Turning the Corner, Moving Down the Road, Joining Our Friends

On Wednesday, Jan. 3^rd I knew immediately that I had a much better sleep. A few times through the early morning hours I woke from dreams and realized that I had been sleeping soundly with hardly any coughing. Yes! Hand pumps in the air! Last night before crawling into bed, I slathered Vicks on the bottoms of my feet and slipped little lightweight socks on.

This was Clemson looking after me before going to bed on Tuesday night

I believe I had a couple of small bouts of coughing but nothing compared to the previous night and day. I knew I’d turned a corner with this cold. I was up out of bed at 7:30 and directly into the shower. That felt great and being it would be our last one with hook ups for a while, I made it last long and hot. As I got out and dried off, I heard Bill and Clem getting up too.

The sun is making an appearance

And there was a possibility for some clearing

Bill took my lead and had his shower right away too. With them out of the way and our bodies fresh as a daisy (!) we had breakfast. Bill opted for his cereal and I had a couple of pieces of toast and finished off the last of Rob and Pat’s homemade strawberry jam. Yum, maybe when I return their jar, I’ll get a refill! I really shouldn’t be so lazy and just make my own. Anyway, we enjoyed it.

It was time to pack up. Today was moving day. Not far, just 43 miles further west into California PT. Pilot Knob campground is in Winterhaven, Ca but they stay on MT since most of their guests travel back and forth to Yuma, Az. While Bill was in the shower, I did take a walk around the park one last time and it felt great to feel well enough to do that.

I hope someone else picks up where I left off instead of abandoning like I had to

If you remember from Bill’s post at clembillpat.blogspot.ca, he had ordered 2 fuses for our inverter from BlueSea. We knew they would be shipped by Dec. 27^th but had no idea of when we’d receive them. The holidays mixed in there added to our concern that maybe they wouldn’t arrive until after we’d left Pilot Knob. I popped in this morning and thank goodness, the box arrived yesterday.

Yay, the parcel arrived just on time!

After saying our goodbyes to Roger and Sue, we were all hooked up and ready to pull out by 10 am. 

Roger and Sue were also getting ready to pull out

We were ready to pull out too

It was weird to leave our site at that time and arrive at our new destination in Holtville LTVA Hot Springs at 9:40 am. It was a nice easy drive, following Suzie in their car who was following George in their coach. 

And we got ourselves a mini convoy

Traffic was quite light this morning so a nice drive

We stopped at the gate and paid our $40 entrance fee for 2 weeks. This would get us into any LTVA up to 14 days so covers us for a time at Quatrzsite as well.

We had a bit of a challenge finding the best spot to park, it seemed quite congested in here, close to the Dryden group. We don’t want to be too close anyway as Bill is always concerned about our generator bothering nearby campers. I have long past stopped worrying about everybody else. There is the likelihood for boon dockers to use their Gennys in the evenings especially. It should be expected that some of us don’t have the quiet Yamaha or Honda brand.

Bill, Suzie and George sign up for 2 week passes

With that in mind and taking into consideration the pots of loose deep sand around some spots, we finally settled at the first spot I’d chosen. We are respectful of others and if we have to run the generator at night, it will always be shut down by 10 pm. I’m curious to see how many others are running Gennys tonight and maybe that will put Bill’s mind at ease. One day we’ll have a quiet generator too.

When the house moves, so does Clemson
He is getting better, not quite so fidgety when we pack up

We got everything set up by 11:30, even our solar panels tilted and the satellite dish set up. By this time, both Bill and I were feeling a bit drained. It has been a hectic morning. 

Bill tilts our panels

All set up

So, we sat and read for a bit and Bill dropped off into a doze. At noon, I was feeling peckish so heated up some chicken with rice soup for lunch.

I like mine with Saltines and then a few crackers on the side with butter and peanut butter. A clementine and some cheese filled the cracks. They just go together for me. Bill had his with a peanut butter and cheese sandwich on the side. Once we got dishes cleaned up I was able to get my post started. I felt that it was time to take a walk.

the road to more campsites goes way back
If we weren't with a group, this is where we'd go

So, Clemson and I set off. I can never call what we do when we take Clemmy out, a walk. It is everything but. As you know, they need to sniff, stop and lift a leg, pop a squat and then repeat, repeat, repeat. It isn’t enjoyable and maybe that is our fault from the very beginning. Not teaching him how to walk properly. Needless to say, we don’t walk for very long and I’m anxious to get back with him.

And the sky never improved BUT it was enough to charge our inverter

When I came back, we settled in our recliners with our books. The afternoon went by smoothly and it was about 4:15 or so when we heard Roland and Lori returning from their bike ride. That meant it must be Happy Hour. Neither of us was up to spending a lot of time sitting around with a group of people, but we didn’t want to be rude either. We took Clemson for a walk over to the gathering and chatted for half hour if that before coming back to start supper.

We've reached the age where we now share a large steak

Bill lit the barbecue and I had the steak and potatoes ready to grill. It feels like a nice evening, the wind has died down and the temperature is still resting around 67F at 5 pm PT. Lori has generously offered her unlimited wifi to me to download pictures and post to my blog so it will depend on how dark it gets when I’m ready to publish, whether I walk over to their rv to take advantage. I might wait until morning. But it is a very nice offer to help us save on our data usage for the month.

Just the right amount of food

This has been a good day. We’ve packed up, picked up and moved locations. When you consider we can stay in LTVA’s (long term visitor area) for 2 weeks for $40, that is less than $3/night. 

Now some pictures of our short drive today
The 4 engine train is for you Dad

I’m hoping that I can get into the Hot springs across the highway before we leave this time. We’ll see how it goes. 

The dunes are so interesting

Egypt? Me thinks not!

Tomorrow we have plans to go to El Centro in the morning so hoping we get another good night’s sleep!

And the All American Canal runs along Hwy 8

Supper turned out delicious. I steamed my asparagus inside and Bill grilled the steak, potatoes and his corn on the Weber. We had eaten by 5:45 and dishes were cleaned up by 6:15. We don’t dilly dally after a meal, I guess anxious to get on with the evening and our books.

I was amazed at the number of construction vehicles working on this
secondary E. Ewen Highway (I think it was called)
What a dirty job this driver had!

I prepared my pictures for this blog tonight and now it is morning and I bundled up and walked over to Lori’s rv. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find their router let alone connect so walked back and posted the blog at home. No worries, don’t fret Lori. I’m getting pretty good at posting it quickly now.

Crossing the canal means we are just a hop away from our LTVA

I hope you’ve had a good day and done things that you’ve wanted to do. Thank you for reading today. Feel free to leave a comment, I love reading them!