Solo life on 30 amps - Living full time in an RV: January 30th through February 7th, 2022 - Week five

Destination number: 82/162/20

Hi there everyone,

Remi and I are at our 5th destination on this 6-month road trip through the USA. This week's location was Gallup New Mexico which is on the northwestern part of the state. This town is much like a lot of the larger sized small towns in the USA. The population is over 12,000 people, and it is really just a working town. The most notable part of the town itself is the fact that it is a place where a lot of train traffic comes through. Though many people may not see the value in staying in Gallup, this is a great location as a home base to explore such places as Four-Corners, Chaco Canyon, the Petrified Forest and the Painted Desert.

This part of the country is also known as the plateau or the high plains portion of the country. I forgot that I would have a pretty high climb to get up to the Plateau and that I would be at that altitude for a while. It would be kind of a long run from Quartzsite to Gallup for one day, so I decided to stop overnight on Sunday night at a town called Payson Arizona. the campground was fine, all the right amenities and even had a donkey across the road named Mr. Bojangles.

The route to get from Payson to Gallup was kind of long and un-traveled. The road was fine, but a little un-traveled and I could have been waiting a while if I had a problem somewhere without cell service, but it all turned out ok.

As with most of my weeks, once I arrive in town, I ensure that the Internet is going to work and the internet works great here. After I made sure that the internet was working, I went and enjoyed an Asian Chicken Salad at one of m favorite restaurants, Applebee's!

Tuesday through Thursday of the week was pretty much just a typical work week. However, a couple of cold fronts collided just north of New Mexico, and it made for some pretty chilly nights here where it got down into the single digits at night. On Wednesday night, it got down to 0 degrees. Brrrr.

Most of the trip so far, the temperatures have been in the 50's during the day and 30's at night, but because we were up an extra 5,000 feet in New Mexico, and because of the cold air mass that came through, it was pretty chilly here in Gallup. On Thursday I woke up to frozen water pipes. I had disconnected the water hose on Wednesday night because the forecast was for very low temperatures, but because of a number of factors including not relying on the furnaces in the bay, and leaving the sewer hose set up allowing super cold air to be drawn into the bay, caused the pipes to freeze. I'm going to try really hard to not make that mistake again. Once I got the pipes thawed out, I was able to take a shower later in the day! :-)

On Saturday, the 5th of February, Remi and I started our day with a trip of traveling out to Four Corners National Monument. The drive up to the four corners where the states of Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona meet was amazing in and of itself. I could spend weeks just driving around and checking out all of the different geological formations, but I had to stay focused on my goals.

It took us a little over 2 hours to reach Four Corners from the Campground in Gallup New Mexico. I had been out here back when I was a pre-teen when I had traveled with my mom and dad from Orange County to visit my sister Karen and brother-in-law Mike in Greely Colorado. Though the marker is the same as it was 50 years ago, the rest of the area is brand new. Because Remi and I got there just as the monument opened, there wasn't much going on, but there were native Indian folks arriving who would do demonstrations of making native crafts and selling them as souvenirs if people were interested. The entire area surrounding the Four Corners marker was very beautiful. Again, you could spend a whole day exploring this area and not get bored looking at the beauty around here.

After we left Four Corners, we headed down to the Painted Desert which is also the home of the Petrified Forest. On our way to that national park however, we came across a rarity in the Arizona landscape, a place on the side of the road wide enough where we could pull over and take some pictures. This was a large area where I could score some pictures and also put the drone up for a few minutes.

After another drive of almost 3 hours, we arrived at the Painted Desert which is also the home of the Petrified Forest. Here is location with its combination of overlooks and hiking trails that you really need two days in order to do it justice. This was the First National Park that we've visited on this trip and the lady at the gate house asked if I expected to visit any more parks in the next year. Since I am just 5 weeks into this trip, I know there will be a lot others, so she suggested an annual pass. The daily pass is $25.00 the Annual pass is $80, so for this trip, it is a no-brainer!

For any of you who know me very well, you know I was raised in a family where going to church every Sunday was something we did when I was young. I evolved over the decades into an atheist and so though I would not refer to my visit to the "Painted Desert" as a Religious Experience, it was definitely one that moved me in the awe and grandeur of where I was. It is amazing how water and glaciers over the centuries has formed such amazing geological formations.

There was also the Painted Desert Inn which was built back in the late 1800's and is now owned by the National Parks service who reconditioned it into something truly amazing. They have turned it into an information of sorts of how things were back in the 1800's and early 1900's.

Saturday was definitely a day full. But, with chores that needed to be done at camp, it was time to head back. If I can ever come back this way again, I would definitely love to spend more time here!

As we did on Saturday, Remi and I left the motorhome just before 7:00 AM so as to make the two-hour drive to Chaco Culture National Historical Park. The last 23 miles of the trip was on a dirt road which was designated New Mexico State Highway 57. After this experience, I will never complain about California fuel taxes again.

I was told about this location by a consultant from Esri Software who has been here in the past. I am so glad once again that I made the time to visit this location. There was an Indian Culture called the Chacoan's who populated this northwestern part of New Mexico back in the 800's to 1000's AD.

They have a great visitors center here with lots of great displays and a movie about the area. The exhibit area is brand new and they are still tuning the HVAC System, so soon, they will have exhibit filled with lots of artifacts.

These people built these massive co-habitive structures that could be also thought of as subdivisions. The structures that they built had these two-foot-thick walls and wood floors were truly impressive considering the time in history they were built.

Once we left Chaco Culture National Historical park, we took the long way back to camp and stopped by an airport between Albuquerque and Gallup where there is a historical beacon that was used in the early 1900's as navigation aids to help aircraft which were carrying Airmail. The beacon was powered by a generator, and it had an arrow pointing towards the next beacon along the route.