My Journey

[Ace Brown]

I fully agree that some form of regular exercise keeps one young and fit. For me it’s mountain biking. But I also do lots of cross country skiing and kayaking in season. I hike some but usually only when I’m in a no-bikes area or after dinner walks.

My dog accompanies me on all my journeys no matter the mode of transportation. Like Roctaxi said, watching her have fun adds to my enjoyment.

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[ITTOG]

Yes walking does wonders for the body. You didn't mention it but I bet it even helps you mentally. I am more of a runner and at times I think the mental rejuvenation is better than the physical. Walking, running, hiking, whatever your active passion is has more benefits then most understand. With all the travel you do the walking is probably invaluable.

Thanks for letting us in on your travels. Love the updates. Merry Christmas to you and all your readers.

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[Trailboss]

While I don't doubt you do a massive amount of hiking/walking, as evidenced by your daily posts, the anal scientist/engineer in me wonders if you have calibrated your fitbit against a known distance? 4000 miles a year comes to almost 11 miles a day, every day, which would be a little more than 3 hours at the average brisk walking pace of 3.5 mph. At any rate, you have a solid baseline established to compare your monthly and annual activity, and I'm envious of your hiking venues.

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

ROKTAXI.....great dog pic and "feeling blessed" is an excellent way to put it and I know what you mean.....

Ace.....and yet another great dog picture ! Hey, if you're willing while you're in Mexico during fuel stops, do you think you could ask about the availability of ULSD ? They call it something else there but I don't recall the name.....

ITTOG.....Merry Xmas ! There was actually another online article that I read about a recent study that was done with a bunch of 65 year olds that had a "mental age" of 93. After 6 months of either cycling or walking they were able to reduce their "mental age" by 9 years.....

Trailboss.....so I've calibrated my Fitbit several times. Once I did it on a track and several times just using the odometer. Surprisingly (?) it's been fairly accurate. And yea I put a lot of time in and on travel days it can be difficult, and that's a large part of the reason I seldom go far on any given day. My total miles so far this year is 4,177.93 which is a daily average of 11.80 miles. The only time I question it's accuracy is when I'm hiking in the mountains. I've noticed that it will calculate more miles when ascending than it will when descending (i.e. it could be 5 miles to the summit and only 4 miles back to the truck for example). In my brain it averages itself out but who knows. That being said, if it wasn't measuring correctly, it could go both ways.....maybe I'm walking 5,000 miles annually !?!

On a very serious note, some years back I took antibiotics at the tail end of one of my trips. I had a severe reaction within 48 hours, and I had some really weird side effects, some of which even made it difficult for me to walk. My life turned into a living hell. My doctor said I was nuts, said it was not the antibiotics, and put me on brain medications. I finally got off the prescribed medications (against his advice) but I had been sick for 9 months. It was much worse than dealing with the cancer for me. Now I'm pretty much a fanatic about walking and my health.....

So now we walk, and walk, and walk.....

 

[ROKTAXI]

You can get lots of info here: http://www.bajanomad.com/ as well as here: www.facebook.com/groups/TalkBaja/
I also have an oil burner, but being an '05 (Jeep Liberty) can run on the low sulfur stuff. However they are all saying that the refineries now are only processing ULSD.

EDIT: forgot this one: I get my insurance from them. http://www.discoverbaja.com/

 

[Mccaf]

Hey Jerry, happy holidays to you and the boys. I really appreciate reading your adventures.
You have the gift that keeps on giving here!

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

ROKTAXI.....I believe that Ed White is the guru on ULSD in Mexico and he seems to say that as well. It'd be nice to hear from someone else with first hand information. Also I'm not a Facebook user.....

Mccaf.....I like it ! What a great way to say it.....thanks for posting and following along. I really do enjoy the feedback. Thank you.....


Lake Havasu City, Arizona would be our next stop as we continued our trek south down Highway 95.....following that nice weather.....



Now I've been through this town a few times before but never had much interest in stopping here in the past. But this time would be different.....way different actually. People I had camped with told me I had to at the very least see the London Bridge (originally constructed from 1176 to 1209). The story of how this bridge came here from England is really quite remarkable. The short story is that Robert McCulloch bought the bridge in 1968 for $2,460,000, had it dismantled and shipped to California, and then trucked to Lake Havasu City where it was reconstructed, and I have to tell you, it's prerty darn cool.....some people sure do think outside the box.....



I also have a friend that's looking to buy a home here so when I told her I was here she asked me to look around and tell her what I thought. Overall my first impression wasn't great, but I'll tell you this town can grow on you.....if you give it time. Lots of old people this time of year.....they say the town swells from 55,000 to over 100,000 during the winter when the Snowbirds arrive (by the way I sure do despise being called one but everyone doesn't feel that way).....



Here's a picture of a snowbird in Lake Havasu City. That's probably a half million dollar rig right there.....



Anyhow after visiting the London Bridge, we headed down to the developed lakeside and canal just below to walk along the shoreline. I just hate places that don't allow dogs.....



I tried another route.....another no go.....



With the dogs in the truck, I went to explore alone. It seems that every tree and bench in this public area has a small monument attached to it.....



At first I found it to be very odd.....it was like I had entered a cemetery almost. But then it started to grow on me, just like Lake Havasu City would. This one resonated with me.....



There was a little of everything and there were a whole lot of these monuments. This one brought a tear to my eye (and still does). This family still honors their 10 year old daughter that died in 1994. Here it is over 20 years later and they've decorated it for the Christmas holidays.....I can't even imagine the pain.....



There's one more thing that Lake Havasu City seems to be well known for.....they've constructed 25 lighthouses along the shoreline of the lake and each lighthouse is a replica of a lighthouse from somewhere in the United States. I photographed just the one.....that's plenty I think.....



Now I never knew about any of this stuff in the past and I was kind of liking it, so I decided that I needed to hang around and check this place out a bit more.....it's not a bad town.....and I started thinking.....could I live here (winter only of course) ?

 

[chet6.7]

Remember,it's a dry heat.
The April boat show has some fast machines,and the tow vehicles are out of my price range too.

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Chet.....beautiful ! And yes it's a very dry heat and that dry heat sure does feel good.....


Now we needed a place to spend a few nights so we drove a few miles south of town and found ourselves a place on a rather bleak piece of BLM land.....



I wasn't feeling real good about this place.....it seemed like people here weren't travelers but were here for the winter (just my opinion). We slept here for 4 nights and always left in the morning, returning late in the evening.....



But here we met an adventurous couple from Alaska that told me about an excellent spot to hike. So hiking was next.....

The first hike would take us back to the Colorado River, this time being just south of Lake Havasu City......



Now this is an area that attracts quite a few hikers, and many of these hikers find themselves off trail as they descend the wash which means that there are trails everywhere. I've hiked here quite a bit now and I swear I'm never on the same trail. This picture pretty much illustrates what I'm speaking of.....



At one point while actually on a trail (but the wrong one) I found myself having to lower Yukon down portions of the steep canyon. When we came to the rope I knew it was time to find a new route.....



Back on the correct trail now, things were looking much better.....



After nearly 4 miles of hiking, the Colorado River was within our sights.....



The dogs were well rewarded for their efforts.....





I only wished that I too could have taken a dip. I sat on the shoreline and took it all in.....

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Another nice hike in the same general area is the trail to the summit of Lizard Peak (1,380').....



There's a few different routes to the summit.....Tanner scaled this 8' high wall but not knowing what lied ahead I decided to turn around and look for another route.....



Our alternative route had us circle around the mountain and ascend from the back (west) side.....



The views were pretty amazing looking west into California.....





We continued up the mountain.....



There's a picnic table on the summit and I've heard people call the mountain Tabletop Mountain.....



Lake Havasu City lies to the east.....



We've been up here a few times now. I don't tire of it.....

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

It had now been 8 days hanging around the general vicinity of Lake Havasu City, Arizona.....4 days north of town and 4 days south of town, therefore I decided that it was time to move on. Stocked up on groceries and just as I was about to leave town, I glanced to the west and saw a group of campers parked in the desert.....maybe a mile out as the crow flies. I had to check this spot out before I left town and once I did my thoughts were that I'd probably like this spot. We moved in.....



This land is owned by the Arizona State Land Trust and a permit (fee) is required. It seems as though most people aren't into the whole pay to camp thing (me included) so the turnover is high here.....people sneak in for a night or two without getting the permit hoping not to get caught (the sheriff was here yesterday checking for permits) and then move on to the free BLM land (I believe this anyhow).....

The Christmas holidays can be a lonely time when spent traveling alone so I decided to spend Christmas Eve at the London Bridge (huge tourist area) where it seemed likely that there would be many people (strangers) to mingle with.....



I have no trouble meeting new people due to my travel companions. They are conversation starters. We had an excellent day browsing shops and walking around doing not a whole heck of a lot. The Christmas lights were beautiful radiating off of the Colorado River.....



The entire area of the London Bridge is lit up for the holidays.....



That day I also discovered that this place is much more dog friendly than I first thought. I posted "no dogs" pictures previously but it turns out that one side of the river (canal) is dog friendly while the other is not. So you can't always trust the first impressions is the lesson to once again be learned.....



I don't think I've ever mentioned how much the dogs love visiting Petsmart (the favorite) and PETCO. There's a Petsmart thats about a 1.5 walk mile away from the campsite which we visit often. Tanner just couldn't figure out why those automatic doors wouldn't open on Christmas day.....



I really enjoyed our new found campsite but once again the trash issue raised its ugly head. It seems as though every ravine is littered with trash, and many of the desert shrubs have trash stuck to their branches or embedded in the sand around its base. Therefore Christmas day was spent ridding the desert of some of its blight.....



That day we collected 97 pounds of trash including a tire, and the following day we dumped it all at the local Toyota dealership.....nice guys that didn't charge me for the tire ! Two days later we picked up 56 more pounds of trash which were dumped at the local Tractor Supply.....more nice guys ! Businesses seem to love people that pick up trash. I ALWAYS am well received when I arrive with loads of trash.....



Check out the one bag in the next image. Some off road enthusiasts dumped this from their ATV yesterday. What's interesting about this bag is what is printed on the bag....."Keep Lake Havasu Beautiful.....Pack It In / Pack It Out".....



Will it ever change ?

 

[Dougnuts]

Jerry, you’re always welcome here in Kentucky. Thank you for sharing and have a Happy New Year.

 

[longhorn1]

Jerry, Happy New Year. May your next adventures inspire us all. Safe travels. jd

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Dougnuts.....Whenever I hear Kentucky I immediately think of lush green pastures, wood rail fences, and sensational race horses. What a beautiful place it is. Thanks for the offer. Also, I've noticed that you've often "liked" my posts and thanks for doing that. I see it as someone saying thank you.....

JD.....thank you. We hope you have a great 2019 as well !

Having now been in and around Lake Havasu City, Arizona for nearly 3 weeks, and not traveling, I thought I might share with you some "short stories" of our life here.....

For the past 2 weeks we've been camped west of town legally (I purchased the permit). Most days an angry, bald headed white man will come by multiple times honking his horn, hanging out the window screaming, patrolling the area, sometimes telling people to leave as he seems to believe that camping is not permitted here. One morning while having my coffee he stood outside the camper screaming profanities towards me. He reminds me so much of the angry, bald headed white man that beat his dog in Colorado and returned the following day with a gun. I've called the sheriff several times, as have others camped here. If I quit posting, Google "drive by shooting Lake Havasu City, Arizona" and you'll know the end of this story.....

Then there was this 73 year old Vietnam War Veteran that I met while walking along the canal near the London Bridge. We walked together for a bit and he told me a little of his life story.....



He told me that he met his wife over 50 years ago, had known her for only 3 weeks when they got married, and his love for her is just as strong today as it was back then. He's a father, a grandfather, and a great grandfather that has survived (or as he said many times "I beat it !" ) cancer which he says is the result of being exposed to Agent Orange during the war. And lastly, he said "I want to spend my last days of life making people smile and making them happy". It certainly worked for me.....

He also told me that his dog owns 63 pairs of sunglasses and never leaves home without a pair.....



One day while walking in the desert I saw this guy riding his horse and I thought what a wonderful photo opportunity.....



The following day we crossed paths outside of Walmart and he happened to recognize Tanner from the previous day, so we talked. We chatted for just a few minutes but what an interesting story he had (or so I thought anyhow). He also was a traveler passing through but he's doing his travels with his horse and 6 dogs. He went on to say that he's also taking care of his friends dog, so 7 dogs in total. Maybe getting another Golden Retriever pup in April isn't such a crazy idea.....



I recently found a new spot near my campsite that makes for great hiking and birdwatching.....



It's probably a bit less than a 3 mile walk to the shores of the Colorado River from my campsite.....



And I sure do love my latest find. Here in the desert you hear the near constant roar of ATVs and motocross bikes, but once you enter the wilderness area and drop down to the shoreline of the river all becomes quite.....



I remember this past summer listening to the waterfowl on the Eastern Shore and remarking that it was like a symphony. This hidden spot is much the same as it too is filled with many varieties of birds. And I love it here.....



The weather continues to be unsettled, the winds are strong, temperatures have fallen, and it's cold.....



Wishing everyone (including the angry, old bald headed white men) a peaceful and healthy 2019.....

 

[GregSplett]

I did not even know there was a like button here. What's it take to get a love button?