Another way of titling this would be high speed moving.

After leaving Tucson we made a small move to Phoenix, Phoenix Metro RV Park which is just about as citified as RV Parks get, even those on the edge of the desert.  During our stay there we spent another day at MIM (Musical Instrument Museum). The small exhibit (in floor space, not content) “Women who Rock” took us two hours to enjoy.  We took a break for lunch in their cafe, listening to an Irish group on the lunch patio, it was March 17, before reentering the galleries to spend some serious time in the geographical areas where we had just been traveling, mostly Asia.  Of course we had to take in the Japan music area as well since we are headed there shortly.  This consumed another two hours and our heads were full, our feet and legs sore and it was time to take a break from “museuming.”

We met Rick and JoAnne Morgan and their travel companions in Scottsdale for lunch in the gallery area.  We had a delightful time touring galleries and having a very nice lunch at Daily Dose. It is always fun to catch up with people we have followed through their blogs and spend time with them in person.  We last met Rick and JoAnne in person in White Sands National Monument.  During our conversation they talked about Sedona.

I checked the weather because the last few times we thought of going there the daytime highs were in the 30’s.  This time the highs were forecast in the 70’s so after we visited the Markusens in Cave Creek we made plans to drive the coach up into the mountains to visit Sedona.  We elected to stay at the Sedona Elks Lodge.  It turns out to be right in the middle of all the places you might was to visit and the view from the camping area is mountains, red rock peaks across the valley, OMG!  The drive was fairly straight forward although the endless number of roundabouts on the way in on 179 gets tiresome, it’s bad enough in a car, but in the coach. . . Carol had the privilege of that stretch of highway.  We drove Schnebly Hill Road in the Jeep. The first 6 miles were a mild challenge, we saw passenger cars on the road and heard their frames banging on the rocks – they must have been rentals, no one in their right mind would do that to their own car. The second six miles were basic smooth dirt.  We also booked a tour on the Verde Valley Railroad.  This looked like an expensive tourist trap, but we decided to give it a try.  Worth It, every penny!!! Susanne in the parlor car serving drinks and keeping everyone happy and Ralph, the Attendant on the open air car, pointed out all the rock formations (Presidents canyon with Lincoln in front and Tricky Dick in back with lots of little bushes) and eagles and many other sites.  18 miles and 2 hours in the train stopped and using a siding they moved the locomotives to the other end of the train to pull us back to Clarkdale Station.  The locomotives were built for the Alaska RR, and then served other lines before being acquired by Verde Valley and reconditioned to pull their tourist consist.  We had turned down the opportunity to take the trip on the cheap by sitting through a timeshare sales pitch, I would rather pay my money than subject myself to 90 minutes of high pressure sales presentation for something I have no interest in whatsoever.

It was time to begin a high speed move.  We had made plans to have dinner with AnnaLee and Jerry in the Sacramento area and we had just under 800 miles to cover in two days.  For folks who consider 250 miles a long day this was a challenge.  Fortunately we had John Grisham’s Sycamore Row queued up (actually we had been listening for several hundred miles already and were looking forward to road time to finish it).  471 miles later as dusk was settling we pulled off the road, CA 58, at an intersection with 202 just west of Mojave, the town not the desert, and found a level piece of packed sand left by road crews and set up camp there just off the road along with at least one other camper we saw and spoke to.  We slept fine to the lullaby of passing traffic and the occasional train.  Early in the morning we had breakfast and set out for Sacramento, the KOA just west of town.  By 2:30 we had covered another 322 miles and were setting up in a full hookup campground where we could do laundry and take long luxurious showers. Grisham still had hold of our concentration with his very detailed unrolling story.

After a delightful dinner at Vic’s Ice Cream !? which of course included ice cream, with Jerry and AnnaLee we went to their home and spent the evening sharing travel stories until it was time to get back to the coach, we had to move on immediately.  2 hours after starting we were settling into the Alameda Elks Lodge, not far from Berkeley, or anyplace else in the Bay Area.  Although Alameda has a reputation as a gritty industrial area, it appears much of the grit and industrial is gone and the town appears to be quite nice.  The Elks Lodge is right next to the city hall and it is somewhat surprising that in this august neighborhood we would be permitted to stay in our coach, but there you are.  We are not alone in the lot either.

No more moving until Saturday!

From Marfa Texas to Phoenix Arizona doesn’t take ten days driving.  We have made a couple of lengthy stops along the way, but somehow I never got around to writing about our experiences.  Our next stop after Marfa was Las Cruces NM where we stayed five nights.  We had a delightful evening with Leora Zeitlin attending a Jazz concert that was the culmination of a high school jazz festival held at New Mexico State University Las Cruces (hereafter NMSU).  The performances were by NMSU music students who were wonderful with the addition of a couple of top notch professional performers/teachers.  We gathered at Marianne Zeitlin’s new home with her family for Shabbat dinner and also had dinner out on Saturday night.

In between we managed to find a museum we had not heard of or been to right on the campus.  It is the Zuhl Fossil Museum.  It is a couple of rooms in the Alumni Center and has a wonderful collection of petrified wood pieces from slabs to cross sections to logs.  There are also a large number of ammonites.  It is worth a stop for the beauty although I am not sure about the academic value.  We also went to Las Cruces Museum of Art where there was a special exhibit of an artist named Bauman who worked in many media, but his woodcuts are among the most interesting and wonderful.  I do not remember seeing woodcuts that are so colorful.  He also was a sculptor and cabinet maker as well as a painter. On leaving the Art Gallery we exited through the Science Museum which is connected.  These two museums are on Main Street in the market area.

From Las Cruces we continued west to Tucson where we set up in Catalina State Park which is just north of the city.  We couldn’t get a site in main camping circles, but we were able to get into the overflow area (Ringtail Circle).  This is an open circle of sand with sites marked out around the edge.  There are no facilities other than a wonderful bathhouse with great showers.  We had site 12 and, should we ever head there again we would much prefer either 12 or 13 which are deep in a back corner with a bit of privacy and room to establish a patio.

 Our solar panels (photovoltaic energy panels) provided us with sufficient electricity to keep our batteries charged and so long as we were judicious with our use of energy (no tv, microwave etc) we had little need to run the generator.  Over four days we ran it less than 5 hours.  There is wonderful hiking and fine birding throughout the park.  We started the climb to Romero Pools, but turned back about a mile short as the going was very steep and we had not brought lunch with us.  This was not a miscalculation so much as a decision.  We were meeting my high school classmate Marjorie and her husband Larry for dinner nearby at 5:30.

The night before we had dinner at Eleanor and Kelly’s home in Saddlebrooke about 6 miles north of Catalina SP.  We met them on our trip to Thailand and Vietnam in December and had looked forward to continuing the friendship.  It was wonderful to see their lovely home with great mountain views and quail marching along their garden wall.  Carol and enjoyed the evening and will certainly call again when we are in the vicinity.  It is not altogether impossible that we could see them in Rochester some day as they have a son living there, Kelly worked for Kodak once upon a time.

From Tucson it was a short jaunt north to Phoenix.  What a change, from the desert campsite with no hookups and absolute quiet at night to Phoenix Metro RV Park located on the frontage road to I 17 with coaches lined up every 20 feet and a city stretching in all directions.  We plan to visit the Musical Instrument Museum (MIM) again and maybe some other galleries/museums we have seen before.  We also hope to see the Markusens from Rochester who have a wonderful place near Cave Creek.  The timing depends on how their basketball team does in a tournament (pardon my ignorance of teams and tournaments – I do know March Madness will be upon us very soon, I heard it on NPR).

I hesitate to comment on my dealings with coach issues, Murphy may be looking over my shoulder.  Everything has been working as I would hope.  I guess I have shaken out most of the kinks, for now.

I’m working on my cliches, if I can be said to be working at anything.  We have too many sources of news, if that is possible.  In the morning we get the NYTimes on our Kindles while listening to NPR and read and listen over breakfast.  When the NPR morning news recycles we sometimes turn on TV for CNN, MSNBC, or a Food Channel show to settle our stomachs.  We read each other headlines and clips from the NYTimes and we remember what some of the places we are reading about looked like just a few months ago.

There is turmoil in so many parts of the world that it seems it is hard to plan a trip that doesn’t involve some area where there is strife. Over the years we have chosen to plan our trips with little regard for potential problems unless of course there are State Department warnings, in which case we think about it and then as often as not venture on.  We have been to Israel many times when others consider it unwise.  We have traveled in Latin America when others consider it inadvisable, especially into some areas of Mexico.  We have avoided parts of Mexico that Mexicans avoid and feel very sad that it really seems foolhardy for an American Jew to visit Egypt.  We may never get there.  We, or maybe just I, have mixed feelings about India. I want to go and I know that much of what we see in the press is limited in its impact on most tourists.  But the very nature of the apparently generalized abuse of women makes me hesitant about traveling there with Carol.

I would love to be able to say I know what should happen in Ukraine and in Thailand, but sitting here as a recent traveler who has read endlessly I can only say I cannot even imagine how things can work out.  Ukraine is a democracy that has turned out a corrupt leader by unconstitutional means and needs to find a way to reconstitute itself within its constitution.  It is caught in a vise between Russia and a substantial portion of its population that is ethnic Russian and a much larger portion of its population that yearns to be a part of the European community.  Ignoring, if that is possible, the financial disaster it faces with no foreign exchange or even internal funds, if Russia decides to really squeeze them it can shut off the flow of gas and that will be the end of heat and power.  Of course that will also be the end of Russia’s largest export and Putin’s income from Gazprom.

Thailand is a total mystery.  A constitutional monarchy with an incapacitated king (I can say that safely sitting the US) where the people of commerce want to throw out the constitutionally elected government and the constitution because they cannot win an election – hmm sounds like Texas Democrats – so they can change the rules (maybe that was Texas Republicans).  The current government is no prize and certainly is corrupt, but so what else is new.  In the meantime in Burma the peace loving Buddhists are slaughtering Muslims who have been exiled in Burma for more than a hundred years and have been declared non citizens.  Oh a side note, last night we watched Bridge Over the River Kwai (1957) since we had just been on the real bridge.  Boy do they get it wrong even if it is a great film.  Just one example, the tease talks about “deep in the Burmese jungle” nice line but the rail line was being built to get from Bangkok to Burma and the section of the line in the movie is in Thailand (even though they filmed it in Ceylon).

But enough about the world.  We left Falcon Lake Monday morning planning to drive three days to Las Cruces.  It is Wednesday Afternoon and I writing from the Siesta RV Park in Las Cruces.  Monday night we stopped at the WalMart in Del Rio Texas, I will leave it to you to look at a map of the Rio Grande Valley and find Del Rio.  Topped up with fuel and our purchases at the WalMart we continued on toward Marfa. Over the years we have not found a suitable place to stay in Marfa.  Being a bit more proactive this year (looking for a place before we got there) I found Tumble In.

This park offers a little piece of desert with all the amenities a traveler might want, electric, water, sewer, nice bathrooms and showers excellent wifi and laundry and much more.  No pool or playground but a short walk into town and great views.  It is honor system self check in.  knowing this I chose to reserve and pay online to avoid the need to leave a credit card number or cahs in a box. Here is Carol at the “office”

We finished a great AudioBook on the drive, The Invention of Wings, by Susan Monk Kidd.  We both highly recommend it.  We started a new audiobook by John Grisham, The Sycamore Row, so far we are deeply in its grip.  We may not listen again until Monday when we get back on the road.

Miscellaneous aggravations.  The dash fan has been acting up and we fear it is more than the breaker which has dropped out on us twice.  Rally don’t want to get into what it might be but I have been assured by Tiffin that they will take care of whatever it is under their extended warranty program, “Bob said to fix it”  The tankless water heater gave us fits, failing to provide hot water when the wind was blowing just so.  A long conversation with tech support – Gary – with me at the heater found two issues.  The heater was installed into an opening that was not square with the heater’s case.  The deformation of the case caused a small fan to stop working.  The fan is intended to help prevent wind from blowing out the flame (?).  I fixed that with a little bending and pushing.  The cover that Tiffin supplied is supposed to have a plate riveted over some of the openings by the exhaust to balance the airflow (?) to prevent the wind from blowing out the flame.  The plate is in the mail for me to install.  There are other small things that with a little twiddling will make life a bit easier.

The keys have not shown up.

We settled in to Rainbow Plantations in Summerdale AL and watched the weather deteriorate.  We had planned to stay 3 days, long enough for our mail to catch up with us and see family in Fairhope. Our hopes to get together with Joy and family did not work out.  As we thought about moving on west, a check of the weather convinced us that staying put for three more days would avoid our driving into the fierce storm that was blanketing the south to the west of us (and headed our way) and was part of the massive system that was shutting down air travel and roads to the north and east of us. We had already ducked horrendous sleet and ice on the road from Florida to Alabama by being “stuck” near Sanford Fl.  We stayed and endured the rains and (relative) cold in the safety of a comfortable campground.

Our route west took us to a new stopping place, Frog City RV Park. just west of Lafayette, LA.  I would certainly recommend this for an overnight or even a few days even though it is adjacent to a truck stop just off I 10.  The noise did not disturb us and the place was neat and clean with sites more than adequate for us to pull in and stay with our Jeep attached for an easy departure the next day. While there we encountered an extreme example of something I experienced mostly in my work.  We met a neighbor who was new to RVing and offered some suggestions of support clubs they might join such as Escapees.  The men (husband and brother-in-law) went to the casino and the wife invited herself to a tour of our coach.  Over the next 30  minutes or so she unloaded her entire life history from a family of addicted people to her career in counseling  to their abrupt decision to sell everything and take up full time RVing with no preamble.  Carol and I were breathless and speechless when she took her whirlwind of tzouris (yiddish for troubles) back to her coach. I have witnessed this kind of “unloading” as I said mostly in my work as a Financial Planner, but also when meeting new people in campgrounds, but seldom in such depth and such a dysfunctional story.  We were not unhappy that they were headed east as we headed west.

We moved on the next day to Rainbow’s End in Livingston TX.  We had three objectives, pick up mail, get the vehicles inspected and VOTE.  Our first vote in Texas and early voting opens the day we plan to leave.  We hope to vote in the morning before we leave.  Our primary vote will be important as there are very few Democrats in these parts.  The other objectives are already taken care of.  We had a great walk around Lake Livingston State Park and a nice dinner out at Pueblo Viejo.  If you are ever in Livingston (I cannot imagine what would bring anyone not a member of Escapees here) and you want to dine out, this may be best option.  There is an Italian place that gets a better rating in Trip Advisor, but Italian in semi rural Texas?

Tech: Since our travel in the Fall we have become rather adept with Skype Video and Google Hangouts, it lets us see the grandkids and get a tour of the construction at Malena and Dan’s.  We put up with the occasional dropouts caused by variable wireless connection for the fun of the video. We have satellite TV, somehow I seem to always park with a tree between our antenna and the satellite we need.  Right now I am shadowed by one small limb, but it hardly seems worth shifting everything so I see how many channels of nothing to watch I can get.  We bought a Roku to watch Netflix (and many other channels) so we have much more, nothing to watch, and some movies.  Unfortunately bandwidth for the movies is sometimes a problem, we need to be in a place with excellent Verizon LTE and be sure the phone is fully charged and plugged in before starting a movie.  I am also learning  more than I want to know about licensing of programs by item and by geography.

Yesterday, Tuesday February 4, my sister’s birthday, all the parts were available and so was a bay.  Nathan had us in the service bay by 10 AM and and we left La Mesa RV Sanford for the third and final time at 5 PM. I must give special thanks to Nathan and the staff at La Mesa RV.  None of the delay was their doing and once they had the parts they got it all done and it seems to be well done so far.  As we returned to Wekiva River RV Park we were debating whether to stay another day or plan to roll in the morning.  We rolled, enough itchy tire syndrome, time to be on the move.

But where to make our first stop.  Looking over our options I noticed a monthly email bulletin from Harvest Hosts in my inbox.  I remembered that there were several members along our proposed route on I 10.  A quick check of the directory map from their website http://www.harvesthosts.com/ showed a couple of probables.  One is Golden Acres Ranch which we stopped at last Spring (May 2 to be exact).  It is 10 miles north of I 10 and I remembered that following the gps to get there might be a mistake.  We called and Fred said “sure, what time should look for you.”  We set off with expectation of arriving between 3 and 4.  This did not take into account the longest fuel stop either of us can remember,  Access to the only diesel pump was blocked by a car whose operator was in the shop shopping, apparently he never heard of pulling away from the pump after fueling.  We waited at least 10 minutes, when I asked him to move his car before finishing his shopping he grumped at me, oh well.  Once we got to the pump it became clear we would be there a very long time.  We needed just under 80 gallons of diesel and it took 30 minutes to pump it.  We will not ever stop at a Marathon station again with the coach, it is better to pay a few cents a gallon more and be on our way.

We arrived at Golden Acres Ranch at 4:45 in the afternoon.  We were warmly welcomed by both Fred and Bobbie.  Bobbie and her daughter-in-law were completing the afternoon chores feeding all the animals.  Fred helped spot us and then showed us what was available in the shop.  I will be leaving here with some fresh frozen local lamb and we will also have several jellies made by Bobbie. Unfortunately I don’t think there will be any mayhaw jelly as last years harvest was a bust, read my post from May 2, 2013 for details. Fred says this year has promise of a good crop.  Not sure when we are likely to get back here, but I am sure we will.

Oh about the gps directions.  The software in the coach thinks that there is a street called Longleaf that gets to the ranch from the north.  Well there is, sort of, I don’t think the jeep could get through, it never was a road.  I thought I had it figured right this time, but no we came to the ranch the hard way again.  Maybe another year we will approach from right off US 19 onto Barnes.  That is a reminder for me and a note for anyone trying to get here. That will result in a really tough right turn into the driveway and I want to remember to cross the centerline to give myself room for the turn.

Not sure if we go all the way to Summerdale AL tomorrow or dawdle just a bit along the coast.  We will know soon enough.

For some reason we have had a collision of problems that have kept us pinned down in Sanford FL, yes “Stand Your Ground” Sanford.  We stayed one night at the Sanford Elks Lodge and met some delightful people in the bar.  The next morning as we prepared to leave for our appointment at La Mesa RV to have the seal repaired I noticed that the gas cap from the Jeep was missing, presumably stolen as it had a been there the day before when we fueled and it is fastened to the Jeep by a strap which was still there.

We arrived at La Mesa and met with Nathan, our service adviser.  He had the heater controller card for the water heater in hand and proceeded with that installation while examining the seal.  It needs to be replaced and their parts department only had a 21 foot piece and we need 28 feet.  I agreed to pay for expedited delivery since it was Friday and that should have it in hand on Monday, Tuesday latest.  At that point we moved the coach to Wekiva River RV Resort about 6 miles away for the weekend.  We drove back to St Petersburg in the Jeep to pick up the remaining part we needed for the water heater which Arthur had called to tell us was in.  Whew now we have everything in place to be underway by Tuesday, Wednesday latest.  So why am I writing this in the La Mesa RV Cafe on February 1?  One could blame the supplier for incompetence, they decided NOT to ship it expedited.  They put it on a truck which never made it out of Atlanta until Friday, January 31, because of the weather.  The good news is that we have been stuck in the warmest place we could have been this past week.  We have had an opportunity to explore an area of Florida we might never have thought about visiting.  We like the RV park we are in, the price not so much.

Monday, Murphy tracked us down again.  We had been having some reduced water flow issues and I had pulled the aerators off all the faucets and found fine gravel in them, especially the kitchen sink which gets the heaviest use.  Finally removing the aerator on the kitchen sink did not restore the flow and I saw black fine sand in the toilet bowl.  It dawned on me that the source of black fine sand had to be the whole house carbon filter.  Clearly in the freeze at Covesville it had had a small internal rupture. When I pulled it Monday morning I found it leaking carbon.  Great! but how do I restore the flow in the kitchen sink? Some basic troubleshooting pointed me to the diverter valve which switches between the sprayer and the tap.  I was getting much more flow through the sprayer, ah a workaround.  I called Pfister customer service and told them my tale of woe.  Not the least being the video for how to remove the diverter was not working on their web site.  I pulled the diverter and cleaned it according to the directions and flow was restored to 50%.  Another call and the part was on order under warrantee, but I paid for 2nd day delivery. The part didn’t show at the campground office when expected or the next day, but I wasn’t going anyplace anyhow. By the third day I was getting upset, I finally got the UPS tracking number which showed it had been delivered and signed for two days before!  It was not in the office, so at their suggestion, I went to the store and found it there addressed to Paul Gobderg, close! The replacement took 5 minutes and flow was fully restored.

Still waiting, the seal has not arrived and it is almost 3 PM on Saturday, back to the campground as soon as they finish with the water heater.  Oh, I didn’t mention, the tech broke the new part while installing it 🙁 🙁 They have pulled a part off a coach in the lot to hold us over the weekend and will finish the job next week when we come back to have the seal installed, assuming it was ever actually shipped.

Still have a smile on my face, I don’t need to be anyplace else yet.  I guess we will blow through the Florida Panhandle, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana in a couple of days on our way to Texas. Fortunately we have explored much of the territory and don’t feel we will be missing much.  Of course this all assumes Mr Murphy has had enough fun with us.  For the non RVers reading this none of this is more than irritating taken as individual happenings.  Other than the seal, all of the problems stem from spending time in temperatures below 10 F which is really rare for us.  The water heater initial failure was a switch that stuck in the on position and caused the plastic housing to distort from the heat, problems cascaded from there.  Likewise the filter failure lead to a lesser cascade of failure.

Time to go enjoy.

Landed at Dulles after 3 months away zonked from 18 hours flying with a 15 hour layover with hotel room in London and 12 hours out of synch with Eastern Standard Time.  Dan picked us up and drove us to his home where we crashed for the night. The drive was hard on him as it was raining and freezing and dark.  I dozed.

Picked up the coach at the storage lot the next day and managed to get it well situated in Dan and Malena’s yard for the coming week in advance of serious freezing weather -remember that for later.  We used auxiliary propane tanks to keep from running down the main tank and it was a good thing as we burned through almost 20 gallons of propane plus about a third of our onboard supply, call it another 8 gallons.  The temperature got down to 4 F one night (that’s Fahrenheit).  We watched the continuing construction project that is adding a master bedroom and dining room to the house along with gutting the kitchen.  This started the day we left in October and I expect will continue for another couple of months.

We rolled out on the eleventh with Corey riding the nav seat out to the highway.  This was his 11 year old treat with the grandparents.  He moved to the couch with his books and pillows and settled in for the long ride to St Augustine, FL and the Alligator Farm.  The drive took two days of about 6 hours each on the road.  Our usual search for interesting stops was cut off by dreadful weather, it was cold and raining most of the way.  We made our way to Indian Forest Campground just outside of St Augustine and set up camp for three nights.  This is a nothing special campground with nice folk reasonable sites and just a bit too much water on the ground, not their fault, but it is low and flat, Florida.

At the Alligator Ranch Corey was in his element.  He had studied the guide books to know what to look for and we saw every reptile they have, twice.  Also plenty of snakes and birds.  I will not recite the bird list here.  Corey has it written down.  He spent lots of time in the evenings keeping up his journal.  After lunch which we had brought with us, he asked if we could go on the zipline ride we kept seeing people riding overhead.  We said sure and both Carol and I decided to share the fun.
We took the shorter route, the longer one takes at least 2 hours! I did not realize that this was a mix of obstacle course and zipline.  While clipped in to safety lines at all times with guides walking beneath us we navigated tight ropes, slack ropes, swinging bridges and ladders.  It was hard work and a lot of fun, especially when we reached a fast zipline.  After dinner in town we slept well and returned to see the Castillo which has defended the city for 400 years.  We also wandered the streets and had lunch at Al’s Pizza, finally back to the coach for dinner.  The next day we took the long way from St Augustine to St Petersburg and set up camp at Fort Desoto, one of our favorites, so Corey could see his Uncle Arthur and Aunt Natalie, Carol’s brother and sister-in-law.

We have service needed so we are holding over a couple of days before going to Orlando for a service appointment for a loose slideout seal.  Today became a marathon of problems and maintenance stuff.  I had planned to have the oil changed in the Jeep and on the way I stopped to pick up windshield wipers because as I was replacing the windshield washer hose, which had succumbed to the sun, I noted that the wiper blades were in no better shape.  As I congratulated myself on accomplishing those simple tasks, I noticed someone walking through our site, very unusual, then there was a knock on the door and a passing neighbor told me water was pouring from the back of the coach, as indeed it was.  A part in the tankless water heater had failed and water was streaming from it.  The bypass valve did not stop water from flowing to the heater.  A call to the manufacturer got me to Gary who calmly walked me through a tear down and rebuild of the sightglass flow sensor in about 45 minutes.  It isn’t leaking, but we don’t have hot water yet.  I hope as it dries out the gas will flow as the igniter ignites.  Not satisfied with that I tried to change the battery in my remote door opener only to find I need two of these very rare CR1616 batteries.

After dinner, as we cleaned up, I went outside to put away the grill.  I locked the cabinet with my key ring and went in to help dry the dishes.  When I went out to stow the barbecue tools, the keys were nowhere to be found, and so they remain among the missing three hours later.  We have turned the coach upside down and looked in and under everything imaginable.  They are here and I am sure we will find them when we move the coach three sites over in the morning, but. . .

From Saigon: Our sons were born in 1966 and 1968. At that time deep in the jungle not far from Saigon,  Viet Cong were building and fighting from a vast tunnel system in Cu Chi Provence that included 125 miles of tunnel through hard clay. These local villagers had first banded together to fight the French in the early 50s, or more to hide from the French using a limited tunnel system from house to house and eventually village to village.   The French were defeated and the US supported the new government of the South.  We became the enemy since these people in large measure supported Ho Chi Minh and the government of the North.

For us, in that day even if we did not support the American war effort fully,  the Viet Cong,  the VC, were the enemy.  Our soldiers were being killed in combat in Cu Chi daily.  Patrols never knew whether they would encounter boobytraps, or fire from hidden bunkers,  or just get savaged by mosquitos. Today this area is a National Monument and a major tourist site.  The least damaged tunnel area has been preserved as it was after the war.  This was where we went to tour today. I helped “locate” a hidden entrance to the complex.  A patch of leaf littered jungle, just like all others, with a small blaze on a tree nearby,  I never would have seen the blaze on my own. Finding the trap door entrance was another matter,  we tapped on the forest floor until we heard a hollow sound. Our site guide cleared the leaves away opened the lid,  lowered himself down lifting the lid overhead. As he got almost down he reached out and covered it with the leaves and disappeared leaving no trace of the entry.  A couple of us tried it.  I managed to get down the entry and lower the lid,  but this entry was meant for underfed VC men and women,  not overfed Americans.  We did enter and duck walk through several sections of tunnel entering several chambers, including one that purports to be command chamber were the Tet Offensive was planned.  We were treated to sections of jungle floor containing a variety of primitive but effective traps which struck fear in the minds of our soldiers patrolling there.  I took no pictures!  Those images will haunt my dreams for a while with no the need for visual reminders.

So far this is touring a 50 year old site that is open to tourists for a fee.  We reboarded our bus and headed off to lunch at the home of a well off family nearby.  Understand that the well off in Cu Chi today were all Viet Cong.  After the war,  those who were on the roles as active VC were rewarded with land which now is mainly rubber plantation. Those who were not on the roles,  or who had the misfortune to have their supervisor die before revealing their involvement to authorities got nothing but a pension.  At lunch were three guests,  a 90 year old former village chief whose major role was to supply food and other material to the troops,  a Colenel who commanded 1000 troops and a Capitan.  Both of them had served in Cu Chi among other fronts and now are the leaders of the veterans association.  I sat across from these two officers and had an amiable conversation about life in the tunnels and their war roles and we shared about our children and grandchildren.  The great spooks of my 20s and 30s turn out to be more like me today than I ever would have expected.  On the site we saw small shards of shrapnel left over from the many bombs that fell on every square meter,  we saw bomb craters from bombs dropped from B52s that were so devastating that the shock wave blew out an adjoining bunker,  yet the men who we met who survived this seem to bear no animosity towards us.

No, not Rochester, NY! Da Lat Vietnam!  This modest sized city of about 250,000 sits at 5,000 feet in the Central Highlands not far from Saigon,  9 hours by road,  35 minutes by airplane. It is in the region the Montagnards call home. It was established by the French about 120 years ago as an escape from the intense heat and humidity of Saigon.  More recently people discovered the climate is perfect to grow flowers year round.  Most are grown in greenhouses to protect them from the heavy rains in July and August, not to keep them warm or shield them from the sun.  There are 25,000 greenhouses covering the valley floors and hillsides today. 

As we arrived we saw signs for the opening of the biennial flower show,  the next day. Pictures cannot do it justice.  Every roadway,  sidewalk,  building was covered with and lined with flowers.  The medians of the roadways were rose gardens.  The hills were ablaze in the glory of so many different flowers and colors that it is difficult to describe.  I have taken hundres of photos and will eventually post some,  but .  .  We asked our tour guide to change the plan for a city tour to a visit to the show grounds,  it cost $1 dollar for entry. If you are mad about flowers and love to travel start making plans now for last week in December 2015. The hotels are booked solid and prices have been doubled and tripled,  but do see it. 

Special note to a friend:  Henry Hamlin,  have you been here to see the bonsai?  They are marvelous, not just at the show where there was a competition,  but at Truc Lam Zen Buddhist Pagoda which we reached by cable car.  There are many examples of bonsia permanently displayed there.

This is also a great time of year to visit Vietnam,  even Saigon’s weather is moderate – mid 80s.

Speaking of cameras.  Murphy has friends.  No sooner did my camera “self repair” then the next day Carol’s Nikon felt left out and gave her the same lens error message on her mid range lens.  The telephoto works fine,  so far.  Out came the new little Canon and Carol has been shooting with that for the last two days. 

Back to the folks and flu racing through the group.  Carol and I have been unscathed so far.  I have to believe that the flu shots we got last September were the “right” ones.  People are recovering and there don’t seem to be any new victims. This may be an interesting night.  Or room “has a window” as promised by OAT, but it is a narrow slot of a Window that admits some light and the crowing of a rooster nearby in the middle of Saigon.  It turns out Windows are a valuable commodity in Vietnam.  The French tax structure here before 1954 taxed property on the width of the property on the road.  Thus it is most common to see houses that are 10 to 12 feet wide, several stories tall and 30 to 50 feet deep.  They have common walls so as not to waste space that is taxed,  hence no side Windows on many buildings.  Even hotels are built this way in the more moderate price range. This tax structure had been retained by the Communist government and so has the resulting architecture.

I have wandered over many subjects in this post.  My comments about the government and politics have been limited,  I know.  Tomorrow we visit the Cu Chi Tunnel, a major construction by the Viet Cong that served as their base near Saigon during the war.  We will also meet with VC veterans and have a chance to talk with them.  Later when I can gather my thoughts more coherently,  I expect to write about the nature of government in Vietnam and try to sort the propaganda from the truth (whatever that may be). For one example we were permitted to enter a mountain village of relocated mountain people,  but only with a government provided guide.  Everyone seemed happy and reasonably well off,  but I have no idea what I was not permitted to see,  if anything.