On The Road With Marge and John: April 2008

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Our visit to Oatman, Arizona was great. The town is a true ghost town on the famous RT. 66. It started as a mining town & when the gold ran out in the 1930's so did the miners. They left their burros behind & they became the true residents of the town.
http://www.desertusa.com/oatman/du_oatman.html

The gold mines

produced two million ounces from its start in 1904. Carol Lombard & Clark Gable spent the first night of their honeymoon here at the Oatman hotel.

The burros

became the main tourist attraction of the town. They come walking into town looking for the carrots that the tourist bring for them.

Then they return back to the mountains for the night. We patiently waited for their arrival. I wanted to share the carrots but they don't just take a bite, they want the entire carrot.

The baby donkeys can only have small pieces at a time. It was really fun feeding them. When I walked away with some carrots still in my hand, one of the donkeys head butted me right in the butt! Twice! And once in the arm. As long as you have some carrots they will follow you around the town.

Each burro in town has been named. The day we arrived one of the donkeys just had a baby. They can sense where there is water & then they stomp their feet on the ground & bring up some water.

Visiting With a Friend

John & I were in Verde Valley area in Arizona. Julie & Frank only live about an hour south of our campground. We stopped by for a quick visit. They were getting ready for a weekend of out on their quads. It was a good visit with friends. Last time we came out this way they drove up the mountain to visit with us. This time we drove down the mountain & what a mountain it is. They have a really nice house with a pool and a beautiful dog. See you next time around Julie & Frank.

Thursday, April 17, 2008

The Beginning of our 2008 RV Trip

We started out on our trip following I-10 across the US to Arizona. A long dusty trip. We left Florida in the rain and entered Texas, the Lonestar state,

plagued with wind & dust storms. We hurried through 2 counties in Texas as we had tornado warnings. We made it out of those counties but hit a hail storm in the next county. John had a tough time driving through all the wind. The hail dented the hood of the car but not to bad. The roof of the RV is pretty dented from marble size hail. Well we made it through the weather woes of I-10. We are bound not to take that route on the way home.

Our first stop was at Colorado River Thousand Trail park. If you are interested in watching deer this is the place to go.

They walk through your camp site with out a care that you are there. I enjoyed watching them.

Our second stop was Tombstone Arizona.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tombstone%2C_Arizona

What a great place. The town really only lasted 9 years during its time back in the 1880's, but it is back as a booming tourist trap. The mines in tombstone filled with water shutting them down. The town also burnt down twice. With the mines going bust & the town burning down, the town died down. But it came back each time, giving it the name, the town to tough to die.
The main road of the town is shut down to vehicles but not to the horse buggies & stage coaches.

The town people all stroll around the town in the clothes of 1880's. We dined at Big Nose Kate's.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Nose_Kate

An authentic saloon & restaurant with saloon girls. In the good old days it was a saloon & hotel. The entertainment was great there. Big Nose Kate was Doc Holliday's girl. She was the one who loved Doc Holliday & everyone else. In the basement of Big Nose Kates was a room where the janitor lived. They called him the swamper. In his spare time he dug a hole in his room down to the underground mines that are throughout Tombstone. He mined quite a bit of silver during his stay in that room.

On the way into the town we stopped at Boot Hill. In this cemetary lies the three men killed in the OK coral shoot out. Doc Holliday & Wyatt Earp were the ones that make Tombstone famous with the shoot out at the OK Coral.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ok_Corral
Here I am with Wyatt Earp, his brothers & Doc Holliday. Note that these were the good guys & they were all dressed in black.

After Tombstone we took a ride to Bisbee, Arizona. It was a booming old mining community, with the richest mineral deposits in the World. It was at the time the biggest city between St. Louis and San Francisco with its own stock exchange. Here we went into a old copper mine. It was cold down there. It was a cool 47 degrees. I haven't been that cold in quite some time.