Back to Work, Nomads-Style

We had a few days of resting at Paula and Tom’s place before moving south and west about 12 miles to Epworth United Methodist Church.  Six rigs, with 12 people, are parked in a corner of their parking lot.  In addition to the usual church functions, the local facilities are also host to a small high school for at-risk teens.

 

Much of our work during the day is outside where the only weather concerns are possible sunburn, with highs in the low- to mid-70’s and very few clouds.

 

Our evening work is continuing to get the hang of this new Toshiba with Windows 8.  It is taking some time but we are getting more programs and files move over.  At the rate we are going, it might take another week to get comfortable.  This posting is our first here with the new system.

 

Back to Sunny and Warm Arizona

This is just a quick note to advise our readers that our trip back to Minnesota for a delayed Christmas went as planned.  We got to see all our kids and all of our granddaughters, Paige’s sister and Ron, and her mother, but only a few family friends since time was short.

 

We got just enough winter during that week, and returned to Arizona yesterday.  It is about 70 degrees warmer here.  We went to Quartzsite today to get ideas for our next motorhome, but didn’t see anything better than what we currently have.

 

We took a look at the new Toshiba laptop with Windows8, but got too frustrated to continue.  This note is being added using the old HP with Windows7.

 

Wednesday, Wednesday, Wednesday

Last Wednesday we arrived at Paula’s compound in Glendale AZ; this Wednesday we will be flying back to Minnesota for our delayed Christmas with our family; Wednesday of next week we will have a flight back to Arizona.

 

Here at Paula and Tom’s place things are busy, which is normal.  Niece Tomie was home from college for Christmas break until yesterday when she returned to USC to complete her Senior year.  Uncle Phil and Elsie are here in their motorhome also.  There’s always a lot of activity around. 

 

We are having an issue with our blogging system no longer accepting photos, since our system is getting out of date.  We had planned to look into buying a new computer system, so now it has become a higher priority.  We’ll pick up our new computer tomorrow, but since we’ll be leaving for Minneapolis on Wednesday, we won’t get it up and running for a week or so.

 

On Saturday, we participated in a pot luck luncheon for any Nomads in the area.  Nearly sixty people were there, including some we haven’t seen for years.  It was good to see them again.

 

The big news this week is that Paige’s mom got the call that there is an apartment available for her at The Pines senior housing in Duluth.  It’s a 2 bedroom/2 bath unit on the third floor with a deck looking towards Lake Superior.  She will also have an indoor parking spot.  Pam and Ron went to Duluth this past weekend to look it over also and sent pictures to us.  It looks great and mom is real excited.  She plans on moving in early in February with Paula’s help.  We’ll work on cleaning the house and getting that ready for sale this spring.

 

Today we will clean up some loose ends and begin packing some things for the trip north.

Anxious to see the granddaughters!

Into the Desert

We left southern California on Thursday without going through the metro Los Angeles traffic by staying north of the San Gabriel Mountains.  However, this was not a scenic drive.  We followed Interstate 40 across the Mojave Desert to Needles, which often has the highest summer temperatures in the nation and then crossed the Colorado River into Arizona.

Our plan was to spend three days in Lake Havasu City with Bob’s cousin Darlene, like we did two years ago.  The first part went as planned with some shopping, sightseeing, and a couple of “happy hour” gatherings with her neighbors.  It was good to see Darlene again! 

A respiratory infection hit Paige on the third day, which had us find the local Urgent Care facility, and extend our stay to a fourth day for further recuperation.

 

After Sunday’s round of medications and sleeping, we headed toward Phoenix along US93, also called the Joshua Forest Parkway, which is quite isolated and scenic.  We stopped for 2 more nights of recuperation at another Escapees park, this one in Congress Arizona.

 

We plan to get to Paula’s tomorrow mid-day.  It will be good to see everyone there!

Happy New Year

The Escapees RV club has really kept us busy and entertained while we have been here in the northern Los Angeles area.  Since we last posted on Saturday, we have been to many different activities. 

 

We spent most of Sunday at a horse arena operated by the City of Los Angeles where many of the units in Wednesday’s parade were able to perform with their horses.  They showed off lots of horses, costumes, carriages, and performed many acts.  This was a real horse-lovers dream event.  One highlight was the performance by the Budweiser Clydesdales.  The 8-horse team turned 90 degrees to its wagon a couple of times to show sharp turns in the beer delivery business.  After the parade, they are off to a secret location to film their Super Bowl ad.

 

Monday’s activities were split between a full morning at BandFest and a quiet afternoon at the Huntington Library.  Bandfest is the chance for the high school marching bands to perform their routines on a football field.  Fifteen high schools and the host Community College bands played during shows over a few days.  We saw 5 schools including the only marching band in Alaska from Palmer. 

 

The Huntington was a showplace of art, horticulture gardens, and a historic library of English literature.

 

Tuesday was a quiet “Free Day” allowing us to do whatever we’d like and preparing for our New Years Eve party.  Now keep in mind that most of us are retired seniors, and we had to leave early for the parade on Wednesday.  As a result, the New Year was rung in at 12:00 midnight EASTERN time (based on TV’s NYC’s Times Square broadcast).

 

On New Years Day the bus left our RV park at 5:00 AM, allowing an hour to drive about 40 miles to a large parking lot.  We found our seats around 6:30 a.m. and waited for the parade to start at 8.  People watching was very interesting while we waited.  The parade was wonderful!  The weather perfect – sunny and in the 60’s.  Here is the band from Rosemont MN

         

We viewed the parade with 700,000 of our closest friends!  Yes, it was packed – but we got in and out surprisingly fast.  Obviously, they have done this before.

           

After the parade, the floats are all taken to a park nearby where they are on display for 3 days.  We went to the park for the afternoon and walked around there in the 70 degree weather and took more pictures.

         

 

Last night was our final dinner with everyone on the tour.  We had another great catered meal of barbecued tri tip, lemon chicken and other fixins with carrot cake for dessert – yum!  We met lots of new people, including some other Nomads who were here, and got to spend time with Dave and Nancy.  All in all, a good 6 days!  Now is our time to recuperate.

Lots of Rose Parade Activities

Friday was a driving day: a little over 200 miles, from the foothills of the Sierras back into the hazy air of the central valley.  Here are two photos taken about 15 minutes apart.  In the valley:

After climbing the “Grapevine Hill” on Interstate 5. 

Isn't the sky color a nicer blue?

 

The road got better, and the litter alongside the road decreased somewhat as we left the valley, but the most noticeable change was the clarity of the air.  We aren’t into the LA basin yet, which has the dirty air reputation.  We have stopped for the week just outside the metro area, in a fringe suburb called Castaic.  Our tour group is made up of about 55 individuals from all over the country.  We had an initial meeting Friday night and got our updated agendas. 

 

Saturday morning was spent at a warehouse in Azusa where 5 floats are being prepared.  If you watch the Rose Parade on New Years Day, watch for NBC’s “The Voice”, the 2 football teams (Stanford and Michigan State), plus China Air and Indonesia.  All visible surfaces must be covered with natural material.  We saw people using parsley for the green of the field on the football float, pinto beans for an animal, half a hot red pepper for a plant, and halved brussel sprouts were being prepared for use somewhere.  Paige and Nancy glued shredded coconut flakes to make the yard lines on the Michigan State float. 

 

Meanwhile, Bob helped to unwrap over 30,000 red carnations whose petals will be the red color on “The Voice”.

 

 

The floats are operated by a driver in the rear, who is assisted by a spotter in the front.  There is not much room for either

 

Lots of work remains to be done before float judging takes place next week.  It’s hard to believe they’ll have everything done in time – there was so much detailed work to be done!  They’ll start working 24 hrs a day soon.

 

Yet Another “Small World” Story

When we planned our trip from Reno to Los Angeles, we knew it would involve two days of driving, so we planned to split them up at the Escapees Park of the Sierras, near Coarsegold California with a couple of days off where we planned nothing at all except recuperating from Amazon and spending Christmas.

 

Wednesday we found a pleasant resort-type restaurant for an early dinner then a Christmas Eve service at a small church in Coarsegold.  With only one exception, all of the music was performed by someone under the age of 25, and they all did quite well.

 

After phone calls with all the kids and grandkids, we spent Christmas day wandering through Yosemite National Park, since we were so close and neither of us had been there before.  Water flow is low this time of year, but there is still a little flow over the waterfalls:

 

The granite cliffs are so dramatic that our photos can’t do them justice:

          

 

We made it back to the park with enough time to rest up before a group dinner.  We were directed to a table where a couple of other non-residents were already seated.  As we walked up to the table we recognized Dave and Nancy Hilmo, who are also former Minnesotans, also Nomads, also recuperating Amazonians, and also planning to go to the Escapees Rose Parade Tour later this week.  We are starting to get used to some “small world” coincidences, but this many all at the same time is something else.  They spend their summers at Dakota County’s Lebanon Hills park in Minnesota, where we first met them.  We have not yet worked a Nomads project with them, but we have met at other activities a couple of times.  They had worked for Amazon in Kentucky last year and had been planning on working in Nevada but had the opportunity to help set up a new Amazon Fullfillment Center in Tracy California (near San Francisco) which just opened.  We had a great time talking about all the things we have in common with them and look forward to seeing them again at the Rose Parade Tour.

 

We plan to stick around here for Thursday, de-Christmasing, laundry, cleaning, then resting, and meet up with the other Tournament of Roses tour people outside of Los Angeles later on Friday.