Yesterday was a quiet day at our end of the campground. Phon D Sutton Recreation Area has three paved parking lots. We’re at the end of the last lot – the pavement ends a few hundred feet from our windshield. The second lot has been taken over by an RV singles group (people that are on the road alone or joined the group as singles). That lot is just about full. They have a group leader coordinating activities. We don’t see or hear them from our place though.
Donna went out for a run yesterday as she continues to train for the duathlon in March. I cleaned the windows on the coach. Later I rode to the grocery store. I’ll have to make another run to the store today as I didn’t have enough room for everything yesterday. It seems like I put 20 or 30 miles on the scooter every time I go somewhere. Nothing is close to our location. It’s a good thing the scooter got 67 miles per gallon at the last fill-up.
The other thing that’s burning fuel here is our generator. I’ve been running it for a couple of hours every morning and evening – about four hours total per day. In the morning, I run the heat pumps while the generator tops up the battery bank. During the day, the inverter provides power for laptops, microwave, Vitamix, etc. By evening I need to top up the batteries again.
One of our neighbors here gave us oranges the other day. She has a sister in the area who has orange trees on her property. She has more oranges than she knows what to do with. On Sunday, Dara and Rob gave us tangelos and oranges from their trees. So we have an abundance of fresh citrus fruit and it’s good!
Yesterday afternoon, I went for a hike up a horse trail that Donna told me about. Parts of the trail were very steep and the footing was treacherous in places. Reaching the top of the ridge was worth it though. Here in the desert, you have to watch your step. Things will poke, scratch or bite. I didn’t see anything too dangerous other than the usual prickly flora. I took a few photos of the view and interesting cacti. The photo of the trail doesn’t do it justice – it’s much steeper than it looks.
Horse trial up the ridge – much steeper than it looks
A thorny barrel cactus
Looking east toward Pass Mountain
Giant saguaro
A uniquely shaped saguaro
Last night, Donna cooked shrimp in a cast iron skillet on our new induction cooktop. She pan-fried corned tortillas and made chipotle-tequila shrimp tostadas with lime cream. It was a tasty treat!
Chipotle-tequila shrimp tostadas
Donna was up early today. She went to Usery Park to meet up with friends. They are hiking the trail up to the Wind Cave on Pass Mountain. I’ll finish the grocery shopping. Later, our friends Mark and Emily Fagan will join us with their fifth-wheel trailer. We’ll have new neighbors! You can read their interesting story and view beautiful photography at their site.