Free night at a winery…

I spent Sunday night camped at the Anasazi Fields Winery just north of Albuquerque.  It is in the little sleepy town of Placitas, NM.  The road into the winery is very narrow, but I made it.

Anasazi Winery is a member of the Harvest Hosts network of wineries, orchards, and farms throughout the country where you can stay free overnight.  They usually have a designated area for us RVer’s with no hookups but Anasazi offered to let me hookup up to electricity which I declined since I have solar panels.  All the places that I have stayed at have been extremely friendly.  They don’t require that you purchase anything from them, but I usually buy a bottle of wine to stock my wine cabinet.

Then I was greeted by Terry and told where I can park.  They had an overflow area that worked out good.  After getting settled in I went to the tasting room where there were others also wine tasting.

The Anasazi Winery does not use grapes in the making of their wine.  Instead they use fruits.  Normally I do not care for fruit wines, as they are very sweet.  However Terry explained that to his knowledge, the Anasazi Fields Winery is the only winery that makes their fruit wines dry.  I liked several of them.  The wine tasting was free and Terry explained each and every wine in detail.

Heading north…

My goal the next morning was to reach the Orilla Verde Recreation Area just 17 miles south of Taos, NM.  Jim and Gayle of had told me about it while I was Rockhound State Park.  They mentioned that there were a lot of hiking trails and beautiful scenery.

I stopped at the Pilar Campground and was greeted by the host Pat.  He was a real friendly guy and told me a lot about the area.  I found a nice electric/water site and signed up for three days.  The electric/water sites were only $7.50 (half price) with my Geezer card.

The campground is located in a big canyon next to the Rio Grande River.  The river is much larger then in the southern portion of the state because of all the snow runoff up here.

I had planned on doing some hiking while in this area, but the day after I arrived I came down with a very sore throat.  I rarely feel ill and this had me stumped.  My nose was constantly running and my throat felt horrible.  I was not in any mood to get out on a trail.  I will return to this area though as it is really nice.

One other thing that put a damper on my time here was the lack of cell phone and Internet services.  I could not even get anything with my booster.  What was weird was that my phone could send and receive messages intermittently.  For example I would get an email, but it could not download the content only the subject line.  I guess if I really had to get any type of important email I could tell the sender to write it all on the subject line.  HA!  Even that was very sporadic.

Here is a pic of the sunrise coming over the plateau.

Off to Taos

I am hoping I can find a reasonable campground closer to Taos so I can check out the town.  By the way, I have finally gotten over the sore throat although there was one night I could not sleep due to it.

Potty training Chica…

There are times when little Chica makes a mistake inside the rig.  I have tried everything including changing her feeding time.  I take her outside several times during the day for walks, which she really enjoys.  Sometimes she does her duties while walking and sometimes not.  I always take her out late before I go to bed hoping that will take care of it.  NOPE!!

I know this sounds gross but I sometimes wake up in the morning and she has had an accident.  She sleeps on the couch on her bed under a cover.  Then she will have an accident on the blanket at the other end of the couch.  I scold her but it does not make any difference.  It is really hard not to scold her very much as she has those sympathetic eyes.

Last night I left a small light on and she went potty on the mat I have put out for her in front of the toilet.  She is smart enough to know that is where she should go potty.  I think the problem is that she cannot see in the dark to get back on the couch.  She has to use the first rung of the ladder to jump onto the couch.  She is too small to jump up on the furniture, which is good.  But without using that first rung she can’t get back into her bed.  I don’t think she can see the step in the middle of the night so she just goes where it is convenient so she can go back to bed.  Leaving the light on allowed her to see therefore she was able to get down and go on the pad.

I am going to try leaving her bed on the floor and see if that works.  I don’t like to sleep with any lights on, but if it helps her I guess that is what I will have to get used to doing.  I am wondering if Chihuahuas have a large enough bladder to go the entire night without having to pee.  Does anyone else with a toy Chihuahua have a similar problem?