Steve & Ellen 50th Anniversary Trip


Chapter 8                                                                                                                              1May2017

The End has come to our 50th Anniversary Trip and we are home.  We arrived home early in April and spent the next few days unloading the trailer and cleaning it.  We have a couple of maintenance issues like a window leaking, only when it rains, and the TV antenna wire got broken off at the roof level and I couldn't fix it, so it's presently an in-patient at the RV garage.

We didn't linger long on the way home, stopped to see relatives and friends in Texas and met friends from Pa. on the road.  For all our friends out there we missed, we'll try to get together another year.  We managed to stay between storms or stayed an additional day at some campgrounds so the bad weather would pass.

This has been a trip of a lifetime and we have been rewarded in seeing so many beautiful places and having so much fun. I highly recommend a similar type of activity for any special event in your life. The United States is a wonderful country.  We will always remember this, our 50th Anniversary Trip, and I hope you have enjoyed the ride too.  We were gone a little over 6 months and traveled almost 16,000 miles through 25 states.  We had no travel disasters and excellent health for the entire time.  I am sure someone was watching over us and helped us make the right decisions.

I close with a final bird picture.  It's a rare, thought to be extinct, ivory billed woodpecker that we watched for quite a while in a wildlife refuge in northern Mississippi.




Enjoy the summer.   Steve

                                                       Steve's & Ellen's 50th Anniversary Trip

Chapter 7                                                                                                                       10 March 2017

It's been a long time since my last post, so here's an update.
We stayed at Green Valley, Az until the end of January.  During Jan, we did a lot of birding, eating out, and socializing.  While I was in the Rec room one day, I found out there was a ping-pong group playing every morning at 8 am.  Now I haven't played ping-pong since sometime back in the 60's but thought I'd go and watch and maybe make a fool out of myself.  Ellen razzed me a bit of my getting up and being ready by 8 am.  Monday morning, I'm up and at the game room.  I couldn't just sit and watch, no, they insisted I also play.  It wasn't pretty but I did manage to return the ball a lot of the time.  I know they were taking it easy on me at the beginning.  After a couple of mornings, there was no mercy and I showed my inability.  By the second week, I had been telling Ellen how much exercise it was, so she decided to join me.  I didn't tell her most of the exercise was picking the ball up from the floor after I missed it.  Anyway, she also participated and the group was very patient and understanding on our inexperience and we made some great friends.
One day we travelled to Casa Grande and spent the day with Tom & Terry, friends from B.C. Canada.  We visited the Casa Grande National Monument Ruins. It was an extra large community of ancient people of the Hohokam period who farmed the area during the 13th century.

Close Quarters since our move in Jan.  The building next to us is a garage.

Grand Lodge at Casa Grande National Monument 

On February 1st, we moved south to Patagonia State Park. We had high hopes of finding the Elegant Trogon which had eluded us the last 2 times we visited there.  Things were not to be different and we left 3 days later saying "Maybe next time".  From there it was on to Fort Huachuca to do a little birding.  Didn't find any unusual birds but there is a good restaurant there named "The Landmark".  The prime rib sandwich for $11.00 included two sides and was a huge piece of meat and not the shaved kind. 

After a short stay it was eastward with stops at Bisbee and Whitewater Draw then on to Portal Az.  We went to Portal to find the rare streak-backed oriole that been hanging around there all winter.  Our first morning out, we found the house where he was seen and about an hour later, sure enough we got a good view and a bunch of pictures.  While in the area we also found an uncommon Violet-Crowned Hummingbird.  At Portal, we stayed at a small intown campground with 6 spaces. The town has a general store/cafe, which didn't have much for groceries and I don't think I would want to eat there. It also has a bar/food Tavern, open only on weekends, which did have good food. There was not a gas station for 35 miles or a school to my knowledge. We didn't have phone service or internet, so we were isolated for the 3 days.  Sometimes that is a good thing.

 Streak-backed Oriole.

Some kind of ground squirrel in Arizona. 

Next was a stop at Las Cruces to visit Dale & Betty, friends from Wisconsin, we met at Mission, Texas in 2007.  While in Las Cruces I got a picture of the biggest red chili in New Mexico.

A 47 foot,  2 1/2ton red chili.

Next stop Alamogordo.  If you haven't been to Alamogordo and like petroglyphs, go and you'll be in utopia.  A short drive up Rt 54 to Three Rivers is the mother lode of petroglyphs.  There is over 20,000 on rocks along a 2 to 3 mile ridge. Some examples are as follows.

While in New Mexico, be sure to visit Roswell.  This is where the little green men from outer space crash landed in the desert.  The town has capitalized on its uniqueness and you see spaceships and little green men on corners, in stores and all around town.  

Local attractions. 

The last stop in New Mexico was Carlsbad Caverns.  We had been there in the year 2000 and had walked down into the caverns via the natural entrance. It's 800 feet down to the cave rooms.  The winding path down is over a mile long and quite dark.  Seventeen years ago we thought it wasn't that bad going down.  Funny how your memory plays tricks with you and forgets the hard things you do. We knew the next day we had overdone it and recommend taking the elevator down and up if you're over fifty.  

 Natural Entrance of Cave.

Sitting Bull Falls, west of Carlsbad Caverns.  

We were soon on our way to Texas, the Panhandle and Central Standard Time.  An overnight stay in Levelland, a free stay for up to three nights with Elec, Water and Dump available. Other towns that allow free overnight stays include Brownfield and Littlefield.  

That's it for now, we are now in Oklahoma, but more on that next time.

Cheers, Spring is coming.    Steve

                                           Steve & Ellen 50th Anniversary Trip
Chapter 6                                                                                                                      1/21/2017

It's been a while since I've added anything to the blog, so here's a little update on our doings.
We are still in Green Valley, Az.  One day we went to the Titan II, ICBM missile site.  It is the last remaining site in the U.S.  It is inactive and unclassified and they give tours throughout the silo.  The missile is still in the silo and impressive to see up close.  Ellen was selected as the mission control colonel for the simulation of an order to deploy the warhead to an enemy target.

I don't know why she's laughing, this is serious business.

Titan II with warhead on top.  Total length 103 feet long.

Another trip was to an active open pit copper mining operation at the adjoining town of Sahuarita. The mine opened 1959 and been in operation since then.  It now is a BIG hole in the ground.  The copper content is less than 5% so there is a lot of tailings.  The hole is over 2 miles long and 1500 feet deep.        

Open pit copper mine

Early mining 147 ton dump trucks replaced with 247 ton dump trucks.

A trip to the Pima Air And Space Museum also included a trip to the 2600 acre military graveyard for over 4400 aircraft awaiting disposal or destruction.  Some of the aircraft are sold to private individuals or a company but most are never flown again.

 At the museum, they had over 300 aircraft on display.  When we were at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, we had the last 2 remaining C131's in the Navy.  Ellen and the girls flew in one every month to San Juan, P.R. to visit the Orthodontist while the girls were in braces.  Shortly after removal of their braces, an inspection revealed the aircraft had structural damage and they went to the graveyard.  One of the two is on display at the museum, which we had confirmed with the official records which showed it arrived in Feb 86 from GTMO.  

Military aircraft at graveyard.

More Aircraft at graveyard in Tucson.

Ellen with C131 from GTMO, Cuba.

Other trips include Tohono Chul Park, a 49 acre desert preserve.  The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, an interpretative center showing the diversity of the Sonoran Desert region with plants and native animals. The Saguaro National Park, both the east and west areas.  The park contains lots of saguaros, early Native American petroglyphs and desert plants and animals.  

Saguaro National Park.

More Saguaro cactus.

Seems like the Saguaro cactus grows on me like the petroglyphs.

It takes 75 years for the Saguaro to grow arms.

I've had some requests for birds we've seen the area, so I've included some below with other miscellaneous pictures.  

Black Throated Sparrow.

Scaled Quail.

Cactus Wren.

Canyon Towee.

Black Tailed Jackrabbit. Look at those ears.

Verdin.

Very Rare, Rose Breasted Becard.

More rare birds watching birds. You may recognize the blue capped, purple sided, northern snowbird.

And finally the other pictures I thought may be of some interest.  

Our Christmas decoration. Those are supposed to be antlers on the top.

Scene near the Mexican border.

We wish all are enjoying family and friends,  keeping warm and avoiding the nasty flu that seems to making the rounds this winter.    Cheers,   Steve

Chapter 5 50th Anniversary Trip

                                                50th Anniversary Trip

Chapter 5

I found a few pictures left in the camera of the big red rocks around Moab, Utah, so I'll include them here.

Red rocks, many with petroglyphs, along the Colorado River

Fascinating rock formations

High up on the mountain of the Lafal range

From Utah, we made our way to Colorado to view the indian pueblos in that area.  Mesa Verde National Park includes the most complete housing complex called Spruce Lodge.  These particular houses were built high up on the ledges in the cliffs.  They were accessed by climbing up the face of the rocks using toe and hand holds.  The primary reason for the isolated location was for defense  from other tribes.

Mesa Verde Spruce Lodge

Notice the windows in the pueblos halfway up the cliff

Foundation of large pueblos in Mesa Verde

While in the same area of southwest Colorado, we visited Canyons of the Ancients National Monument.  The ruins here included both canyon lodges and housing on the plains indians.

Indian ruins at Hovensweep

Pueblo, notice square corners and stone all hand shaped to fit.

From Colorado we headed south to New Mexico, stopping at the four corners of Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico.  In New Mexico, we stayed at a Corp Of Engineers Campground  called Cochiti Lake.  Since we stay at Federal campgrounds for half price, this was only $10.00 a night.  The spaces were extra large and with only a few campers and lots of birds, especially blue birds, both mountain and western.  While in Cochiti Lake area, we went to Tent Rocks National Monument with interesting rock formations, and to Albuquerque to the Petroglyph National Monument.

4 corners, Ut, Az, NM and Co

Tent rocks.

Petroglyphs near Albuquerque.

Our campsite at Cochiti Lake, N.M.

On a trip to Santa Fe, we did the tourist thing at the Governor's Palace and and viewed the wares and jewelry on sale by the local native americans.  There is a lottery every day to select the vendors and all must attest to the genuineness of their merchandise.  We also did a tour of the Capitol.  It's a round building the shape of the state's official emblem with the seal in the center and offices and legislative rooms on the sides. It does not have a dome like most other state capitols.  Another building we visited was the Loretto Chapel.  It contains the Miraculous Staircase to the chapel's choir loft that has two 360 degree turns with no visible means of support. An anonymous carpenter built the spiral steps in 1878 using only wooden pegs.

State Capitol at Santa Fe.

State Seal inside Capitol.

Loretta Chapel, Santa Fe, N.M.

Stairway, the bannister was added later for the Nun's safety.

Inside the Loretto Chapel.

Moving farther south, we stayed near the Bosque Del Apache NWR and visited the refuge a couple of times.  There are many Sandhill Cranes wintering there combined with lots of snow geese and different breeds of ducks.

Sandhill Cranes

A coyote looking for a sandhill crane meal.

In southern New Mexico, we stayed at Rockhound State Park near Deming.  We had a terrific site on the side of the mountain overlooking the valley with the city in the background. Behind us was a mountain with trails into the desert.  We only stayed a few days but will probably return when we start east again.  We are now in Green Valley, Arizona staying at Green Valley RV Resort.
Our address is:  Steve & Ellen Philbrick  Lot 56
                          19001 S. Richfield Avenue
                           Green Valley, Az  85614
  We will spent 2 months here although the original plan was to stay only one month.  But at the end of the first day, we both agreed this wasn't just a stopover but a place we wanted to spent a lot of time at.  It has lots of birds, some good restaurants, good park amenities and everyone is very friendly.  It's only 20+ miles from Tucson and within day trips of Tombstone, Patagonia, Saguaro National Park and other canyons and areas of good birding.

This brings us up to date since leaving Maine on September 28th.  We have travelled nearly 8000 miles without a mishap or a rainout day.  We feel really blessed to have the health and opportunity to travel this wonderful United States Of America, God Bless America!!!!

Steve

The following pictures are roadside scenes I though were interesting.

Vultures eating car at a junkyard.

Something to do with your stumps.

Drying Red Peppers at Hatch, N.M.

Roadside Greeters at Hatch, N.M.

A Dogs dream or nightmare.

Cotton bales waiting to be loaded and shipped to the gin.