Tucson and Work Plans Delayed

 

Leaving Quartzsite a little over a week and a half ago, we made our way down to Tucson. We met up with our friends Rayn and JJ whom we met a couple of years ago camphosting at Big Bear in California. Rayn and JJ were coming from Texas and heading to Tucson for the Rodeo and the Rodeo Parade. We made plans to meet them and to enjoy a week visiting before we all head off for our summer jobs.

Our first night we stayed at the Casino del sol parking lot and then the next morning moved over to the Gilbert Ray campground in the Tucson Mountain Park. It is a fairly large campground set in the desert with nice views. They do not take reservations so we went over early to look for spots.

There were alot of sites open, but most of them were way to short for our fifth wheel. On our second pass through we found two sites together where we could both get into easily.

The campground is $20.00 a night and has electricity. There is a dump station and water available. It is fairly close to Tucson by taking Gates Pass rd over the mountain.

Our first night we packed our dinner up and went up to Gates Pass to watch the sunset.

Max and Rayn waiting for the sunset.

It did not dissapoint!

Of course no outing with Raynn and JJ is complete without a visit to some well known, highly reviewed food place. It could either be Ice Cream, Taco’s or Hamburgers, this week they found us all three. These guys know how to find the best places. This time it was a taco truck and it was awsome!!

Rayn and JJ our Foodie’s!

We decided to attend the Rodeo on Sunday then the Parade on the following Thursday.

The Rodeo in Tucson is one of the top 25 in the country. The last Rodeo Max and I attended was the one held every Friday in Kacee Wyoming last year. The thing we noticed was that the bulls in Tucson were alot bigger, and the riders had a tougher time getting to the 8 seconds for a qualified ride. It was a fun afternoon and they put on a pretty good show.

Monday, we made it a shopping day and then for dinner Rayn and JJ came over an put on a cooking show and taught us how to make a new salad.

Brussel Sprouts and Kale! It was very good!! So good in fact, Max bought all the ingrediants to make it again.

And of course, paired with a tastey adult Root Beer!

Tuesday we made plans to go Jeeping with some friends that were also visiting Tucson. We picked out our trail from an Arizona 4x4 guide book. Once we got to the trail we found out that we needed a permit to go across Arizona State Trust Lands. We did not have permits so we had to go to plan B.

We ended up just taking a trip through the Patagonia Mountains which went through some pretty areas and within 5 miles of the Mexican border.

Lunch stop at some abandoned buildings

We came accross this old cemetary that had some interesting stories to tell.

Adobie ruins.

Wednesday Rayn found us a nice short 2 mile hike. We have not done much hiking so she needed to find us old people an easy one. It had very little elevation gain but it had some pretty views.

 

Thursday we went to the Rodeo Parade. It is the countrys longest non-motorized parade.

It was a very fun week hanging out with Rayn and JJ. They are heading for a tour of Southeast Arizona. Friday we said our see ya down the roads and gave them hugs goodbye. Thanks you two for the week of fun, food and games!

We found out on Thursday that our work schedule was postponed. The office was not quite ready for us to start, so now our start date will be moved forward when we return from our visit to Indiana. That will be around the first part of April.

Our boss is letting us store our rig on his mothers property in Casa Grande area while we fly back to see the kids. With that, we do not want to venture too far away so we decided to head up towards the Phoenix area where we can visit Max’s mom and sister.

We spent last weekend at the Wildhorse Pass Casino in Chandler. It is about a forty minute drive from there to Max’s mom’s house. We visited with mom on Saturday and then went to dinner with her and Max’s sister and her husband.

Of course being at the casino we had to partake in a little gaming. We both had a few good hours of entertainment and came out with about $300 ahead. I am sure we will be donating it all back very shortly!

 

With a few weeks to kill, we decided to move up north of Phoenix and boondock on some BLM land. It is actually a dirtbike/atv trail riding area, but durring the week it is not crowded at all.

 

It will be good to be out here for a few weeks, I have a few maintenance items to work on, a couple of books to read and several naps in my future….Life is good!!