March 16-31 Road Trip

This is one of our favorite times of the year in the desert.  There are flowers everywhere!  These are our favorites but there are a lot of others that are great too.

Beavertail Cactus in full bloom.

Overton had their spring yard sale and these are just a few of the treasures I picked up.  The 18 inch bow saw is great for minor tree trimming.  The 30 inch bows saw is old and has a sturdier steel frame than the new models.  The hand saw is sharp and apparently well built.  But my favorite is the hand drill.  It's one of the better quality models with the flat top on the handle, a good side handle and it cranks as smooth as butter.  I paid five dollars for the lot of them.  I also picked up some other stuff including another hand drill (although it is a cheaper model).  It was kind of stiff but a little WD 40 had it running smooth.

At one yard sale they had a large, four foot wingspan plane shaped kite.  Scott fell in love with it but it wasn't for sale.  We looked on Amazon and found this kite modeled after the space shuttle and ordered it.  It works great as long as the breeze is a bit stiff.

The Navy as out practicing take-offs and landings on the lake.  It was fun to watch and we got some great photos of it flying over.

We were down getting some stuff out of storage and while we were busy doing that Scott set up his bike seat inside the trailer tongue then opened up his umbrella for a sun shade.

We were going to Kansas and Illinois to visit relatives so we cooked up some pork chops to take on the road.  When we are hungry we eat one of these instead of stopping for food along the way.  Once they are cooked they'll keep longer in the cooler and they make great "finger food."

We bought three RAV 15 solar chargers.  They have built in USB connections for charging tablets, I phones, etc. So far they work great and will charge a tablet in about 1 1/2 hours in full sun.

Scott got some rudimentary surfing lessons from a friend camped nearby.  He had a lot of fun just paddling the surf board around.  His balance is excellent as well.  Now we just need some waves!

The dam at Lake Powell.  They have the same problem as Lake Mead ... low water levels.

On the way to Kansas and back we passed through 11 states.  There was about every type of scenery the US has to offer in the trip from high desert, mountains, plains, hardwood and softwood forest and hills and even some small cypress swamps.  (No we did not take a direct route home!  We meandered a bit!) 

This and the photo before it were both taken in Utah (I think!)

Four corners where you can easily walk in four states while taking baby steps.

Colorado!

More Colorado ... Scott wanted to take a few steps in the snow with his swim flippers on.

More Colorado ...

ditto ...

and ditto!

I believe this was taken at a McDonalds in Kansas.

Kansas feed lot.

An old Kansas grain elevator.  Most of these had wooden grain bins in them.

We couldn't resist taking this photo.  Read the sign then look at what's behind it (a cemetery).

Anyway, we took more photos on the way home which I'll put up on the next blog.  On the way home (Nevada) we received word that a niece of mine had died.  She was 32 years-old. She'd had some health problems but her death was a complete surprise.  So I'm here for a week then I'll hit the road again for Colorado.