Hike in the Casa Grande Mountain Park

We got together with Debbie and Rick Chaffee today at their new lovely home in Arizona City and we decided to go for a little hike in the Casa Grande Mountain Park which is quite close to their place.

All of course except for Rick who is still healing from a bad fall last summer, we hope he gets better soon so he can join us next time. The desert is a little green because we have had a couple small rain showers and the flowers are just starting to bloom, it is an exciting time of year as the desert really starts to come alive.





The mountain was full of trails and so we just headed off and followed the path.



Ruby was very well behaved and walked along right beside Debbie.







A small desert flower in the middle of the rocks

When we got back Rick had prepared us lunch and it was delicious, this is the new kitchen with

beautiful new appliances.

Feb 12

So I am busy trying to get the computer to work and find the thousand of pictures and documents that have disappeared but having no luck so decided to take a break and look at facebook and up pops a message from Rons Auntie Anita, they are all over at Yuma Lakes and the jam session starts at 1pm, tell Ronnie to bring his guitar and get over.

So that is what we did and much fun was had by all.

Here is Ron preforming with some of the other talent.

Right behind him comes his cousin Alva, she does lots of fun entertaining songs.

Back to Adrian and Alva's for happy hour and of course dinner, Alva would not hear of us not staying.

Alva playing one of her favorites, the Snowbird song, while Vern (Diane's husband, Diane is Auntie Simones daughter) watches on.


Here we have from left to right Adrian, cousin, Diane, and good friend Tina.

Auntie Anita, always looks so good, she and Uncle Art had just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary.

Ron playing his heart out.

We have now moved on to Casa Grande, where we will spend the next two weeks. Had Rick and Debbie Chaffee over for spagetti dinner at the Clubhouse , it was good to see them again.

Castle Dome Mine

Feb 10th.
We had a lovely day out today with Reink, Lona and Edla, as we all went out to the Historic Castle Dome Mine just northeast of Yuma. This whole area was very rich in silver, there were many mines in the area.



The fellow who is creating the recreation is doing an excellent job and has been gathering everything he could get that has been abandoned from around the area.

He has made a small townsite of the remains, even though initially it was spread out over 10 miles.

Here is Ron, trying to get a drink out of the bartender.

Look here are some tea towels just like the ones my grannie made for me.

The church and behind it Castle Mountain.

This is the picture when you look through the window in the church, isn't it wonderful.

Ron found some young boys working an old grinding wheel so he decided to put them to work and sharpened his pocket knife.

Look at the size of that saguaro

Lona and her mother Edla, Edla has come all the way from Saskatchewan to visit for awhile.

We had ourselves a picnic and then went for happy hour at Lyle and Carol's new place in the Foothills.

Great day.

The Jeep Trail

Feb 8th.

This was our last day out geocaching with Jane and Clyde out on the Barry Goldwater, the road if you can call it a road was tough and I was worried at times but we made it through the pass. The caches were some of the toughest we had found and we only found about 23 of the 30 hidden.

So have a look, you are looking right at it, can you see the cache, pretty hard, it is a little cylinder hanging right in front of your eyes but they camoed it and it was hard to find.


The Jeep trail was through a new pass for us and it had wonderful scenery.


The pictures do not seem to show how tough the road was, many times I walked.


Here is something the military left behind, don't touch.

It was a beautiful day in front of us but we turned behind and saw the big black clouds coming in, we had to hurry out as not to get caught in it and had over an hour to go.

Beautiful Pass

The sun was shining on one side but it looked ugly behind, it never did rain that day.

Can you imagine some silly bird making a nest in the saguaro.

Just about home, here we are just getting into Yuma.

Dome Valley Sand Drags

Well we have had computer problems for a couple weeks now but hopefully we are rid of the horrible virus we got and can back to routine. Sorry Curtis the only pictures that were really damaged were the ones of the drags but here a just a couple I could save.

It was a great day, the races were fun to watch but they were over in seconds and then they prepared the track again. We stood down from the finish line so we did not get covered in dirt and it was not quite so noisy.

They raced everything from top fuel to ATV's and even trucks.

Oh Wasn't that a party

Oh what a party......

Could it have been some whiskey.....

Maybe it was some gin......

No.... it was the 3 or 4 6 packs, looks at the shape he's in.......

Yes it was a great party.

Yesterday friends George and Grace Harris from Edmonton invited us to the Yuma Palms where they stay,it was the weekly(yes weekly) burger and beer bash....for 3.50 you get a burger and as much beer as you can drink for three hours. Most weeks(like yesterday) it is only for park residents and their guests, last week it was open to the public, they had 3200 people that weekend.

Here are a few shots of all the people and our table yesterday.

They set up two tables at either end of the club house and just continually pumped beer.

The sign says limit yourself to one in each hand, that is what Grace had.

The park is very upscale and we were in awe, they have two pools, this is the lap pool, another fun

pools sits in behind it, as well as two big hot tubs.

There is every sort of craft room, pottery, jewelery etc. one would never get bored at this park, even dance lessons.

Today they had a live band and lots of people danced, the park also has a big hall and bring in alot of good entertainment.

But the beer flowed and flowed and the empty glasses on the tables grew tall.

Much fun was had by all, here is left to right, Reink Reinks, Grace Harris and Ron Carlson.

Thanks George and Gracie for the wonderful day, I did manage to get him home in one piece, he fell down

the coach steps once but no harm. Ha ha what a day.

Geocaching in February

Well we have had an internet problem but we fixed it, we put that absolutely useless Telus aircard in the drawer and bought a Verizon Hot Spot, it works so much faster and allows 5 GB a month, I think I will be happy.

So yesterday we went back geocaching and I wanted to show you how much effort the people who have placed some the caches go to, they can be so much fun.

One series is put out by Mr. Peanuts and he has done a lot of work.

The one below was called Mr. Peanuts Jackpot and when we found the spot we found this little handmade slot machine with the log hidden inside.

The next needs no explaination, called the Yuma Jail, we found puzzles, decoys, chirps, so much fun out here in the desert.



Yes there was one in this lovely saguaro, but what a scene

Look a whole family of saguaros

Now if you look really close you will see the cache, it was called Chest 6 in a little series of 10 chests set in about a two mile stretch. I will give you a hint it was bright red and still took us a few minutes to find it.

Here is where a helicopter had crashed many years before but some of the carnage still remains, Clyde found the cache.

Now this is not a cache and before we got to go on the range we had to sign a form saying we would not touch military devices found out there.

Clyde and Jane had a special day today as they have found their 2000th cache, we have found 275, we have a ways to go.

Ron found a good one, it was called the Ark and yes he found it stuck on a rocky hillside like where the ark was supposed to have landed, quite funny.

Looking out over the desert, it was such a good day, we are certainly enjoying the area.

So after a very good day we went back to our favorite little pub in Welton, where we had a great supper and live music with a bunch of local snowbirds having a fun evening, perfect way to end the day.