Since driving south from Palm Springs we have been fortunate to have the sun and hot weather following us all the way. We spent a few days in El Centro, just north of the Mexican border. There was a lot of agriculture going on in the area courtesy of the Colorado River where the water was being diverted through numerous canals. With 90+F temperatures the working conditions in the field were extreme and we were told that unemployment often reaches 30% in the summer when the majority of workers remain indoors and collect unemployment insurance.
Border security was very tight especially near Calexico (40K population) and Mexicala (800K) which were seperated by barbed wire fences and border patrol cars every 500 metres. It reminded us of the El Paso / Juarez border in Texas. Before heading east to cross over into Arizona, we drove through 50 km's of sand dunes which were very popular with the ATV crowd.
Our first overnight stop in Arizona was at Yuma where we played some golf and enjoyed the RV pool in the afternoon. The next day we drove on to Casa Grande where we found a great place to stay (Sundance RV) with another lovely pool area, some nearby golf and warm enough evenings to have a BBQ. It was at this point that we realized that many of the parks we had stayed in, not intentionally, were designated as adult parks (55+) and no one had asked us so far for ID to make sure we qualified!
We spent two more nights in Queen Valley, about an hour west of Phoenix. The plan was to hike Superstition Mountain but some locals convinced us to try Picklepost Mountain instead which was not far from the RV park. It was a very challenging hike..........4 miles up and 4 miles back down a steep mountain with a path only marked by cairns (small piles of rocks) and a few blazes. We got off the intended path several times and paid for it with some tough scrambling. The 360 view at the top was spectacular though and included a mailbox that had been repositioned by it's former owner followig several clashes with automobiles in it's original location. No chance of that happening where it is now!
From there we drove on to Scottsdale where we have just spent the last 5 days with Rhonda's uncle and aunt (Murray & Mavis) at their beautiful winter home. We had a great visit with them, did a little shopping, had some fine meals together, a game of golf and we hiked Pinnacle Peak which was close to their home. We also had a chance to hook up with our neighbour Lorne and his posse who were down for a boy's sports week-end.
We left their home this morning with the intent of driving north of the city for some sight-seeing but after noticing the cooler weather to the north (higher elevation) we decided to stop in Sun City and enjoy a few more days of warm weather before deciding on our next route. The night time temperature at the top of the Grand Canyon is already dropping below freezing so a trip there to hike down to the bottom of the canyon to Phantom Ranch has been scuttled. We will play a little more golf in this area, enjoy the pool in the afternoon and do some more internet research before making any decisions.
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