RETIRED ON WHEELS

5 WEEKS AND COUNTING

Only 36 days until retirement and the starting of the next leg of our adventures. Only 36 days but who's counting. We have made arrangements for the storage of the 5th wheel while we are in the north and are busy trying to get everything done before we leave.

We are heading to Shreveport for the weekend to test out the Truck Camper, hopefully things go well. The hardest part of the trip will be keeping Kathy out of the Casinos.

I had an enjoyable day on Sunday as I was treated to a game of golf at the Hackberry Golf Club. A good friend of mine as well as the CEO of Duplium is a member and invited me to play. It is a very nice course but the greens we very, very, very slick and a three putt was the norm.

We started out enjoying the day but the tention grew as we got closer and closer to hole number 4. The reason for this was that Bernie got his first ever HOLE IN ONE on hole # 4 which is 207 yards. The question of the day was:

CAN HE DO IT AGAIN.

Nope, not this time.

He did hit the green which is more that I did. In spite of not getting another hole in one, it was a good day.

BACK IN GRAPEVINE

Well, we are back at Grapevine in the Vinyards Camp Ground. We left Silver City on Friday and we arrived back in Grapevine on Sunday after nightly stops in Van Horn, TX and Weatherford, TX. We will be here until the end of March at which time we will be loading up the truck camper and heading to Alaska for the better part of the remainder of 2009.

Retirement is being looked at with great anticipation.

SILVER CITY, NM and Surrounding Area

We woke up this morning in Silver City, NM to a slight frost as the temperature went down to 29 last night.

Silver City is at an altitude of 6200 feet and came into existence when silver was discovered and silver mining is still a big part of the area. Prior to that it was the stomping grounds of the Apache Indians. Silver City’s other claim to fame is that Billy the Kid spent part of his youth here and was said to have been arrested twice while living in Silver City, both times for stealing. In addition to mining Silver City has developed an artist colony with a section of the downtown set up strictly for artists to retail their wares.

Downtown Silver City, NM

We went downtown for a coffee this morning before heading out to Whitewater Canyon and the famed Catwalk. The canyon has been worked so that people can follow the trails for about 1.1 miles in and the same back out. They have built a catwalk through parts of the canyon so that you can walk right inside the canyon with the water running under you. It was only a little over a 2 miles hike but it felt like it was ten miles as everything was up and down. It certainly got the heart rate going. Kathy kept asking me if I have paid the insurances premiums this month.

Even with the difficulty of the climb the scenery was spectacular. I have posted a bunch of pictures and just hope that they do justice to the actual beauty that was there.

After leaving the canyon we headed up the road to an official ghost town and it is called Mogollon. The drive to get there was a big part of the fun as it is 9 miles off Hwy 180 and the first 4 miles were fine. The last 5 however proved to be an adventure as it narrowed to one lane and climbed over the mountain and down the other side to reach Mogollon. We ran into a couple of other people and it was a tight squeeze getting by each other. I had to 4 wheel drive to turn around as I almost got stuck in the snow and mud.

When we pulled into town I realized that they knew my brother in law. There was a painting on the rock face just as you entered town that proclaimed it was “ Ricky Donny Time “ After having a quick look we headed back to Silver City and called it a day.

It's Ricky Donny Time in

Mogollon

LEAVING CASA GRANDE, AZ

We left Casa Grande this morning and after a 274 mile drive arrived in Silver City, NM. We plan to spend two nights here before continuing our return trip to Dallas. Tomorrow is supposed to be a nice day but it is going down to 29 degrees tonight and there was snow on the ground in places as we came into town.

Tuesday, January 6, 2009 was our last night in Casa Grande. Where has the time gone, we have been here 20 days and it just seems like yesterday we left Dallas to begin the trip here. However we have to say goodbye to

The Howies

and their children

The last day was spent golfing with Peg and Rick and the game todaythat day gave us a total of 7 golf games during our stay here. I do believe the final score was Rod 4, Rick 2 with 1 tie, but who's counting. ME. I left the best for last as I shot my lowest score today with a 40 front nine and a 44 back nine for a total of 84. Rick did have the lowest score of the series with an 83 on the day he shot par. He is the best.

We then finished off the day with a nice steak dinner ( Kathy had lamb ) which we cooked on Ricks BBQ with brickettes, no gas and I must say the steaks were great. Nothing beats the traditional old fashioned BBQ.

This morning Cliff and Gayle along with Peg and Rick showed up to see us off and to laugh at my travelling clothes. They obviously confussed me with someone who gave a hoot.

The Goodbye Crew

My sister is going to miss me.

But not as much as Ricky Donny will.

STILL IN CASA GRANDE, Jan 2, 2009

Happy New Years, okay belated Happy New Years.

We are still in Casa Grande enjoying the company as more family arrived, eating to much, playing a fair amount of golf and in general enjoying life.

We did not do much on New Years Eve but Kathy and I did manage to stay up until midnight and welcome in 2009. We then spent a lazy day on New Years just enjoying each others company.

My niece and Peggy's daughter arrived yesterday with her husband JP and her 2 kids, Alex and Beth. They will keep Granny pretty busy over the next week.

Also there was another siting of "Bellisbeerius " and I do believe " Son of Bellisbeeris " was with him. There were spotted on the horseshoe pits accompanied by a bunch of shiny silver cans.

The crew plans to go to the Mesa flea market tomorrow and then get in a little more golf before we have to leave on Wednesday. When we leave here we will be headed to Silver City, New Mexico for a two day lay over before heading back to Dallas.

Bellisbeerius

Son of Bellisbeeris

Alex and Beth. Son and daughter of JP and Wendy.

CASA GRANDE Friday December 26, 2008

Well hello all. It is boxing day and we spent the day relaxing and trying to digest the amount of food we ate yesterday. I spent the day playing a little poker, watching a litte TV and of course catching up on the Blog. Kathy was a little more ambitious as she got up a lot earlier than I did and I will be having home made turkey soup tomorrow. Thank you, thank you.

Christmas Eve and Christmas day have come and gone for another year and it is nice to be with some of my family again this year.

Christmas Eve Kathy and I spent Christmas eve doing a little shopping at the outlet mall in and fortunately not much damage was done to our pocket books. It was very nice weather wise and as a result quite enjoyable walking around the mall as it was an outdoor mall. We left the mall and headed over to the grocery store to get the necessities for Xmas breakfast and Xmas dinner. Kathy spent the evening making pies for Xmas and I did my part by watching her do it.

On Christmas morning Kathy and I had our traditional breakfast of Eggs Benedict with Canadian Back Bacon with hash browns. This year however we had guests as the Cribbs and the Howards joined us for our tradional Xmas breakfast. It was a little cozy in the RV but went a lot smoother than I expected. Nobody got hurt from the closeness and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. I know anytime I am getting eggs benedict I am enjoying myself.

We spent the remainder of the day trying to digest our breakfast quickly so we could do it all over again at supper. The breakfast crew met at the Cribbs for Xmas dinner or should I say feast. The meal was stupendous and most of us ate too much and it was funny watching every one of us waddle around. We tried to find Christmas Crackers or Pary Crackers or whatever they are called, you pull both ends and they go off like a fire cracker and inside you will find a party hat. Ricky Donny was very pleased we couldn't find any until he found out Kathy had made party hats for everyone. However he was a good sport and wore one. It was an excellent meal and start to the evening.

Once dinner was over we did a tacky gift exchange with no gifts costing more that $ 10. The premise of the gift exchange is that once you pick a gift you can then exchange it for any gift already picked. As it turned out we all ended up with the gifts we brought. It was still good for some laughs as the gifts were pretty tacky.

After dinner the girls challenged us to a rematch of Cranium and you can judge from the picture below who came out victorious again. In fact it was another runaway as the boys cruised to finish late with no pressure. Then to add insult to injury we played a game of Trivial Pursuit with the same teams and of course with the same results. I don't think we will be challenged again.

CASA GRANDE Tuesday, Dec. 23, 2008

We hit the links again today and the highlight of the day was that ROD beat RICK. Again let me repeat Rod beat Rick. I believe that the last and only time was in 1990 in Whitby, Ontario. I know, I know, it is embarrassing to admit that it has been that long since I last won. However I believe the trend has changed and it will be a common occurance in the future.

The weather was a little colder but we dodged the rain and it turned out to be a good day especially because Rod beat Rick. The course was nice, it wasn't that long but the greens were very fast making putting very tricky.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. We returned from golf to do a little barbequing on Rick's real BBQ with charcoal. There is no better way to cook a steak. After dinner we just relaxed and Kathy watched a little TV and I replayed the day of golf in my mind. The day where the trend changed and Rod beat Rick.