Golfin' In The Rain

"Yes RV, we must go home, we can't stay here forever," says Jim to RV last Sunday morning.  We left Ruidoso last Sunday at 6:40am (Tucson time) and made it to just east of Benson before we hit a rain storm. It wasn't too bad but of course got the RV all nice and dirty again. We got the RV back in the barn and all tucked in by 1pm to let it rest up for its next run probably not for another 4 months.

We decided to play golf this Friday because the forecast was little chance of rain versus Sat. a big chance of rain. So we headed to Forty Niner Golf Course for a cheap ($19/ea) round of golf. Almost finished the 9th hole (following behind some quite slow players) when the sky decided to let loose. We headed up to the clubhouse and saw all the slow players taking refuge from the rain under cover, so we braved the rain and played hole #10 to get ahead of every one. Then we had to find cover under trees to wait out the rain thinking it would last only a short time. After about 15 minutes it slowed a bit so teed off on #11, then started to rain hard again - again we found cover under the trees (thankfully there are a lot of trees on the course). Waited again - then was able to hit our second shot then wait out the rain again.

The storm lasted probably a total of 45 minutes then we were home free. Finished up at the clubhouse  bar for our free draft beer that comes with the golf. Such a deal. Usually the beer tastes great after a hot, dusty round of golf, but not as great after a cool, soggy round of golf. But the pizza we ordered  with the bottle of red wine was more to our liking.

 All in all a great day even with the unpredicted rain that got us quite wet. But we did mostly dry off after it stopped. From now on I will be bringing our rain jackets this time of year even with the forecast of no rain.

Inbetween Rain Storms

Thursday at 2pm it quit raining, so off we went to the golf course and teeing off on #1 by 2:30. Had a few sprinkles in the 2 1/4 hours it took us to play. Needless to say there was not anyone in front of us, we just zoomed through and ended up with a fair game, but enjoyable none the less.

Our evenings consist of sitting around the fire pit enjoying a glass (or two) of wine while taking in all the peaceful scenery. Wait - where is everyone?

Oh here is the better half enjoying the cooler temps in front of the fire.

Friday after cleaning off another portion of the coach and taking our short hike on the trail, we headed to this little trail by the river in town. It's a great trail, but only .65 miles long so only 1.3 miles round trip. 

I got a bear hug along the way.

They called this a river, but it looks more like a creek to me.

Just as we finished our walk a thunderstorm went through with a pretty good downpour. Glad we didn't get caught out in that. We walked around town looking in shops, nothing spectacular, then after a hamburger for lunch we decided that it was still possibility of rain so no golf yet. Headed off to the local casino to check that out. We walked out of the casino after 3 1/2 hours $164 richer from the fruit of our labors. Not a bad days work for having fun. 

Today (Sat.) we finished cleaning the RV and put the dirty towels in the washer while we went for our walk. Now just waiting for the towels to dry before we get to start our day. Of course rain is predicted again today, so will need to play it by ear (or feel) if we can get a round of golf in this afternoon. If not, we will figure something out - there is an art festival going on, so might take that in. It's just so nice enjoying the cooler weather, it doesn't matter that we do something or not.

Our play time will be over with tomorrow morning when we head back to Tucson. Hopefully we will get back without going through a rain storm.

Along for the Ride

RV needed to stretch its legs and go for a nice long run after being cooped up in the barn since April 23, so Jim & Linda decided to go along for the ride. On Wed. late morning, RV headed east on I10, barely missing a thunderstorm just outside of Bensen, but had a smooth gallup all the way to Las Cruces where RV stopped to fill up on some oats (diesel). Back heading east on I10 RV had to slow to a trot to get through a wind and dust storm, then got back up to a gallup when headed north on I25. But once RV headed east on Hwy 70 RV slowed to a walk to get through a downpour. After about 10 miles of rain, RV increased back up to a gallup continuing going east and eventually climbing a mountain. After slowing for a small town, RV finally slowed down and turned into Ruidoso Motorcoach Ranch and found a cozy stall in the stable and settled in for the next 3 days to let Jim and Linda play.

Since we got in the "stall" at 6:55pm after we set up there wasn't much time to unwind before eating dinner and heading off to bed. Dinner was simple, beef stew in the crock pot that cooked on the way over.

This morning we woke to beautiful 62 degrees and blue skies. After breakfast, we took off for a little walk on the trail around this property. We shared the trail with the natives, a herd of about 6 deer, one buck with horns with his females following him. Was a short trail, but nice. The park only has 29 stalls, so quite small, but quite nice. Each space has a little patio with a gas fire pit.

Then we hopped in the car to check out the golf course just down the road, but they have a tournament going on, so no go there. Then into town to check on 2 others. Decided we would head back to the RV to clean up the Lincoln up after the rain storm yesterday and pick up the rain jackets to play golf after 1pm.

About noon the thunderstorms decided to move in, so grilled a couple of hamburgers for lunch and indulged while waiting for it to maybe clear up. So we are in a holding pattern waiting for the rains to leave the area (probably not for today). We'll see.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Cabin Again

I know - I've been quite remiss in my postings as of late. So will go back and recap what has been happening.

The end of May we were back up to the cabin and again cleanup around the cabin was in order. We needed to get all of it bagged up and out on the street for pickup before 6/15. So this was our last chance to get this work done. Here are some of our piles we needed to bag up.

 After we got all the pine needles and pinecones picked up we needed to cut down new growth oak trees we  didn't want to grow into mature oak trees.

 This is our fruit of labor - I sure was glad when we got that finished and could just relax and enjoy our time at the cabin. The weather was beautiful. We found out that there are an influx of a lot of people to this area over holiday weekends. We made the mistake of going to Safeway on that Friday afternoon. It took us forever to buy the ingredients for our making our cookies to satisfy our craving, the checkout lines were at least 15 deep. Won't make that mistake again.

 For something to do, we took an overnight trip to Phoenix where we stayed at the Sheraton Downtown again. Went to a car show at the convention center which turned out not worth it, all low-riders (nothing against them, just not our cup of tea). But we did have dinner on the 24th floor of the Hyatt which is a revolving restaurant. Had an enjoyable dinner which was quite good, we chose an excellent bottle of wine and watched all the sites of Phoenix.

 It takes about 1 hour to make one revolution, and we made it around probably 1 1/2 times. This was worth the trip to Phoenix.

Enjoyed breakfast the next morning at the Sheraton then headed back home. Nice to get out of 107 degrees in Tucson to experience 112 degrees in Phoenix.

OK, now we are up to date. Here we are back up to the cabin over the 4th of July extended weekend. Came up on Thursday afternoon, got some work done around the yard on Friday, grilled a turkey that evening and had a wonderful dinner. Then Sat. afternoon Jamie and Eddie came up to visit us. We took them of a tour around the area and ended up at The Cattlemen's Steakhouse for dinner, pretty good. Enjoyed our dessert of homemade apple pie out on the patio. Sunday morning we went for our 4 mile walk around the area. They headed back home after we had lunch at the Torreon Country Club restaurant. It was so nice to have them visit us so we could share our little bit of paradise.

 This morning we were back at it again! It never ends.

The temps at the cabin have been a bit warmer than usual - the upper 80s to low 90s, so a little sticky sitting out on the deck during wine hour, but still a relief from the Tucson temps at 107. It's been such a hot June and July is just continuing on. We'll be heading out early tomorrow morning to head home hopefully before all the traffic.