LoriBarb

We are at the end of our journey for this season. Leaving tomorrow and heading home. Tracking weather has been a bit of a challenge, but Barb is doing a great job keeping us on track.

Temperature, wind, rain, ice, snow, all play a factor in when we leave and when we stop as we move north.

These past months have been fabulous having the ability to stay in one spot for lengthy periods of time. While we didn’t hit as many states this time around, we did enjoy everything we did. Sunny/warm weather, tons of exercise and lots of friends.

To end this part of our journey we decided have a night on the town. We started with the Virgin Hotel, then the Patterson House, then to a fabulous restaurant called The Catbird Seat. The Virgin Hotel was our first stop to have a glass of Prosecco. We met a lovely women in the bar and had a great conversation while we waited to move onto the Patterson House. The hotel lobby and bar was artfully decorated and it was a great first stop to the evening.

Next we walked towards the restaurant. We were early but we knew that there was a bar that we could go to before our allotted dinner reservation. The Patterson House is in an old home, which also houses the Catbird Seat. The cocktail lounge was the first in Nashville and the ambiance was elegant and dark. I continued with Prosecco and Barb tried a Best Foot Forward which consisted of Libra spirits, 1643 Alpine Gin, Byrrh Grand Quinquina, Luxardo Bitter Bianca, and Mint.

Now onto the Catbird Seat. This is a small intimate restaurant seating 18 people at a time around a chef’s horseshoe table. No upfront menu but a 15 course dinner which was fabulous. Here are some pics.

It was great to watch the prep of the food as each course was being prepared for us. It was truly a culinary experience from start to finish.

Nashville we love and we know we will be coming back at some point again. If you ever get a chance to visit, don’t hesitate, just GO!

On average 3 days travel to get through Texas. Lots of highway driving with the speed limit of 75-80 miles an hour. WAY too fast for us. We average 105 at best, depending on wind/rain.

We see a lot of interesting things on the road. Have you ever seen arms of a wind turbine traveling down the highway? Well we have, and they are HUGE! We also, unfortunately, see accidents which is not surprising given the speed at which people travel. And lineups?? When it comes to the inspection stations, manned by the border patrol, the lineups of trucks can be overwhelming.

The craziest drive this time was Dallas/Fort Worth. The highway system is immense and traffic can be heavy. The one great thing though is the highway numbers painted on the road lanes. Very easy to follow, but it was great to see the Tennessee border sign and the Bass Pro Shop pyramid. A little trivia for you, there are aprox. 36 Base Pro Drive/Lanes (streets) across the U.S and only about 3 in Canada.

You never know what you are going to get when you enter a small town. We were pleasantly surprised at our surroundings when we went for a walk. For the little town of Pecos, which has under 13,000 people living in it, there was an incredible community centre with outdoor facilities which included a football/soccer field, batting cages and a baseball diamond. Indoor there was an amazing gym, huge pool and squash court.

There was also a little plaza with a plan and dedication to those who lost their lives in the wars the U.S participated in.

Pecos is well known for delicious cantaloupes and its connection to the rebound character Pecos Bill. It is also widely recognized as the home of the world’s first rodeo which was July 4th, 1883.

We love KOAs in the U.S. The one we stayed in Las Cruces was small and on a bit of a hill so we had a view of the surrounding mountains. While there wasn’t much to do in the KOA itself, we had the opportunity to go into the town of Mesilla. Here are a couple of pics of the KOA.

The town of Mesilla is one of the oldest and most visited communities in southern New Mexico. It has been named one of the top 10 small towns in the U.S to visit. We liked the fact that there were numerous stores, boutiques, galleries and award winning restaurants and cafes all within walking distance from one another.

The plaza, which is the heart of the downtown core, has been witnessed to many historical events. The signing of the Gadsden Purchase which transferred the town of Mesilla from Mexico to the U.S in 1854 was one of them. The other was in 1881 Billy the Kid was tried in the old courthouse on the southeast corner of the plaza, which is now a store. Billy the Kid was sentenced to hang for the murder of Sheriff Brady.

In 1881 the railroad also wanted to go through Mesilla, but Mesilla didn’t want the Iron Horse to go through their town. So the railroad went through Las Cruses which exploded its growth while Mesilla remained a small village.

We had our favourite two stores, one was a kitchen store and the other a jewelry store. The kitchen store was extremely high end and was more larger serving accessories vs gadgets. Charcuterie boards, wine racks, serving bowls/plates etc. all made of wood and metal. Lucky us, they were having a major sale!

Here are some pics of the plaza as well as the restaurant we ate at. The restaurant was unusual with birds and piranha fish. It also housed a high end jewelry store which we perused while waiting for our table. Clever really, and there were some beautiful pieces on display. If only we had won the power ball…….

We decided to take a little tour into Mesa for the day, in an area called Agritopia. In 1927 Agritopia was a homestead where which 90 years later morphed into a thriving village centred around an urban farm. Imagine a world where you know your neighbours and they know you. Imagine a barrier-free lifestyle, where low fences encourage small talk, porches welcome lounging, parks promote playtime, and shady sidewalks connect your home to schools, gardens, restaurants, and shops. A slower pace. A shared life. A connected existence. This was the dream of the Johnson family who bought the original homestead in 1960 to raise their family, and has now spearheaded the growth and development of this little area of Agritopia.

Barb and I toured the shops and restaurants around the farm area. We were happy to purchase a few items and happened to stumble upon a place called Undertow. We thought it was a cool store……..we were wrong. It was a VERY cool bar. You had to book your seat and you only had 90 minutes to visit. Well a bar with a timeline?! We had to go!

First off you walk down a short hallway which is all ship themed. As you walk down and turn the corner it is getting darker. Once we walked through the small passage to the bar, we couldn’t see a thing! Our eyes adjusted but yikes it took a bit. We sat at a small table by a porthole window that showed we were on the rolling seas. The bar is small, but very cool interior. The drink menu is extensive (and not a cheap date) and there are NO SUBSTITUTIONS to any of their cocktails. The service is fast, and the ambiance is effective. On the hour a thunderstorm rolls in and you can see the rolling seas pick up through the portholes and the rain streaming down on the walls and wooden barrels that adorn the back of the bar. The thunder is loud and scared the crap out of us when it first started (we were NOT expecting a show) as we were not prepared for what was about to happen.

Here are some photos of the place. Glad we went!

After this little experience we decided to go for dinner next door to a fusion restaurant called BELLY The Kitchen. We ordered crispy pork spring rolls, which were so good, we ordered them again. We then ordered orange chicken and rice, which was OK.

What was so good about the spring rolls? They came with lettuce wraps. A little thing to add to a very popular dish, and one that made it stand out more than any other crispy spring roll we have ever had.

Well that is going to be about it for Arizona as we will be heading out towards Texas soon. Sad faces as we start moving our way East to then head North back into Canada by the end of the month. Another season under our belt!

We haven’t posted in a long while. I guess this is what happens when you are in one place for a month and are too busy to think about taking pictures and adding them to the blog.

We spent a great month in Indio, just outside of Palm Springs. We had a great time swimming, playing pickleball, hiking, biking, and going to “happy hours” with friends.

Our time came to a very sad close at the end of Feb when we moved on to Arizona, which is now on our way home for the season. Here are some pics from our stay.

K & S were so kind to lend us their car whenever we needed to do groceries, so we took them out to dinner (with their car) on one of our last nights to say thank you!

After dinner K treated us to some very “cool” ice cream. It was made in front of us and they used liquid nitrogen to turn the cream into ice cream before our eyes. It was amazing!! What an experience

We are going to miss this location, and our friends. Maybe next year………

Two distinct desert ecosystems, the Mojave and the Colorado, come together in Joshua Tree National Park. A fascinating variety of plants and animals make their homes in a land sculpted by strong winds and occasional torrents of rain. While temperatures can fluctuate depending on the season, the winter highs are usually around 15 C, and near or below freezing at night. It occasionally snows at higher elevations………did you catch that we said occasionally it snows???

Did you know the Joshua Tree is not actually a tree? Botanists call it Yucca brevifolia, a member of the asparagus family. It is also a succulent. Morman settlers in southern Utah nicknamed it “the Joshua” supposedly because the striking, human-like form was reminiscent of the biblical Joshua reaching up to the sky.

Joshua trees are most commonly found in the Mojave desert. Joshua trees need to undergo a dormant period of cold weather before flowering, but once they flower, they are dependent on one tiny insect for pollination. Yucca moths transfer pollen between flowers to ensure seeds will form. Then they lay their eggs within the pollinated flower. When the larvae hatch, they feed on some of the seeds, the rest disperse and grow into more Joshua Trees.

Because Joshua Trees require a cold period to flower, they are vulnerable to climate change. The U.S Fish and Wildlife service is currently reviewing the Joshua Tree for listing under the endangered species act.

Joshua Tree was designated a National Monument in 1936 by President Franklin D Rosevelt and accorded National Park status in 1994. Human history stretches back well over 10,000 years. The first group known to inhabit the area was the pinto culture, followed by American Indians, including the Serrano, the Chemehuevi, and the Cahuilla. In 1800’s there was mining and cattle driving. In the 1900’s homesteaders began filing claims. Everyone left a footprint here and if it wasn’t for Minerva Hoyt, who knows what this place would be like. Minerva Hoyt became a staunch backer of the protection of desert landscapes. Because of her wealth and status she was able to convince authorities that a National Park was the best way to preserve deserts. It was Minerva Hoyt who got the park its National Monument status.

In Joshua Tree park the topography is outstanding and ever changing. The rock formations are very interesting and the oldest rocks here are 1.4 – 1.7 billion years old. The rocks were formed over 200 million years ago by two tectonic plates. The North American plate collided with the Farallon Plate, that sat under the Pacific Ocean. The denser Farallon Plate was forced under the North American plate, a geological process called subduction. The jumbles of rock piled about Joshua Tree got their start underground via volcanic machinations. It was the upward pumping of monzogranite, a particular form of molten rock, that eventually gave birth to the landscape that we see today. The pictures below really don’t do the landscape justice.

In the Colorado desert, the landscape was quite different and had smaller plants, teddy bear cholla, that were beautiful in the sunshine and there were fields of them!

Let’s get back to the cold and snow shall we? Here are some pics. Just so you know we weren’t lying. In fact at the top of the mountain we saw a guy carrying old wooden snowshoes out to the trails.

We had the opportunity to take a nice 8 KM, 2 hour hike in the Badlands with our friend KK and his dog Midge. We hiked to the top of one of the mountains and had a great view of the Valley.

East Indio Badlands trail opened in 2020 to the public. It offers a spectacular loop through a classic Badland topography, formed by thousands of years of erosion and San Andreas Fault. We hiked through slot canyons, through the shadows of tectonic uptilts, and along a prominent ridge with 360 views from the Salton Sea to San Gorgonio mountain.

Badlands means a baron area in which soft rock strata are eroded into varied fantastic forms. There you go a bit of trivia for you all!

Stop at the Fountain of Youth Spa and RV resort of course!

We travelled in the rain all day from Quartzsite. If you were watching the news around Jan 22 you would have seen a lot of flooding etc. in the California area. As we were heading closer to the Spa, the roads did get a “little” dicey having a lot of dips to allow runoff into the Salton Sea, which is really a lake, and deserves its own paragraph (which is below).

Here are some pics of the ride in, was a tad dicey as the flooding in the Valley was concerning in some areas. But we made it through.

Now some info. On the Salton Sea. The Salton Sea, which is not a sea at all. The Sea is a shallow, landlocked, highly saline body of water at the southern end of the state of California. It lies on the San Andreas Fault. Over millions of years, the Colorado River had flowed in this Valley and deposited alluvium (soil) creating fertile farmland, building up the terrain, and constantly moving its main course. For thousands of years, the river alternately flowed into the valley or diverted around it, creating a salt lake. The Salton Sea was formed from this inflow of water from the Colorado River in 1905. This lake is 24 km wide and 56 km long and has a surface area of 824 km. In the 50’s and 60’s the area became a resort destination, and communities grew with hotels and vacation homes. In the 70’s, scientists issued warnings that the lake would continue to shrink and become more inhospitable to wildlife. In the 80’s, contamination from farm runoff promoted the outbreak and spread of wildlife diseases. Massive die-offs of the avian populations have occurred, especially after the loss of several species of fish on which they depend. Salinity rose so high that large fish kills occurred, often blighting the beaches of the sea with their carcasses. Tourism was drastically reduced. After 1999, the lake began to shrink and the lake bed became exposed, which sent clouds of toxic dust into nearby communities. In 2018, local agencies declared an emergency and , along with the state, funded and developed the Salton Sea Management Program. In 2020, Palm Springs Life magazine summarized the ecological situation as “Salton Sea derives its fame as the biggest environmental disaster in California history”. Back in the day all the Hollywood stars came to this location, now….its a bit of a ghost town.

The Fountain of Youth Spa has been here since 1966. The pools and hot tubs are all naturally heated with 133 degrees of mineral water. They are then cooled down depending on the pool and hot tub. There is one hot tub called the Lobster pot which is heated to around 106, although one day people said it was too hot for anyone to go in. The pools are glorious and sit at around 85-90 degrees. FABULOUS! Some pics of the place.

There is no shortage of things to do here. Yesterday we were out from 9am to 6pm enjoying the amenities, including biking around the mountains.

One thing we also did yesterday is shop at the Veggie Guy market. A truck comes into the park and sells almost everything you would want. We came out feeling like we could be really healthy while we were here! We have to say you really don’t need a car for grocery shopping as there was a restaurant on site as well with good food.

We made some friends at Fountain of Youth Spa (FOY as the locals call it). K&E from Washington were parked right beside us. Very friendly and on day 2 took us into Bombay Beach for lunch at a local pub. Now remember, Bombay Beach was hopping in the 50’s and 60’s, but is really a very depressed little village now. We weren’t sure what to think, but we really wanted to see the Salton Sea and the surrounding area. The State is really trying to clean up the Sea and they are using hay bails to create a compost to allow for fertile soil. Not sure how this is going to work, but we’ll see. We were shocked at the state of the little town/village. In fact some places looked uninhabitable. There were interesting art works everywhere though, in peoples yards and on the beach. The most surprising though, was the pub we went to eat at. Outside looked VERY tired and worn down, then you open the door and “WOW” nothing we were expecting. The food was also VERY good, a welcome surprise.

We landed at a KOA resort in Tucson Arizona, which turned out to be quite fabulous in that it had heated pools, hot tubs, pickle ball and enough streets that we could bike. The best part though was the fruit trees on the property which were all ripe and open for picking.

Orange, grapefruit (including ruby red), lemons and Meyer lemons were all over the place. So off we went picking!! We have to say the lemons are outstanding as well as the grapefruit which we can’t get enough of. We juiced over 30 grapefruits and collected another 30+ to take with us. We also froze over a dozen lemons for future use.

We also met some fabulous ladies from New Foundland. K & J were as friendly as one would expect from our east coast neighbours. We had the opportunity to have a little happy hour with them before heading out to an authentic Mexican restaurant. Now, before you think authentic, really? I will put your mind at ease, this was as authentic as you can get. When walking in we immediately met the 98 year old lady who opened this restaurant MANY years ago and it is now being run by her son and grandson, even though she is there overseeing things. She was AMAZING, having been married 3 times the last husband, who we met, was a native Indian and you can see some of the Indian flare in the menu, like the Mexican Taco (which was delish!)

We had great fun with margaritas, food and lots of laughter. We hope one day we will meet up with K & J again, either down south somewhere or in New Foundland. One never knows.

Some pics of the 4 of us as well as the two of us with the owner.