The Escapees Hangout in San Felipe has been a lot of fun! I made a lot of new friends. One day, we had a brunch pot luck.
What can be better than this - eating brunch on the beach!
That night, Rosemary, Pat & I went to town for dinner. We even made another new friend!
The next day, we went with several of the group to the Puertecitos Hot Springs, about 50 miles south of San Felipe. On the way, we passed Cowpatty, a rather famous small restaurant. Unfortunately, it was closed that day.
Arriving at the hot springs, we were greeted by this nice statue.
The hot water from the hot springs flows down towards the sea, mixing with the cold sea water to get the perfect temperature.
As the tide goes out, you move down to a lower pool. The upper pools are then too hot. When we got there, there was only one that was the perfect temperature, and it was a little crowded.
But later, we moved down to a larger pool.
Aaaaahhh, perfect!
This big bird is a statue, but he has attracted several real friends.
There were also lots of pelicans nearby. Beautiful!
That evening we had a "Guacamole Throwdown," a fundraiser where we got to sample everyone's guacamole, and vote for our favorite.
I'm off on a trip with the Escapees RV group to San Felipe in Baja, Mexico. All of us (46 rigs and 87 people) met up the first night at the mall in El Centro, CA. A caravan of 46 rigs requires a lot of planning, and David and Cheryl, our fearless leaders, were on top of it!
The next morning we were up bright and early to take off.
We entered Mexico south of El Centro in Mexicali.
We waited along the wall on the Mexico side until everyone got through the border.
Then had a police escort to go through Mexicali. Not because it was dangerous, but just to keep everyone together.
We even got to go through red lights and stop signs!
At the south edge of town, we passed by the Escapees group that went before us, who were waiting for our police escort to take them north to the border.
On this trip, I'm riding along in my friend Rosemary's rig, so that we can split the costs. My rig is in storage. This way I get to take lots off pictures of the unique landscape of Baja. There are beautiful mountains -
And then some unique barren desert.
About 125 miles south of the border, we entered San Felipe, our home for the next 10 days.
All lined up to enter the RV Park.
We are at Victor's RV Park, right on the water, and a beautiful beach!
Rosemary and I at the Malecon, for the classic photo op!
After Quartzsite I headed back to Yuma for a while. I stayed again on the BLM land behind the VFW. The VFW has live bands and dancing 4 afternoons a week, and is very popular.
But my favorite thing in Yuma is the ukulele group, the Uku-holics of Yuma. They meet and jam twice a week.
The group started only 3 years ago with 5 members, and has been growing by leaps and bounds! I'm in there somewhere.
I did a lot of shopping while in Yuma. I learned not to go to the Goodwill on the day when everything is half price! That's the checkout line.
On the night of the full moon, Wanda and Ernie invited many friends to their house for a Howling-at-the-Moon party. They provided the most delicious chili I have ever tasted!
Eventually, the moon appeared over the mountains, but it was pretty cloudy. That didn't prevent a lot of howling, though...
And I never get tired of the sunsets here. I'm getting ready to go on 2 big trips soon!
After Yuma, I moved up to Quartzsite for my favorite gathering of the year. Why is it my favorite? Because I get to see a lot of my old friends that I haven't seen for a while, and I get to make lots of new friends!
The main reason that people come here in January is to go to the big RV show in the Big Tent. I went, but I forgot to take any pictures. Instead, I took pictures of the Gem and Mineral Show, which goes on at the same time.
And in Tyson Wells, next to the Big Tent, there are lots of other vendors. This one wasn't too popular...
And this one was definitely the weirdest!
The WINs had lots of activities planned. This is just a small part of the 2 weeks that we were there.
Each of the 3 singles groups- WINs, Solos and LOWs,- invite the other singles to an activity. We had our usual ice cream social. The ice cream was a little late arriving, so we did a little flash mob thing, where I got to play my ukulele.
The Solos had a dance, with pizza, and the LOWs had a band with wine and cheese. All of them were great fun!
Later in the week, our own Paul Martin put on a concert for us.
A short video of him and his "band."
Then another evening, we had our own dance, with our brand new music system.
And on another late afternoon, Andy hosted The Dating Game. There was a lot of laughter involved.
My solar regulator was acting a little strange, so I went to Discount Solar in town to buy a new one, and have them install it. When they came to my rig to look at where it would go, they said they could fix my old one by installing a new switch. WOW! I'm one happy camper!
One day, Paul took us on another 4-wheel drive trip.
This time we went out to look for some old mines.
Looks like it must have been a copper mine!
The hummingbirds are just as friendly here as they are in Yuma.
