we were behind schedule, and my days off are not yet unlimited, like you lucky retirees!  Grrrrr.  The journey was unremarkable, but Sandy’s knee was beginning to bother her due to the long sitting spells that deprived her of the movement she needs for optimizing the healing process. We shouldn’t have any more of these long driving days; I’m trying to keep the legs below 300 miles.


Bubba met us at Lightner Creek Campground in Durango around 10:00 p.m., and boy, was it dark—country dark!  We didn’t even attempt to unhook Homer from Lucille, because setting up in the dark is not only a struggle, but it’s noisy, and the other campers don’t appreciate all that racket so late in the evening.  We just hooked up electricity and water and went to bed, dog tired.  We would finish setting up in the morning.


We awoke to find ourselves in a very nice campground that followed the banks of Lightner Creek, a clear, gurgling stream that flows down a narrow mountain valley about five miles west of Durango.  The place is full this July 4th weekend, and we roamed around until we found Bubba and his crew. 

Bubba, LouAnn and Sandy in front of their trailer

We then went out on our own for a little shopping, during which we ate lunch at La Margarita, a fairly good Mexican restaurant, but certainly not up to Texas standards.  I’m not sure why we keep trying Mexican restaurants outside Texas; so far, it hasn’t yielded very good results; I guess it’s because hope springs eternal.  By the way, the worst Mexican restaurant we have ever patronized, and the one by which all other bad Mexican restaurants will be judged, is the one in London, England.  I can’t even remember the name now, as I have attempted to obliterate it from my memory.  Suffice it to say that it truly deserved to be dispatched to the dustbin of history by a talented arsonist.   Sandy enjoyed looking in all the shops in the bustling downtown area, she bought some very handsome earrings in the shape of a Suguaro cactus, which I thought appropriate, given the area in which we are traveling. 


Durango is a vibrant, busy town that is very clean and well-policed, appearing to be almost devoid of the kind of blight we saw in Clovis.  I’m not sure how they manage that, given today’s economy, but it reminded me of towns we have seen in Switzerland and Austria that appear to have no citizen underclass.  Amazing.  (Post-publishing note:     We found the, ah, more modest residential area some distance north of the city, in the Hermosa area.)


On tap for the evening’s entertainment was dinner and a show at the Bar D ranch, serving a barbecue dinner to about a thousand folks, who remained for music from a talented quartet singing mostly western songs including, to our delight, the iconic “Tumbling Tumbleweeds,” which I’m sure the group has done every night since 1969 when the place opened.    The dinner was forgettable, but the guys were superb instrumentalists and singers, and we enjoyed the show very much.  We got back to Homer quite late and slept well, enjoying a short rain shower peppering down on the roof. 

Bar D Ranch audience pavilion covered due to brief shower

Bar D Ranch singers and the Barker Family

 
Barry and Algene, Bubba’s mom and dad        Pavilion cover retracted after rain

Ain't Lovin' Clovis

We got a late start from Wichita Falls due to my failed attempts to get the new Pressure Pro tire monitor to work.  It never would initiate as the instructions describe, so I think I’ll have to send it back for a replacement.  The leg from Wichita Falls to Clovis was just 300 miles, but we were pretty tired when we got there and decided to stop for the night.  The next leg to Durango will be a fiendish 430 miles, so I’ll have to take some Geritol or something, I guess.


I really hate to disparage communities, because every town is someone’s home town.  But Clovis seems to go out of its way to invite criticism.  U. S. highway 84, the main east-west drag through town, has been allowed to deteriorate to the extent that it could possibly damage your suspension.  Pulling Homer through town gave the new Air Safe hitch a workout as the pin box gyrated around wildly on the air-suspended hitch head.  Even with this marvel of a shock-dampening hitch, we found a few things tossed around inside the trailer when we stopped for the night.  The city fathers should be flogged for allowing a main artery to get in this shape.  Even for the streets that had been resurfaced, the work was inferior.  The asphalt overlay had not been applied to cover the entire street, but only those portions that had deteriorated.  While this fixed the potholes, the uneven surface made for a terrible ride everywhere we went.  Except for the newer, more affluent north end of town, the area along U. S. 84 looked very bleak, impoverished and worn.  This was certainly one of the least appealing cityscapes that I can ever remember seeing in all our travels in the U. S.


Traveler’s World, the more desirable RV park, had no 50-amp site available, so we stayed at KC Campground, a pretty low-rent place with dusty and unkempt dirt and gravel (mostly dirt) sites and no shade anywhere.  It was priced pretty well at $24, and the proprietor was friendly.  After parking and exiting Lucille, we couldn’t help but notice in the breeze the unmistakable odor of the stockyards south of town.  After retreating into Homer, we elected not even to unhook, as there was not really any more of this place we cared to explore.  We made a very tasty Caesar salad with grilled chicken, watched a little TV and turned in fairly early.

Sunrise at Clovis

View from our window:

Rain Delay

Oddly enough, it has never rained before on a day we departed on an RV trip.  And perhaps never before had we been so fully prepared for an early departure yesterday, but it was all for naught.  It came a gully washer there in Fort Worth, and I wasn’t about to try to hook up and drive while that was going on.  There are enough crazies on the road as it is, and they get even crazier when the road is wet.


So, we didn’t launch until mid-afternoon, and that allowed us to get no farther than Wichita Falls before time to quit for the day.  This puts us way behind in our schedule, and we’re going to have a couple of long and grueling days getting to Durango.  RV travel during a defined period of time off from work is often frantic for us, and we can hardly wait for retirement so that it won’t matter if we take a delay for rain. 


Here are some photos of our departure from Homer’s little RV port beside our house near Fort Worth:
 
(In case you’re wondering, backing Homer into this RV port was a little challenging until I had done it a few times.  Nowadays, I rarely hit anything.)


About halfway to Wichita Falls, Sandy began chanting and meditating, zen-fashion, getting herself mentally prepared for the long trek across west Texas and New Mexico.  She is less than enthusiastic about traveling through desolate and featureless landscape, and there is plenty of that along our route.  Unfortunately, there is just no way of avoiding it if you’re going west or northwest through Texas.  I do love my state, but God was not particularly slavish to topographical appeal in some areas when He designed it.  One fable has it that God, when putting Texas together and beautifying it, became tired because of the hugeness of the state.  He decided to rest when he was about half-finished but never got around to completing west Texas.  Other Texas lore says that when God was creating west Texas, he tossed all the leftover rocks into Big Bend.  We would agree with that, but at least in Big Bend, you’ve got the rocks to look at.  In much of west Texas, you’ve got nothing to look at but, well, nothing.


We stayed at the Wichita Falls RV Park (wonder how long they agonized over what to name it?), an older park that was nice enough, with lots of trees and not very crowded.  It was very quiet, and the wi-fi was free and working pretty well.


Upon a recommendation from a local denizen, we tried McBride’s Land and Cattle Co. for dinner and found it to be a little above mediocre. 


After the obligatory stop at Wal-Mart, we returned to Homer, watched a little TV and turned in for the night.

A Trip is in the Works!

For the past several months, Bubba has lobbied for us to join him and his family in Colorado over the fourth of July holiday.  We finally gave in, not because we didn’t want to visit with them (they’re quite a hoot to be around), but because it is so disagreeably hot in July and August if you’re south of, say, Nome.


Sandy and I are hopelessly dependent on air conditioning during the summertime here in the hell simulator we call Texas.  When we built the new house, we demanded a higher capacity a/c unit than was recommended.  As a result, all the lights in the neighborhood go dim when we fire up that sucker.  (Not really, but it does keep the house frosty cool.)  We even added a separate a/c unit for the master suite, which we keep at 68 degrees while sleeping.  And no, our electric bills are quite low, thankfully, due to extreme overkill in insulating the place.  It’s actually more like a huge Styrofoam cooler than anything else.
 
Bubba, LouAnn and daughter BreAnn have a head start.  They departed a few days ago for the Grand Canyon, after which they will make their way back through southern Utah to Durango, where we’ll meet them on July 1.


We’ll leave Fort Worth next Tuesday and stay overnight at Lubbock and Santa Fe en route to Durango.  While there, we will ride the old steam train up to Silverton through some really gorgeous mountain scenery.  I made that trip when I was a kid, so I don’t remember much about it, and Sandy has never ridden the train.  I got a note from Ed Dray today, giving us some suggestions about where to sit on the train for the best view and a line on a good Mexican restaurant in Durango.  Wish he and Marilyn could be there with us, but schedules just didn’t match up this time.  We hope to see them in the fall when they head back to the RGV.

We’ll bid farewell to Bubba and family at Durango and continue into the southeast corner of Utah and Monument Valley.  This is a bucket list item for me, and we’ll be so close at Durango that I can’t pass up the chance to go there.  In this setting for so many western movies, we’ll be prepared for an Indian attack at any time in Monument Valley, but confident that John Wayne will ride to our rescue if we get in trouble!


After Monument Valley, we will turn south to Flagstaff, Holbrook, Show Low, and back into New Mexico, where we’ll go through Silver City, Las Cruces, Alamogordo and Roswell—all places we’ve never been--before re-entering Texas and making our way home.  We’re going to pray that Lucille’s air conditioner holds up in this sun-drenched part of the country, lest we have to call a wrecker to drag her to an air conditioner repair shop!  If any of you dear readers have suggestions for interesting places to visit on this route, we’d be delighted to hear from you.


In preparation for this trip, I’ve acquired a couple of new gadgets.  One is a Pressure Pro tire monitoring system, and the other is Microsoft Streets and Trips software.  The Pressure Pro will give me some peace of mind with Homer’s tires, which are hardly worn but have been on the trailer four years.  The conventional wisdom is to replace tires at five years, irrespective of the amount of wear they’ve seen, so this will probably be either the last summer for this trailer or the last for the tires.  I’ve begun to fiddle with Streets and Trips, and I like what I’ve seen so far.  However, I need to investigate extra databases I might acquire to show even more cool stuff while planning trips.
This weekend will bring about the final trip preparation and making arrangements for our mail pickup and house monitoring, things you full-timers don’t have to worry about any longer.  Grrrr.


We’ll keep you posted along the way, so TTFN!  (Ta-Ta For Now!)


346 days to retirement, if anyone is counting!

Lucille Gets Hitched!

Well, I have a new respect for bloggers who post every day; I don’t think I’ll be able to do that as long as I’m still working.  For me, it’s just so difficult to carve out enough free quiet time to construct a thoughtful piece that I think might be worthy for someone to read.  Sandy says I am way too obsessive about the writing process.  (I admit to a certain preoccupation in this area, as I may revise my copy a dozen times if I deem it to be imperfect in any way.)  I think she’s right; this is hardly the great American novel, after all, and I know I need to lighten up.  Old habits are hard to break, however, and it would be so painful for me to discover that I had split an infinitive or ended a sentence with a preposition and not caught it before publishing a post.

Last weekend went by much too quickly; Saturday involved a few minor projects and dinner at the Flying Fish, a favorite seafood joint in Fort Worth, to celebrate Sandy’s and my 34^th wedding anniversary.  Bubba, and old friend of many years, joined us, along with his daughter, BreAnn.  (I’ve written about Bubba and his family a number of times in earlier posts.)

The Flying Fish - A Ft. Worth Fave

BreAnn, Sandy and Bubba (and Lucille, of course)

Bubba approves of the new hitch.

This thing reminds me of a lunar lander or something!

Four air bags, two struts...Homer thinks he's riding on a cloud!

I was asked to be a front stage singer at church on Sunday, and that involved a sound and camera check at 7:00 a.m. and three services to follow, ending at 7:30 p.m.  It’s getting pretty exciting at First Baptist Dallas, as we are about to embark on a $120 million building program.  I’m told that’s the largest church-related building project in history.  (See a remarkable animation video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5_EifcV1eE)

Monday brought Lucille’s first experience pulling Homer since I acquired her a few weeks ago.  I must say, I was excited to see what the difference would be with the Dodge 3500 dually versus the old Hornet, a 2500 SRW.  Of even more interest was the function of the new Air Safe 25K hitch just installed by United RV Center.  I swallowed hard writing that check, but I was sold on the hitch after reading recommendations on several forums and after watching the convincing video on the Air Safe website.  http://www.airsafehitches.com/videos.html

Lucille proved very capable of her new assignment, purring happily along S.H. 121 to our house; the tow was a short one—about 10 miles—and the dual rear wheels seemed to add a good deal of stability under Homer’s 11,000 lb. load.  The star of the show, however, was the Air Safe hitch!  I set my rear view mirror to get a good view of the hitch and pin box, and I was utterly amazed at the oscillations of the pin shoe atop the Holland Binkley head floating on the air bag/strut assembly—oscillations that were absorbed entirely by the hitch’s air bags and not transferred to the truck chassis at all!  This should make for a far less fatiguing ride when towing, and I couldn’t be more impressed.

This marks the end of our progression from the original Reese hitch, with which we pulled Homer I and which nearly jarred our teeth out of our mouths, to a Pull-Rite Super Glide hitch and Fifth Airborne pin box used to pull Homer II (a really fine combination, by the way), to the current Air Safe hitch, an absolute marvel of engineering that, in my view, is probably unrivaled and worth every penny.  How much, you ask?  About four grand, installed.  (I told you I swallowed hard.)

The outfitting of Lucille is going nicely.  The Air Safe hitch was easily the most expensive of the upgrades so far.  I just finished installing shiny new step tubes underneath the pickup’s front doors, along with some mud flaps to protect Homer and other following vehicles; then I added extra gauges for EGT, turbo boost pressure and transmission temperature.  (A pilot can never have enough gauges.) Next will be a new satellite radio/GPS system, an exhaust brake and some engine intake/exhaust modifications.

Yes, I’m planning for Lucille to be with us for a long time, and I want her to have all the bells and whistles.  That’s the reason I bought this particular truck with its legendary Cummins engine.  The darned thing will probably outlast me if I treat her right!

Only 353 more days until we say goodbye to work and hit the road; the time is passing quickly, and there is much to be done!

Mason's First Birthday Party

The past week was pretty much a blur, as Sandy and I were preparing to play a support role for grandson Mason’s first birthday party on Saturday, June 5.  Mindy, his mom, has been nothing short of a dynamo in planning this thing, ordering all kinds of personalized party decorations from the internet, a custom-decorated cake, food, punch, party favors, balloons, streamers and the like, and all of it coming to my house!  Yes, our smallish new retirement home, kept lovingly in immaculate condition by Sandy and never remotely envisioned as a party barn, was to be invaded on Saturday afternoon by (gasp!) the Sweaty Masses.  It was not clear that it would ever look the same again.

I certainly didn’t mind helping host the party.  (It wouldn’t matter much if I did, as such things are normally decided at a higher levels of authority—namely, Mindy and her mother.)  It’s just that this house is not particularly well suited for entertaining a large group. 

I couldn’t help but marvel at the elaborate preparations Mindy had undertaken for this event.  Everything had to be just right, from the invitations to the color of the punch. 

I told Sandy that I hadn’t yet figured out why Mindy went to all the trouble when Mason, barely a year old, will have absolutely no recollection of any of these festivities. 

Sandy, never reluctant to explain all things unknowable to a man—which, in her view, is just about anything not classified as machinery—informed me that the party was not for Mason!  As I scratched my head, she put her hands on her hips and, with her nose angled upward, made that familiar sniffing sound that she usually reserves for people who have had their brains removed but still try to engage her in conversation.  


“It was for Min-dy,” she explained, drawing out the name as though she didn't expect me to understand words of more than one syllable.  


“She so loves that baby, and she’s ready to celebrate having raised Mason through a thriving first year while going to college and working part time—all without any meaningful sleep.” 

Finally figuring out the mysterious polysyllabic name of our daughter, I agreed that she had a point.   We are very proud of Mindy and the very positive spiritual and family growth that she and Tyler have experienced with little Mason over the past year, and we think she deserves whatever kind of celebration she wants.

All in all, it was a grand and happy occasion, and everyone seemed to have a good time.  Nothing else really matters, does it?

Proud Grandma (Mimi)

Proud Grandpa (Poppy) will teach Mason how to make the perfect salsa.

Great Aunt Brenda (Sandy's sister)

Good friends Marty and Cathy (well, Cathy anyway)