November - December 2011 Arizona

Tempe Travel Trailer Villa, Tempe, Arizona

10 days at $185.00.

What a beautiful state Arizona is!  The landscape is subtly different than the high desert of Nevada.  It’s very red for one thing.  The rocks are red and are different.  The plants are different.  Here you see an abundance of Saguaros, Cholla, Prickly Pear and Organ Pipe Cactus.  Traveling through the lower part of the state in November is the best time to visit as the weather is perfect—around 70 degrees every day with clear blue skies.  The Indian or Native American influence is just as strong as the Mexican-Spanish influence and you see it in the art, the architecture and the ambiance of the state.  There is also a strong cowboy presence here too.  Summer temperatures can reach above 120 degrees which would scare me to death!  I don’t understand how people can live in such intense heat.  Of course there is air conditioning but what if the power fails?

As we arrived in Phoenix we were debating on whether or not to continue down to Tucson, but then the front brakes on the truck went out and the decision was made for us.  We stayed in an RV park in Tempe, a suburb of Phoenix, where Pep Boys one block away did the work in less than 2 days.  They actually had to do several things to the truck and as a result it depleted our bank account almost $700.  The tires are worn too and need to be replaced but that will have to wait until the next paycheck.

Between gas for the truck and repairs from the chronic wear & tear on an old truck and trailer, it keeps us poor and we have to travel very slowly, literally from 1 paycheck to another.  Did I mention that we get 8 miles to the gallon when we pull the trailer?  That averages out to $100 per every 200 miles we drive.

So we stayed in Tempe for one week.  Weekly rates in RV parks are cheaper than the daily rate; and staying a month is the cheapest of all.  But if we stay a month in one place, it would take us forever to travel and get anywhere.

We liked Tempe and Mesa very much.  It’s very pretty and upscale and Tempe is a college town which houses the university.  Phoenix is rather a dump but has a few nice parts.

We ate out very little but did manage a nice evening at a sports bar & grill called the New Yorker.  Dan enjoyed watching the golf game on the big screen tv.  We ate breakfast one day at a café called Cracker & Company where I had the most incredible, fattening plate of French toast and Dan had blueberry blintzes.  We had to take home a box of leftovers which Dan finished over a 2 day period.

We went to the Heard Museum one day in Phoenix and there we were immersed in Native American history.  We really enjoyed it—the basketry, Navaho blankets & rugs and the Katchina dolls.  I wish I could have afforded one for the granddaughters but everything was too pricey.  A hand-made wooden flute cost $350.

One thing we enjoyed very much was a movie theater we went to.  It was very unique.  We chose it because it was the only one playing the new Planet of the Apes movie, which happened to be as good as I hoped.  The theater was one of those traditional 10 screen theaters, but it only cost $3 per person and it was decorated to the nines.  One side of the lobby had a very large, ornate Christmas scene and the other side had the entire cast of the Pirates of the Caribbean—with life-size mannikins.  All through the theater were these life-size Hollywood mannikins—Tom Hanks, the Rat Pack, Elvis, the 3 Stooges, etc.  There was even a glass display case with metal lunchboxes—also with celebrity faces.  I found out later the theater is privately owned so that explained its unique-ness.

Our RV park was managed by a very nice couple but the office and attached public bathrooms smelled terrible from their cigarette smoke.  There are too many smokers out there!  It’s one of the few chronic irritating things about travel.  The bathrooms also had no dressing rooms and nowhere private to dress and undress.  That to me is a deal-breaker.  From now on, every RV park we enquire about is going to be asked about privacy.  For the week we stayed here, we just used our own trailer shower even though it’s small and we have to unload all the storage from it every day.  The shower/tub is where we store our laundry hamper, our bathroom bags of wash stuff and clothes and towels.  It’s just easier to use the public showers.  I’ve also found that all the showers from every park we’ve gone to just isn’t quite as clean as I’d like.  Mostly my complaint is about the showers.  There’s always mold in the grout, in the corners and discoloration.  I don’t know why all rv parks don’t use a little spray bleach to whiten and kill the mold and bacteria.  I also wonder why they don’t install hand-held shower heads.  They’re cheap and make it easy for people to get a quick shower, plus it makes a shower stall easier to clean.  They spend money on other non-essentials, you’d think they could afford such a useful thing as these. 

11/20/11

Tucson Mountain RV Park, Tucson, Arizona
$25 per day
10 day stay

Wow, this is what I get for not checking out the park before we arrived, as I called the park after seeing it listed among others online and this one looked to be in the town so we decided to come here.  I’m going to get better about asking questions because the management never tells the whole truth.  I would definitely rate this park as a 1-2 star (out of 5--5 is for the rich executive types).

When we arrive in a town it’s actually difficult to pull the trailer everywhere to check on parks so I’ve gotten to where I research online and pick one before we arrive.  I call ahead to see if they have room and feel thankful when they do.  Because the southwest is where all the winter Snowbirds vacation, it’s not that easy to get an RV spot.  And some parks are out in the woods, far from town, making it expensive to drive around to explore the area.

For instance, here the bathrooms are private but are so rustic they border on absolute decay.  The old walls and floors are crumbling, the old, exposed pipes are filthy and in one shower, the first day, there was a huge wad of hair in the corner.  At first, horrified, I thought it was a dead rat.  I also discovered that even though there are 2 bathrooms, only one shower can be used because the other one only runs cold water.

I solve the bathroom problem by taking a bottle of spray bleach with me and I spray the shower down beforehand.  I wear a pair of flip-flops into the shower so my feet don't touch the floor.

For toileting we use our own trailer bathroom most of the time and Dan is good about keeping the tanks maintained.

This particular park gets very few travelers because most of the people live here.  They cater to Vets and the Disabled so poverty is apparent.  However, what a nice group of people here!  All friendly, all helpful.  The spots are very crowded though and there is little privacy unless you stay in your RV.  Our spot is next to the bathrooms and laundry room on one side and next to a walkway on the other so people pass by within a foot or two all day long.  Somehow, these things don’t bother me all that much, maybe because we won’t be here long.  Living and traveling this way on a limited budget means that we can’t stay at 5 star parks and make demands.  So it changes ones’ attitude.

Payday is on the day we leave here but we are thinking about staying a few additional days.  That would allow us to do some more local exploring but we just aren’t certain yet.  Unfortunately, Thanksgiving fell on this week and that means days we couldn’t go do things.  Holidays always mess up our plans.

We’d like to take a couple of day trips without the trailer.  We’d like to visit Biosphere 2, Tombstone, and Bisbee before we leave.

We’ve noticed that RV people divide up into 3 groups.  One group, the largest, are the retired people who either live and travel on the road, or are out often or for extended periods of time.  The second group are the vacationers.  These are people with or without families who still work and go camping or rv traveling when they get vacation time.  The 3^rd group are the poor who hit upon hard times and found themselves without jobs, then went broke, lost their home and now all they can afford is to live in their run-down rv/camper/trailer and live in an rv park.  Some of these have struck a deal with the parks they live in.  Free or reduced rent in exchange for work.  Of these poor, some are permanently disabled, mentally or physically, and cannot work and have to get by on social security or disability payments.  And of these, many are veterans.

These poor are 1 step from being homeless.  If it weren’t for having some sort of rv to live in, they would be on the streets.

At one park we saw a man up on top of his run-down trailer, placing tarps over the roof just before a rain-storm moved in.  Another lived in a camper on blocks, and he must have had a wood-burning stove in there because we noticed smoke regularly coming from the pipe attached on the roof.  Some have wood tacked up over missing windows.

I have to say that so far, not one thing has been stolen from us.  That is something we worried about when staying where there are obvious poor people living.

In fact, I have never met a better group of people than RV'ers.  Rich or poor, doesn't matter.  They all respect boundaries and privacy, but look out for each other and most enjoy chatting and are very friendly and helpful.

It costs an average of $350-$500 a month to live in one of these 1, 2 and 3 star rv parks.  That is not bad considering it includes utilities.  Sometimes, the electric bill is extra but most people don’t spend more than $50-$100 per month on electricity.  And people like us with a solar panel use only about $20 per month.  I can't think of a cheaper way to live but one must own their rv for it to be cheap.

December 1, 2001

So, Dan wants to keep moving on.  He doesn’t really want to stay here any longer.  We’ll have to catch Biosphere 2 another time.  Today we head for Tombstone.  We’ll try to get an RV space at one of the 4 or 5 parks there.  We only plan to stay maybe 2 days and then head on to New Mexico. 

The 10 days here has flown by.  A couple of days we just stayed in—me writing, reading, watching tv and cooking; Dan doing his thing—playing online fake poker and enjoying walks and tv and doing maintenance on the truck and trailer.  He’s in charge of our money so he works on the budget and logs in the receipts for everything we spend money on.  That way we can budget and see where the money is going.  No matter what, it’s very hard to save while traveling.  Everything costs so much.  We often have to hunker down the last week before the pension or social security check comes, just to avoid spending money.

We certainly enjoyed ourselves here.  We always enjoy ourselves wherever we go.  Yesterday we went to high tea at Chantilly, a local tea house.  That was nice.  A bit of elegance from another time.  Sometimes I need a touch of civilized life—to drink tea from a china cup and saucer, eat delicate scones and finger sandwiches.  I’d like to go to a symphony concert soon too.

We took pictures, we drove around.  Enjoyed what beauty there is.  Tucson is very run down in many parts and there is poverty here.  But there is beauty and culture as well.  The Cathedral downtown and the southwestern architecture all around.  The mission, the historic buildings, the saguaros and the beautiful cactus landscape.  The clear blue skies.  And of course, the shops and stores we are familiar with.  In addition to sight-seeing and soaking up local history and culture, there is also the day to day mundane chores at home, and cooking and grocery shopping and general cleaning and maintaining.  Laundry, ironing.  I even had to buy buttons to replace lost ones on one of my blouses. 

The every day chores include filling our water filter and then bottling the water for drinking and cooking.  We empty the ice trays and fill them back up again.  We use a lot of ice in our drinks.  There are always dishes to wash, bed to make, floor to sweep and mop everyday.

Our neighbor next door is from Georgia and I love his thick accent, although he’s been living and traveling elsewhere for years.  His wife is a nurse so they travel now and then while she takes jobs.  He was sitting outside in his chair yesterday while cooking a pot of ham-hocks and mustard greens.  It smelled delicious.  I’m not sure I’ve ever seen mustard greens before.  I left my soda cans with him because I noticed one of the park residents, a disabled vet, makes the rounds every day looking for cans and this guy keeps a bucket next to his rv for that purpose.

Another old guy with plenty of wear on him and no teeth, stopped by to tell us someone put several boxes of yellow squash in the laundry room and to help ourselves to it.  He chatted for a while, something we all love to do around here.  He freely told us about his years in prison and parts of his life, laughing about the whole thing.  He seemed very nice although I can see his status in life is very low.  But, what an amiable guy!

While in Tucson, we managed to drive out to Sanctuary Cove, a place advertised on the Attractions of Tucson list online.  I was curious about it—it’s an interfaith meditation place.  It was very pretty there but nothing special and at least we got some photos.

We enjoyed a visit to Trail Dust Town—an old western village great for picture taking and there is a little restaurant there.  We got a few pictures but the batteries died in the camera there.  Dan obviously forgot to keep the batteries charged.  It’s one of the downsides of growing older—we are both forgetful of things we shouldn’t forget.

The Chapel of San Pedro was one of my favorites—an old street that is now residential and houses about an acre with little paths to walk and at the end of it is this little Spanish chapel that has been restored and maintained.  It was right in town and yet felt so far away.  We were the only ones there and it was very quiet.  I spied a cottontail bunny, who didn’t appreciate us invading his sanctuary.

We enjoyed a couple of nice restaurants but mostly ate at home.  The Blue Willow provided a tasty breakfast.  One of the bakery-coffee bars cheated me on a latte but it’s not worth it to complain about it here.  And of course, our tea room, my favorite.  We visited a Waffle House but were not impressed.  It’s simply a diner, a step up from a fast food and we didn’t think the food was all that special although the waitress was very nice.  We try to get a game of cribbage going whenever we’re out at a restaurant like that.

Dan, ever mindful of every cent we spend, enjoyed discovering that Costco’s food court has great fast food very cheap.  They had a special going—a hotdog and soda for $1.50.  He wanted to go there whenever we planned to eat out!  We went there twice but that was enough!  The food was good but still, it was Costco and didn’t reflect the culture of what Tucson really is at its heart.  Dan doesn’t seem to appreciate things like that.

We spent one afternoon in Old Town Artisans—the art section of town where we enjoyed a visit to the Museum of Art and the historic County Courthouse.  We walked a few blocks to a great little Mexican restaurant where I ate delicious food, but of a type different than back home.  Even Mexico has many cultures and the food reflects that.

December 1-4, 2011

Wells Fargo RV Park, Tombstone, Arizona
3 day stay @ $ 102.00

I’m so glad we were able to get an RV park downtown, next to the 3 block square of Tombstone.  It’s a historic and tourist town, much like Virginia City, Nevada, only smaller.  The economy has been hit hard here too—many of the shops are closed.  The little houses surrounding the town are very run-down.  We did have fun though.  We enjoyed the shops that were open but did not want to spend too much money.  We bought Brian a funny t-shirt.  We also got Arizona tshirts for the granddaughters with Navaho coloring books and a Christmas card with $50 in it for each girl.  We bought post cards.  All this we mailed out.

We found a nice little Pizza restaurant, housed downstairs in a motel.  Very plain décor but clean and good food.  We bought some fudge at the chocolate shop.  We visited the museum and a Magic Shop where spiritual and Wiccan things are sold.  It smelled so good in there with all the incense.   We got a kick out of all the men in Tombstone.  They have long beards and dress up in the old west style.  They really get into it!  Dan and I took a stagecoach ride through the town.  It was a simple town and we enjoyed the modest attractions they had to offer.  It wasn’t crowded at all while we were here.  And of course, we had our home chores to do—laundry and cooking and cleaning.  The usual.

The towns leading into Tombstone are nice too—Benson, St. David’s.  It’s a 2 lane, 24 mile long road into Tombstone, so it’s definitely out in the middle of nowhere.  That’s the way the old west was too—mining towns that boomed and then became ghost towns after the mines were stripped.  Dan and I read up on the history here.  Dan enjoyed it more than I did because Tombstone is one of his favorite movies.  He likes old westerns.  It was nice to see Wyatt Earp, his brothers, Doc Holiday and the other compatriots immortalized in this town.  Enjoyable to see the OK Corral and the Birdcage Theater. 

There are a lot of tourist things to do too but we didn’t do any of them.  The Queen Mine Tour, which was in its heyday, the most productive copper mines of the 20^th century.  The Tombstone Trolly takes you for a ride throughout the area and ends at the Boothill cemetery.  The evening Ghost & Murder Tours.  Bisbee, an old mining town, and the Kartchner Caverns State Park are within driving distance but because the weather turned so cold, we didn’t go there either.

Even though it's small and very touristy, Tombstone is a must for any Arizona traveler.