Okay, so maybe we're getting a little closer to ADVENTURE...

That extra day at Holiday Palms RV Resort in Quartzsite really helped.  I had enough energy  walk around a little and take a few photos so you'd have some idea of where we stayed.  Rustic and quaint with an artistic touch here and there - mostly plain-ol' folk having a pleasant time.

       Here's out RV, Great A'Tuin parked in our space at the RV Park

 So this morning we added gasoline (the RV sucks gas like an addict inhales cocaine!), checked the fluids, and hit the road before the rain started.  Apparently a nice big rainstorm that started in southern California made its way across to cause all sorts of trouble this-a-way.  As a result, a lot of today's journey was done in weather that varied from cloudy and threatening through light sprinkles to semi-downpour. Luckily, we made it to the RV park in Tucson and made our water and electric connections etc  JUST MINUTES before the rain started in earnest!  We even found a Chinese restaurant that delivered to our campsite - poor guy was soaking and protested that it wasn't raining all that much...We're now in the Prince of Tucson RV Park (sounds a great deal snazzier than it looks) in a space luckily quite near the office, laumdry room and tiny little store.

So, what were our adventures as we crossed the miles and miles and miles of miles and miles and miles?  Well, first, it was interesting to see the huge valleys and distant mountains that comprise central and southern Arizona.  Even in the overcast it was quite pretty in a stark, commanding sort of way.  Here, take a look:

 

It was a little over 120 miles to Phoenix, and the topography looked just like these two photos the entire way - vast spaces of brown scrub on tan ground bordered on all sides by tall, craggy mountains.  Very big - quite large, very expansive.  As Bernadette Peters said in "Into The Woods"..."SOOOOOOOO BIG!!!"  

On and on it went until...

Phoenix happened!  Ooh, a real city!  After tiny little towns and dry river beds for 100 miles, suddenly a real city.  What fun!  So we skirted most of Phoenix, following Route 10, and almost immediately came upon our first interesting sight - a sheep farm.  A few acres of carefully "baa-ing" and munching critters, and it was over.  A brief but charming thrill, followed by the grand sight of the cloud-capped Pacacho Peak, the highlight of a state park named in its honor.  Here it is:

Yup - big and rocky and so tall its peak was hidden by the clouds.  Imagine what it looked like, if you will.  We were too distracted by the sight of our next wonderful attraction - "Rooster Cogburn's Ostrich Farm"  where you can pet the ostriches (at your own risk, 'cause they bite), feed the donkeys or the lorikeets or the deer, and buy ostrich feather dusters or other ostrich-related treasures.  http://www.roostercogburn.com/   

No doubt it was a high point on our drive!  We were also interested in seeing an old-time western town but it turned out to be attached to a casino, so in all probability it was phony.  We passed it by.

It's about another 120 miles from Phoenix to Tucson, and we were surrounded by pretty much more of the same topography, and more of the rain.  

 I liked the way the sky looked so I photographed it.  This was during one of the periods between rainstorms.    I have no idea what this was - I just thought it looked pretty.  Dead tree - you know...

And once again, lots of scrub leading to a distant range of tall, craggy mountains.

After all this lovely scenery we needed another break in the monotony, so our last adventure of the day happened about 17 miles before our journey ended when a policeman stopped us because we don't yet have a license plate on the RV.  He was very pleasant, we pointed out the temporary tag, he checked out Al's driver's license just to make sure we weren't nefarious crooks, and asked if we had any weapons with us.  Of course we mentioned the birds at once but soon understood that he meant non-living weapons.  We told him about the stuff we've got stored under the dinette seats and he was happy enough, so, wishing us a safe journey, he sent us on our way, where, as I said at the beginning, we arrived, ate our Chinese food, and now I sit here telling you all about it while Al logs into work to put in a few promised hours.

Oh yeah, Dorian appears to have acclimated enough to become a nuisance so after driving us crazy for a few hours we stuck him in his sleeping box, where he was apparently delighted to go, and this shut him up.  Sadly, Rover was not well behaved, and came out to go exploring, ignoring Al's commands to return to the cage and risking being strangled by a very furious yours truly, who had to clean up the nasty mess he made on the floor.  I calmed down enough to feed them some of the Chinese food, and not COOK them for dinner - and all ended well.  Peace has returned (for the time being at least).

All in all, not a bad day at all.  We might just be getting the hang of this adventuring thing.  Give us time... and speaking of time, we are now in the MOUNTAIN TIME ZONE.  Good night to all!