March in the desert

March found us traveling from the Little San Domingo Wash by Wickenburg to Quartzsite, and then back to Stanton, north of Wickenburg. Our new friends, Bob and Blanche, are from Oregon and were camped by us at Stanton then Wickenburg. Bob is very lucky as he suffered lung blood clots when they arrived at Wickenburg, but because they were close to the hospital in Sun City he was able to get immediate treatment and is doing well now. The metal detector club in Quartzsite had a coin shoot while we were there. We all stood around a football field and started looking for 8,100 coins at the sound of the horn. Ron and I won a gold nugget and found about 100 coins between the two of us. What a hoot! Bob and Blanche had fun, too, as Bob found more coins than all of us and also won a big nugget! The next day we went to Yuma to shop and stopped over to Algodones, Mexico – thought you might enjoy seeing the prices of meds there. Of course, flowers were blooming in Quartzsite, too – here are a few pictures of them. Back here at Rich Hill by Stanton there are different flowers blooming than in either San Domingo Wash or Quartzsite. Ron found a horned toad while metal detecting. And of course, I had to take a picture of cat claw – this stuff is almost as wicked as jumping cholla, the thorns are razor sharp and curved; Ron says it feels like putting your hand into a basket of newborn kittens who are all stirred up and yowling. He certainly has the scars to show for it!

Little San Domingo Wash

Southeast of Wickenburg is a gold district named San Domingo. We have been camped in the desert by the wash, watching spring arrive. Everywhere you look, there are Mexican poppies – Ron took my picture as I sat in them! The Gila Monster slowly waddled his way through the wash, allowing me to follow him with the camera. His little scales look like smooth beads. Although he is poisonous, he is SLOW and only if I stuck my hand in his mouth would he be able to get me. The other night a wild burro stood outside the camper and brayed, ruining my beauty sleep (and scaring me to death!) They must have really impressed the desert dwellers, because someone made a silhouette of a burro out of sheet metal and stuck it on a high hill. I decided to hike up to it to investigate – it had lots of graffiti dated back to 1975 and plenty of shotgun holes. Actually, it rather looks like a moose to me. Our camper is in the background. Here are a few more flower pictures. I looked up their names – the white one is desert chicory, blue one is a desert lupine, the yellow is called fiddleneck, the red is owl clover, and the pink is fairy duster. Yesterday I climbed up to a mine area which was just covered with poppies and purple flowers – here is a picture from the top. I could see to Wickenburg, a dust devil on the plains far to the west, and even 50 miles to Phoenix skyscrapers. An amazing place!

Spring

Spring is about here! After many weeks of coat and raincoat weather, we are finally seeing the warmer temps and the sun! The grass is growing tall in the desert and new flowers are popping out every day! Of course, I have to include their pictures. I looked through my flower book tonight but can only identify the poppies, manzanita bush and ocotillo bloom. Also, we’ve been exploring old mines, bumming around the desert on the quad or in the pickup. Lots of history resides here; we have met some fellow travelers who are only too happy to tell us stories about what we are seeing. There seems to be two or three waves of miners – in the late 1800’s, in the 1930’s, then the more sophisticated mines of the 1950’s and 60’s, which is the pictures I included here. We were at Stanton, a ghost town north of Wickenburg, during the eclipse of the moon. It was a very dramatic event – after this sunset, a huge thunderstorm moved in. Lightning was flashing across the sky, thunder was growling closer and the wind was blowing fiercely. The stars were shining brightly around the cloud and the moon was blood-red, although the top of the cloud was glowing with moonlight. Then the cloud took over, it hailed and rained, and in the morning the mountains around us had snow on their peaks! Unforgettable.

Projects

I thought I’d put a blog on about the projects I work on while traveling. Of course, quilting is important to me. Here is a picture of the table runner, placemat and napkins that I made for Kelly and Matt’s wedding. But I have also taken a few classes while we were in Quartzsite. One class was a beaded bracelet designed by the teacher – I liked it so well I made a couple, and sent one to my niece in Niger, to remind her of America! I also attempted to take a watercolor class, which happened to be a Valentine’s card which I gave to Ron. The teacher thought I knew about watercoloring, so she kept saying “Don’t do that!” and “that’s not right!” so now I’m a bit paranoid about my skills. However, I thought it turned out okay, at least you can tell it’s a flower. But my sorry work had a long ways to go before it looked like the others in the class – oh well. I’ve been learning to knit socks. I bought the yarn while I was in Sheridan, WY this fall. I am learning about gauge and what size needles produce what size stitch, and how to adjust the pattern accordingly. I misplaced a needle in the camper (it’s not that big, I can’t imagine where it went!) so ended up driving an hour to Prescott to the specialty yarn shop. Between that and the weaving shop, I felt like I was in candyland! But I didn’t buy anything except a book and needles.

Wickenburg town

Wickenburg is a town about 1 hour northwest of Phoenix. When we arrived it was wet from recent rains and cold, most days around 40-50 degrees (I know, you in the northern states may sniff but when you're living in a camper that's cold!) So here is the beautiful desert greening up from recent rains.

The jumping cholla (pronounced choiya) truly jumps at you and embeds deep into rubber shoe soles. I spend a lot of time tweezing out 1 inch stickers.

The Vulture Mine was one of Arizona's biggest lode gold mines. We checked it out, here is the gatehouse with artsy designs cut into the gas cylinders.

Tours underground have been cancelled because of new ownership, we were disappointed to learn. So we've been prospecting at some of our club claims just outside of the mine. Here is Ron in action.

One day I hiked to the top of Vulture Peak, you can see the notch between the two high peaks that I hiked up to.

Spring is coming - I found new flowers blooming. Also I've included a few shots of the local scenery and the gorgeous sunset last night!

Kelly's Wedding Dance Video

I am so happy this actually worked (I think). I have been trying to figure out how to post a video to this blog site for a few weeks now. The camera took the video in a different format than what could be uploaded to the internet, so it took awhile for me to figure out how to reformat it. Anyhow, here it is, for those of you with faster internet than dialup. Click it and see!

Lake Havasu City

Okay, so now we have moved from Quartzsite to Wickenburg, AZ. It is about 1 hour northwest of Phoenix. The weather has not been very warm (in the 50s) but neither has your weather, wherever you are, unless you're in Hawaii! :)

Before we left Quartzsite we visited Lake Havasu City with our friends Margie and Bill. This city bought the London Bridge from London in the 1970s which is a tourist destination now. It is located on the beautiful Lake Havasu, created by the Parker Dam on the Colorado River. Margie had a kayak and she and I took turns kayaking around the bridge - what a hoot!

A fantastic sunset highlighted all the quartz rocks around our campsite the night before we left the area, sort of a good-bye sendoff to our next adventure in Wickenburg!