Monday April 3rd 2017

Temperature and sunshine wise, today was a lot like yesterday. The difference was the wind. At times today the wind was so strong you couldn’t comfortably be outside. On one attempt at a walk around the campground, I was holding my hat with one hand, leaning into the wind and trying to walk in a straight line. I spent most of the day inside.

Cactus in a line

I spent the day on the computer and phone working on travel and sightseeing plans. I have all of my campground reservations through the 24th of the month when I leave Las Vegas. To a certain extent, I have to make commitments sequentially. I’m now working on the Reno, Lake Tahoe area after Las Vegas. I’m going to take a chance on the stops between the two locations. If I don’t find suitable campgrounds, there is always a parking lot for the night. In the Reno NV area I have narrowed the search to two campgrounds, but they are expensive. I need to be sure before I lock in the location.

After the Reno area I will move on to Twin Falls Idaho for a week or so that will include the Memorial Day weekend. Right now places that allow you to look at their booking online have plenty of room over the holiday. These may be famous last words, but I think I still have time to commit to a location for the holiday. At the beginning of June, I will make my way to the Missoula Montana area for a few days, then up to the West Glacier National Park area. How long I spend in the southern Montana area depends on where and when I book my Glacier National Park stay. I started making lists of things to do in each area to figure out how long I can stay before I run out of interesting things. The campgrounds in this area are expensive and well booked already. Ninety dollars a night is more than I want to pay. I’ll trade distance from the park for cost to mitigate the expense.

From Glacier NP I’ll have a little over 3 weeks to get to the Salt Lake City area. I spent time researching that route and possible stops as well. After my stay in the Salt Lake City area I’ll move up into the Park City area for the first half of August. The second half of August I’ll work my way south toward the lower part of Utah. September will be the National parks of Utah. October will probably be the Grand Canyon area of Arizona and possibly the Monument Valley area of southeastern Utah. All of the options keep me from committing. I also believe that what I miss this time around I’ll catch next time.

In addition to all of these planning activities I’ve been working on a couple of other planning items. I’m trying to identify the shows I want to see in Vegas and the best way to buy the tickets. The cheapest way is the same day ticket sales on the strip, but that is not always the best way. The seats you get aren’t always optimal.

The other planning activity is for next March. The booking window for the Florida State Parks is 11 months. The campsites in some of the parks get book very quickly. I’ve already missed the two weeks starting on March 1st, 2nd and 3rd. I’m trying to figure out when the daily booking window opens. It isn’t midnight eastern and it is before 10am eastern. Hopefully, I’ll figure it out before the month is gone.

One last cactus picture. I’m moving out of the area they are predominate. There is a bird on the left arm.

Tomorrow I resume my march across the state of Arizona. I’m going about 80 miles to Gila Bend so I can reach the River Island State Park on the Colorado River Wednesday. I could only get two nights there so I’ll move up to the Kingman AZ area for the weekend.