Currently in Albuquerque NM (Low 42 Cloudy, Rainy, Windy High 62)
Another weather delay (sorry Deb), this time due to rain and some wind. We got up this morning and looked at the weather here and in Tucumcari, our next stop in New Mexico, and there were warnings and alerts with potential gusts of 60 mph. That caught our attention and we paid for another night and delayed our departure until Monday. We could have left today but our deciding factors were that we already paid for tonight plus it would mean 4 nights in Tucumcari. We opted for 2 nights instead.
Living in the Midwest for many years we know that weather forecasting is fickle at best. We were still surprised though when we started this blog entry later in the day. No more high wind alerts, although the gusts were now 40 mph. The potential for rain is still there and Monday looks like a better travel day, RIGHT NOW, so we are still happy with our decision to delay.
When we paid for the extra day as part of our walk Jo found this unique picture frame and you just knew we had to have it.
We will blog later when we have added the photos, we are thinking a picture of our cats will go into the one in the bedroom where the tree photo is since that is where they stay while we travel.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Albuquerque NM (Low 38 Showers and Wind High 62)
We toured the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History while in Albuquerque.
Both of us worked in the Nuclear Weapons Complex. We met while walking into work on a Sunday and the rest is history. We worked at the Kansas City Plant that originally was run by Bendix then Allied then Allied Signal then AlliedSignal. AlliedSignal bought Honeywell in 1999 and adopted the Honeywell name for all its holdings. It's been Honeywell ever since.
The Kansas City Plant manufactures all the nonnuclear mechanical and electrical components for the Nuclear Weapons Complex. It was neat to see the end products of what we worked on. Here is the W80.
The B83
The B61 holds special significance as both of us worked on this program, Jo as a Program Planner coordinating the manufacturing schedule and Bob as a Product/Process Engineer in printed wiring board fabrication.
The museum covers the science of nuclear energy from its theory proposed by Ernest Rutherford and Wilhelm Roentgen to the Manhattan Project which developed the first atomic bombs. They had a replica of the "Gadget" which was detonated at the Trinity Site.
Here are replicas of "Fat Man" and "Little Boy".
We always like to find and report on the neat stories. Here is one of the Packard limos that ferried the scientists up the hill to Los Alamos.
The Packards were cut in half and a 6 foot stretch was added. This car was found in a Gallup New Mexico salvage yard in 2005 and restored.
We always make jokes about the "duck and cover" exercises we did growing up, like the school desks would protect us during a nuclear explosion. It was neat to see literature on this.
The last story maybe not so neat is that when they were building the facilities near Oak Ridge Tennessee some people had to be relocated. About 3000 people got a knock on the door and were told they had to leave in 2 weeks or less. Can't imagine that happening now.
In addition to the Pioneers of the Atom, Manhattan Project and Cold War exhibits that we have discussed here the museum also has exhibits on Radiation 101, Nuclear Medicine, Atomic Culture showing all the movies related to the nuclear age, plus other exhibits.
It is a great museum and a good walk down memory lane for us.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Albuquerque NM (Low 41 Partly Sunny and Breezy High 71)
Bob recently had one of those "it's a small world" moments recently.
He was wearing a Kansas City Royals World Series t-shirt which caught the attention of a couple checking in the RV Park while he was getting propane. As we talked about the Royals and Kansas City we mentioned our home towns. Bob recognized the home town and said he had family history there naming a couple of families. The lady had the same families, turns out her Grandmother and Bob's Grandmother were sisters so we are second cousins.
This is the second such event. The first being Bob's second cousin near Newton Iowa that received our mail forwarding by mistake that we blogged about earlier here. Turns out his grandfather and Bob's grandfather were brothers.
It truly is a small world after all, and we apologize if that song is playing in your heads right now.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Albuquerque NM (Low 40 Sunny High 69)
We first want to mention how glad we are that we made the trip from Windsblow to Albuquerque on Sunday. We had 50 mph gusts on Thursday and Friday while we were in Windsblow. We had great traveling weather on our trip to Windsblow on Wednesday and to Albuquerque on Sunday. The weather changed again on Monday with 60 mph gusts on the Windsblow to Albuquerque route. This kicked up a dust storm and closed some roads along the Arizona-New Mexico border. We are glad to be here and hitting some of our foodie favorites like La Salita.
La Salita has been in business since 1965 and we know why, they serve great food. They typically finish first or second best for chile rellenos and for sopapillas each year. Here is Bob's plate from a recent visit for lunch, Jo had the same thing except her sides were refried beans and rice.
Later that evening the chile rellenos passed the ultimate test. Even though the batter was soggy, when crisp it is excellent, it was still good when we had leftovers. After lunch we had sopapillas, a deep fried pastry treat, a great dessert with honey.
Our tip is to bite one of the corners and then pour honey in and the swirl it around to distribute the honey. We haven't been there for a few years and the only change is now the sopapillas are 25 cents each instead of free but still a bargain because they are so good.
We will have more on our visit to Albuquerque in future postings.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
But where did we end up, Gallup or Albuquerque?
Currently in Albuquerque NM (Low 43 Sunny and Windy High 75)
We left Windsblow Arizona yesterday and drove to the KOA in Albuquerque New Mexico.
Here is the route we took.
There were 3 things we thought about as to where to end our journey yesterday; Jo's back, cats, and weather. We wanted to make sure that Jo's back could handle the extra hours and that the cats were comfortable in the bedroom. We placed our outside temperature sensor in the bedroom and took the inside unit with us in the truck and monitored the rise in temperature. Luckily we were traveling on a cool day so that was not an issue.
No sooner had we gotten on the road yesterday when the decision was made for us. We got a high wind warning for Windsblow from one of the weather apps we have. At first we thought it was strange saying that there would be 60 mph gusts when it was calm wind wise until we realized it was for Monday. Checking the forecast for Gallup and Albuquerque we realized Monday would be another bad wind day so we pushed on. Jo's back did pretty good considering that with stops it was about 5 hours total. Certainly not a PDD type of day by any means but for us it was the most driving we have done since we started out. As we have mentioned before we now plan for 150-200 miles but when we started out it was 250-300 miles with 350 the most we have ever done towing.
Wherever we stopped New Mexico is noteworthy on this trip because it will be our first time on Daylight Savings Time since October 31, 2014. We sprung our clocks forward one hour as Arizona was on Mountain Standard Time and did not switch to Daylight Savings Time.
Depending
on the weather we think we will be here a week. After some short stays
it will be nice to not be traveling all the time. Plus there are some
great places to eat and some sightseeing we would like to do. We are
liking the lower temps that we are now experiencing, a welcome respite
from the 90s we had a few days ago in Goodyear.
We leave you with a foodie picture. Here is the Roberto's Special from Sadie's here in Albuquerque. It is a hamburger steak smothered in queso with Papitas (diced fried potatoes) and Frijoles (beans) then smothered again with red or green chile. After we got settled Bob went and got takeout and it was sooooo good.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Winslow AZ (Low 33 Sunny Currently 36)
Heading to either Gallup NM (Currently 29 Sunny High 67) or Albuquerque NM (Currently 46 Sunny High 72)
We survived the 50 mph wind gusts just fine. We saw travelers coming off the road and saw a few crazies head out. We like traveling too much to have a white knuckle driving day.
While here we drove into Winslow to eat breakfast at the Turquoise Room in the La Posada Hotel. All foodies should eat here at least once and all train lovers should visit here too as this was the last great Railroad Hotel built in 1929 by the Santa Fe Railway for the Fred Harvey Company. The architect, Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter, famous for her Grand Canyon buildings considered La Posada her masterpiece.
Our two favorite breakfast meals are here, Jo had the Corn Maiden's Delight (polenta topped with fire roasted tomatoes, spinach, poached eggs, jalapeno jack cheese and a fresh roasted corn salsa).
Bob had the Arizona Green Chile Eggs (polenta in a pool of a green chile and tomatillo sauce with eggs, covered in jalapeno jack cheese and roasted corn salsa, diced tomatoes served with a side of black beans).
After eating we know why they are our two favorite breakfast meals. After breakfast we shopped at Wal-Mart and got a prescription.
We head today for somewhere in New Mexico, to either Gallup or Albuquerque continuing our trek to the Kansas City area. As we are getting close to Gallup we will decide if our day is 143 miles or 292 miles. We will let you know what we decide.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Winslow AZ (Low 43 Cloudy and Increasingly Windy High 77)
Winslow, aka Windsblow, has not let us down this trip. We got teased a little on our first day but the winds returned yesterday and is steadily getting worse. So we have decided to hang out one more day. We did make it to Windsblow yesterday and had a great meal at the Turquoise Room which we will blog about tomorrow. No trip to Windsblow is complete without 'standing on the corner'.
Forecast today calls for gusts over 50 mph, we think we might have seen a girl with her dog and a bike floating by so we think we made the right choice.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Winslow AZ (Low 39 Mostly Sunny High 82)
We left Congress yesterday and drove to Meteor Crater RV Park near Winslow, Arizona. Here is the route we took.
We plan to be here a couple of nights. We like to eat at the Turquoise Room in the La Posada Hotel and we need to get a prescription at Walmart. Traveling and getting medications these days is becoming more and more challenging. Did we think it would if we got bureaucrats involved in our healthcare?
Here is a photo of the La Posada Hotel from an earlier visit.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Congress AZ (Low 55 Mostly Sunny Currently 64)
Heading to Winslow AZ (Currently 45 Sunny High 83)
Well we made it, we left the spot we have been since November 2014. It was a short trip (about 60 miles) to Congress Arizona and Escapees North Ranch.
Here is the route we took.
We are here to get our Lifestyle LS38RS and Ford F-350 weighed at Escapees SmartWeigh. Bob was worried when the sticker that was put on when the Lifestyle was built listed about one thousand pounds less for cargo carrying capacity than the brochure.
The results of the weighing are that both the truck and RV need to go on a diet and we need to move some of the weight from one side to the other. The great news is that we won't need an expensive upgrade to the axles and tires that Bob thought we might need. We will shed some pounds and move things around this summer and get it reweighed when we are back in the area in November. We plan a more detailed blog entry on this in the future.
We leave today continuing our trek first to Kansas City for about a month and then to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for a couple of months. Should be an interesting summer, we will keep you posted.
We are only staying one night since the park has 30a electrical and it is hot enough to be a little uncomfortable without the second air conditioner. As we mentioned before 30a electrical is what we consider camping.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
Currently in Goodyear AZ (Low 55 Sunny High 75)
We have to admit we are a little nervous as our departure date from the valley of the sun approaches. Except for a couple of 'vacations' from the heat
we have been in Goodyear for almost a year and a half and we are so looking forward to getting out of here. Yes you can fry an egg on the sidewalk here during the summer. There were a couple of movies that we wanted to see before we left. First we saw 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2' and we really liked it.
They brought back the cast from the first one which was nice. If you liked the first one then you will like this one. Another movie that if you liked the first one you will like the second one is 'God is Not Dead 2'.
Be sure and stick around to after the credits for some bonus material. A good laugh and an uplifting spiritual film, who could ask for two better movies.
We also have been eating at some of our favorite restaurants one last time.
There is of course shopping for the travels but we are shopping like we won't have any places to shop along the way. We are sure once we get on the road and back into the routine of traveling again it will be OK. And yes there will be shopping along the way. Our summer plans call for us to be in the Kansas City area for about a month and then two months on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
Till next time,
Bob and Jo
