Saturday, December 29 - Back to Normal (Las Vegas, NV)

 

Friday we were up and out by 9:45am. We drove to the Clark County Government Building to get our badges.

When we were finished we were hungry and we went to Panera for some brunch. Then back on our side of town to our local Walmart Supercenter. Seemed like a nice Walmart, but we didn’t have a lot of time to look around. We picked up some movies from the Red Box picked up and a few items we needed and headed back home.

We met with Bobby, our supervisor, and he gave us our supplies. Two buckets, grabbers, rubber gloves and face masks. He told us we would train on Monday at 6:30am on the pistol range. We think that will be on only day we work this week. The complex is closed for the New Year and Bobby will be back on Thursday.

After I drove down to the post office to take care of some things. The guy from the auto glass company came and measured our window. Not sure when the new one will be installed.

I didn’t sleep very well  last night so I didn’t get up this morning until 9am. I computered for a little while then made up some breakfast.

Once all the breakfast dished were finished I decided to get all the Christmas decoration put away for another year and things look normal again.

We took a few pictures of our site. We are parked in the public camping area because the 30 workcamper spots are full.

This is the skeet shooting area

View from our back window, which Jesse duct tapped to hold it in place. Mountains from all sides.

Notice the snow on Mount Charleston.

We got showered and dressed and went out. I was so impressed that Jesse wanted to go out on a Saturday night.  Wow a real date night!

We took the movies back then went to Fiesta Rancho Casino, which is on our side of town. It was our 1st time in this casino so we walked around. They have an ice arena and I enjoyed watching the young people skate.

Then we played some slots machines. Jesse played poker and I played penny slots.

We were getting hungry and decided to go into the Buffet for $8.00 a person. Of course they had all kinds of food and what I had was very tasty.

After we were stuffed we went back to the casino. I played some different slots and had fun. I was up and down several time, but ended the night $11.00 down. Jesse was $20.00 down.

After returning home we took a few pictures of the lights from our site

We ended the evening watching TV before retiring to our bed.

Thursday, December 27 - Busy Day (Las Vegas, NV)

 

We left Freightliner in Tolleson, AZ at 9am. We took loop 101 North to Grand Ave North to 60 West to 93 North, then to I40 West. Just before Kingman we stopped to have lunch at Subway and walked the dogs. It was cold outside and had begun to snow, actually sleeting.

We proceeded on I40 West to US 93 North past Hover Dam and into Las Vegas arriving at the Clark County Shooting Complex  2:40 pm.

While I was setting up the inside I noticed that the back picture window, inside pane (we lost the outside pane this past Saturday during our travels) was loose and falling in the RV. Jesse tried to secure it as best he could for now.

We continued to set up and make a few calls to let them know we arrived safe.

This morning we contacted the insurance company to file a claim for the broken window. Because we have vanishing deductible we will have the window replaced with zero deductible. They are suppose to come out tomorrow to measure.

Then we met with our supervisor Bobby at 10am to talk about our volunteer position. We went over some things and then he sent us to the office to get our paperwork.

We were given paperwork to make appointments to get our Clark County Badge and to have a hearing and blood work done to test for lead exposure and zinc-proprprophyrin.

After that we headed over to our friends home to visit them. It was so good to see them. We became good friends when we lived here in 1980 and have stayed friends. Our children who were all friends are now grown with their own children - My how time flies.

We had gifts for the little ones. They are Crystal’s (Chick and Carolee’s youngest) children Camern and Blake.

After playing and visiting we all were hungry so we headed out to Long John Silver for lunch.

Chick and Carolee

Camern

Crystal and Blake

And of course the biggest kid ever Jesse

When we were finished Crystal and the children went home while the four of us went back to their home to visit. They are leaving tonight to Portland, Oregon to help their son Casey and his wife Catie set up their dental practice. Carolee will be gone for about a month and I will miss her.

As it was getting late and we needed to get back to the boys.   We bid them safe travels and came home.

This was the moon we saw tonight. It was really beautiful.

I heated some leftovers for dinner. We were not too hungry so it worked out well.

Tuesday, December 25 - Merry Christmas (Tolleson, AZ)

 

 

The boys must have known it was Christmas morning. They got us up about 6:30am.

They wanted to open their presents.

Fun, Fun, Fun!!

 

 

We had our coffee while watching the TODAY SHOW and computering.

We got dressed and went to the 10am showing of Les Miserables. We were shocked when we walked into the theater it was packed. I had no idea so many people went to the movies on Christmas morning.  I liked the movie a lot, Jesse said it was okay.

When we got home I made us dinner. I had ham and pineapple while I made Salisbury steaks for Jesse. I also made mashed potatoes, stuffing, broccoli and corn to go with our entrée’s.

We talked to family back in Baltimore and all the children and grandchildren in Colorado.

All in all it was a nice day at Camp Freightliner.

Monday, December 24 - Christmas Eve (Tolleson, AZ)

 

Yesterday I baked some oatmeal raisin cookies (Jesse’s favorite) and more snicker doodles. We just hung out, watching TV and computering. Jesse went out and rented some movies for us to watch. I made chicken tacos and bean dip for dinner.

 

Today I made us some eggs, toast and corned beef hash for breakfast.

We got our truck back just about 2pm today. They had to rebuild the shifter tower. Parts $69.38, Labor 724.50, plus taxes and Shop/EPA and the total $896.14.

Merry Christmas to us!

We decided that it was too late to travel today and I didn’t want to travel on Christmas day, so we will depart Camp Freightliner on Wednesday and hopefully travel uneventful to Las Vegas. 

Jesse aired up the tires on the big truck and he drove around the block and he said it was working fine.

We talked with some family from Baltimore, wishing them Merry Christmas.

I made us some shrimp for dinner and we watched more movies, only this time the DVD player wouldn’t work so we watched them on my computer.

Saturday, December 22 - Travel Day (Tolleson, AZ)

 

We left Gold Canyon at 9am and headed east on US 60, then north on 101 loop, north I17, west on AZ 74. That took us about 1 1/2 hours.

My view

After just a couple miles on AZ 74 Jesse pulled over to the side of the road. He said the big truck would not shift into gear.  I walked the boys on the side of the road while he tried to figure out what was wrong. He called the guy we got the truck from to see if he could help. He had no help for us.

He continued to drive in whatever gear worked which meant we drove on the shoulder of the road going about 11-18 miles per hour.

Wondering why we did this, I asked him and he said he was hoping it would shift into gear. After about an hour of this I noticed that the back window was falling off the back of the RV. I had to pull in front of him to stop him because he couldn’t hear me on the horn.

We pulled over off the road and called Coach-Net, it was about 11:30am.

To make a long story short the very nice tow truck driver Daniel showed up at 3:30. It took him about 1 hours to get us hooked up and another hour to tow us to Freightliner in Tolleson, AZ which also has RV hook-ups.

We made it to the the repair shop about 5:30.

 

They sent another truck to move the RV into place.

Jesse hooked up the water and electric and I heated up some leftover tuna casserole (we hadn’t eaten all day) and we settled in for the night.

Hopefully they can look at the truck tomorrow for Monday and fix the problem and we can be on our way.

Friday, December 21 - Airport and Preparing to Depart (Gold Canyon, AZ)

 

Yesterday I took the boys to be groomed then went shopping at Walmart to pick up a few things.

When I returned with the boys and got all the groceries put away I called Marilyn to let her know I had returned. We had planned to go out to a Chinese buffet with them.

It was our last time to have a meal with them until May when they arrive at Mountaindale in Colorado.

They picked us up and to a place that was recommended by Nick Russell, #1 Eastern Buffet. He raved about it but I thought it was okay. Spending time with Ed and Marilyn was great.

This morning we picked the Dray’s up a few minutes before 7am. We took them to Sky Harbor in Phoenix for their 9:40pm flight to Missouri to spend Christmas with their family.

After dropping them off we went to Crackle Barrel for breakfast. As usual it was delicious.

When we returned to the rig I stowed the things inside for travel. I plan to leave the Christmas tree all set up and stowed in the shower with the plants for travel, hope it makes it okay!

We plan to leave between 8 and 9 am traveling to Las Vegas.

Tuesday, December 19 - Saying Bye For Now (Gold Canyon, AZ)

 

When I left you last we were heading to dinner and an evening with our RV family to celebrate Christmas. We were going to cook dinner but the guys suggested we go out instead, so we left it up to them to decide where to eat. They chose Texas Roadhouse.

We had a mix of ribs, shrimp and steaks with sweet and baked potatoes, salads and vegetables. Everyone said their meals were very good.

After we headed back to the resort. We all went home to gather our choice of games and drinks and headed to the multi purpose building for an evening of fun.

The ball room was all decorated for the holiday.

We met in the Prickly Pear Room just off the ball room to play.

We stared the fun with a game of Farkle, Bob won. Then we moved on to Sequence. I think the guys won 2 out of 3 games but not sure.

We stopped the fun for delicious dessert then played Left, Right, Center with dimes and nickels. I think everyone won at least one game, except Jesse … so it was a lot of fun.

We exchanged some goodies and called it an evening around 9pm and headed to our own rigs.

Today Jesse aired up all the tires in the truck and trailer. He also took our car to a tire place. There has been a lot of noise from the front tires. He had to purchased 2 tires for the front.

He also strapped our bikes on the bed of the big truck ready for travel.

I messed around the house and did a load of laundry.

In the afternoon we went over to say good-bye to Bob and Janet. They are leaving in the morning to fly back to Missouri to spend the Holidays with their family.

Monday, December 17 - Change is Good (Gold Canyon, AZ)

 

Previously we had purchased tickets to attend Desert Botanical Garden. We were to go on Friday night.  Now in it's 35th year, Luminarias at the Garden is a holiday tradition. The Garden trails are lit by 8,000 luminaria and over 10 musical acts are located throughout the trails.

The 6 of us were suppose to take a bus trip with the park. Well they had to cancel because we had RAIN. So we were to go on Saturday. Well the rains came again on Saturday so it was cancelled.

They were going to reschedule for next weekend, but none of us will be here, so on Monday the guys went to the office to get our money back.

Since it was Saturday’s night we decided to all go out for pizza and we invited Pam and Henry to join us. We went to Chicago Pizza and it was really good and great company.

Sunday Bob and Janet picked us up at 10am and we drove to Globe, AZ to shop at Pickle Barrel Trading Post. They wanted to run their truck so we rode with them. It was an interesting place to walk around.

When we returned to the resort we walked the boys and drove over to pick up Ed and Marilyn and headed to Garcia’s for late lunch/early dinner. Bob and Janet drove themselves in their car.

We all had a good meal and lots of laughs.

Today I baked cookies and did laundry.

We are all going out for dinner for our Christmas Celebration with our RV family and then playing games. I will let you know how that turns out in another blog.

Our Christmas tree: