Dancer in the desert

As a young girl, my mother introduced me to my first pow wow in Sisseton South Dakota. The annual Wahpeton event took place every year on the 4th of July (148 years this year) and had participants from across the country. I do not recall noticing at the time but I'm relatively certain that we were in the minority as a blonde blue eyed mother daughter team. We were welcomed at the pow wow and it was a memorable experience I will never forget. We did not dance but my mother told me that when she was my age, her mother took her to the Sisseton pow wow and her mother did dance. My grand mother was 1/2 Mandan, with beautiful black hair and dark eyes, but I'm sure she got noticed with her little blonde blue eyed girl.

As we were walking in the desert I took this picture of a Yucca that reminded me of the Dancers in Sisseton. The movements are so true to my memories and it stopped me in my tracks.

Saguaro down

On our first trip to the south west we stayed at Justin's Diamond J RV Park and had the chance to see a rare saguaro cactus with over 54 arms. I even made our Christmas e-card with that photo. We are staying at the same resort this weekend and sad to learn that the famous cactus came crashing down last year after several rains in the area. Apparently the cactus took on too much water and became too heavy to support all the weight and down it came. Very sad news but at least we had the opportunity to see it when its was standing tall and proud. This picture is not of the actual saguaro but another sad reminder that these giants live long but not forever.

A prickly home

It is amazing how nature adapts to its surroundings. Here are a few examples of how birds have taken advantage of the very prickly cholla to make a nest that is sure to protect the young from predictors. I guess the fledglings just need to make that first flight and good one so they do not get impaled on their home.

Thankful for...

There's so much to be thankful for this turkey day. Our family and friends, we can't say enough for all the love and support over the years and being separated over the holidays can be difficult. Our health is very good despite a cold that followed us in the beginning of this years journey, we are strong, mobile and happy. The ability to retire a few years early and get out and see this beautiful land is a true blessing, especially when we have family join us from time to time. And it is wonderful as we make new friends in our travels. It is all good but there are two boys I need to give a shout out to this day. The first is my husband of over 35 years, I can hardly believe it's been this long, I guess he is just another child that's grown old (Bonnie Ratt, thank you for that verse) And the second is to my little traveling buddy, Blue. He woke me up at 2:13 just to play and even though it was earlier than I wanted to get up, he let me fall back to sleep. Then at 7:30, I woke again to a warm wet nose and chirps that let me know he wanted to join us under the covers. He slides in between Gary and I, then spins around to stretch out beside me all warm and furry softness and begins his rumble. This cat can purrrr, I mean it's like magic fingers, the mattress shakes from the vibration and he stretches his paws up to pet my chin as a thanks for petting his chin. And that purr will go on as long as we are both awake without a single quarter needed.

Now some of you might say, OMG she is a cat lover, and yes I am but there is so much more to the story. As a young girl, my mother, an artist would go to shows; cat, dog and horse shows and do portraits of exhibitors animals to earn some extra money. She once told me that cat people could be a bit snobbish at times, dog people were often lovers of both dogs and cats but horse people were true animal lovers. Have I ever mentioned that my mother also had a philosophy that if you could get a stray to follow you home, you could keep it? In our household we had many animals as pets, cats and dogs, many at any given time, horses, a raccoon, a monkey, a squirrel, a coyote, hamsters, mice, snakes, birds... You get the picture. So I guess you would have to say that we are animal lovers. So I am also thankful to have grown up in that home and continue the practice of taking in a shelter animal, in this case, a nice blue cat from the Sedona Humane Society and love them the rest of their lives getting as much love in return. Yeah, we are thankful for so much this day and throughout the year!

Sky Islands of AZ & Kartchner Caverns

The Whetstone Mountains just south and west of Benson, reach a height of 7,711 ft on Apache Peak, rising from 4,800 ft at their mountains edges. Watersheds on the eastern side drain into the San Pedro River, while those on the western side feed Cienega Creek and thus flow into the Tucson basin. Starting at Kartchner Caves State park you can take two hikes from the campground, into the Whetstones, one that circles the hills that contain the caves (the foot hills trail) and the second, the Guindana trail that leaves the state park entering the Coronado National Forest. The second trail, is named for the canyon it navigates and is home to old mines no longer in use. The little I have been able to find indicates that they were mines for novaculite, a mineral used for whetstones for which the Whetstones mountains were named. But this area is mineral rich and is threatened by the copper mining companies in the area. Time will tell if the statues of national forest will keep these relatively unexplored mountains safe from further mining. I'll keep my fingers crossed

First big hike in the south west

Now that Gary and I are over our colds, it's time to hit the trails. Our first big hike is only 2.75 miles with an elevation change of less than 1000 ft, OK that's not much but it takes its toll on both of us. The colds might be gone but the effects and altitude make this first hike a challenge, at least for me. No problem, we take our time, rest at the view points and enjoy the warm weather that holds over our little spot in the south east portion of AZ.

The best rest stop in AZ

As you drive from New Mexico toward Tucson AZ on I 10 there is one of the nicest rest stops you will ever see. If you are traveling west, it is prior to the Dragoon exit in the Texas Canyon. The views are some of the best in the world of rest stops! Some travelers can go hours on the road without stopping, that's not me however. I get restless after about an hour so if we have a long way to travel in one day, we need to break it up just for me. Blue is also good with that, let's face it, he is a cat and cat owners know how much they love their naps but it is not like you can take a really good cat nap while you are bouncing down the highway.

Quail at Rock Hound State Park

One of our favorite NM state parks is Rock Hound. The park sits at the base of the mountains were locals once mined for geodes and if you wish to do some pick work, you can take home a bucket. The hillside is covered with the remains of this summers bloom of majestic looking yucca. We have traveled through this part of NM in the spring and marveled at all the bright yellow poppies along the hillside, I can only wonder what these tall spires look like when they are in full bloom! Just in front of our site is a sprawling Datura (moon flower) with tinted flowers of white and purple. I've collected a few seeds for next spring. And for Blue's entertainment a covey of Scaled Quail walk our site searching for seeds. These little birds are not as showy as the Gambles Quail but very pretty with several subtle colors and chose to run more often than flight when you show them interest.

White Sands NM

The white sand dunes confuse some into thinking this is as good as snow. I watched as this family took saucers slowly down the dunes, just not the same but I'm sure they had fun!

One of my first family travel experiences (that I remember) was the trip to AZ for Christmas to spend the holiday with my grandparents. Just mom driving, the boys and I in our Buick Wildcat. I was very small but I remember eating pine nuts, and loving them, leaving Phoenix early due to some flooding and jumping off the dunes at White Sands. While I don't do as much jumping these days, I love the visits to the beautiful white sand dunes in the heart of New Mexico. The contrast of the clear blue sky, blazing white sand and sparse vegetation makes for one of my favorite locations for photography. The little footprints in the sand give record of small creatures that roam the sands once all the visitors are gone for the day. On this visit, we arrived just in time as the nearby range was firing missiles over the area and it was closed until we arrived. Good timing on our part.

Yucca study

My first choice for desert plants is the Yucca. Perhaps because I grew up withYuccas in South Dakota so these and not just desert plants but I like them just the same. In this pant of New Mexico, they grow tall looking a bit like the Joshua Trees in AZ but not the same. The Soap TreeYucca grow tall as an adaptation to avoid the ever shifting sands.

New Mexico and a new pass

Another first for us this year was our drive through Ruidoso taking us to an elevation of over 7500 feet in the Lincoln Nation Forest and Range. Absolutely beautiful and just enough snow to put us in the seasonal spirit. We stayed just the other side of the mountains and drove up to the small cowboy town of Cloudcroft. Cute town but now that I've seen it, I'm good.

Look at the top of the above photo, that is the moon peeking over the bluff!

Where's Wile E. Coyote?

Wile E. Coyote, no where to be found but this guy is taking no chances, best to stay hidden

A walk in New Mexico

Blackwater Draw site

This site is the Clovis site for the oldest accepted widespread culture in the New World. Evidence of their remarkable fluted points (a New World invention), other stone and bone weapons, tools and processing implements were found at this site. These implements were used by ancient people while hunting Pleistocene life including mammoth, ancient bison, large horses and large turtles. Other Pleistocene-age animals that visited the site for food and water were tapir, camel, four-prong antelope, tampulama, llama, deer, wolf, ground sloth, short-faced bear, saber-tooth cat, shovel-toothed amebeledon, beaver, armadillo and peccary. The site is also famous for its stratigraphic record in the sediment layers giving a unique gauge for the last 13,000 years of cultural sequences. And while we were here, it was closed for the season, so sad.

Nessy? Is that you or Champ?

Our beautiful campsite along the Canadian River in Texas last night.

Alibates flint

Along the canyon rims of the Canadian River in the Texas Panhandle, where we stayed last night, are signs of craftsmanship that spanned the course of human history in North America. Small pits and literally tons of stone manufacturing debris are signs of thousands of years of quarrying a brilliantly colored stone known as Alibates flint (technically a silicified or agatized dolomite, just for Mary). The material, prized by prehistoric hunters, was traded over distances as far north as Montana, as far south as Central Mexico, and east to at least the Mississippi River. What catches your eye for hundreds of yards beyond the pits are the quarry wastepiles and tool-making debris blanketing the hillslopes: thousands of quarried chunks, tested cobbles, flakes, and tools in various stages of production. Based on evidence at the Alibates locale and at sites further afield, prehistoric peoples throughout the millennia have used stone from the quarry to make tools and weapons. Late ice-age hunters apparently sought the material to tip the weapons used to kill now-extinct large game animals. Finely flaked and fluted Alibates flint projectile points were found at the Blackwater Draw site in eastern New Mexico, near our current campsite. The scene of a mammoth kill, the site dates to 13,000 years ago at its earliest level.

Huber City Park, a pheasant surprise!

With the two of us still sick, we do not want to spend a lot of money staying at a park we cannot enjoy, so we venture off the beaten path to find the small towns of Texas that have city parks with basic facilities for free where we can hold up for a few days. Even in the towns that were once booming with oil money and have suffered over the years as needs and resources change, we are amazed to find little gems like this park. Gary, feeling better went for a walk in the park this morning to find it full of people enjoying the beautiful day and much to his wonder, an aviary with some beautiful examples of the several different varieties of pheasants, a few spectacular black swans, Manderan and Wood ducks in the waterfowl part of the exhibit. Who new! A bright spot in my day.

RVing tip #1

Many a thought process goes "if you are traveling in an RV, you need to downsize everything" tiny sink, tiny cabinets and all of your storage is small. Well while it is true that you are working with less space, that is not to say you need to shrink your life, it means to use the items that are the most important, things that might be able to do double duty and so on. Example, a queen size bed in an RV is smaller the a queen size bed in your home, and for those who have seen Gary you know that ain't going to work, he is 6' 5" Our fix, buy a firm piece of foam that ads an additional 8" in length and cover everything with one of those memory foam 4" pads. It not only makes a very uncomfortable bed comfy, it also keeps Gary from sleeping across the bed leaving cat and me the corners. When we move, the foam flips on top of the bed and it all fits when the slide moves in. We all have our slice of the extra long comfortable bed. Now if I could just teach Blue to use his share of the bed rather than laying across my legs, life would be purrrfect!

On that same thought process we were using a pint sized dish pan that held two glasses and just a few spoons, that was crazy and everything was wet including at least two towels each washing along with the counter. Now that we have a regular size pan, we can wash all of our dishes and let them drain before giving them a wipe and away they go. This pan can sit on top of the cutting board that sits on top of the stove and hold any dishes we make dirty until the next washing.

Hold up in OK

Traveling is for us a joy, unless one of us gets sick. When we both get sick, we find a nice spot to hold up for a few days until we feel better, because traveling when you do not feel well is no fun. That is the case for the last few days. It is rare that we both get sick at the same time but unfortunately it is what it is. Blue is in high spirits and entertaining us, we have a good internet connection and good TV reception. With a frig full of food, all is well. We're OK

On a brighter note, the little city park where we are hold up is our usual stopping point when we travel this way. It has electric, water and a nice view of the lake which plays host to waterfowl, Hawks and owls passing through. Late at night we can hear coyotes singing in the prairies, reminding us that this is true grassland and ground zero for tornadoes and other landscape changing events, but not this week.

Earthquakes in Oklahoma

In our first visit to Oklahoma we were about to go to sleep in the small historic town of Guthrie when we experienced our first earthquake. No such experience this time but I was shocked to learn the number of quakes that happen in the area have increased from 2 per year four years ago, to 585 last year. Until recently the local government was in denial over the reasons for the massive change. But now the state is admitting that the injection into deep underground wells of fluid byproducts from drilling operations is behind the quakes. This wastewater injection a byproduct of fracking, impacts Oklahoma’s underground faults and began in 2010-11. New reports describe for the first time how injection-induced earthquakes are occurring at a higher rate than ever before and pose a much greater risk to people living nearby and are likely to increase from the current magnitude of 3.0 to 5.0 or greater in the very near future.

Osage Hills State Park

We have two new parks from this Years adventure that go on our list of places to stay in the future, Hillsdale State Park near KC and Osage Hills State Park near Oklahoma City. The pictures in this post are from Osage which sits in the heart of the Nation of the same name. Just a small park, a little out of the way, but well worth the stop. Plus, it gave me nice subjects to test out our new camera, a Nikon Coolpix. I loved my old Kodak but today's cameras give you so much more in options which I will use as a photographer want-a-be.