The wind blew out of the south yesterday at a sustained 20 mph with occasional gusts. It rocked the coach a time or two, but wasn’t a big deal. Our intention was to wait for the wind to die down and move on to Kingman today and then to Lake Mead.

After looking at the latest weather forecast, we’ve ditched that plan. Lake Mead will have sustained 40 mph winds on Friday. We would have to pull the slides in and hunker down while the coach takes a battering. A cold front is forecast to move through the area over the weekend, followed by temperatures in the mid-90s next week. This doesn’t sound too appealing.

We’re looking at our options again. Our first thought is to book another four nights here and wait out the stormy Friday and cooler weekend. We’ll scratch Nevada from our current plan and head towards Flagstaff. This will probably mean we’ll backtrack along the Carefree Highway through Anthem and stop at Camp Verde. I wouldn’t try to take AZ89 over Yarnell – it would be shorter, but it’s not a big rig friendly road. There are tight switchbacks as you descend into Prescott. I remember switchbacks so tight that there were 10 mph speed advisory signs.

We have a few days to ponder our course. Meanwhile, it’s analysis paralysis. I want to avoid wind, extreme heat and cold. Donna may need to fly to New York on May 5th and, if so, we need to be somewhere near an airport. We’ll have a week’s notice or so for that. She’s already booked a flight out of Denver at the end of May for a conference back in Phoenix.

This time of year, weather is hard to call in the southwest. It’s typically windy in northern Arizona and southern Nevada. The desert is heating up. The higher elevations have comfortable daytime temperatures, but places like Flagstaff can still be below freezing overnight.

The other thing we need to think about are the sights we want to see. Our original intent was to go through Zion National Park. Maybe we will scratch that as well. We can go to the Petrified National Forest, then head north and go to Moab. There’s so much to see.

We’ll sit tight and I’m sure a plan will come together over the next few days.

Today, I will get my mountain bike out and ride some of the trails Donna has been hiking on.