March 20, 2005 - Van, TX (Yuma & Van)

Back at Duske's place in Yuma, Marc is "curing" a cast iron frying pan he found at the flea market earlier in the day.  It got red hot, and that's just what he wanted.  Barb looked like she didn't have anything to do, so I told her to go get her "Carol" shirt on, and I'd take her picture so send it to Carol.  While shopping in San Felipe, Carol was looking at shirts for herself, and got to talking and didn't notice she'd bought a medium rather than a large, and when she got home realized her mistake.  So, Barb got a new shirt!  And that's Barb's "funny" hat.  It's one of those sunscreen hats with a long bill down the back of the neck for protection.  And she'll howl at me when she sees I posted it here!  :-)

Since Marc spent most his working life in the construction trades, he's doing a superb job of implementing Claudia's ideas here on their lot.  Like this nice patio.  That's Claudia with the big smile there.  The neighbors were invited over to initiate the new furniture, fireplace, and bar-b-cue.  We sure have good timing, don't we!

Isn't this what life is all about?  Relaxing on the patio with old and new friends, kicking back under the awning.  Particularly when somebody else is doing the cooking!  Marc was "doing" the chicken.  They're sitting on beer cans, which will keep the meat moist and give it that special flavor.  And it really did work!

Marc showing off the new bar-b-cue and "testing" the chicken.  Another thing that made this time special was the fact that Bill and Carol who'd been staying at the Elk Club in Yuma, were driving around looking for us, and found a similar situation with a "For Rent" sign and they made arrangements to stay for a while.  All the time not knowing where we were.  When they called us to tell us about it, we were thrilled, because we thought it was right around the corner from us.  And it was!  So they got to meet Marc and Claudia, and are planning on spending some time there as well when they're done with their SOWER project in Peoria, near Phoenix.

Another thing that made it fun was that friend John called from Quartzsite and said he was coming down for a visit and would we like to do some 4-wheeling.  Did that guy get hooked on playing in the dirt or what?  We of course thought it would be a blast, and the Nelsons went too.  Into the KOFA (King Of Arizona) National Wildlife Refuge where we were going to go to some mine.  John's book said it was one of those "moderate to easy" roads.

And of course, Barb found some flowers that "needed" their portrait taken.

Nelson's and us are suckers for museums, and John is a good sport so here we are.  John had mentioned there was a museum on the way if we wanted to stop, was the way the conversation went as I recall.  Turned out to be a re-created ghost town, which is even more fun.

We just cracked up laughing about "Mile-A-Minute" Wilkes' name.  And what a wonderful noise that old boiler must have made when it blew up.  When I was a kid, my older brother had an erector set with a small electric/steam boiler that was used to make things move.  Pretty clever little governor on top of it, and even then I had this lust for power.  I remember getting into a lot of trouble because I was caught messing with the governor, trying to get it to go faster.  Having it blow up wasn't even on my mind.  Only more speed!

Not having any mining experience in my past, or anybody else in our group either, (Ray Hill, where are you when we need you!), we could only guess at what most the machinery was used for.  I think that thing I have my foot up on was used to crush ore, but it's only a guess.  What amazed us was the fact that it's here at all.  Hauled from where?  In pieces?  Never having the "gold bug", it's hard to imagine all the effort for that precious metal.

Well, the sequence is in the right order, however, after getting out of jail, Carol might should have gone to church!  That church, by the way, had one of those stamped tin ceilings.  Beautiful work.  And Bill's leaving the Sheriff's office, heading to the saloon.  Those tiny little ore cars look like they'd fall over if you pushed on the side, but they don't.  And I suppose they aren't small to someone down in a mine filling it with pick and shovel.

We both love general stores.  Even modern ones.  And the mine shaft.....that I actually went into!  Of course, I went back to the car and got a flashlight first, and made sure nobody was coming in after me.  And Barb caught me in the saloon.  With a borrowed hat!

There's a more "normal" picture of me in a saloon.  Both hands on my bride.  But when I left, I darn near had a major problem.  My first reaction was to kick the gun out of his hand, but I wasn't quick enough and realized what was going on before that left foot got me in trouble.  But he sure did give me a hearty start!  Amazing that Barb was able to catch the action the way she did.

And then the sheriff shows up, and the red-shirt captures him and marches him off.  After disarming him, of course.  Nice old Winchester rifle, too.  The handgun was a fairly modern Ruger revolver.

The sheriff had managed to escape, and was taking his lady to the general store, when Red-shirt shows up again and they have another confrontation......that ended abruptly when one of them got to laughing too hard.  And to think we got all this for about $5 each!

Carol is walking through assorted machinery, heading over to the elevator, which I had to try out.  Meantime, Barb is taking pictures of a saguaro making an obscene gesture.  I was going to sit down and enjoy this guy playing his 3 stringed (the other 3 were missing) guitar, but just as I was about to sit, I realized the chair had no bottom!

We hadn't quite pegged our fun meters, so on the way back to Yuma we decided to check out the wildlife refuge.  And as usual, we were surprised by what we found.  Lake Martinez is a fishing spot, and a housing development of sorts.

See that nice little black and white dog on the ATV?  Well behaved, too.  But as Barb was taking pictures of the geese, it began to whimper just a little.

Then, after all the geese were up on the ramp posing for Barb, the little dog's owner, said, "Well, alright then.  Get it over with."  And the little dog jumped off the ATV and went after the geese.  Who immediately went back in the water, and the little dog went right back to the ATV with a smile on it's face.

There's John giving Carol some advice about something.  And she's probably believing him!  So ended another day of great sight seeing with great friends.  Thanks, John, for taking the trouble to drive down for us.  We'd probably have missed the whole thing if you hadn't come down and dragged me away from the silly computer.