After spending the day at Meteor Crater, I headed back east on I-40 to Winslow, then south on US-87. This route took me through some small towns up in the forested areas of Arizona. I stopped in Pine at a small RV park but couldn’t find anywhere to park. It was designed in the 1950’s when RV’s were all tiny. And it really looked it. I went on to Payson. Stayed the night at a WalMart. I would have rather stayed in Pine but, oh well.
Next morning I headed on to Phoenix. There was a good reason for this portion of the trip, the Seattle Seahawks were going to be playing the Cardinals in Tempe at Sun Devil Stadium. There were 8 or 9 RV parks nearby the stadium so I felt confident that I could find a place to stay. WRONG!
The parks in and around Tempe are all very expensive. Because of the taxes mostly. Anyway, I had a week to kill before the game so I headed west on I-10 to a little wide place in the road named Tonopah. There is a large RV park there with reasonable weekly rates of $125 so I spend the next week hanging out there.
Here’s a shot of sunset just outside my front windows…
I arrived here on Tuesday. I’d already bought my game tickets a few days earlier, only $52 bucks! On game Sunday, I drove the rig over to the stadium and found that they want $40 to park an RV. Wow! Buttheads.
Here’s a view of the stadium.
The field…
We win!!!!!
On the following Tuesday, I head on over to Quartzsite, Arizona. I spend the night at a small campground, do my internet cruising, clean up the house, jump in the drivers seat, start up and drive away…with the water hose and electrical cable dragging behind. The owner yells at me a little, but gets the water turned off quickly, then repairs it all in less then an hour. Meanwhile, I’m fixing my electrical box that got ripped out of the basement wall. He charges me $20 for the damage, and off I head to Parker, Arizona.
Why Parker? Well, Quartzsite isn’t very interesting. It’s got the world’s largest flea market in January but the rest of the year it’s a dumpy little town in the desert. Parker is much larger then Quartzsite…like 13,000 or so, so it has larger and more stores and the like. I crossed over the Colorado River into California looking for a RV park. The best deal I found for a months stay was at Big River RV Park. I’ve been here since Nov. 10th and really like the park. Made some friends, had a lot of fun, found a nice bar.
Here’s a view of the river a few steps from my front door.
My space…
Your pics are always so nice.
Have been to Parker several times on holiday weekends. Needless to say, this is the smoothest I have seen the river. On these weekends, speedboats and skidoos clog the river and 3′ waves and swamped boats are not uncommon. Some cliffs are a short walk from Jim’s camp on the Cal side, with a nice trail to the top. I wandered up there with some U$C students one night and it was quite a sight at dawn. There is a jump-off rock about 30-40′ above the river that everyone jumped off except me – I was loaded but not stupid!
My friend Jack had a very nice boat and I always had some wild times. The So Cal students have made this place into a real West Coast version of Daytona. All the older people complained about the kids and said what a great place this is on other weekends. Well you know what – passing up all that dazzling eye candy would be freeking nuts!