Some Family Christmas Time At The RAT - December 23, 2014

Sunday, Decmember 21st - We took Candy back to the San Diego airport for her flight back to Vancouver, WA. Her flight out was at 8:30PM. San Diego traffic... at night...sucks. We were glad to get back to out RV park. But it was a great time we had with the family.

On the way back, I topped off our truck at a Circle K Mobile gas station. Diesel was $2.89 per gallon. Nice!

Just before we entered the 'no cell' zone, as we left the city, Donna saw on Facebook that my Aunt Ruth in North Bend, OR had passed away. She was my favorite Aunt. I sure am glad we stopped to visit her on the way back up to Washington this last Spring. Here she is visiting us in our RV .

She is with her Husband, my Uncle Dale, who left us first. She was a wonderful, caring person who will be missed greatly.

This December, our RV friend Loretta lost her husband Bill. Our Sister-in-law Cyndi, my Aunt Ruth, and now too Joe Cocker. A sad season for lots of folks.

Bright and early on Monday, we left Pio Pico and the 'no cell' zone. We drove up, up, and up, 4000 feet to get back on I-8 to head East. We saw lots of pretty country, and the sand desert just west of Yuma. I'm keeping track of all the boondocking opportunities we see along the way. We had planed to stop for the night around Quartzsite because I made reservations for the RAT (Riverside Adventure Trails RV Park) for Tuesday, but the drive was nice and easy and we just kept going. 364 miles of driving is way over a normal move day, but it was a good day. The weather was great and Christmas music was playing on XM/Sirius radio.

We pulled into the Avi Casino boondocking area at 5PM. This is a nice spot and only 4 miles away from the RAT.

While Donna got into her jammies and started to watch some Hallmark Channel Christmas movies that I had DVR'ed, I went over to the casino. Mitch (Cyndi's brother) always went to the Avi for the Monday night football game. Mitch and Gene were there. Cool. I sat with them and watched the game. It was fun, even though Denver lost. The casino had lots of drawings and giveaways that nght. Mitch won a cooler and Gene won two free buffet tickets.

The next morning we moved on over to the RAT. 4 miles....big move day :)

Found a good spot. We are using our RPI membership this time, $77.00 for the week.

After we were settled, Donna made a big lasagna and we headed over to Gene's house. We shared a good meal together and did a lot of reminiscing.

Mitch and Gene are doing ok. Just need some time to pass. We all miss her, but life goes on.

Quartzsite is in our future. Maybe the whole month of January.

God, thank you for this life we live.