The Last Two Weeks in Quartzsite

The Monday after our Rally ended the weather changed dramatically.  The wind went around to the north at anywhere from 20 to 50 mph for about three days.  On Monday night about 10:00 PM the wind was howling so bad all I could think of was was some of the lyrics of Gordon Lightfoot's  "The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald".  "...When the winds of November come early..."  We had the solar panels tilted and the wind was coming directly behind them. Although, I was pretty sure they werent going anywhere, I was concerned enough about them and the just general rocking of the motorhome, which was facing west, so we were getting broadsided, that we brought in the slides, loaded up the things we had outside, and turned the rig into the wind.  This made things a lot better, and we were finally able to get some sleep.The next couple of days the wind was still strong, but not enough to cause us to move the motorhome again.

The reason we moved the motorhome facing west in the first place was to tilt the solar panels, and have them face south to get maximum performance from them.  It worked real well.  For the week we were parked that way, the only time we ran the generator was to run the microwave or the printer.  I love it when a plan comes together!

With almost everyone else from our group having left, we got to really enjoy the peace and quiet of the desert.  We didn't do too much during the week, save for couple of trips into Quartzsite in the evening to get something to eat, a beverage or two, and for Ann to sing some karaoke.  There are several places in town that do karaoke, and a few of them have it early enough in the evening that you can have some fun and still be home by 8:00PM.  That seems to work well for a lot of the older people out here.


On Saturday we decided to go up to Parker Arizona, which is about 35 miles north of Quartzsite to see a movie and get some groceries.  As we got north of Quartzsite about 20 miles we could see a huge dust cloud to the north and west, as the wind was pretty near calm, we wondered what was the reason for the dust cloud. It is not easy to see in this pic, but it is to the left of the tower.

When we got to the north side of Parker, near the Blue Water Resort and Casino (they have a movie theater as well), we saw lots of off road racing vehicles, and when we pulled into the parking lot there was Robby Gordon's souvenir truck.

I thought wow, this must be a big time off road race!  It turns out it was a big time off road race; it was the Parker 425.  Even though I had never heard of it, it is a well known race.  The race consists of 2 or 3 laps, each about 125 miles through the desert.  The run several classes, and one guy we talked to said there was about 200 entrants.

We wandered around a bit, then walked a few hundred yards to a decent viewing area, even though we were a couple hundred yards from the track, we could still see then racers come down along the river, head up hill, then go out of site in a cloud of dust.

While we were there we visited with a couple from Utah.  The husband used to race midgets against Dick Simon, who later became an Indy car racer then an owner.

On the walk back I got a pic of Ann in front of the Lucas Oil sign.

And she got a couple of me under the General Tire finish line.

As it was going to be a while before the race would be over we decided to catch the movie Ann wanted to see (The Rite), then go watch more of the racing action.  The movie was just a movie to me, but Ann liked it despite having been scared enough a few times to make her scream, but I think she likes that in movies.  :)

After the movie was over we went to the finish line, where the announcer was interviewing the racers as they finished.

Since every one does not start at the same time, each racer is timed separately, so it is some time after the event is over, before the finishing order is established, but it was till fun to listen to the guys talk about their race.  By this time a large crowd had gathered, and it looked there was going to be a huge party once the race was over, not wanting to get stuck in traffic, we decided to head out to Safeway, get some groceries, then had back to Quartzsite.

After Safeway we did make a stop at the Wal*Mart to look for a 8 inch frying pan.  We were both surprised to see how limited the options were for housewares, and they didn't have what we wanted.

Then it was back "home" for a light dinner as we were not all that hungry after eating a large container of popcorn and a huge soda at the theater.

Sunday is "dump and refill day".  Even though we could probably go for 10  days or so with dumping our tanks and refilling with fresh water, we did it every Sunday just so we wouldn't have to interrupt Ann's work schedule during the week to do so, and this way we didn't have to worry too much about conserving.  Depending on the line at the dump station it usually took us an hour or so to stow things inside, bring in the slides, raise the jacks, drive the couple miles to the dump station, wait in line, dump refill with water and return to our spot and set up again.  Waiting in line is not so bad when you have nothing else that you have to do, or should be doing.  One guy in line was real slow in dumping, so the ranger who monitors the area had to remind him that this was a dump station, and not a campsite.  The guy was offended, but it did get him going.

When I hooked up the water hose to refill the fresh water tank, I then went up on the roof and reversed the tilt of the solar panels as we wanted to park with our door to the south this week.  After getting back down off the roof, I realized that I had forgotten to turn the valve that let water into the tank on, so I had to wait another 10 minutes or so for it to fill before returning to our campsite.  Glad I wasnt in a hurry.

When we got back to our campsite this time we faced the motorhome east, so that the door and awning would be facing south.  Again this week the solar panels did their job!

I am going to post this now, and bring you all up to date on our travel adventures tomorrow.

It is 10:30Pm here and time for bed.

Paul

First Two Weeks at Quartzsite

Once again time has flown by.  We have already been here two weeks, and our winter sojourn is already half over!  One of the few things that is not as good as could be out here is the Virgin Mobile broadband service, it is just too slow to do many things other than check email, and read a few blogs.  I have been trying to use it exclusively to save bandwidth usage on the Verizon Mi-Fi, as it is limited to 5G with our current plan.  Today Ann decided that since she would probably go over the 5 G limit, she may as well up the plan to the 10 G one, so I am now using the Mi-Fi connection, and hopefully can post some pics.  The blog is just not the same without pics.

Here is a pic I tried posting before.  This is the first three couples to arrive at Quartzsite having dinner at Silly Al's Pizza.  From the left it is me(Paul), then Marilyn whose husband Dave is next to Ann, then Bob, and his wife Laura.

Here is the line up of the first rigs at the rally.  The rig in the foreground belongs to a couple who dropped off their coach and went to their home in Goodyear, Arizona for a couple of days.  Then is the coach of Bob and Laura, then ours, and the camper of Dave and Marilyn.

Here is a pic of the first sunset in Quartzsite.

Then a couple of days later pic of the full moon rising, a pic similar to the one I took when we were in Del Rio, Texas.  The pic is at the bottom of the blog.

And then a pic of our dinner for the evening; steak with tinfoil potatoes, with onions and green peppers.

Over the next few days, the place really started to fill up.  Most of the day was spent greeting, and visiting with the new arrivals, and posting the list of new arrivals on RVForum.net.

Here is the group assembling for Happy Hour on January 21.  The group is growing!

 And here is the full moon going down with the sun shining on the mountains to the west, as it is about to break over the mountains in the east.

 

As the days went by the area filled in nicely, with a total of 37 rigs being here at one time or another.  

While people were arriving I decided I had better get to work on my solar project that I had been planning, and acquiring parts for since last summer.   So with a trip into Quartzsite to pick up some brackets to attach to the solar panels, and then brackets to attach to the motorhome, and some  tilt bars to raise the panels with, I began in earnest.  First job was to locate the panels on the roof so they wouldnt be shaded if I didnt tilt them, but still be close enough together to maintain a short of run of wire as possible  Once this was done, I cleaned the spots on the roof where the brackets would go, then carefully set them in the 3M 5200 adhesive to let them cure.  One thing we(Ann) didnt want to do was to put holes in the roof, that is why I chose the 3M adhesive, but because there is a slight arch to the roof, the panel brackets wanted to slide downhill.  I am glad I didnt just leave them to cure on their own, as I would not have been happy to go up on the roof the next morning to see the brackets up against the rain gutter on the edge of the roof! So we decided that I should put one screw in each bracket to hold it in place till the adhesive set up. Once I did this the installation of the panels looked good.

To back up a bit, one of the obstacles to overcome was to be able to get the panels themselves up on the roof.  As the panels are about 37" x 65" and weigh 40 lbs, this was no easy challenge.  My solution was to take the strap part of the tire tie downs, attach one end to the panel, and use the straps as a rope.  Dave came over with a ladder and with his help, getting the panels on the roof was quite simple.  Thanks Dave!

That was enough work for that day.

The next day I worked on where to mount the charge controller, and where to run the wires from the roof to the controller.  The easiest was is to go down the refrigerator vent, behind the refrigerator, and on down to the compartment below.  It was no problem at all, and was easily accomplished in a day.  :)

The last issue to be solved was to go from the controller to the battery.  So it was off to Quartzsite again to a solar dealer to get two five foot pieces of #4 wire with ends on, plus a 60 amp fuse and fuse holder to be put downstream of the controller.  Once back home these were fairly easy to install.  Then it was the moment of truth!  I connected the two panels together on the roof, then determined which wire coming from the panels was the "hot" wire as both wires were black, and I hadnt marked them.  Once this was determined, and I got them hooked up with no spark or fires, I went into the motorhome to check my amp meter, and it was showing an input of about four amp hours, despite being relatively late in the day!  WooooHooooo!  Success!

I dont have a lot of pics of the installation process, as once I got going I didnt want to stop and take pics.  Here is one of the panels installed and operating.

One of the high lights of the week was during Happy Hour one night was Betty, who put herself in charge of entertainment, came up with the idea of the "Twelve Days of Quartzsite", a take off on the "Twelve Days of Christmas".  Each day of Quartzsite was represented by something you might buy while here.  Ann got to be the Fourth Day of Quartzsite I bought four funnel cakes, even though she only bought two, and intended to cut them into, but decided she then wouldnt be able to hold them all.

It was a fun event, and was filmed for posterity, and is on RVfoum.net, though I am not sure where.  If you would like to see more of the activities, and comments about our fun here, then checkout RVForum.net, and look through all the threads about Quartzsite.  You may have to sign up and login to see all the pics and videos that are posted. 

On Thursday four of us went to a golf course in Blythe, California, which is about 30 minute from here.  As we had a 7:00AM tee time it was decided to leave here about 6:00AM  to be sure and be on time.  When we arrived about 6:30, there was no one to be seen.  It didnt take us long to realize that California is on Pacific time, and Arizona is on Mountain time!  So we got there an hour early, but it was a beautiful morning.  The round of golf was interesting; the other three guys play pretty regular, and it showed, I havent played in a few years, and it showed as well.  But all in all is was a great being outside in such beautiful weather.

During Happy Hour on Thursday Betty organized a take off the Kentucky Derby, women decorated hats, and there were four teems of "horses" and "riders".  Ann teamed up with another guy and called themselves Bling, Bling.  The idea was that the "horse" was blindfoled, and the "rider" had to guide the "horse around the course that was marked with beer cans filled with sand.  I had the "duty" to provide the empty beer cans.  Everyone needed to contribute, and I gladly did my part!

It was pretty silly, but still fun, as Ann and her partner Rolf won the race!  I didnt get any pics of the "Derby", but I am sure there are some on the forum.

Here is a link to the  horserace on youtube.

On Friday I went into town to get our mail that has been forwarded from Iowa.  The line at the Post Office was short, relatively speaking, as last year it wound around the inside of the office and out the door. 

I cant imagine what it must be like working there, going from a small town to a town of over a half million people for a few weeks a year.  Then it was off to get a haircut before returning "home".  The price of a haircut was only $11.00, one of the few bargains you can get this time of year here.

Saturday was the grand finale with a buffet meal at 3:00PM, preceded with a group picture at 2:00.  Ann made a wonderful dish of orange chicken, and fried rice.  As usual at a buffet there was more food than we could eat, but Ann's chicken was one of the best dishes!  She has to quit cooking like that, or I will expect her to cook more often.  :)

After everyone had eaten more than they should have, Ann and three of the guys who are musicians, gave an impromptu concert after only practicing only 30 minutes and never even had met each other before the rally.  The sound quality is not good, but the singing and playing was.

On Sunday morning many of the group left, and headed for Death Valley, others went there own way, and a few of us are still here.  We plan on staying till the thirteenth, and then head toward Phoenix, as Ann has to go to Baltimore either the week of the fourteenth or the next week, and we are planning on meeting up with a friend from home who will be visiting in the Casa Grande area for a few days.

The first two weeks here have been fun, relaxing, and satisfying, and I expect the next two weeks here will be the same!

I will keep you posted, hopefully, more often than I have in the last two weeks.

Paul