Back to the desert - with my toys! , Quartzsite, AZ - January 23, 2015

It was only 138 miles from the RAT (Riverside Adventure Trails) to the Roadrunner BLM area just 6 miles south of Quartzsite. It was a great travel day. The cats slept all the way and we saw lots of RVs heading north. That means more room for us.

We have lots of friends still in Quartzsite and we will have plenty of time to meet up. We plan on staying in this area for 26 days.

We picked out a good spot to park, so our solar panels are aiming south. There are folks around us ... but no one close. A peaceful, relaxing spot.

I had to get a few pictures of the area ..... with my toys.

Fergizmo the gnome, finds a big Saguaro cactus just behind our rig.

My big Gumby, playing in the 'woods'.

Mister Bill loves to climb trees.

And Gumby & Pokey checking out the 'forest'.

The last weekend for the 'Big' event at the big tent. We headed over there around 10 AM. Traffic was nuts. We found a place to park and proceeded to walk our legs off.

There are many vendors set up all over the place. We looked at a lot of stuff, but didn't really find anything we couldn't live without.

Onward to the big tent.

We mostly just browsed, but we did find some Happy Camper. It works great for holding tanks. kills odors

We then drove out to Plomosa Road to visit some friends. We sat and talked to Mark & Terri (from the Christian rally). Coming back into town, I stopped off at the RV Pit Stop and filled our water jugs. I got 25 gallons of well water (for our fresh water holding tank) and 1 gallon of drinking water. $1.75 for all.

Then I modified my method of getting the water into my tanks.

.Using my bicycle rack and ladder actually worked pretty good. But I know a 12 volt pump is in my future.

Out here in the desert, we see many rigs with solar panels. Some on the roof, some standing up all around the RV. When I ordered mine through AM Solar out of Oregon, I bought four 100 watt panels, a TriStar 45 amp Charge Controller, along with all the cabling and misc to install it. I also ordered 4 Lifeline GPL-4CT AGM batteries and a Magnum Energy MS2012 pure sign wave inverter/charger.

This setup is working out great for us. I installed it myself in 2012 and got a nice tax credit of $1,605.00 that year.

So .. I spent $5,249.00 on my solar setup (you can get a lot more for less today). Minus the tax credit, I have $3,644.00 in the equipment.

Was it worth it? Since we have had this setup, we have boondocked 67 nights. that is, we were parked without hookups and used out inverter to power all the important stuff, like tv, coffee pot (Keurig), lights, and charge all our goodies.

If we had paid .. say 20 bucks a night for a site with hookups, that means we would have paid out $1,340 more in camping fees alone. I guess that means if we boondock 115 more nights, we will break even.

I am sure we probably will do that. But even if we don't, it is still worth it to us. To not have to fire up the generator (Honda 2000i) and deal with the noise, and gas, it is a peace of mind thing. 

Ahhhhh.....


What a nice relaxing spot.

Later


Fergs signing off........