Today’s weather was a slightly less windy version of Friday’s. It was a mostly sunny day with a high temperature around seventy. Tomorrow is forecast to begin a warming trend that will have the temperature in the nineties by the end of the week.
Fruit trees in the RV park with the mountains to the north.
This is the end of my first week of waiting out the COVID-19 pandemic. During the week three of my next four stops have been closed, so the decision is looking pretty good right now. The campgrounds at the Grand Canyon and Glen Canyon have closed. The Grand Canyon National Park is still open to day use visitors, but the local authorities are complaining about the danger associated with the high number of visitors. Monument Valley in the Navajo Nation is also closed to visitors. The private campground I was planning to stay at is currently closed. As I anticipated pretty much my entire month of April has fallen apart. I’m glad I made the decision to come here.
Arizona still hasn’t shutdown the state to the extent that some locations have. I read an article that ranked the states by reaction to the crises. Arizona was in the middle of the pack, but I expect it to change at any time. As the number of cases climb, the pressure to apply more stringent measures will increase. It is hard to know what the appropriate level of restrictions should be. When life is in the equation, the decision needs to be weighted heavily in favor of preserving it. I intend to stay as isolated as possible over the next few weeks.
Wind was the operative word in today’s weather. It blew hard and gusted even harder. Although the sun was out most of the day, the temperature only got into the high sixties.
Mountains on the north side of the valley.
As the end of the month gets closer, many of the snowbirds in the RV park have packed up and headed home. These are the folks that are keeping to their schedule despite all of the issues with travel associated with the COVID-19 virus. I learned when I arrived last week that others had departed early and some had extended rather than heading into potentially worse areas of the country. There are also many RVs with Texas and South Dakota license plates which usually means they are full timers like me.
Today was another day in my new routine of a couple of walks around the park during the day with reading and TV in between. I will probably do a little touring of the area from the inside of my car over the next few days and weeks as a diversion. I might even find an area to hike that allows for “social distancing” while hiking. Also on my list during this period of forced downtime are a few maintenance tasks around the RV. I’m taking it one day at a time.
The forecast drop in temperature finally arrived today. The mostly cloudy day only allowed the temperature to reach seventy. Late in the day the cloud cover broke for a little while. It allowed for a pretty desert sunset.
Tonight’s sunset
Today wasn’t a very exciting day. I lingered over breakfast with a second cup of coffee with the TV on. It was almost noon before it was warm enough to open the door to the outside. Even then I didn’t leave my RV home until much later.
Today was a two walk around the park day. Going up and down each of the roads and around the perimeter I get more than a mile of exercise, but it isn’t very interesting. I ventured out the main gate for hundred feet or so. That is a walk for another day. It is a very sparsely settled neighborhood.
Wildflowers along the entrance road to the RV park.
Today began sunny and calm. It got windy during the middle of the day and ended with cloud cover. The temperature made it to the upper half of the seventies. Tomorrow is forecast to be up to ten degrees cooler.
Interesting afternoon cloud cover.
With the exception of my move on Saturday, I’ve been pretty much staying around my RV home for the last two weeks. There isn’t a stay at home order in Arizona yet, but it only makes sense to isolate as much as possible. On my last trip out for groceries fifteen days ago, I stocked up on food fairly heavily. Since then I’ve only used up the things that have a short life. I was out of bread, milk and Orange Juice. Today was the day to replenish and extend my supplies before a more restrictive edict is established.
The experience was not what I expected. From the news broadcasts I expected to find ghost towns in some areas and waiting lines in other areas. Traffic on the interstate was a level I’d judge as normal. On the surface streets of Casa Grande traffic was light, but many businesses seemed to be open. On the surface Walmart appeared very normal. The parking lot had a normal level of cars and nothing appeared different as you entered the store. The produce and bakery sections of the store were fully stocked and had an expected level of customers roaming around. It wasn’t until you started to work deeper into the store that differences became visible.
The meat section had been well picked over. I found meat to buy, but not in the size packages I would normally purchase. For example, instead of a pound of ground beef I had to buy a two and a half pound package. As a positive consequence my freezer will get filled with a few more days of food so I can stay isolated longer.
The can goods, pasta and baking supply aisles were in bad shape. There were a few odd items in the middle of long empty shelves. Surprisingly I found some things I could use in those odd items. An unknown brand of bow tie pasta found it’s way into my shopping cart along with a jar of Prego spaghetti sauce. Neither would be my choice in normal times.
The dairy section had plenty of milk and eggs. The butter substitutes were a bit picked over, but I managed to find a large container of my favorite brand. In the Orange Juice section I had to buy the good stuff. They were out of the Walmart generic OJ I’ve been buying lately.
Overall the selection of food wasn’t bad. I got some form of everything I had on my mental list. The store was busy with people of all ages. There really wasn’t much obvious concern about the virus. Most, but not all, of the Walmart employees were wearing plastic gloves. Concern about maintaining distance was not apparent. I was in the checkout line behind one multiple family shopping party with about four mothers and half a dozen or more kids. It was a mob that I kept my distance from, but the poor checkout person was surrounded. Later, in the parking lot, I saw them all climbing into one van. Maybe they don’t have a choice, but probably they just don’t get it.
Top down view of a cactus in bloom.
I think I’m through with big stores for a few weeks. The convenience store at the intestate on-ramp near my RV park seems like a better choice for the few things I’ll need during this period of isolation.
Once again I misunderstood the weather forecast. Today was another great day very similar to yesterday. The high temperature was in the mid seventies with lots of sun and not to much wind. The cooler cloudier weather in the forecast is later in the week.
I got a slow start to the day, but with nothing planned it played into a nice lazy day. I spent the day reading interspersed with a couple of walks around the RV park. The TV is on all the time, but I’ve stopped listening to most of the virus coverage. The conflicting information and the focus on the negative needs to be taken in small doses. I watch the first few minutes of the local and national evening news to get an update, then go back to entertainment broadcasts.
Train with double high containers heading east outside the RV park wall.
This park is in the classic RV park location. It’s between the Interstate highway and the train tracks. At my request my site is located well away from the highway. It turns out to be closer to the train tracks. During the day you don’t really notice either the highway or the trains. I’ve looked out my window a couple of times to be surprised by a passing train a few hundred yards away. At night it’s another story. The truck traffic on Interstate 10 is a steady coming and going noise from both directions. Every now and then the trains join the noise symphony. Loud train whistles for the grade crossings announce the arrival of each train. The rumbling noise of the train moving along the tracks is even accompany by actual vibration inside my RV home. All of this is more of a diversion than an annoyance. It is interesting to listen to as I wait for sleep to arrive.
Today’s weather was nearly perfect. It was a bright sunny day with a light breeze. The temperature reached the mid seventies. The forecast for the rest of the week is not as good. Highs only in the sixties are possible the next few days.
For the second day in a row I was up before 5AM. Despite the uncertainty of my immediate travel plans, I’m still working on reservations for next winter in Florida. Yesterday morning I tried to reserve one of 4 available campsites at one of the popular Florida state parks for the end of February without success. This morning there was only one available site at that park so I attempted to reserve a site at another state park nearby. This one had three available sites, but is usually less popular. I struck out again. When I pushed the enter key at 5AM, it came back with “no inventory available”.
It looks like there will be more sites to choose from later in the week at both state parks. Once I get a reservation for two weeks at one of the parks, I’ll work on filling in the gap from my last reservation. I will probably need to reserve an RV site at a commercial campground away from the coasts. Making and juggling reservations is my least favorite activity associated with this life style. On a positive note, I did manage to cancel and get a full refund from the state Arizona for my next two week stay at the Dead Horse Ranch State park near Cottonwood that I’m not going to use.
After my failed attempt at making a reservation for next winter I went back to bed. Once I did get up, my day wasn’t very interesting. I took a couple of walks around the RV park and spent most of the day reading an Ebook with the TV on for background noise.
There was a high layer of clouds that filtered and blocked the sun today. It kept the temperature in the low seventies. Overall a very nice weather day.
Cactus in bloom.
I worked on getting settled in for a long stay as a I wait out the COVID-19 virus social disruption. Hopefully nothing will require me to move until at least the middle of May. It is that level of certainty about were I will be parked that caused me to stop traveling and settle here for awhile. I’ve got the tires that face the sun covered, my bicycle locked to the ladder on the back of my RV home and have got the inside setup for a long stay.
Many of the winter residents of this park have returned home. Most of the people still here are full time travelers like me or people who have decided to stay until things stabilize a bit. After I make the general assumption that most of the South Dakota, Texas and Florida license tags belong to full time RVers there are plenty of people from other states and provinces a long way away. The people across the street are from New York and down the road a bit is an RV from Alaska. It looks like about half the three hundred and fifty sites are occupied.
All of the buildings and recreation facilities are closed. The planned activities and events have been canceled. The only open areas are the office and the laundry. I’m not sure what I think about using the laundry. My dirty clothes are accumulating, but I wonder about laundry facilities in good times. Right now I’m going to watch how busy the laundry gets before I make up my mind. There is a reason I carry too many clothes.
Today I pulled the plug on my current travel plans. I’ve taken a site at an RV park in Eloy Arizona for the next two months. It is the same park I spent the month of March in during 2017. It is about an hour south of Phoenix along Interstate 10 south of Casa Grande Arizona.
Site 48 at the Silverado RV Resort in Eloy AZ.
My decision was driven by a desire to be ahead of the ever changing restrictions imposed by the government to fight the COVID-19 virus. I’ve been watching the news with respect to my next month of destinations closely. I probably would have been OK at my next stop at the Dead Horse Ranch State Park near Cottonwood AZ. This state currently seems committed to keeping the parks open for camping, but it could change at any moment. My options in the Cottonwood and Sedona area are not as plentiful as in Phoenix and points south, so it would be a risk.
My second stop in April was a week at the Grand Canyon. The park is still open, but the buildings and exhibits aren’t. The bus transportation has been stopped, but car traffic has not been opened into all areas of the national park. The Trailer Village campground is only open to fully self contained RVs with existing reservations. I meet the criteria, but who knows how long the current condition will apply.
After the Grand Canyon I was heading to Monument Valley on the Navajo Indian Nation. All access to Navajo tourist attractions has been suspended. I still have a viable campsite in the middle of the area, but what I could see would be very limited. I also understand the cell phone access and internet are not good at the campground. I’m not sure this is the time to be that disconnected.
The next stop was going to be at the Glen Canyon Lake Powell National Recreation Area. Once again the campground is open, but buildings are closed and tours aren’t running. The government and health officials in nearby Page Arizona have started to raise concerns about all the tourists in the area. Similar concerns last week by Moab Utah officials was followed a couple of days later by public and private campgrounds and hotels being ordered to close. This is probably a counter measure to the large number of people heading for Arches and Canyon Lands National Parks both of which remain open to a limited extent.
At the beginning of May I was planning to visit Zion National Park again. The campground is not the issue since my plan was to stay in Hurricane UT a couple of dozen miles west of the park. The problem is they’ve shut the buses down in the park, so it is one big traffic jam.
The next significant stop on my travel plan is Yellowstone NP at the end of May. I still hope to make that one, but time will tell. For now, I’ve got a site in a good size RV park that should be isolated from the changing government requirements intended to keep the health care system from getting overloaded.
The day began sunny and cool. The temperature managed to reach the high sixties before a layer of clouds arrived to slow the increasing warmth. It also managed to obscure any chance at a sunset.
All of my days this week have begun with the President’s task force briefing on the TV. It’s on at 9AM in this time zone. In so many ways it is a depressing start to the day. They provide one or two new pieces of information and over an hour of low value “discussion”. Not long after they get finished the 11AM local news come on and repeats the information with a twist based on the “discussion”. I’m not sure if the reporters are committed to providing information or providing tabloid level sensationalized “news”. As I said, I find it depressing.
To get away from the TV, I took another short hike today. There were fewer people on the trails, but the day use area of the state park still had lots of cars. Perhaps many people were on different trails. The wildflowers are still pretty, but the yellow brittle bush blossoms are starting to fade. The mount of yellow is going down.
There was a great deal of turnover in the campground today. Most people stop here for one to three days. They are from all over the United States and Canada. Tonight there was even a foreign language speaking family in a rental motorhome on a site nearby. I don’t know if they are US residents, stranded travelers or something else. They just stood out as unusual in these times. One aspect of social distancing in the campground is that conversations between campers are getting more limited and are taking place at closer shouting distance than conversation distance. I’ve exchange hellos with a few neighbors, but not much else.
Yesterday’s storm continued into the night. Eventually the wind let up, but light rain continued off and on into the morning. The trails and little washes in the area showed the signs of heavy runoff. In the metro Phoenix area many instances of downed trees and flooding were reported. To the north in the Flagstaff area more than half a foot of snow fell. By noon the sun was peaking through scattered clouds.
Some snow is visible on the mountains to the north.
The temperature just barely broke the sixty degree mark today. I bundled up to go out and explore the campground. At first I had to stay on the paved roads, but by late afternoon the trails were dry enough to walk on without doing the long jump over puddles every few feet. There were a lot of bird out late today. The wind was gentle enough that the birds voices could be heard clearly. I managed to get a few pictures of them, but I still haven’t gotten any pictures of the Cactus Wrens going into the nests in the big saguaros.
The rabbits in this park seem to be very skittish. I see them on just about every walk, but they don’t stand still long enough to pose for a picture. Usually, they are running for cover before I’m thirty feet away. Tonight I got one that was a little more photogenic. I was within twenty feet when it stopped and watched me play statue. At least I got a picture.
By the end of the day three was a nice sunset. I keep trying to find new places to take sunset pictures. It is a bit of a game to get a different cactus in the foreground of the pictures.
Rob's Rambling Road Trip 