A Ride in the Desert and Pizza With Friends!

Tuesday, February 21. 2023

We have settled in to a calm enjoyable life here in the desert. Our neighbors are quiet and fun to be around. Our daily routine throughout this adventure has brought a peacefulness to our lives. No list of what we "need" to see, no rushing to do this and that, we are just letting the days flow as they will. Not that we never make any plans, we do, yet the ones we do make are filled with enjoyment and relaxing. 

An alarm on the Jeep has gone off a couple of times with no indication as to why. So Tom brought it over to one of the Auto Shops here in Quartzsite. They could not find anything wrong with it and said it probably is electrical and beyond their realm of work. So he will have to look into bringing it into a place that does work in that area. Just because we are out in the desert all the fun of vehicle or house ownership for that matter, it is just on wheels now, does not go away. 

Getting back to the idea of letting our days flow by when Tom got back from the Auto Shop I said, lets go for a ride so off we went. The pictures below are of that ride. We took the Pipeline road, which is just behind where we are parked out here at Roadrunner BLM, till we were behind the Dome Rock BLM. At that point we turned on to another road that took us into a part of that BLM area. It was a nice ride. I did get out a couple of times to take a short walk so I could take some pictures of Saguaros I could see that looked interesting. Otherwise, I took them out the front window, just a few steps from the Jeep, or the rolled down passenger window. Mostly a lazy picture taking day...😊

We have just turned on to the Pipeline Road heading west.

Looking North at the Tyson Wash.

One of the Saguaros I walked to.

Looking back towards Roadrunner BLM.

Dome Rock Mountains are ahead of us.

I just thought it was an interesting looking cloud.

Then these guys were ahead of us.

You cannot tell in the pictures 

 but they had reddish beaks.

I am pretty sure these were

Turkey Vultures.

Some of the desert wildflowers. 
My favorites the ones would be the Desertstar Daisy. 
The purple I believe are Scorpion Weed.
The yellow flowering bush is a Creosote Bush.

The other Saguaro I walked to.

Looking North towards Dome Rock BLM

Looking East toward the LTVA's we could see
lots of little white dots in the distance.

I just liked looking out

at these views

as we road through the Dome Rock BLM.

Arriving back home in time for Happy Hour the wind had picked up. Thank you, Deb for folding up our chairs and tables. So the search was on for a place out of the wind to sit for Happy Hour. We started behind the Stinger "B" but the wind soon found us there. Next stop was east of the Igloo where we stayed until it was time to go in. Doug had been off to visit another blogger and found us there, he did suggest inside the White Lion but by then we were ready to call it an evening. Not sure why I did not suggest inside out of the wind earlier, we certainly have enough room...I guess I thought it was more fun and challenging to find a place out of the wind outside...lol We did persevere and we had a fun Happy Hour pretty much the norm for this group.

We went in before sunset and then I noticed the color out the
window. A lovely afterglow which I took leaning out
our large bedroom window and another window up front.

We were under a wind advisory. The prediction was for sustained winds of 30 to 40 mph with gusts of 40 to 50 mph. We are thinking the prediction was right. We ended up pulling in both our slides before we went to bed as our toppers were flapping. We went to sleep with the wind howling all around us while it occasionally rocked the Stinger "B".  

Wednesday, February 22, 2023

We went to sleep with the wind howling and we awoke to the same howling. It is Ash Wednesday and for us as Catholics a Holy Day of Obligation so we were off in the wind to attend 10 o'clock Mass here in Quartzsite at Our Lady Queen of Peace, Mission. Then back home and inside sadly no Coffee Hour today.

I have been watching the clouds float by and the lovely shadows they make on the  mountains across the way from us. Below are some of the pictures I took, again through the bedroom window, throughout the afternoon. 

The clouds move quickly in the wind

and the shadows

dance across the mountains.

A little more to the north and I could really see the dust in
the air. Yet the clouds above were beautiful.

Today there was a plan...😊 and it included friends and pizza at Silly Al's in Quartzsite. Deb suggested we take one vehicle versus three so we, Riley, Doug, Tom and I, joined Deb in the Dogsled and she drove us in to join Cheryl, Dave, Patsy, and Bill for dinner. The pizza was good but the company was the best part. It was a fun couple of hours and hopefully we will get together again before we all leave this area. Just in case there were hugs exchanged. I personally do not thing there can be to many hugs and it would be nice to do it again.

From the left front of the table: Riley, Tom, Cheryl,
Dave, Patsy, Bill, Deb, and Doug.

Despite the wind, as I write this it is still with us, and cooler temperatures the days continue to be good.

The mantra right now is: at least the temperature is above 0 degrees and there is no snow blowing....at least the temperature is above 0 degrees and there is no snow blowing....at least the temperature is above 0 degrees and there is no snow blowing....lol 

We are glad you stopped by!

If you have time to leave a comment we would enjoy hearing from you.

Monday, Sunset...Sunday, Sunrise & Happy Hour with Friends...Saturday, RC Planes in the Sky

Monday, February 20, 2023

A quiet beautiful day in the desert and the weather co-operated. We were able to sit outside  for a Coffee Hour this morning under a wonderfully blue sky filled with sunshine and it felt good. Later we came together for Happy Hour and again we were under a blue sky and sunshine. We probably did not solve all of the world's problems but I do know we had a good time chatting away. Conversation is never a struggle with good friends.

The sun slipping  

down

behind the Dome Rock Mountains

Looking out to the Southwest I could see touches
of pink on the clouds.

It was a good day in our little corner of the world.

Sunday, February 19, 2023

Up early this morning we were on our way to Mass at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Parker, AZ by 7:15AM. The pictures below were taken out the passenger window of the "Little Black Limo" as we made our way North on AZ-95. I mention this because there will be some blurring in these pictures. 

Just turning onto US-95 and the Sleeping Indian
is still sleeping.

For most of the ride we only saw patches

 of light on the edges of the dark clouds.

One quick spot of bright light. Even though the
the picture is quite blurry I decided to include it.

Is Snoopy running in the clouds today?

Then I could see rays of light shining

down through the openings in the clouds.

Just a few miles before we reached our destination

the sun popped above the clouds.

Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Parker, AZ

Bottom Picture is the Altar.
The picture above on the left is Our Lady of Guadalupe
and on the right the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Four of the stain glass windows. The two below are not on the
outside of the building. 

After Mass we stopped at the Crossroads restaurant for breakfast and noticed several people we had attended Mass with. We had not had breakfast here in a couple of years and interestingly nothing inside had changed. The wait was not long, the service excellent, and the food was good. We would stop again.

After breakfast we stopped at a car wash and Tom took at
least a couple layers of dust off of the Jeep. Not a lot to do
inside while he was spraying away so I took pictures.
Top left. he thought he was being cute aiming the hose my way.

After the Jeep was washed we headed over to Safeway for a few groceries then across the street for a curbside order at Walmart before heading home. Arriving home we put our groceries away then it was time to head outside to wait for some friends/guests for Happy Hour. Deb, Riley, Doug, Tom, and I enjoy a Happy Hour just about every evening together and today we had four more people join the group. Cheryl and Dave arrived first followed shortly by Patsy and Bill. The conversation was lively and the time flew by; it always does when we are having fun. All to soon they were on their way home but not before we made plans to get together later in the week for a visit to Silly Al's. A nice outing to look forward to.

Going Left starting with Deb in the front left of the picture.

Deb, Dave, Doug, Bill, Tom, Cheryl, Patsy, and Riley

Like the beginning of this morning's sunrise tonight's
sunset was behind the clouds.

There was a little bit of pink on the edges

of some of the clouds as the last of the light left the day.

It was a day we enjoyed from the moment we got up until we went to bed. First a nice morning ride to Parker as the sun came up. Then later in the day time spent with friends and that always makes for a good day.

Saturday, February 18, 2023

I had received a message earlier in the week from Patsy, Chillin' with Patsy about an Air Show being put on by the Quartzsite Desert Flyers this weekend. Bill, her husband, On Our Way is the president of the group and would be the MC for today's show. So we, Tom and I along with Doug and Yuma, decided to take a ride over to watch. It was fun and interesting to see these planes in flight and hear about them plus a little history of this group. 

The pictures below are what I was able to capture as they flew by. I really do not know anything about these planes so I cannot add any real captions.  If you are interested in seeing them a little better/larger click on the picture and it should open larger in a new window.

Middle left is a picture Tom took of Bill on the run.

This one was fun to watch

as it left a trail of smoke behind.

In this shot it looked like the plane was just hanging there.

Cannot really see the plane but can tell by the smoke
he did several twist and turns as it came down.

This is the one flying and then landing in the three pictures below.

We enjoyed our time at the field watching the various planes taking off, flying, and landing. If we are in the Quartzsite Area next year we would certainly take the time to go and watch again. 

After leaving there we made a quick stop on Kuehn street to walk around and check out some of the venders that are still there. After that we went and had a late lunch at the Mountain Quail Restaurant. 

Back in time for Happy Hour we enjoyed a couple of hours sitting our and chatting with our neighbors, Deb and Doug. This is always a nice way to end our day. 

It truly was a good day.

We are glad you stopped by!

If you have time to leave a comment we would enjoy hearing from you.