Month: June 2015

Crystal Mt. Sunday June 28, 2015

Hank and I got out this morning for a hike up the right side of the valley.  My Fitbit says we went 7.35 miles, 15792 steps, the gps on my InReach says we got to 5608 feet up the mountain. We turned back because I cannot tell how tired Hank is when we are hiking.  He goes as fast as he can until he has nothing left.  We were at about 4 miles and my guess was another 1 to 2 miles to the top.  That would add 2 to 4 miles to our outing and I decided 7 to 8 miles on our first day out was enough.  I also have to watch out for his feet. The trails up the right side of the valley are all  roads and I’m always concerned about  the amount of time he has to walk on small crushed rock and larger rocks.
I marked a waypoint where we turned around.

We did the right thing turning around, Hank has been sleeping since we got back.  He’ll lift his head when I go outside to make sure I don’t leave without him.

Elk Flats Campground at Cave Lake State Park, NV – Tuesday June 16, 2015

Got here at 1:00 and we are in site 14.
Did not do anything this afternoon, well not really I did work on the jigsaw puzzle Brian and Christine gave me for Christmas.  Most days when I am driving I’d think about getting started on this puzzle and then after we were stopped I’d forget about it. It is a Shutterfly puzzle Brian had made of a picture I posted on the blog last summer.  I got the outside border done before I had to quit for dinner.
Yesterday while at Cathedral Gorge we had a challenge with the refrigerator.  It seems when the temperature gets over 100 it gets unhappy.  With the sun on the outside of the motor home it had to be between 180 to 200 degrees on the outside of the frig.  This morning while filling up with water I took some temp readings.  At 9:00 a.m.after 20 minutes the shaded side of motor home was 78 degrees, sunny side the fiberglass 110, metal doors 140, steps 124.  The weather channel said it was 96 where we were yesterday. Anyway the temp in the refrig started rising. At 58 degrees it was time to do something. This happened last fall one day at Lees Ferry when the temp got over 100 degrees.  In the fall I worked on it for several hours and made plans to go to Flagstaff to get it worked on. I finally used the electrical disconnect to turn all the power in the coach. This reset the refrig and it worked fine until yesterday.  This worked again, by bed time it was down to 45, at 4 a.m it was 37 and at 7:00 a.m. It was 35, happy refrig, has worked fine all day today.

Jacob Lake, AZ – Sunday June 14, 2015

Left Lees Ferry early so we could get a site at Jacob Lake Forest Service Campground at the north road to Grand Canyon north side. The canyon is still 50 miles south of here.  There were a bunch of open sites and we took site 5 which is where we stayed last Fall.
Really nice day in mid 70’s, Lees Ferry is to be 95 and Hurricane 104.  We will head to Cathedral Gorge, Nv tomorrow where it should be 90. 

Bandelier Natl Park Valley – Saturday June 13, 2015

Pictures from my morning hike into Bandelier Natl Park. 
I got up early one morning and hiked to 1.5 miles down into the valley and then did some more exploring of the valley floor.
Looking across the mesa at the  volcano which created this rock.
The higher area is the caldera which created this area.
Frey trail down to the valley floor.
The information I read at the visitor’s center says this is a parrot.
Couple of years ago a flash flood created quite a mess, here are some of the thousands of trees backed up on other trees.
Trail up to the Alcove Area of the park.
It was a nice morning, I was back to the visitor’s center by 9:30 a.m. to catch the first bus back to the campground.  I did have a jog down the trail a ways to catch the bus.

Our first afternoon at Bandelier Natl Park.

Here are a few of the pictures I took during our first day in Bandelier Valley.
A flower that was all over the valley.
An open Kivia.
This shows here some of the houses were built extending from the wall.
Looking up the valley at where the homes are placed.
Showing the homes in the holes in the rock wall.
In the middle you can see the railings and steps up into the homes.
More of the railings between houses.
This rock is just full of holes and is relative soft.
This cool flower again.
You can see people in the middle of this picture.
Here is a herd of Rangers.
The homes on the valley floor.
More of the railings and people looking at homes.

The logs go all the way back into the rock wall to form a roof for the lower unit and floor for the upper home.  Later I’ll have pictures of the log holes in the rock wall.
The holes in this rock is just strange.
See the railings and people.
Couldn’t get enough  of these holes.
Homes down in the valley floor.
Shows homes under an over hang.
Long row of homes.
The small round holes is where the roof and floor supports went into the wall, the homes were three stories.
Roof and floor support holes.
 Abert’s squirrel, look at the ears.
This is from inside the museum, shows how they constructed the homes.
This is from the road leaving the valley.   It was a nice morning.