Changing Afternoon Skies

The monsoon season is definitely here. The mornings dawn clear and bright with no wind. By the afternoon, around 1 PM, you can see the storms forming. One of the staff members that lives here year round said that you can see these storms forming from the lodge, but because of its location relative to the Rim, we seem to avoid most of them. Such was the case yesterday. We saw lightening in the distance but heard no thunder, had only moderate wind and no rain whatsoever. He said that this phenomenon was a result of a point in the Rim that causes the winds and storms to skirt the lodge. I don't know about that - we'll see. Today is clear and bright and calm also but we will most likely see the storms develop again in the afternoon.

Yesterday was uneventful at work and we enjoyed a relaxing afternoon watching the storms go around Happy Jack. Today is our first day off this week and we plan, at least for the first day, to just stay close to home and do some reading and organize some things in the fifth wheel. We may decide to take a drive into flagstaff later since we still have an issue to resolve with Verizon that we can't seem to fix via telephone.

More later...

Heating Up

Wow! It got to 86 degrees yesterday. It was the first day since we arrived that we were actually sweating. We saw where it got to 109 in the valley so we are thankful that we are here. Actually, we still have not had to turn on the air conditioner. This time last year it was running non stop day and night.

The day was normal as far as Sundays go. Lots of dumps and very few check-ins. We had to close last night and we had a problem doing that for the first time. It was only about the third time we have closed, so the procedure is still a little strange to us. The process was further complicated because we had an individual call and he wanted a cabin for the night but couldn't get here before we closed at 6 PM. We told him to come and we would stay open until he got here. We took care of him and then started the closing process and another individual arrived and we had to stop to sell him a couple sodas and a dump. Start over again on the balancing procedure. We finally got out of the lodge at about 7:15.

This morning the temperature is 49 degrees and the sky is clear. As we have the early shift, we should be done about 2 PM and then we are off until Thursday AM. This is the big 4th of July weekend coming up so we expect to rest up before it gets crazy...

Attacking the ATV Problem

It was mentioned in yesterday's post that there was a developing problem with the ATV's in the resort. It came to a head early in the morning when a gentleman drove down to the lodge for breakfast from his site on his ATV - with six kids hanging on to the vehicle. They were on bumpers, fenders and seats and none of them had a helmet. A recipe for disaster. After seeing this, Bob made 95 copies of the "Rules and Information" sheet with the ATV rules highlighted in yellow marker and attached a flyer with the new state laws regarding off road vehicle use and the licensing and registration laws. The rule that was highlighted stated that ATV's could only be driven directly from the campsite to the trails and anyone under 18 years old must wear a helmet. Bob used one of the golf carts to drive around and place one of these notices on each rig that was in the park. Several people were at their rigs and said they were happy to see the rules distributed because they have seen the many violations in the resort.



This seemed to have had, at least temporarily, a positive effect on the ATV use. Until about 5 PM when we saw about three ATV's riding down the road with small kids driving, and with no helmets. Sheesh! What kind of parents are these that allow their kids to violate the rules? You wonder if they have any rules at home. Not only that, but the same guy that drove the six kids down to the lodge in the morning did it again, with the same six kids, driving them to the showers! That was enough for Bob who walked down to confront him and the guy just stood there and said "you mean I can't drive my kids down here to take a shower". He had to tell him that we are enforcing the rules because last year there was a serious accident here with an ATV and they had to airlift a boy out of here in a helicopter. He also intercepted the other violators and asked them to drive back to their sites and park the ATV's.



Other than that, it was a normal, hectic Saturday. Today is our one day on late shift so we don't go in until 12 noon. Today will be a big "dump" day and everybody will be checking out so it should be busy. We'll have a leisurely breakfast and take it easy this morning. The weather has been beautiful with highs at 80 and lows in the high 40's. Perfect...

Weekend Crowd

The usual weekend crowd began pouring in yesterday. We had 17 check-ins for our RV sites and cabins. That doesn't sound like much but the seasonal people - those that come here on weekends and go home to work in the Valley on weekdays - also showed up.

There is a problem developing though that the staff at the resort will need to address. Most of the people that come here on weekends bring their toys - all kinds of ATV's. We have strict rules for riding these in the resort. You can only ride them from your campsite to the trails. The problem is that, late in the afternoon, we are seeing kids - 10 to 12 years old - joy riding around the campground. Not only is this dangerous, but it is illegal and against the rules. Bob went outside about 7 PM last night to tell two young kids that they had to park their ATV at the campsite. We have already seen the county sheriff deputies drive through the resort and write tickets to those that are driving without licenses and without valid registrations. We are going to make copies of the resort rules today and highlight the ATV rules and pass them out to all those that check-in in the future.

We're back to work at 7 this morning. There was a slight change in our schedules for next week. We have Tueday and Wednesday off instead of Wednesday and Thursday. No big deal.

That's about it for now...

Blue Ridge Reservoir and Long Lake

Yesterday started slowly for us but picked up in a hurry after we decided to take a drive on a couple of the forest roads nearby. Our first drive was on forest road 751 that started about 5 miles north of here off route 87. This road went to the Blue Ridge Reservoir. It was only 4.5 miles in on this road and we passed a really neat campground on the way in. The Rock Crossing Campground was the kind of place that dry campers love. In the forest, quiet and well maintained. Here is a picture of one of the approximately 36 sites:

All of the sites had a fire ring, picnic table and barbecue grill. Then we went to the end of this road to the reservoir. We were pleasantly surprised at the beauty of this body of water. Here is a picture from the road as you enter the reservoir area

Another shot of the launch that is at the bottom of this road:

And another of the sign at the top of this road above the launch:

The total distance from the lodge to this point was only 12 miles. We decided to take another of the forest roads a little further north off rte 87. This one, forest road 211 took us to Long Lake. There were actually two lakes, Soldier and Long Lake, but the road goes closest to Long Lake. It was a nice drive of about 20 miles through the forest to get there. We saw lots of wildflowers along the way. Here is a shot of some morning glory- like ground cover:

We finally arrived at Long Lake and it was in an area of no trees and flat, baron land. It was a huge lake and there were only a couple vehicles in sight. Probably because of its remoteness. Here are a couple shots of the lake and the boat launch:

Shortly after this shot was taken Josie came running up the launch and swatting at something. It turns out that there were hundreds of mosquitos on her legs and she couldn't get away fast enough. I looked down at my legs and mosquitos were swarming everywhere. We got out of there in a hurry.

It was a fun trip and now it's back to work. We again do the AM shift and expect a rather normal day. We hope so...

Good Results

The results from Bob's Colonoscopy were good. No visible sign of Colitis and a few benign polyps. That takes care of that for a couple years. We went to Village Inn for food as soon as we left the clinic just before 2 PM. It made it a bit of a challenge to finish our schedule today with the late procedure at the clinic.

We stopped at our storage unit and unloaded another box, went to Josie's doctor office to get some samples of a medication she takes, went to Wal Mart to get one of her prescriptions and some food items and then went to the Happy Trails site for the last time. We were shocked to see that our neighbor (Phyllis) directly across the street had a huge fire that totally destroyed her trailer and did almost total loss damage to her home that was also on the lot. We talked about it with another neighbor (Jim) who we left our keys with. He said that her refrigerator in the trailer sparked and caused an explosion. It happened a couple weeks ago and she was in her home at the time watching an auto race on TV. He said she took her drink over to another neighbor's house while the fire was being put out and watched the rest of the race - I think we probably would have stopped watching the race. Her house was totally renovated six months ago as a result of a faucet leak that flooded the whole place while she was gone last summer. That insurance company is going to drop her for sure! It was sad to leave the place for the last time.

By the time we left Surprise at around 6 PM the temperature showed 105 outside. The range of temps in Happy Jack while we were gone were 80 and 49. It's nice to get back to the nice temps here. We didn't see any elk this time while driving through the forest roads at dusk.

Today's schedule is still up in the air. We definitely are getting a slow start though. Stay tuned..

So Far So Good

We left for Surprise, AZ , after work yesterday at about 2 PM. We got within probably 5 miles or so of the hotel by 4 PM when Bob had to begin his "flushing" cocktail beverage in preparation for his Colonoscopy today. We'll just say that everything worked according to the described results and Bob is sitting in the hotel room, empty and hungry, ready to go to the procedure that starts at 12:30.

Our plan is to visit the space at Happy Trails afterward - that is, after Bob gets some FOOD -and clean the shed floor and turn over our keys and gate transponders to a neighbor there. This will officially end our stay there and it will be a little sad to leave since we enjoyed our time at Happy Trails. Who knows, we may be back again some day. We also brought another box that needs to go into our storage unit in Surprise. We still have a long term plan of eliminating that space entirely. Maybe we're dreaming about that. There are so many boxes in there that contain stuff that would be near impossible to get rid of - pictures, family heirlooms, etc. Perhaps we can at least downsize the unit to the smallest space they have.

We are getting packed up now to check out of the room so bye for now...

Summer Arrives

It looks like summer has finally arrived in Happy Jack. Yesterday was the warmest day we've had at 81 degrees for the high. It was a perfect day with sunshine all day. This morning dawned with lots of clouds so rain is probably on the way.

Our dump was still down but fortunately we had a lot fewer customers that needed it. The management is supposed to have it fixed today. You'd think that with all the dumping business we get that it would be a higher priority.

Today is our last workday for our workweek. We have Wednesday and Thursday off every week so it makes it easy to schedule appointments. Tomorrow is Bob's Colonoscopy so he begins the preparation today with a liquid diet. Ugh! We head down to the Valley after work and Bob has to begin the MoviPrep solution at about 4 PM. We hope to be settled in the hotel by then. His procedure isn't until 12:30 on Wednesday so it is a long wait in the morning. Not the kind of thing you like to do on your day off. Our plan is to return home in the afternoon on Wednesday so we can plan some fun stuff for Thursday. Josie says she can't go hiking until she gets a decent pair of hiking boots and a backpack. Maybe we can start searching on our days off.

Later...

Check Out Day and Dump Crisis

The family reunion wrapped up yesterday morning and we had a flood of checkouts. Fifteen cabins vacated and sixteen RV sites checked out. We also had three tent sites check out. All of the comments from those that checked out were positive and they indicated that the family member who was responsible for next year's reunion may bring it back to Happy Jack Lodge even though he lives in CA. Yesterday's temperature range was 73 and 43 and that helps to make for an enjoyable day. Even though it was a little cooler than normal for this time of year everybody appreciated the sunny days.

Everything was sailing along smoothly until one of the dumping customers came into the lodge and said the dump was backing up. Wonderful. You may recall that we had this problem once before. This only seems to happen on Sundays - the busiest dumping day of the week because of all the boon dockers coming in on their way home. The only thing we can do is direct them to pull through RV sites in the campground to empty their tanks. It was almost impossible to stop the people from driving up to the dump station before letting them know. See, most people will drive into the resort, stop in front of the lodge to let somebody out to pay for the dumping while they drive straight to the dump station to get a head start on the dumping. Eventually, we just had to put construction tape - you know that tape that police use at a crime scene - across the wide gravel road that leads to the dump station. We watched the heavy traffic flow through the campground sites all afternoon from our window while watching the US Open on TV.

It is kind of nice to see some young golfers in the running at the US Open. We get tired of seeing Tiger Woods winning every tournament. We know how great he is and that history is being made in the golf world by him, but he just doesn't have the charisma that, say a Phil Mickelson has. Tiger doesn't seem to care about or acknowledge the people that have supported him. It's like a smile once in a while will crack his face. Just an opinion.

We expect a more calm Monday this morning. We certainly won't have the traffic through the lodge that we had yesterday. We hope that the dump station at least has been cleared so that we can use it again. We'll let you know...

Extra Time

The family reunion was in full swing yesterday. We found out that this reunion has been held every year since 1988. It started as a reunion for the grandfather who was 92 at that time. He died at 97 and the family kept having the reunion after his death. Every year they have new tee shirts for everybody and one individual said he had 21 shirts now from the reunions. People come from all over - Albuquerque, Los Angeles, you name it. There must have been 100 people total. They had asked us if we could provide a couple staff members as judges for their cooking competition in the afternoon. Josie was one of the judges for the cookies contest and one of our other staff members was a judge for the salsa competition. There were other food contests that they recruited other campground guests to judge.

The day was filled with games and competitions and Bob was able to sneak away from the front desk long enough to get a couple pictures of the games. Below is a picture of the horseshoe competition:

Another shot below of the field next to the Ramada that was set up for different games. They had just finished an obstacle course game when this shot was taken:

Notice the puddles that were left from our overnight rain. We had no more rain all day and the sun was in and out. It was a full day of games and fun for this family. Throw in a day full of families enjoying their ATV's on the back trails and it was a busy day for everybody. We worked a couple hours over our scheduled time so that we could help with the store and the activities.

Today is checkout time for almost everybody so we will be busy again today. We like it that way as opposed to being slow. It makes the work schedule go must faster...

Full House and Rain

It was just as we imagined yesterday. The people started showing up early at about 8 AM and it was a steady stream all day. We also had quite a few of our storage customers come in to sign out their rigs for back woods camping this weekend. The weather cooperated as it went up to a nice 77 yesterday and we had a cool 40 as the low. We had .01" of rain which was at night and already today (overnight) we had .21" of rain. This is the first measurable rain we've had in June. We saw on the news where the Valley was getting winds and rain in some places also. The Monsoon is very near.

Josie did laundry after work and Bob watched some of the US Open golf tournament. It's unusual to see Tiger Woods off the leader board in a major tournament but there is a long way to go and I'm sure he will ultimately be in contention as always. We rounded out the day by going to Friday night fish fry at the Long Valley Cafe at Clint's Well down the street. What a great meal of all-you-can-eat fish and shrimp. This is the second time we had it and we ate just as much as the first time. Too much! It looks like we crash diet for a few days to get rid of those extra calories.

Today we will be assisting the huge family that is here for their reunion. They have planned all kinds of activities: ball games, a horseshoe tournament, a volley ball tournament and several eating events at various family sites in the resort. So far they have been well behaved as everything was quiet at 10 PM last night at quiet time. We hope it continues tonight...

Just Hangin Out and Payson

Yesterday was a near perfect day weather wise. We had a high of 73 and a low of 40. The wind was also down with high gusts about 17 MPH. The weather is turning warm just in time for the big weekend crowd. Some of the crowd arrived yesterday and we have a family that set up behind us and pitched a couple gazebos that have ASU plastered all over them. It looks like a party setup to us. Let's hope they break for sleep at night.

We mainly hung out in the fifth wheel until early afternoon when we decided to take a drive into Payson to fill one of Josie's prescriptions at Wal Mart and to get the Jeep serviced and washed. We took the Jeep to Jiffy Lube and were surprised that they had almost doubled their price of Signature Service since we last used them in Surprise about 6 months ago. The free popcorn and pop didn't make up for the $40 charge. Bob also printed out a $7 coupon to use - but left it home. Way to go! The wash was much better at $8 and the Jeep was probably as dirty and dusty as it has ever been.

We are on early duty this morning and expect a flood of check ins and people checking out the store. We expect a good crowd for our restaurant too which is open for breakfast and dinner today. The folks that run the restaurant usually try to give us a plate of breakfast containing either eggs and bacon and pancakes to eat at the desk if it's not too crowded. We should be done around 2 this afternoon...

Change in Plans

All morning long yesterday we were trying to decide where we should go. We had to decide where to go to take care of all the things that needed to be done: fill prescription, grocery shopping, bank, take things to goodwill, pack things for storage, get the Jeep serviced and find a Costco where we could replace some toiletries and items that only can be found at Costco. The answer was- make a trip to the Valley. Getting a late start - 12 noon - hurt our chances for getting everything done but we gave it a shot anyway.

We went to Goodwill, dropped off our goodies for them, went to the storage unit and dropped off a couple boxes there and tried to fill my Colonoscopy prescription. We went to two pharmacies and neither could/would fill it. The first didn't have the product and said they could get it by tomorrow. That wouldn't work. The second said they couldn't fill it because the prescription didn't have a date on it. We never heard that excuse before. The girl said she needed to call the doctor before she could fill it. That wouldn't work. We ended up walking into a CVS in Camp Verde on the way home and getting it filled in fifteen minutes. We also went to the bank, and Costco, where we hadn't gone since we came to Happy Jack. It was worth the trip although we didn't get the Jeep serviced. That will be done after work one day, either in Flagstaff or Payson. Everything else got accomplished.

We headed home and about 8 PM we were about 7 miles from the lodge when a big bull elk ran across the road in front of us about 30 feet away. Bob hit the brakes (luckily no cars were behind) and pulled over to the side to try and get a picture. The elk stopped by a tree and was barely visible in the darkness so we didn't get a shot. We always drive cautiously at dusk for that reason. The speed limit is 65 on that road and we were going about 50 at the time. It's always a thrill to see them while driving around.

Today is another stay home and organize day as we still have a lot of stuff to go through and get rid of. Someday, we will be organized and the fifth wheel will weigh what it is supposed to weigh when fully loaded - maybe...

Quiet Day

Yesterday was a predictable slow day. There were only two cabin check ins and one cabin checkout. The RV sites saw two in and one out. There were a few people coming in to dump their waste tanks and other than that we had just a few come into the store to buy miscellaneous items. We did have quite a few phone calls from people making reservations and changing others. Our day ended at 2 PM and we came back to the fifth wheel and relaxed the rest of the day.

We also received an email back from Doubletree regarding a fix for our water valve problem. They have a complete retro fit solution available and they wondered if we could bring in the rig to have it installed. Right. Howe, Indiana! It will either have to be installed by a dealer in Arizona or by Bob using instructions they provide. Since we will be here at least through Labor Day, we suspect that Bob will probably end up installing it himself. Not looking forward to doing that. They have obviously had more customers with the same problem. The picture they sent of the solution eliminates all of the brass valves and replaces them with nice heavy duty plastic valves.

We will most likely have a slow start for today's activities. Both of us finally had a sleep in day. It felt good. That's about it from here...

Better Weather and Airing Out

It is definitely starting to warm up as we hit 70 degrees yesterday for the first time since June 4. It is still a bit nippy in the mornings and we have to turn on the heater for one cycle, but that isn't too bad. When Phoenix hits 100+ degrees we should be in the upper 70's and low 80's during the day.

We opened all of the fifth wheel basement storage doors before we left for work to hasten the drying process from the flood we had when the water valve failed. Bob sent an email to Doubletree RV explaining our situation with the water valves and included some pictures of the newly configured lines and the (failed) broken valve. We're hoping to get some tips on how to air out the sub basement area which could develop mold if it isn't dried properly. We'll see.

Today is our last day of work before our 2 days off and we are looking forward to them. There are a couple of errands that we need to run. Most important is getting Bob's prescription filled for his upcoming Colonoscopy on June 24. We also have a list of items for Costco or Sam's Club, depending on where we go.

It sure does get quiet during the week. Most of the seasonal people go home for the week and all the kids are gone from the weekend. It makes for slow days in the lodge and the time tends to drag when you're not busy. We better rest up though since there is a huge family reunion scheduled for this weekend and that means fire drill type days starting on Friday and going through Sunday.

Later....

Prescott Run

Yesterday was our sleep-in day but it didn't work out that way. At about 5 AM, Josie came into the bedroom and told Bob he had to get up - now! Bob got up as Josie was saying that water was leaking everywhere outside. Bob went out and discovered that one of the water valves on our plumbing system had broken and water was gushing out of the entire underside of our fifth wheel. Our rig has a total of 12 water valves for the water system. There are two valves each (hot and cold) for the kitchen sink, bathroom sink, shower, outside shower and washer hookup, making a total of 10 valves, plus one master valve each for the hot and cold lines The valve that broke was the hot water for the kitchen sink.

All of the valves are manufactured by Zurn Industries. We have had two other valves fail, in the exact same place, since we bought the fifth wheel. Of course these things only happen on Sundays, just like you only need a doctor on Sundays. Try and find a place open on Sunday that can help in an emergency. It turns out that Lowe's carries these valves so Bob went online and ordered three (one to fix the problem and two spares). We had to get to Prescott, the closest Lowe's, pick up the valves, fix the problem and be to work by 12 noon.

We made it back to the rig at 11:30, rushed to get ready for work and arrived on time at about 11:55. We opened both sides of the basement storage area before we went to work so it would dry out. Bob had to replace the valve after work at 6:30 last night. It was a long day. Fortunately, it wasn't real busy at work - the usual Sunday dumping crowd and people checking out.

Today is back to early shift at 8 AM and we get off at 2. It should be a quiet day...

Busy Day and Strawberry Festival

It was an unbelievably busy day at the lodge for our morning shift. There were non stop people coming in for all kinds of goods - RV stuff, candy for the kids, directions to trails, changes to accommodations and new reservations for future trips. The hayride was again in operation for the day and it was full for every trip around the resort.

We heard about the annual Strawberry Festival in Pine, Az. After our shift ended at 1 PM, we drove to Pine which is about 20 miles from the lodge. It was a typical small town festival with arts, crafts and lots of food. Following are a couple pictures of the event.



<

We did the strawberry Sunday thing at the community center where they were selling flats of strawberries, strawberry shortcake, strawberry floats, chocolate covered strawberries, you name it. The problem for us was that we wanted strawberry shortcake but had to settle for the Sunday since they ran out of shortcake. Oh, well.

Today is the only late shift for us during the week. We start at 12 noon but need to make a run to Lowe's in Prescott first. We'll tell you about that later.....

Weekend Kickoff

The resort started early filling up yesterday. It seemed like everybody that checked in had 2 or 3 kids in tow. All the tent sites were taken, most of the cabins were filled and the RV spaces were all booked. The morning was filled with kids coming into the store and checking out mitts, bats, baseballs, gloves, footballs, basketballs and buying candy. It was a fun day for all, and it was only Friday! We also started our "hayride" for the kids. You can see from the shot below that the wagon was a little light on "hay".

The wagon actually contains a huge bench for everybody to sit on. It works. Along with all the kids that arrived with each family were a bunch of dogs. We had to go remind our cabin tenants that dogs were absolutely not allowed in the cabins. The people staying in the cabins said they had kennels to keep the dogs in all night and they would be outside. Brrr!

It does appear though we are going to warm up a bit. It only went down to 49 this morning. That was after yesterday's low of 32 (poor tomato plants). We did make 69 yesterday for a high and expect it to be warmer today.

We do the morning shift again today and expect a steady flow of people in the store. We shouldn't have many arrivals since the resort is nearly full already...

Lazy Day

The weather rut continued with a high of only 66 and a cool low of 39 yesterday. The low was already beaten at 5:30 this morning when the temperature read 32! Sheesh. Let's hope these cold mornings don't kill the tomato plants.

We spent the whole day just relaxing and emptying a couple boxes we brought up from Surprise. We will end up giving away a lot more stuff to Goodwill as we don't have the room in the fifth wheel. Bob put out the hummingbird feeder on the back window (below) and we watched as two hummingbirds came in the afternoon. Of course, they don't come when you have the camera ready.

Today begins our work week again with the morning shift. It should be a fairly busy day with people coming up for the weekend. We know of one family reunion that has most of the cabins and tent sites reserved. Two of the tenters came in last night as we watched them set up camp. It's fun watching how different people set up camp different ways. It's the same with RVer's.

It will also be interesting to see how the site problem was resolved that was mentioned in the post on Tuesday...

Rim Road

Yesterday was the first chance we had to use one of our days off for a local adventure. We headed out to County Road 300, better known as the Rim Road, at about 10:30. The road begins at US highway 87 about 10 miles from our lodge location. We had heard about several vistas along the road that provided spectacular views of the valley and the Mogollon Rim itself. They were right on! Following are some pictures we took along the way:

The first is a view of the rim up close and taken toward the west.

Another shot taken a little further down the road and facing southeast. This one shows the jagged edges of the Rim.

Another of Josie standing close to the edge - a lot closer than Bob would get.

It was hard deciding which pictures of the many that were taken should be included in the blog but here is one more from another vista point on the Rim.

All along the road were areas of charred trees where you could tell forest fires had roared through in years past. The Forest Service was conducting a controlled burn not too far from where we were yesterday in order too minimize that kind of damage in the future. In addition to the spectacular views from the road, we came across some other interesting things. If you can believe it, there was a battle that took place on top of this rim on July 17, 1882 - called the "Battle of Big Dry Wash". It's difficult to read the story of the battle from this picture because the sun was creating a shadow but the net of the battle was that there were some Apaches that attacked a troop of soldiers and Indian scouts and two soldiers were killed and about twenty Apaches were killed.

Then, along the side of the road about halfway through our trip we spotted this hedgehog cactus in full bloom. Unbelievable! We were at an elevation of about 7400 feet and with the cold weather at this elevation this cactus was thriving. We saw no other cactus of any kind on the rest of the trip.

Finally, after about 42 miles of travel on the Rim Road we came to the end. The road came out on US highway 260 at Christopher Creek about 20 miles east of Payson. This is a shot of the highway just before we got to it at about 3:30.

By this time we were ready for some food. Our original thought was to stop at the McDonald's in Payson for a burger and coffee, but saw a Mexican restaurant as we drove into town - El Rancho. Well, El Rancho was El Bad-O. It was the worse Mexican food we have ever had. The only good thing about it was the margarita we had. That wasn't the best either. First thought is the best.

All in all a good day and a fun adventure. We expect to take many more of these on our days off. Today is probably going to be a "stay at home and do some organizing" day in the fifth wheel...

Weather Rut and Mice

We had the same weather pattern yesterday as we have had for a week now. There have been 5 straight days with highs in the mid 60's and lows in the high 30's and low 40's. The most remarkable thing is that we have had 7 straight days of high wind gusts at 23 MPH or higher. The weather forecasts are all saying that this pattern will continue, at least for the next week. The seasonal people that are here are saying it should be in the 80's by now.

We were greeted at the lodge yesterday morning with a strong odor of a dead animal. We cracked open the windows, turned on the fans and began a search of the lodge. Bob found a small mouse in a trap in a far corner of the lodge but that little thing could not have caused this much odor - could it? As you recall, we set several traps after mouse poop was discovered several weeks ago. Anyway, either the smell will disappear on its own or something else will be discovered. It could very well be a situation similar to what my brother, George, had in his home. While trying to sell his home a strong, dead animal smell appeared and lasted for a couple weeks until it finally went away. He couldn't even show the home because of the strong odor. There was a dead animal in his attic that could not be seen until a search of his attic revealed the thing. We hope this is not the case here.

Today is our first off day and our plan is take the forest road 300 along the rim. We are told that there are some spectacular views along the road so maybe we can get some shots today.

Later...

Where's Summer?

We appear to be in a rut weather wise. The days seem to repeat themselves with 65 (high) and 38 (low) ranges and 24 MPH winds. The Valley is also in a cool down which is nice for them as the temps will soon begin climbing to the 110 range and stay there for months. The maximum temps for this area should be in the high 70's and low 80's for the summer. Bring it on!

Our morning shift was as slow as we have seen it since we started. We did have a couple situations to deal with that were new for us. There was a problem with the dumping station. An individual came in after paying for his dumping and indicated that the dump was clogged and nothing was going in. We got on the radio to maintenance to get them over to check on it. Yep, it was clogged and would take a while to clear so they asked if site 1,2 or 3 was open for people to go dump in the meantime. Our system showed that site #2 was open. It turns out that someone, unauthorized according to our records, was set up in the site and not present at his rig. The seasonal person who was supposed to be in site #1 was gone, and there was no sign that he was using the space. The rig in space 2 was different from the one supposed to be in space 1 so they are different individuals. Anyway, we used the (temporarily) vacant space 1 and we need to sort this out this morning.

After work, we had a liesurly afternoon and had a good salmon dinner with baked potato and watched some TV before going to bed.

This is our final shift this morning before our two days off. At this point we are undecided how we will spend the two days. We are leaning toward taking a drive on some of these forest roads to check them out. That would be fun. We'll see...

Schedule Switch

We arrived at the lodge, ready for work, at 6:45 AM yesterday. Our coworker, who was to work the PM shift was there and informed us that there was a schedule change and we were to be on the afternoon shift starting at 12 noon. See, our schedule gets printed out every two weeks and begins on Mondays, the day after pay day. We always make copies of the schedule the day it is published and every worker gets a copy. It turns out that late Saturday the General Manager made a schedule change, posted the new schedule, and only the afternoon workers on Saturday got to see the new schedule. Nobody told the AM crew about the changes. So we had the morning to ourselves now. What do we do? Laundry. UGH!

We started work on time at 12 noon and relieved the other team according to the new schedule. It turns out that Sunday was the only time change on our schedule and was made because the other team had to leave town early to start their two days off. Anyway, Bob did get a few shots of the lodge that haven't been seen yet. Below is a shot of our front desk area and store taken from the loft in the lodge:

Here is a picture of our loft area. This is the wi-fi hot spot and is used as a lounge area and area for people to use their laptops:

Finally, here is a shot taken from our front desk area out into the store. This is our view every day:

As you can see, the store is very large and has a very good selection of all kinds of clothing, candy, groceries, toiletries, beverages, etc. It does an excellent business.

We're still in a cool and windy cycle. Yesterday was 65 (high) and 37 (low) with a high wind gust of 24 MPH. It is suppose to start warming up and calming down today. We hope so...

Office Stuff and More Wind

We had another cool and windy day yesterday. It only got to 64 with a low of 37, but the winds remained at a steady 20-25 MPH with a peak gust of 26. Once again though, the day dawned bright, sunny and calm and remained that way until about noon.

Our day was pretty slow again but we did get the RV sites totally filled for the weekend. We took some of the office stuff that we cleaned out of the Surprise location into the lodge for them to use. Bob had a lot of heavier stock paper that he used for brochures for real estate sales that we had no room to store. We still have more stuff that they will ultimately get.

The restaurant is beginning to see a good increase in traffic and they are featuring some nice entrees. Yesterday was a special 14 oz. New York Strip Steak Dinner with baked potato, fresh vegetables and a salad for $18.95. They are also serving a buffet breakfast each morning on the weekends for $8.50. It provides a good option for the seasonal RVers that stay the whole summer and don't want to travel a long distance to eat out.

Today is the AM shift again and we will try to get some pictures of the lodge interior for tomorrow's post. The morning shift really suites us better since we still have a good portion of the day for ourselves when we get off work. Josie did some baking yesterday after work - Banana nut bread and a yellow cake. I suspect that some of that will make it into the lodge for the staff to enjoy.

Later...

Slow Day and Winds

Yesterday was a very slow day for us at the lodge. We did a few reservations, had some folks check in and basically spent much of the time accepting deliveries for the weekend. We had a keg of Bud Light delivered, a freezer full of ice bags and ice blocks delivered and several bottles of hard stuff for the bar in the banquet room. The restaurant will be open for the rest of the weekend so we will be getting some traffic from that side.

The biggest story yesterday was the wind. There were steady wind speeds in the 25-30 MPH range with a highest gust of 33 MPH. This area is located fairly close to the edge of the Mogollon Rim which creates different air currents and more winds naturally. It is a beautiful area because of the Rim but you can almost always expect different weather patterns as a result of it. Anyway, we haven't had any rain yet in June which is nice. The temperature range yesterday was 69 (high) and 46 (low).

We went into Payson after work yesterday to pick up a prescription at the WalMart Supercenter and also to deposit our paychecks. There is no direct deposit here so we can expect to have at least one trip to either Payson or Flagstaff every two weeks to make the deposit. That's OK though since we will need to go into town to replenish food supplies.

Our shift begins at 7 this morning and ends at 2 PM. We don't expect an overwhelming flow of traffic but the resort is about 80% booked for this weekend.

Later...

Finally Finished in Surprise

Josie went to the Arrowhead hospital in the AM to see her former coworker that had complications during a surgical procedure the day before. Evidently, her blood pressure dropped drastically and they had to place her in intensive care as a precaution. She is doing fine now.

Yesterday also saw us complete the shed project in Surprise. We spent the better part of the day shredding documents, taking files to storage and dropping off a couple things at the Goodwill drop in Surprise. We did, however, bring the shredder back with us since we still have a lot of documents to shred back home. One thing most people can always count on when they live in a house - they hoard just about everything that's in writing that contains some kind of personal information. Here's a shot of Josie doing the last of the dreaded chore:

We took advantage of being near some needed personal services as Josie went and had her nails done at her favorite nail shop and Bob had a haircut at Mario's in Surprise. That should hold us for awhile.

We left Surprise about 3 PM and decided to stop somewhere for dinner on the way home to Happy Jack. One place that we've always wanted to stop but never had the time was the Rock Springs Cafe located in Black Canyon City north of Phoenix. They are famous for their pies and we each had a slice after our dinner - hmmm, good! Here's what the place looks like:

The outside is deceiving. It appears to be a modern little restaurant but once inside it is very western and rather large. There's a saloon on one side and the restaurant on the other, separated by a gift shop in the middle. It's well worth the stop.

The last two days in Happy Jack were very nice. The high both days was 77 and the low was 39 and the rain gauge shows zero precipitation. It is starting to warm up a bit but it will never get as hot as Phoenix.

It's back to work this AM and we work the 8 to 1 shift today...

Good News is no Bad News

We arrived at the Clinic about 9:30 yesterday to do the paperwork and pay the copay for Josie's procedure. She went in about 10:30 and Bob didn't get a call to come in to her recovery room until noon. people that arrived after Josie were already leaving so there was some concern about what was happening with Josie. It turns out, and Bob should have remembered, that they were actually performing two procedures on Josie - the Colonoscopy and an Endoscopy. Josie has been taking medication for Barrett's esophagus for several years. Both procedures were done with just minor discoveries, none of which were bad. The doctor took a couple specimens for biopsies and we will know the results in a couple days.

Josie was pretty groggy and very hungry. We went to a Village Inn for some food and then stopped at the grocery store for some food for the room and went and checked in. Not a very exciting day.

Today we will finish the job at the shed and do some miscellaneous stuff. Josie has a friend and former coworker that had an operation yesterday and had some complications so she wants to see her at the hospital. Also, she needs to check with her former employer about COBRA details.

Other than that, we are hopeful to get back to Happy Jack at a decent hour.

Until then...

Mass Reservations and Drive to Surprise

It was like somebody threw a switch and said "OK, you can start making your reservations now". We had a morning shift that was almost non stop phone calls by people making reservations for everything - cabins, RV sites, storage spaces and tent sites. The thing that made it unusual for us was that a lot of the reservations were by one person wanting multiple sites. With our system, Campground Manager, you have to make each site reservation separately. That makes for a longer process to complete the whole reservation. Our Resort is very nearly full for the season now. It was an otherwise normal day except for all the volume of reservations.

We were off duty by 2:15 and got ready to leave for Surprise and were on the road by 3 PM. Josie took one of her medications while on the trip to Surprise and made it easily to the hotel. Bob went to the local Safeway store to get a pot pie to do in the microwave in the room for his dinner while Josie prepared her Colonoscopy cocktail for her dinner. She needs to be at the clinic by 9:30 this morning for her 10:30 procedure. She'll be glad to get some real food afterward. We booked an extra night at the hotel this time because we really need to finish our project at the old space while we're here.

Till tomorrow...

Miscellaneous day

It was a normal work day yesterday morning. We had several reservations, several check ins - both storage and RV sites - and sold lots of "stuff" in the store. It was one day where we didn't have to do any odd ball things like assisting with housekeeping duties or bathroom cleaning. We are always happy about that.

The afternoon was kind of laid back with Josie planting her tomato plants and turning over the "garden". Here is a shot of the finished garden that also contains a couple other plants that were already there from previous camp hosts:

The two tomato plants are to the left in the picture. We'll (hopefully) update this picture showing lots of tomatoes on two big, bushy plants.

The rest of the day was spent trying to organize the trailer with some of the things we brought back from our last trip to the shed in Surprise. We still have a ways to go before everything is finally put in its proper place but we are making progress. It's not fun work. We'll try to finish the job on this trip. We both will be glad to get it all done.

Today is another AM shift - from 8 to 2 after which we will depart for Surprise to prepare for Josie's Colonoscopy scheduled for tomorrow AM. She will not eat any solids at all today. Let's hope we can get to the hotel without any "incidents".

Later...

Is the Monsoon here?

It seems like the monsoon season is here early this year. Every day is about the same, weather wise. The days dawn bright and sunny without a cloud in the sky. The clouds start rolling in about noon and by 3 or 4 in the afternoon we get a short storm that dumps a little rain and cools things off about 10 - 15 degrees. Yesterday was just like that - 70 (high) and 35 (low) with .02" of rain in the afternoon. There is definitely more precipitation in this area vs the Phoenix area. We had 2.20" of rain since we arrived in mid May.

We had the afternoon shift yesterday - 1 to 6. After a late breakfast and leisurely morning we went to work and were greeted with our usual Sunday afternoon dumping crowd. The main business on Sunday is the dump, water tank filling and propane. It's a predictable pattern. We stumbled through our closing at the end of the day. This was the first time that we were alone at the closing and it was a bit confusing for awhile. We figured out the reports that needed to be produced and we finally reconciled the cash and credit cards, closed out, and got home about 7 Pm.

Today is an early shift as is tomorrow when Josie needs to begin taking her medicine in preparation for her Colonoscopy that is scheduled for Wednesday AM. Anyone who has had this procedure knows you need to be near the "john" when you start the medicine and it is about a two hour drive to Surprise. We'll see...