Benson, AZ

Short day, 3 hours and we decided to stop early as the weather was nice and we only have 100 miles to go tomorrow for the rally in Casa Grande. After we checked in and set up we went to Tombstone, 25 miles south. Kind of disappointing due to all the commercialization. We visited the Tombstone court house (a state park) which was interesting. There's a lot more history here than Wyatt Earp and friends shootout at the OK Corral. The OK Corral is privatly owned so we decided we didn't need to go inside. On the way out of town we stopped at Boot Hill Cemetery.

Deming, NM

Last day in Deming. After Judy returned from Curves we headed out to Columbus NM, 34 miles south. This was the small border town (still is, 1500 people) that Poncho Villa raided with 500 Mexicans in 1916. He killed 7 soldiers and 10 civilians. He lost over 90 and was persued by General Pershing into Mexico for almost a year but wasn't captured. Pershing had to return for WW I. We visited two museums before crossing into Polomos Mexico for lunch. As best I could tell I had a lime burrito. This was a very small place compared to the Mexican city we visited while in the RGV. One lane crossing, no Federales, no charge to cross or reenter oe park, one decent restuarant and store. There were just a few Americans, looked like retirees from RVs out to lunch. The state park in Columbus had a sizable CG. After we reentered the US we stopped at the duty free store, bought 2 liters of rum (1 bottle each) for $15.50, returned to Mexico, turned around and crossed back into the US of A with our purchase. After we were home the German slave driver made me wash the truck before dark.

Deming, NM

Today we did some sight seeing at the City of Rocks State Park and took a drive in the boones to Silver City. We saw our first Road Runner (yes, he/she ran across the road in front of us) but are still looking for Wylie Coyote. We also stopped at a very large (couple miles long) open pit mine. The Indians, then Spanish, then Mexicans, and since 1903 the Americans have been mining copper there.

Deming, NM Tuesday & Wednesday 2/5 & 6

Tuesday was a rest day, Judy did Curves then the laundry. Otherwise we just stuck around the CG. Wednesday after Curves and a buffet lunch we spent the afternoon in the local museum. For a small city they have a terrific museum. We spent hours in it and didn't make it upstairs. It's in the old armory and a home across the street. They had everything, local history & old photos, cowboys & ranches, Indians & pottery, WWI, WWII, dolls, china, furniture, rocks, gee...I can't mention it all. In the pictures Judy took one of the local mountain covered in a cloud blanket then there's the same mountain without the cloud.

Click on the pic to blow them up & get a better view. It's been sunny and clear but some wind and cold. 17 last night and 50s daytime.

Deming, NM

I gotta tell you we are having an adventure! We met a man today who had a terrible adventure this afternoon. We traveled 290 miles today and are in the Escapee Dreamcatcher RV park in New Mexico. Did I tell you it was windy? What a day. We stopped just east of El Paso TX at a rest area on I 10 for lunch. When we pulled in a guy was trying to remove his awning from his motorhome as the wind had already torn it half off. Did I say it was windy? Anyway, a guy comes up to me excited about a trucker who won $100K in the lottery and was giving away $100 bills celebrating and I should come over and join them. Mama didn't raise no fool (besides I'm already wealthy! ha ha) so I continued helping the RVer with his awning. As we were finishing another guy who was VERY shaken asks me for help. He was so upset he couldn't dial 911 on his cell, I thought someone was real sick. I used our cell and called 911 and the guy was so upset he couldn't tell 911 where we were so I did. He then told the sherriff that he was assulted and robbed of over $50K. Did I tell you it was windy? Turns out he fell for the free $100 story and why on earth he had $50K+ with him I will never understand, he was also in a RV. Anyway 4 or 5 guys rolled him. He was so upset before 3 sherriff cars arrived he said twice if he didn't get it back he'd kill himself! I gave the cops a statement and good description of the guy who approached me and Mr Suicide. Did I tell you it was windy? OK, after we entered NM it did get REAL windy, so much blowing sand it was hard to see at times. A motorhome and toad passed us and we both thought he'd loose it more than once, we backed off. Anyway, we made it, the guy pulling into the RV park behind me with a HitchHiker was too rattled to go to the soicial hour his wife said. The pics I just took look like snow, you can't see the mountains behind us. Forecast sounds like Michigan, not sure about staying here, Dave Wood is more use to this than me. Did I tell you it was windy? But....I'm glad to be off the road!

Balmorhea, TX

Good news, we put 290 miles on the truck today going up and down some nice hills without a problem, I think she's fixed. We left the beautiful Texas hill country at 10am and 200 miles west it is now the dead, flat, boring west Texas. This state is big. The hill country turned into small buttes then flat land and we now see some nice hills in front of us called the Saddleback Mountains. We are spending the night in an inexpensive CG beside the expressway. We passed lots of windmills generating electricity, they are beside the expressway for what must be over 5 miles. If you look close you can see some in the pic or click on it to enlarge. As you can see, not all our campsites are in secnic locations!

Some Texas observations: two lane roads are 70mph, the expressway is 80mph (good news for Margaret!), there are lots of working windmills to water animals, mistletoe is growing in select trees, the Texas hill country is beautiful and we'll be back, the Rio Grande Valley has lots of Mexicans and ya hear a LOT of Spanish, Texas is big, Texas is very friendly to "winter Texans", there are as many deer here as in Michigan.

Ingram, TX

Today we visited Fredericksburg and the National Museum of the Pacific War and Admiral Nimitz Museum. We spent several hours in the museums and the outside grounds. One picture is of Judy beside a set of torpedo tubes, the round cabin of the top is where sailors controlled them, in the other pic she's standing in a small flower garden at the museum. There was a History Channel premier showing of the documentary USS Enterprise CV-6 which was good but there were 5 WWII vets there that served on the Enterprise during WWII! You can just see them standing in the back of the last picture. Two of them were pilots, one fighter and one torpedo bomber. The second pilot actually was in the Battle of Midway and attacked and help sink two Japanese aircraft carriers that had attacked Pearl Harbor! He was 92, all of them spent time telling of their experiences and answering questions.

You just had to love todays weather, 80 and all sun! Fredricksburg is a German tourist town so we had a great jager schnitzel dinner before returning home for the night.