Petroglyphs and talent show

Posted on March 29, 2011 by Jim Melvin

A group of us traveled north of Deming, NM to visit a petroglyph site. We had to travel 11 miles down a wash-board gravel road to get to them. They are located above a spot where the Butterfield Stage Coach used to travel. It was a very interesting site with many petroglyphs. I created a short movie of our adventures to the site.

In the afternoon we all got together in the “chuck house” and were entertained my many of our LOW’s actors and actresses. It was very funny and everyone really enjoyed it.

Our first group sang the song “Make an Ugly Woman Your Wife”. It was hilarious!!

This is the wife. She was UGLY !!!!!!!

The the Blues Brothers made an appearance. They brought the house down.

I was also able to make a short video of their act.

Then Olga went into detail about her many problems to Carol.

They even had a demonstration of Will getting a mammogram from John. Very serious stuff.

It was a great day and a great rally. I really enjoyed myself. I got to catch up with some old friends I had met here last year and also got to meet some new friends as well. I hope I will run into some of them down the road in my travels. If not, I am sure I will catch up with them at next years rally. Meeting friends on the road is one of the most satisfying parts of being a fulltime RV’er.

Winery Tour

Posted on March 24, 2011 by Jim Melvin

I have been very busy with the Rally so I must apologize for not blogging. The rally is now over so I have no excuses.

A large group in our rally went on a tour of a local winery in Deming known as the St. Clair Winery. It was very interesting and I got to see all the different processes that go into making that wonderful bottle of wine that I so enjoy.

Be sure to click and then click again to enlarge all photos.

This man is pouring fermented wine into the kegs to be labeled and set aside for aging.

These are the containers used to ferment the wine.

The bottling line. The orange labels are for the mimosa, which is a combination of fresh orange juice and wine. I forgot to sample it but was told by others that it was very good. Great for brunches.

These are the kegs that contain wine for aging. They are usually left in these kegs for about 1-2 years before being bottled.

After the wine tour we all enjoyed the wine tasting as well. There was no charge and they also had really great salsa. After tasting many different wines I purchased a bottle of Cabernet and some salsa as well. Delicious!!

low’s (loners on wheels) rally – deming, nm

Posted on March 23, 2011 by Jim Melvin

From Rodeo, NM I drove Hwy 9 to Columbus, NM. This is a fairly lonely stretch of highway. Only one car passed me the entire 74 miles and most of the vehicles coming in the opposite direction were Border Patrol. I also saw Border Patrol stationed at my spots down the highway.

I stopped in Columbus, NM at the Columbus Historical Museum to visit with my old friend Jack who I had met last October. He was busy showing some people around the museum, but was able to talk for a while. The people he was showing around the museum were also going to be attending the same LOW’s (Loners On Wheels) Rally as myself so I chatted a bit with them as well. Jack will be busy working at the museum so will not be able to attend the rally. However, I do have plans to swing back to Columbus after the rally to catch up with Jack and chat about our adventures since we last saw each other.

After my short visit in Columbus I headed up Hwy 11 to Deming, NM to the Lo-High RV Ranch where the rally was being held. I decided to get here a day before the rally started in order to get set up in the boondocking area for only $3 per night. I will be here a week in order to attend the rally and also get my RV serviced.

The next day I signed up for the rally and attended the opening ceremonies. After that it was “Happy Hour” where we all introduced ourselves and told the group how long we had been in the LOW’s organization (I became a member in 2010). Some of the group had been members for 20 years.

Here is a pic of the “Happy Hour” and a raffle. The prizes were donated by area merchants and some of the were very nice. I won a free large pizza at Domingo’s Pizza. I will take advantage of that after the rally is over. The rally also furnishes breakfast and dinner every night. Not too shabby.

After the rally there was a workshop put on by Steer Safe who are located in Deming. The build a steering stabilizer for your rig to help keep it going down straight when driving in winds or when 18 wheelers pass you or when you have a blowout. It is definitely on my Wish List.

Later we all had dinner. I am in the group that handles tonight’s dinner and Sunday’s breakfast. We cooked bratwurst and chili and then had ice cream and toppings for dessert. Our club president brought out a bottle of Sander’s fudge topping for the ice cream. I introduced myself and she and I had a long conversation all about Detroit, MI where Sander’s was originally located. It brought back a lot of old memories. My sister Bev always orders a large bottle of Sander’s fudge topping for all of our family members at Xmas. I still have some in my rig. It is soooo gooood!!!

Next was our “mystery entertainment”, which was a local mariachi band from the Deming area. They played and sang a lot of music and it was great fun.

I also got a short video of the band.

Tomorrow is more rally activities including a tour of the St. Clair Winery which is local to Deming. It should be fun.

gypsy gathering rally

Posted on March 10, 2011 by Jim Melvin

I woke up on Monday to very high winds. The weather said winds blowing out of WSW at 25 mph. However there were gusts that exceeded 40 mph. Not the best weather to be traveling in. I do not like driving in high winds, but the Gypsy Gathering Rally would kick off at 3:00pm today. Normally I would never drive in wind, but because I needed to get to Yuma and also the fact I would be driving into the wind, I figured I would at least give it a try.

It was about 11 miles from the campground at Painted Rock to I-8 and figured if it was too bad I could always turn around and come back and stay another night. Driving to I-8 was a real bummer as the winds were blowing sideways. I came to a huge field that was blowing dust so bad I could only see a few feet in front of me. However, once I got onto I-8 it wasn’t too bad as I was then driving into the wind. My gas mileage probably took a beating though.

Anyway I got to Yuma, got parked and set up, in time for the opening festivities. I read Nick Russel’s blog and also subscribe to his Gypsy Journal, but have never attended any of his rallies. I am used to rallies on the smaller side, such as the Balloon Fiesta (28 rigs) and the Lazy Daze SW rally in Benson, which I recently attended (16 rigs). The Gypsy Gathering Rally had 175 rigs.

However, the two things I really enjoyed about this rally were the seminars and the vendors. There were five time slots for seminars each day with 4-5 seminars per time slot. You were always busy going from one seminar to another. There was a nice group of vendors and you could get personal with them as you saw them many times in seminars as well as on the vendor floor.

This is where I was parked for the entire rally. I was not hooked up to either electric or water. I filled my fresh water tank and dumped my grey and black water tanks prior to arriving at the park. My solar panels supplied me with more then enough electricity.

Be sure to click and then click again to enlarge all photos.

The rally took place at the Yuma County Fairgrounds. They had to fit in rigs wherever they could find room.

Here is Terry (Nick’s wife) serving pizza to the hordes. They had 130 pizzas delivered to the fairground.

Here are the people lined up for the pizza. It was really good.

This is Nick making announcements. At the beginning of the rally he introduced all of the vendors and they were able to say a few words about their products.

The Yuma County Fairgrounds is located directly across the highway from the Yuma Marine Corps Air Base. Every day there would be jets flying low over the fairgrounds. As Nick said, “It is the sound of freedom”.

I really enjoyed the rally. I met a lot of really neat people and attended a lot of really informative seminars. I learned everything from many uses of Velcro, all the neat Apps I can use with my Android Smartphone, remodeling my RV, to many places I can camp overnight for free, to traveling south of the border. I also enrolled in the Moose Lodge and the Elks Lodge. This will give me the opportunity to stay at any of the Elks or Moose Lodges on the road and enjoy their cooking and hospitality as well as their inexpensive camping rates.

Quartzsite Lazy Daze Rally

Posted on January 18, 2011 by Jim Melvin

We caught up with many of our Lazy Daze friends at La Posa West Campground. It is an LTVA (Long Term Visitors Area) which is on BLM land. It costs $40 for 14 days which can be renewed. We were camped about 1/2 mile from the Big Tent and the town of Quartzsite. I met up with several people I had met at the Balloon Fiesta back in Oct 2010. They were:

Rodger

Jerry

Annie and Rick

Frank and Cookie

Jim and Gayle

I also met up with Ed and Carol who I met in Crater Lake, OR on the way up to have my solar panels installed.

Then there were some new folks I just met and they were:

Jerry and Anne – Met at Death Valley

David and Mary

Jack and Jeannette

Beverly

It was a wonderful time. We had hors d’oeuvres every night and always a great campfire.

Be sure to click and then click again to enlarge all photos.

Here are a couple of pics of our campsite.

This is the big tent which was filled with many vendors ready to do business with the hordes of people. We all walked down to the Big Tent the day it opened and it was so crowded you could hardly move. Later in the week it was much better.

Frank is preparing his Manly Man breakfast in his dutch oven with Rodger looking on and of course Buddy checking me out. Frank also made an apple fritter as well and one night I bought ice cream to have with it. Too delicious!!

Frank and Cookie have been coming to Quartzsite for many years and know the town quite well. They gave Rodger and I the grand tour of the entire town. First stop was the RV Proctologist. That really sounds like a wonderful job.

Then we went to the Quartzsite graveyard where they have a monument to Hi Jolly (Haiji Ali was his real name). In 1857 he was brought over to the AZ desert to experiment with camels as a means of transportation. The experiment failed but he was eventually honored with this monument.

This is the naked bookstore guy. His real name is Paul Winer and he is the proprietor of the Desert Oasis Bookstore. He wears a sock like thing to cover himself up in the front. He is quite a personality around Quartzsite.

Frank talked him into playing some music on his piano inside the bookstore. Everyone gathered around and watched him play. As you can tell I had a back row standing room only. HA!!

I also was able to make a video of him. In order to hear it completely through without interruption click on the play arrow first then click on the pause arrow. Once it has completely loaded then click on the play arrow.

Here we are beginning to gather around the evening campfire. One evening Frank got out his guitar and we all sang to his music. It was really fun.

On the 31st just about everyone departed and went their separate ways. Some of us will be getting together again at the Balloon Fiesta this October. I really had a great time with all my Lazy Daze friends and a few non – Lazy Daze folks as well.

Chapter 37 Rally – Quartzsite, AZ

Posted on January 15, 2011 by Jim Melvin

Roger and I drove down from Parker to Quartzsite. We weren’t exactly sure where there was an Escapees group. Once in Quartzsite we checked with a camp host who mentioned there was a group camped out at mile marker 99. That is about 5 miles out of town and in a free BLM area. We drove out there and sure enough found the Chapter 37 rally. Escapees are the most friendly people you will find anywhere. We asked if we could join up with their rally and for $25 ($15 for the cost of the rally and $10 for the cost of food which included 3 meals) we joined up with the group.

Be sure to click and then click again to enlarge all photos.

This is a pic of the food lines. One table is for the main dishes and the other for the deserts. Lots of delicious food.

The rigs were parked in opposite directions since our solar panels were on opposite sides. They were tilted to take full advantage of the winter sun.

Each night we had a campfire and watched the sunset and each night was just as beautiful as this one.

One day we drove into the Tyson Wells section of Quartzsite to check out all the vendors. They had everything from A to Z. Anything you could possibly think of that goes with an RV. They even had an “Adult Day Care” which I showed in this next pic.

The rally even had a triathlon. I signed up for it and had a ball. This pic shows one of the guys in our group trying to blow a tooth pick threw a straw and into a bowl from about 15′. Not an easy task. Our group came in 2nd and we won a bunch of candy.

While on a hike I heard some very loud music in one of the campsites farther down from us. Being curious I decided to check it out. It was a huge family that comes from all parts of the US and meets up every year at this campsite and spends a week together. How neat! They had a 6 piece band with all their electronic instruments and were playing and singing away. They asked me to sit down and I joined them for a while all the time enjoying their music and conversation.

After 6 days with Chapter 37 we moved on down the road to meet up with our Lazy Daze friends. It was really a fun rally. Thanks everyone in Chapter 37 for allowing us to join you.

chapter 21 Rally – parker, AZ

Posted on January 7, 2011 by Jim Melvin

Chapter 21 is the Escapees group from Saguaro, AZ I had met last October. This was their annual winter rally. It took place at the La Paz County Park in Parker, AZ. They had lots of activities and food planned for the 5 days we were to be there.

This is where I was parked for the 5 days. The Colorado River was only a few hundred yards away. Unfortunately it was way too cold to go into the water. Even boats were not running.

Be sure to click and then click again to enlarge all photos.

The highlight of the rally was a trip to the Desert Bar in the Buckskin Mountains. It was a 4 mile trip over a washboard gravel road to get to it. There was no electricity so everything was run off of solar panels. This is the road just as we were approaching the Desert Bar.

The Desert Bar was owned by an old hippie that wanted to get off the grid. He built a home in this area and then decided to build the bar. It was a very unique place.

This is the food menu. Notice the “No Cheese Ever” part. They said it was because of the fact they didn’t have electricity. However they did manage to have hamburgers and hot dogs in their refrigerator and also and endless supply of beer.

The hippie owner also built a church where many people get married. What a trip!

Chapter 21 also had great potlucks every night. One night was a “Burn Your Own” night. I donated my grill to help the cause and we all had a great time. This is Lonnie as head chef.

I had a wonderful time with my friends from Chapter 21 and even met some new friends as well. I am looking forward to seeing them all at future rallies.