​We bid farewell to Mesa and our fellow workampers at Val Vista Villages and headed north to Cave Creek Regional Park.  

​Cave Creek is another one of the Maricopa County parks, such as Usery Mountain where we went hiking last week.  This is another gem out in the desert and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.  The campground is spread out enough that even though you don’t have a lot of trees and shrubs separating the sites, you feel like you have enough of your own space to enjoy the beautiful views.  The sites are paved with curbing and have electric and water.  There are some additional sites that were put in later, that are only gravel, electric and water and those sites are right next to each other.  Thankfully we had a nice spacious site and were able to enjoy the beautiful views of the hills, mountains and desert.

The Cave Creek area is really a cool area with lots of ranches, cowboys and bull riding.  At the recommendation of my cousin, we set out Wed night to Buffalo Chip Saloon, which is a Packer bar in the area, to enjoy dinner and watch the bull riding they have out back off the patio area.  Well damn if we didn’t get there two hours before the bull riding and the place was soo packed, people were parking waaayyy down the road.  There was no way we were getting near that place.  We went down the road to another great place, The Horny Toad, and had some delicious BBQ while watching the Milwaukee Bucks game at our table on my cell phone.  We didn’t feel like we were disrupting the place, but more so, adding to the ambiance since the big table next to us was playing a heated game of Uno.  
We were able to visit Buffalo Chip Saloon the next day after the dust settled, and had a delicious lunch.  Even their cheese curds were up to WI standards!  Great saloon with boots hanging from the ceiling, wide open walls of "windows" and out back they had a small arena for bull riding and a huge patio.  Lots of WI artifacts and a Packer tribute corner.  We even left them with a couple of our WI license plates to adorn the wall.

​We went out for a couple hikes while at Cave Creek and enjoyed the somewhat cooler mornings to explore the beautiful area.  One trail brought us to an old clay mine, in which the entrepreneurial woman who mined the clay, bottled it as a healing elixir, said to cure many things.  The one thing it really did help with was dysentery.  The mine is now gated off but it was really interesting to read the history.

​Out on all of our hikes we were hoping to see more of the animals in the area, such as burros, wild horses and even rattlesnakes.  Unfortunately, we came up with a big goose egg, unless we can count the rattlesnake and tortoise at the nature center!!

Our final outing while in the area was to McCormick Stillman Railroad Park in Scottsdale.  What a hidden gem in the area!  It has received national park awards and we can see why.  People of all ages will find something of interest here, but if you are a train fanatic, like Rick, it is train heaven!  They have a large building that houses several model train setups that clubs run and they are something to see.  They have all different gauges of track, Lionel and HO trains and even tiny little ones!  This building was free and there were several areas that were interactive, where you could make trains move, a UFO to take off and many other cool little actions.

​For just a $2 ticket, you can ride on the beautiful carousel, tour the museum and Pullman presidential cars or take a train ride around the park.  They also have the AZ Merci train car that was a gift from the people of France after WWII.  They have lots of shaded picnic areas and snacks as well.  A wonderful place to spend the day.  We rode on the train and went through the museum.  Amazing to see the presidential train car that Hoover, FDR, Truman and Eisenhower rode on. 

Next up...Lake Pleasant...or is it???

We are down to our last week in Mesa and our workamping positions at Val Vista Villages.  Working at the grill is really heating up.  Literally!!!  This week they are forecasting upper 90’s. The bar and dining area are all outside and most in full sun with some table umbrellas, but when you are running around, delivering food and drinks, it really is hot!  Even if it is a dry heat.  Rick has some reprieve in the kitchen with an AC, but on hot days and the fryers going, it only helps a bit.  Even after all that whining, we really do like working here and have had a good time with co-workers.  We are ready however, to get the wheels rolling and head to more scenic, cooler locations, especially if they include a campfire!  

Since we knew we would be here in late spring and would be tempting fate with the hot temperatures and no shade at our site, we decided to put up some Reflectix in the windows on the driver side of the RV were the afternoon sun beats on it.  The window over the oven and the two side bed windows do not have the tinting like the rest, so we wanted to be sure those were included.  We also like a nice dark bedroom to sleep in, so for those windows we used some Velcro strips in beige that blend in with the wall.  This way we can take the Reflectix off when we don't need it and easily put it back up when we do.  The Reflectix is very easy to cut to size and we also labeled it to know what window it goes on so the velcro lines up.  That, coupled with the dual pane windows, has been fantastic and as I write this, it is 97 degrees and the AC is not running all the time and still keeping the RV a lovely 72 degrees. Well worth the investment all around!

With having been stationary for a bit, we are getting things ready to roll on down the road.  This week we cleaned out the outside storage bays and mopped them all.  Our front bay had a latch that wasn’t contacting correctly and Rick fixed that with a bit of composite shims to tighten that up.  He also gave the RV a bath with the Aero Cosmetics waterless system and the truck got a bath last week; however, we are full of pollen again.  Oh well tis the pollen season, even here in sun valley!  ​​

​We also finally took the cracked plastic covers off the recliner foot rests. We wanted to protect them as long as possible.  Rick watched a video from the manufacturer that walked you through the process.  It was a lot easier than others made it sound on social media.  I then gave the furniture a good cleaning with some cleaner/conditioner to keep them looking good.  I am hoping that with the conditioning they will not tear or peel like others have experienced.  Fingers crossed!

​This coming week has a lot more “To Do’s”, a good spring cleaning, just like our old house but on a smaller scale!  I love when cleaning the bathroom takes less than 20 minutes!
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We took a day to be tourists and drove to Queen Creek to tour the Queen Creek Olive Mill. They have over 700 olive trees, with 16 different varieties and they sort of resemble a willow tree with breezy type branches and leaves. The trees are just starting to bloom with little white flowers everywhere.  Interesting fact, if 4% of the tiny blossoms become olives, it is a big crop.  Wow!!!

​We then took a tour of the processing room and watched a quick video of the olive oil making process.   The guide was really informative and answered all our questions.  All of the olive oil they make is extra virgin olive oil.  We had taste tests and learned how EVOO differs from other olive oils and how most of us are used to tasting rancid olive oil!  My tip to all, always buy EVOO and the darker the bottle the better as light promotes oxidation which greatly diminishes the freshness.  Plus EVOO has alot of healthy qualities such as decreasing LDL cholesterol and blood pressure.  Good stuff!

​The mill also had all of their oils available to sample and buy as well as balsamics and other seasonings in the gift shop.  Another plus to this location is the wonderful café, where they use their oils in addition to the citrus and garden vegetables, they grow.  We split a yummy kalamata prosciutto pizza with balsamic drizzle and a fresh caprese sandwich.  If ever in the area, this place is really neat to explore!

We also got more hiking in on a day where it was forecasted to only be in the high 70’s.  Even with that, the bright sun really warmed things up fast!  This trail was in Usery Mountain Regional Park, one the wonderful Maricopa County Parks.  This park encompasses over 3,600 acres, has a 75 site campground, numerous picnic areas, a premier outdoor archery range and lots of great hiking trails.  We hiked Blevins Trail, another easy 3.1 mile trail that took us past Usery Mountain and the Cat Peaks.  We are feeling confident now and might try a more difficult trail next, just as long as there is no scaling and descending steep cliffs.  That is where I get in trouble!!!    

​Once we leave Mesa, we will head north of the city to another Maricopa County Park, Cave Creek.  We are looking forward to dark skies and campfires!!! 

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Greetings from sunny AZ, Valley of the Sun!  We have been here in Mesa for two months now.  This is officially the longest we have been in one place...well technically two places, because we moved from the resort we are working at to a smaller park down the street on March 1st and we will be here until 4/15 when we start moving again.  We are definitely getting hitch itch and are craving a campfire in the worst way! We will move to a Maricopa county park to meet up with friends and you can bet we will try for a fire every night, even if it is 90 degrees!!!  
We have been enjoying our time here in the greater Phoenix area. The park that we have moved to has been a wonderful reprieve from the hustle and bustle of being on the main drag at the entrance of Val Vista.  The folks here have been soo nice and welcoming and the pool has been pretty much all ours whenever we went. There is even really nice little putting greens by the pool as well.  Sunsets also have not disappointed!

We were fortunate to be able to go see the Milwaukee Bucks with complimentary tickets from an organization called Vet Tix.  Organizations donate tickets for various event to Vettix for past and present military members to use.  This is an awesome program and I urge anyone who has ever served to sign up for the program.  It is free and works well for full time RV'ers as you can continue to change your locations you are interested in seeing offers for.  Sign up here.

One of our main reasons for coming to AZ this time of year was to see our beloved Milwaukee Brewers at spring training!  We were able to see three games, with one being an away game at the Oakland A's stadium, just up the road from us.  Tickets for one of the Maryvale games was compliments of Rick's old boss Frank at State Fair Park who we just happened to see as we drove by the stadium.  What a pleasant surprise!!!  He was down in Phoenix helping out with the concessions.  Thanks Frank!!!  Good to see you again!
We had a great time at the games and we really liked the intimate feel of these spring training parks.  You really are up close and personal with the players and they get to show off a bit of their personality too.

With Rick picking up more shifts at our workamper bar and grill assignment, we have had to carefully try to plan when we can get out and see the sights.  The weather has also been very erratic this winter in AZ going from very cold days, to rain, to hot and then a rinse and repeat!  We have really been wanting to get out and go for a hike in the desert, but where to start??  You see we are not avid hikers, scaling mountains and traversing cliffs.  We needed to start out with something a bit simpler to test out how the old body with bionic parts would handle the uneven terrain and varied surfaces since standing all day on concrete was taking its toll on the hip.  Well I stumbled across an amazing app that can help find just the right trail, AllTrails.  If you don't have it, you need to get it!  It identifies trails wherever you want to go, supplies maps, you can sort by easy, moderate and hard, and then you can even record your hike and it will summarize your hike with things like elevation change, time moving, calories burned, etc.  

We chose Hawes trail in the Tonto Forest area near Red Mountain, which was a perfect starter trail.  It gave us gradual elevation changes and nonstop scenery.  It was a perfect day for it as well being mostly sunny and 70 degrees.  The desert was very lush and green with the unusually high amount of rain of the last couple months and many plants were in bloom and many more about ready to bloom.  

Rick also got to check off something he has been wanting to do for some time and that is getting his stetson shaped to cavalry standards.  Every year we try to get together with his old Army buddies he served with in Germany, either at a 11th ACR Blackhorse reunion or just camping somewhere and the stetsons and stories always make an appearance.  Well this year he will be able to sport a finely shaped stetson compliments of the Boot Barn in Phoenix.

We are winding down our time here in the Sun Valley and this week will be our last big push at work before the sunseekers head to their colder climate homes in US and Canada.  The resort where we are working is expecting around 300 lots to vacate around April 1st.  That should look like organized chaos and we are seriously thinking of taking our chairs to go sit and watch that day!  It should then get a bit quieter at work since Happy Hours have been crazy busy with a couple hundred people each afternoon, drinking libations and dancing up a storm...if it is not raining.  The weather is also supposed to heat up to hit 90 with full sun.  We will see if it really is a dry heat!

​Another great addition is the RVLock Keyless Lock on the entry door.  We can lock or unlock with a keyfob or code, just like a vehicle.  This took about 15 minutes to install, with very clear directions.  I really like being able to go for a walk and not have to worry about grabbing the keys to the door.  RVLock runs specials all the time so watch for them, especially around Black Friday.

​One other big upgrade we finally decided to bite the bullet on, is a new mattress.  We initially started off with a lovely  3" gel memory foam mattress topper  on top of the original RV mattress, which did a great job for awhile, until the mattress underneath decided to flatten out.  We started to feel like we were sinking straight to a hard board.  The mattresses that come with an RV usually aren't the best for the long run and with all of my surgeries and joint issues, it was time to search out an alternative.  So, as I usually do, I researched for several weeks.  We wanted to find a memory foam mattress that would be best for side sleepers and that had support for hips/shoulders.  We narrowed it down to a couple that were highly recommended.  Well we decided on the Tuft and Needle queen adaptive foam mattress. They also offered a military discount, 100  night sleep trial and free returns, which sealed the deal for us.  It came in a small box and immediately started to expand right out of the box.  Too cool!  It is supportive and I have really noticed the hip and shoulder pressure point pain has gone away, however, we missed having that poofy mattress pad from our old home bed that made it feel like you fell into a cloud.  Unfortunately Kohls does not carry that particular one anymore.  But, never fear, with my sleuthing capabilities, I found an even better one on Walmart.com here.  OMG, it is like a fluffy cloud and does not take away from the supportive mattress at all!  We have slept on the new mattress for a week now and are really liking it.  I don't think we will need to exercise the free return policy.

In addition to all the groovy upgrades, we have also kept busy with some upkeep.  Knowing our house would be rolling down the road and encountering some bumpy roads, some much more than others, we knew we would continue to have to keep an eye on everything and it is now second nature to glance over everything as we set up at each new stop.  Rick noticed that some screws on the skirting were coming loose and decided to replace them with stainless screws and used a dab of silicone to keep them in place.  Inside, we have come across some trim in various areas that need to be secured and have used gorilla glue to get the job done.  We did have one cornice above the dining window come loose and it looks like the finish nails just missed a secure attachment to the other piece, so Rick re-nailed those.
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As we prepared to move to our latest location, we took off the tire covers, (which are really a good thing to have when you are stationary for awhile in a very sunny area like AZ),  and noticed that one of our RV tires was flat.  Ugghhh, well better here than while on the road!  There was a screw in the tire which we must have picked up backing into this site. This was our first tire change on this 16,000+ pound behemoth, but Rick handled it like  pro!  He retrieved the spare from under the back of the RV and used two wood planks and his bottle jack to lift up the RV and switch out the tire.  Now that we made it to our new location, which was 3 miles away, we will have a new tire mounted on the rim and put it back on the RV.

We also needed to clean the awning.  After our cross country travels and some dusty, dirty locations, it accumulated a good amount of dirt and streaks.  We had heard of folks having some success using Mr Clean Magic Erasers and we found a Mr Clean Magic Eraser Mop and decided to try it out.  WOW!  It really does the job.  It is nice to use the mop as it's on a long pole and you don't have to worry about getting out a ladder.

Whew!!!  Thats alot of information but thought it would be good to put it in one post.  We have been really happy with our upgrades and really feel they have been helpful and have improved our travels.  If you have any questions on any of them or want to see additional pictures, just drop us a line!  Thanks for stopping by!!

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Don't get me wrong, the views were absolutely breathtaking and everyone should experience it.  We have almost 200 pictures of the day and will share some here.  The reason for soo many is that as the sun moves, it lights everything up a bit differently, so around every corner, over every mountain was another beautiful view. 
​This was also our first encounter up close with desert flora and it was all very unique and pretty.  We cannot wait to see the desert in bloom, which locals say should be a good show this year because of the higher levels of rain they have received.

The drive took us just over 5 hours to complete the 120 miles round trip with the true Apache Trail, partly one lane, being 42 miles, and just over half being unpaved.  The drive wound us around the Superstition Mountains, Goldfield Mountains, Lost Dutchman State Park  and past Canyon Lake, Apache Lake, Roosevelt Lake and Roosevelt Dam through the Tonto National Forest.  Prior to modern civilization ending, I mean the paved road ending, you come across Tortilla Flats, which is an old 1904 stagecoach stop that has food, quirky gifts and just about everything prickly pear, including Prickly Pear Gelato.  It was busy the day we drove through and really no place for us to park the dually, so we took a picture and kept driving.

From there it was pretty much you and nature, the occasional overlook and the oncoming thrill seeker.  At those times, it was trying to figure out who was pulling over to let the other pass.  Almost always, it was us because the oncoming vehicle was barreling toward us looking for a thrill around the next curve.  Here's what those curves looked like. 

There was also several one lane bridges over wash areas or creeks were a quick rain could lead to quick flash flooding.

But really, this was spectacular viewing the entire way.  Probably our favourite part was Fish Creek.  This is where you hit the plateau of the high Sonoran Desert.  You can get out at the overlook and see down into the canyon where the cars look like little specs as they traverse the one lane dirt road with white-knuckling hairpin turns, lots of washboard areas that make you wonder if you will bounce right off the edge.  The descent is a 1,500 ft drop in 3 miles and some folks seriously take this as a challenge and treat it like an all out, no holds barred hill climb! Even a newer Ferrari!!! The views are as beautiful as they are terrifying as you hug the side of the cliff.  

​We started right around 1pm, which is probably the latest I would have wanted to start, now knowing how long it took, because I would not want to be on the dirt, one lane roads after dark.  The ever changing lighting really did lend to some amazing views and as always, pictures just cannot do it justice.