Bless You All

This little gem was still on the camera and we couldn't leave it out, so here it is.  Susan hopes you won't get the wrong impression about the whole of the mid-west from this, but having said that, church, faith and religion are pretty big.  There are more churches than pubs, that's for sure.  

We're trying to decide what to do today.  We're both pretty tired now and not that keen to fight the traffic and the freeways in unfamiliar territory in a rental car...but needs must.  We'll see.  

See you soon Arthur.

Cincinnati and Kentucky

So we went to Cincinnati to see my cousin Susan and her friend Sandi.  Susan is my Father's Sister's daughter.  They were absolutely fantastic too and took us all over the place.  The following photos are a bit out of order, as we're quite tired tonight.  We flew back to Phoenix and gained 2 hours so it is very late for us now.  

And by the way, we've posted two blogs tonight, the other one below is titled Phoenix.  

We did so much that it is a little scrambled in our heads but this is one thing we did.  This is Serpent Mound and if you can read this you'll understand the following picture, which is the serpent.  Anyway it is an effigy of a snake made in about 1000 a.d.  which is really old.  

See the snake.

This is Susan on the left of the photo and Sandi on the right.  

And this is a deer that came out of the woods in their back yard.  It is walking on what they lovingly call "the moonscape", which is the neighbours back yard (a work in progress).  

Ohio has lots and lots of bridges and right across the river is Kentucky.  Who knew?  

On our first day out we saw our first covered bridge.  Wonderful.  Still has the old wooden floorboards and took lots of traffic during the few minutes we were there.

There is also an Amish community near by.  It is smaller than the Pennsylvania communities, but Amish nonetheless.  They farm, make and sell pies, furniture, and nic-naks.  No I don't know how to spell that.  They won't pose for pictures and often turn away but don't mind if you photograph them going about their business.  We clearly missed this chap but caught the horse and buggy.  

This is Cincinnati from one of the many bridges. 

The next day we went to the butterfly exhibition which was charming.  Lots of children enjoying feeding and photographing the butterflies.  Some were a little the worse for wear, but the really special ones were protected behind netting.  This little guy landed on me the moment I walked in the door. 

There were some botanical gardens included in the the visit and we saw some unusual flowers and whatnot.  Also a desert garden.  As we went from one room to the next it got hotter and hotter.  

And then we went to a local baseball game.  We didn't know it at the time, but we were actually in Kentucky watching a local team.  Freedom Fighters? maybe?  They won too.  We had seats on the first base line and enjoyed ourselves immensely.  We had hotdogs and beer.  Yea.

I think the next day we went fossil hunting.  The side of this little non-descript hill had at least 4 layers of ancient geology to fossick in.  We brought home a few little rocks, if customs doesn't take them off us.  

These are the two lovely dogs.  That's Murphy on the right and Josh on the left.  Both very lovable, friendly dogs and great mates to each other.  

Clancy blogging in the living room.  They had a lovely 3 story house with all the mod cons in a very modern American neighbourhood about 6 years old.  The streets were laid on the ridge of the foothill and the houses' back yards slopped into the woods.  Just lovely.  

The extended family included Dan on the right who is Abby's boyfriend.  Abby is Susan's daughter and my first cousin once removed.  She really reminded me of Jody and I think they would get along quite well.  

A barge passing under the bridge.  We went out to dinner on our last night there and took a walk on the Purple People Bridge.  It used to be for cars, but they closed it and it is now a tourist attraction.  It goes from Ohio to Kentucky and is again, charming.  There's a picture of it down below.  We're a little out of order here.  

One of the vendors was selling hermit crabs for pets.  Nicely coloured shells and lots of crabs, some clearly ready for another shell.  I didn't think customs would go for it.  

The family again with Cincinnati in the background.

Cincinnati is a big meat-processing state and pork is an important part of the economy I presume.  They built these little statues to honour the pigs.  Yes, they have wings. 

Another porcine reference. 

And here is the purple people bridge.  I loved it.  A warm balmy evening and a walk after dinner.  Really nice.  

Remember to keep going to see the Phoenix blog.  We're actually back in Phoenix tonight for the last night.  Tomorrow we drive to L.A. for 2 nights and then we head home.  Can't believe it.  I think we're both about ready.  Either that or we'd stay another 6 months.  I'm not sure we'll blog again, but keep your eyes peeled.  Love to all.

Phoenix

Hello again our friends, family and fans.  We've had a busy time in Phoenix catching up with old friends and, oh yes, shopping!  Here is the front of Cabela's which is any entire shopping centre in itself, I think.  Mary got a pair of pants here that were specially hemmed for her long legs.  She is very happy.  The whole shop is hunting themed and they have a replica mountain inside covered in game.   That's Clancy with the shopping.

We did try to spend some time relaxing after our exertions.  Also we landed in Phoenix in the middle of an unexpected heat wave.  It was 38 this day and 40 the next.  We kind of enjoyed it and even got in the pool, but it was pretty hot.  

These lovely birds hang out on the shady side of the palm trees.  Funny to see them move throughout the day.  They also have a lovely song.  I think they're called Grackles.  

This is Dorothy, the mother of my friend Valerie and someone I spent quite a lot of time with when I was a kid.  It was really good to see her and Les, her husband, again after all these years.  They are doing so well.  Perhaps I shouldn't say so, but Dot is 90 and Les is about 95.  Dot had to get off to her 10-pin bowling game.

And that was Phoenix.  We hopped on a plane to Cincinnati, Ohio on the 22nd via Charlotte, North Carolina.  See blog above for details.

Johsua Tree National Park

So here we are at the Visitor's Centre.  They provide a range of services from maps to history and geology of the region to souvenirs.  These latter range from caps, tee-shirts, mugs and shot glasses to fridge magnets.  They are usually themed on the vacinity as you would expect.  

Here is a proper Joshua Tree looming over Clancy.  They grow about 1 inch a year so this one is probably 480 years old, give or take a century.   Clancy is somewhat younger.  

In the part of the park that we drove through, this is the only free-camping area and it was lovely, if hot.  A cluster of huge boulders for shade and shelter and a few level sites for tent or RV.  If we ever returned, it would definitely be on the list of must-do things.  

Mary's about to wander into a fire pit area on the side of a rock.  We noticed there were modern-day petroglyphs tapped into the fire-blackened rock.  Kind of eerie.  

Cacti of various types. 

Joshua Tree National Park takes in two different deserts.  Each desert has its own desert plants and geology.  So, in the early part of the drive, there were the Joshua Trees and later, the Cholla.  Clancy only noticed the round red cactus near the base of the cliffs as we were driving through and it was some time before we saw one close enough to the road to photograph.  

After Joshua Tree, we headed for Phoenix.  This entailed leaving California and aiming for Arizona.  Somewhere around the border into Arizona, we stopped for lunch and noticed someone really having a good look at the RV.  After lunch Clancy had a good look herself and noticed a flattening tyre.  We immediately zipped off to find assistance and three-times lucky, found a tyre repair place before the tyre was too flat to drive on.  Lucky us.  So... the next hour or 2 was spent in the sweltering heat of an Arizona heat-wave while this chap repaired the valve.  Good man!

And then we were on our way.  We got into Phoenix about 6:30 and found our motel and the pool.  We unloaded the entire contents of the RV into the motel room and then collapsed into the pool.  

In Phoenix, we need to pack for the trip home, clean the RV, and get ready to fly to Cincinnati for the weekend.  We also need to shop for another suitcase and maybe one or two more little things.   So, bye for now and we'll post another blog about Phoenix and then Cincinnati as we are able.  Love to all.

Lone Pine and 29 Palms

Hi Arthur, hi everybody.  It's been a little while since we blogged, sorry.  But, we're still here and having a good time.  As my cousin Jay says, it looks like we've been stuck in Death Valley.  In spite of its inhospitality, I loved it and thought it quite beautiful.  But off we went on the road to Lone Pine where we had a night with our favourite  RV Park.  These people really made an effort to make the environment pleasant; even going to far as to have a petting zoo and a nice play area for the kids.  Here is the front office.  There was a pool and a spa too and I think it was about the first one we've seen in working order.  

This was just a strange and weirdly beautiful white-barked tree.  

Their resident tortoise.

One of their cabins with the Sierras in the background.  

Now this is a chair in the Lone Pine Film Museum.  It turns out that heaps and heaps of the early B Westerns made for Saturday cinema leaders and later for television were made in Lone Pine.  Between something called the Alabama Hills and the High Sierras was the perfect setting for such westerns with rocks for the bad guys to hide behind, little box canyons and room to run the horses.  They featured, Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, Hop-a-long Cassidy, Tonto and many, many more.  Here is one of their strange chairs made from the horns of cattle, I presume. 

And this ia typical load of guns, holsters, bullets and the necessary hat.  There is also a complete outfit worn by John Wayne in one of his westerns.  Oh yes.  

This bit of the High Sierras is quite jagged and rough looking in spite of the little bits of softening snow.  

Back to food.  I can't remember where we had breakfast, but Clancy still fancied the pancakes.  My omelet is a 4-egg one and we ate the balance for dinner.  The other thing there is a variety of hash brown potato.  

We drove down one side of Owen's Lake coming into town and then up the other side on our way out in the morning.  It was really pretty but there were no places to pull over for snapshots.  A common problem.  Some of the colour is caused by algie and some by salt and other chemicals.

The long road forward with the marching pylons never very far away.

Somewhere.....

Entering Cactus country.  (A non-official title.) 

These are actually Joshua Trees although we didn't know it at the time. 

Gorgeous legs....on the trees I mean!

A close up of the Cholla cactus.  Pronounced choy ya.

While I did a spot of banking, Clancy spotted this seemingly homeless man with a crutch having a siesta out of the sun in the heat of the day.  It was really hot too.  

We arrived at Twenty-Nine Palms just after 5 p.m. and got this for a site.  It was about 38 degrees outside, maybe more.  We had a little talk with Jessie on Skype and then went swimming.   Although the air conditioning in the RV worked, it was really noisy and we could barely talk over it.  We even had to leave it on at night and it made for rather poor sleeps as it came on and off with the thermostat.  

The next day we planned to drive through Joshua Tree National Park so onwards we go.