03-05-10

I have some catching up to do. We have had a party and two trips since the last blog so here we go. Tuesday, 03-02-10 Today is Dennis's birthday.

so we had a small party for him. The gang all met at Silly Al's Pizza. After eating and (for some) drinking a few beers we all went back to Becky and Dennis's for cake and ice cream.

Of course the candles were the kind that relight when you blow them out. We had lots of laughs at Dennis's expense.

Happy Birthday again Dennis.

Wednesday, 03-03-10

We planned a trip with Missy, Junior, Debby and Mike.

We were to leave around 10:00.

At 9:00 Junior came by to say that they wouldn't be able to make it because he had to take David to Blythe to get some metal to make repairs on his fifth wheel.

To give you a little history, I have to go back to a couple of weeks ago when, Dennis got a call from Mike saying that he needed to be rescued because his buggy broke down in the desert. I went with Dennis on the rescue mission and we towed Mike back to the park.

As it turned out the drive belt on his rig had broken.

OK, so Mike replaced the belt Tuesday night but on Wednesday morning the buggy would barely move.

After a couple of hours Mike got it going.

At noon, we started on our trip. By then Junior had returned from Blythe so he and Missy were able to accompany us. We headed west on a frontage road that follows the south side of I-10 until we got to the first overpass west of "Q". When we arrived at the turnoff we were joined by Alan, a young man who also lives in the park.

We crossed over the freeway and had lunch where Tom Wells road goes north into the hills.

The plan was to try and make our way back to Quartzsite by working our way through the hills to the north west. Patti had forgotten her cigarette lighter but being a resourceful buckskinner woman made due with the help of the sun and a magnifying glass that we carry to read the fine print on maps. "Damn"!

I had never been in this area so we spent a lot of time following many false trails.
Along the way we saw the first Cactus blooms of the year.

Alan mentioned that he had been here before and thought he knew a way through the mountains.

"Great" I said. "You take the lead".

The trail was kind of rough and I think that Alan felt that the Jeeps wouldn't be able to make it. At each bad spot he would stop and look back at us to be sure we were still coming. After a while we were through the first set of mountains and were in an area that looked familiar. I thought I recognised the trail that would take us to Diablo Pass and back to "Q". after a mile or so I realized that this was not the track that I thought It was but it was going in the right direction so we continued on it. Within sight of Quartzsite we came to a locked gate and had to turn back.

In a short time we had retraced our route and as the time was getting late it was decided to go home via the Boyer Gap road. We got home about 5:00. We got off to a late start this morning but had a good trip. Here is the map.

Thursday, 03-04-10

Suzanne and Roy had been in Texas for the last few weeks and returned on Sunday, 02-28-10. They missed the trip to Dripping Spring. (see blog for 02-27-10) So we decided to go back there yesterday. Instead of going from west to east I felt that it would be fun to do the trip in the opposite direction which meant coming down the wash instead of driving up it. I also thought it would be easier getting through the rough spots if we were going down hill. :o)

We started off around 9:00 and followed I-10 east along another frontage trail.

The brittle bushes are beginning to bloom along the highway.

We followed the frontage road to Gold Nugget road and then turned south toward the mailbox cabin then headed east over the mountains and into the wash that goes by Dripping Spring.

We stopped at the spring so Suzanne and Roy could check them out.

Junior parked in the garage of the crumbled cabin there.

We left Dripping Spring and headed down the wash. We took some video's at the rough spots. They were not as easy as I thought to get over going down hill. Here is a still that illustrates that nicely. This was taken at the second bad spot.

Now, here are the video's. Some of them are kind of long.

Junior at the first Rocks,

Roy comes over the rock.

After watching the rest of us, Dennis decided to go around the obstacle.

The next challenge was even more fun.

After we all got through the rocks we drove a little way farther down the wash and stopped for lunch. Our Canadian friends decided that the center of the road was the best spot to sit down to eat. That was until some ATV's came roaring up the wash.

I had planned to show you many more video's but I have been working on this blog since around 10:00 this morning and it is now 8:00 in the evening. Some of the best ones are not working and the others take so long to upload that if I try to post all the vids I will no doubt be here until the wee hours of tomorrow morning.

After leaving the wash we stopped at the quartz area where we stopped once before to let the rock enthusiasts play in the large quartz outcroppings. From there we did some driving in and out of washes and across gullies until we eventually got to the entrance to the long term visitors area and then home.

Here is the Map;