Tuesday, March 24th

A beautiful day in the valley.  There was a slight breeze and it got very warm, in the high 80's today.

  We got moving early today as we were going out in the desert with the Bingers & the Blanke's.  We took our atv's in the trailers and towed them out east of Florence, so about 50 miles from here.  It was a great scenic drive, paved for the majority of it.  The last part of the trip out was desert roads, so sandy dirt and occasionally it was very hard and rocky.  I would guess that part was likely about a quarter of the trip.  It was the dusty part, that is for certain.  These roads are a very fine powder dust and very curvy.  We went down to the San Pedro river in the area where the old abandoned coke ovens are. 
 

We found a neat area with large cedars down by the river that was very pleasant even in the mid-day heat.  There was a cool path down to the river that was all over grown with willows and it was like driving through a long arbor.  We saw a few lizards, but that was it for wild life.  Lots of birds, especially buzzards.
  Got back just in time for happy hour.  It was a much smaller group today and that makes it much easier to visit.  Darryl & Rita left today and another couple tomorrow, so the exodus is well started.  The park is still pretty full as there are new day rate campers coming in all the time.  The parks around here are hard to get in to until this time of year and they are starting to appear in numbers.
  Bingo tonight, the Powerball was over $700, but alas no winners in this household.
  The Smith's leave tomorrow, so our readership will take a blow, but will continue the postings for the next few weeks.