First week in Borrego Springs

As mentioned previously, we arrived at The Springs at Borrego RV Resort in the dark.  Set up "camp" and had several well earned cold beverages. When we awoke in the morning and looked outside we saw our first blue sky in days.

Our front yard

So, now it's Super Bowl Sunday and time to party. Everyone parties on Super Bowl Sunday but to watch it outside in 75 degree temperatures was special.

We whipped up a "Super" dinner of lobster, filet, and creamed spinach. YUM!  Look at the size of these suckers.....

We all had a glass of wine (or 6) as well.Disappointed in the results of the game but at least it was a good fight.

Now we are into Monday and Patty only has today and tomorrow to see a little of Borrego Springs. The two ladies got in the car and came back 6 hours later. They drove around to look at the metal sculptures of free standing creatures that roamed the valley millions of years ago. They are all around in the desert and are life sized. Dennis Avery (of the Avery paper company and  the "post it" notes fame) fell in Love with Borrego Springs and he purchased mega parcels of land so that people could enjoy for free and never to be built upon. He commissioned a famous Spanish metal sculptor and below are just a few of his works of art. It is truly Awesome! Ate lunch in town and did a little shopping. Jim got caught up on some book work, took a long walk with Breezie; enjoyed us being gone and used the fitness center.

Patty is showing off her new cowboy boots

Our very favorite....The Serpent. It is so large that you are only seeing part of him. The rest of him is across the road 

It got to be cocktail hour about 4 pm so we loaded up our glasses and headed for the hot tub and pool.

It's now Tuesday and Patty's last night.  The three of us started off with a late lunch / early dinner at a restaurant in town called the Red Ocotillo that had moved to a new location and is now pet friendly, so Breezie was with us.

There is a special place here in the desert called "Font's Point" which offers magical views of the valley "badlands" from it's 1000' elevation. It's very special on any night, but tonight there is a full moon. When lucky, visitors to the top can witness the sun going down on the Western side of the mountain lined valley at the same time the full moon is rising on the Eastern side. Ellen and I got to see the event several years ago.  The hope was we could all see it together tonight.

It's accessible only by 4-wheel drive vehicle and while Ellen and I have been up there before in the CRV I vowed to not do it again because I was scraping bottom and almost got stuck several times not to mention getting lost up there in the dark. So I was not going to try it.  However, Patty being the super travel agent she is, booked us a private Jeep tour with a local outfitter to take us out to the turnoff to the point and up the wash 6 miles to the top. The view was magical as expected. We did see the sun set and the moon rise but simultaneously did not happen tonight.

It's All Good!

Last days at Catalina and on to Borrego

We are back!

Our apologies for not updating "you all" with new blog posts the last two weeks.

Left you with day 6 in Tucson's Catalina State Park on January 22.  Days 7 - 12 were pretty laid back. The hike we planned up Sabino Canyon was cancelled because of rain in the forecast.  We did numerous walks around the park with Breezie, went out to dinner, saw a movie, and did some sightseeing by car. That's about it.

Breezie wants Ellen's new hat and her wine

Afternoon clouds before the big rain

Our 13th day in Catalina (Thursday the 29th) we drove to the airport to pick up Patty P. She flew in to RV with us for 6 days. That livened things up somewhat!  It started to rain on the way back to the campground and pretty much continued until we left the area on Saturday.


Sue Cobb drove in from Las Cruces on Friday to spend the night and party with the girls.  It was a surprise for Patty and it was Patty's birthday as well so they had good reason to party like rock stars! It continued to rain all day Friday as well so we did nothing but sit under the awning and "wine" and eat a lot.

Girl's gone wild - Yeehaw!

Saturday was a travel day for us. We needed to drive 360 miles West to Borrego Springs for our one or two month stay at The Springs at Borrego RV Resort.  The plan was to leave by 9:00 am arriving at Borrego early afternoon with sufficient time to get all set up and ready for Super Bowl Sunday.

Patty was staying with us for the trip and would fly out of Palm Springs on the following Wednesday. Sue was planning on meeting a friend in Tucson on her way back to Las Cruces to attend a big rock and gem show.

However, it rained all night and was still raining when we got up Saturday morning. The park always has had signs posted about the potential for flash floods after heavy rains. The only road into and out of the campground goes through a low spot in a wash that is known to occasionally flood (in our 7 or 8 years of staying at Catalina we have never seen a drop of water in the wash). When it does flood, anyone in the campground can't get out and anyone wanting in can't get in.  The biggest worry for most is to be staying in the campground but leave to go shopping, dining, hiking, etc. and have a flash flood prevent a return to your RV for what sometimes can be days. Very problematic if you have left pets (or kids) behind.

To get on with this - Saturday I was naturally curious to see if there was any water in the wash so made the drive down to it about 7 am to have a look. Arrived there to see that the wash had indeed flash flooded during the night and there was an RV already stuck in the middle of it. No way we were getting out at 9:00 am!

The rangers had no idea at the time if or when we would get out that day. Their best guess was to plan on staying another night. So we watched and waited. The RV got pulled out with a tractor. The water began to recede slowly, but there was about 3 feet of mud and rocks in the road with the water still flowing swiftly. Eventually the water flow slowed sufficiently for the big front end loader to begin clearing the roadway. The water continued to fill the roadway with mud and debris but not as fast as the loader was removing it.

By 1:00 pm they had punched a hole through the wash and began letting anyone with a 4-wheel drive vehicle (no rv's) make the crossing while the heavy equipment continued clearing debris. By 1:30 the first brave rv'er who had a 4-wheel drive truck pulling a 5'er was allowed to attempt the crossing and made it. At 2:00 the rangers said it was safe enough at that time if any other rv's wanted out to go now!  More rain was falling and they expected the wash to flood again.  Ran back to pack up our rv and get to the wash.  We lined up at the water's edge and waited for the front end loader to get in front of us to lead the way across. With the bucket of the loader down scooping the still accumulating mud and water off the road in our path we followed it safely to the other side. The rangers repeated this one at a time for every rv wanting to leave.

We decided to get as far away from rain as we could get that day. Not sure if we could make it to Borrego.  But, Borrego was sunny and hot and we just wanted to get to our destination. So we drove the entire 360 miles and arrived at our new home after dark about 7:30 pm.  Long day. We have always talked about what a flash flood in the desert was like and now we know!