Happy Tuesday! Only got down to 30 or -1 over night, but with almost no wind it doesn’t feel to bad, it’s almost 6am I have to admit we are (I’m) not adjusting well to three hour plus daylight time change, I’m struggling to stay up to 9 and I’m awake at 3, so if some of the posts seem to jump around more lately, it is probably because they do. We crossed from New Mexico to Arizona yesterday so we were at 7200 feet again as we made the trip we travelled 211 miles (300 kms) yesterday which is much closer to our normal, we are on the part of Arizona they call the high country so as we toured the sights yesterday it was sunny and 68 or 18 degrees almost perfect for a 3+ mile hike, but because of the elevation it is so much cooler than Phoenix which was 85 or 26 yesterday and is only 100 miles south and about 4000 feet lower, the humidity is only between 20 and 30% so the temperatures do not feel the same as they did back in Ontario. You know it’s a dry heat or cold, how many times have you heard that? But it is a reality, the below freezing temp this morning is not the same and we are going back to 60 or 14 degrees today as it’s going to be sunny again today!

Now as wrong as this will sound yesterday was not a good solar day, we came from full hookups, then drove three plus hours, sat in the park welcome centre for three hours, than drove to the truck stop, fuelled and settled in for the night as the sun set, so only about 54 amp/ hours were brought in, the reason the battery bank was full, the panels could have produced so much more if we had needed it, today will be different, the furnace has been running battery voltage is around 12 volts and the bank is at about 75%, I may have to fire up the generator this morning to run the inverter, although sunrise is only about 40 minutes away so we may make it through without the generator.

Miss Laurie want to see the corner in Winslow that it described in the Eagles song “Take it Easy” which describes standing on a corner in Winslow Arizona and includes a girl in a flatbed Ford, all of which are at said corner, so some more Kodak moments today. We are then moving only an hour west to a casino which has a RV parking area, near Flagstaff to spend a couple of days, one at the Grand Canyon and one the Sedona area just south of Flagstaff, before heading to the valley and much warmer temperatures.

And then there was sun bright sunshine battery charging beautiful bright sun…oh yah by the way Happy Friday…today is pack up day, as we are heading down the road tomorrow, heading south on US-95 through Parker to Quartzsite and then east on I-10 towards Phoenix. We are booked into a RV Resort for a week, over the American Thanksgiving, this will be our base while I secure some new batteries and prepare for our month in Why.

Our stay in Why takes some planning, the closest grocery store is ten miles north in Ajo, it is an IGA and has a good variety and reasonable prices, but the closest department stores are a couple of hours away either Tucson or Phoenix, either way a full day outing. So as everyone asks why “Why”? Why is located at the “Y” in the road were AZ-85 and AZ-86 connect, it is two hours west of I-10 and Tucson and about one hour south of Gila Bend and I-8. So we learned about a little campground in Why from a YouTuber (Bob Wells) that explained it was a great value…and being our first booking of that length and at a price of $220 for the month we had to give it a try. So we were booked into the park for the month of December, our (my) expectations were not high, but what met us at that little park in Why truly changed our lives, and I mean for the better. I will explain further as time goes on.

Because we are booked into a fancy RV Resort in the Phoenix area we need to cleanup our act, including getting Thunder a bath, and getting the towed washed up from 2600 miles of road grime from out trip to the south west and a week in the desert. We will take Thunder through a Blue Beacon truck wash, while they don’t do a great job, they do a reasonable job and it’s done quickly. For the towed I may look for a “you do it” wash in our area as with the kayaks and bikes it is a little more difficult, no automatic washes for us, no this will be a manual wash hopefully I can find a coin operated wash.

There is a chill in the air this morning, as the overnight temperatures have dropped to near 50 or 9 degrees, but the forecast today is clear skies and sun all day, the batteries will appreciate that as they can get a full charge from the panels. The highs for the day are 18 or 68 degrees, not the mid to high 80’s from before the rain but a little more realistic for the area and time of year. Over the three days of this storm Phoenix has received almost two inches of rain, and had lots of localized flooding, part of Phoenix even had enough hail to accumulate on the ground to turn it white, and just up the elevation Flagstaff has received 4+ inches of snow, anything above 6500 feet has received snow, California has even got some needed rain. Our expectations for temperatures during the winter in the desert are high sixties with nights in the low forties. Our perfect temperature is 70 or 19 degrees, and with no humidity we will take a little higher but that’s about all, that was why the above normal and humid temperatures of Florida last year were just simply uncomfortable.

Day 780