The Fun Continues

 

As you might suspect, there’s a lot going on all the time. We are treated to spectacular sunsets constantly, but every once in a while, I decide I need to capture one. This particular shot I’m going to make into a scrapbooking background.

Two Thursdays ago, our hiking group did Pilot’s Knob just across the border into California. I had done this hike four years ago and it scared me, so I found two other companions to hike around the bottom. This is a scrapbooking page that I did of the guys who went over the top and our group later on.

This is a better picture of our group on the backside after we all got together. Our trip back over by a somewhat easy path was only in the mind of the beholder.

It is rather redundant. The person taking the picture is the crazy lady in the red shirt in the previous picture.

The newbie's were intrigued by the clothing left behind by the illegal's crossing the border. They don’t swim the Rio Grande, Gila or Colorado, but the American Canal which provides the irrigation for the produce fields. I have pictures of all sorts of things that Norma dubbed artifacts to include a ballpoint pen, a child’s barrette and all sorts of underwear and outer clothing.

This happens to be a perfectly good baseball cap.

My daily walk is usually into town to some kind of store to run an errand, but I really prefer heading off into the desert. This my preferred path.

Our singles group decided to do an Eastern European ethnic Christmas dinner. So Barb, Frances and I got together at Norma’s to make pirogues, but we had to toast the occasion with a Macadamia nut tequila.

 

Gosh, old people just get together for any excuse to eat and drink. Here’s our spread.

The weather has been so great, but this evening it’s raining. If it doesn’t stop by the time the boys need to walk, that’s OK, I have my slicker.

Busy Having Fun

 

We all remark about how fast every day is going. There is so much to do that it cuts into drinking time; however, “happy hour” is carefully observed daily. Thanksgiving Day was a whole lot of fun. Pictured below, I’m surrounded by all my new Canadian friends.

We were scheduled to hike on Thanksgiving Day, but we all opted out mostly because of the wind. The next week, we hiked up Crazy Lady Trail, again so named because of the group’s experience with a wildly screaming lady a few years ago. It seems that she spent  the night in her small pickup afraid to go any farther up the mountain and unable to turn around. The next morning our group was the first thing she saw. One of the guys got her truck turned around and sent her down the mountain.

It’s been my experience that ocotillo will bloom any time in Arizona as long as it finds a water source.

There were a lot of mine entrances, claims, and deep shafts to fall into. This is one of the entrances.

Ralph and Frank are gazing at a mine entrance in the side of the mountain with Dome Valley in the background.

Near the bottom of the mountain, we found the Dome Cemetery. It was started during WWII. Some of the graves were marked and others weren’t. They all had money, mostly quarters and pennies, decorating the white crosses. This was a very elaborate grave for a nine month old baby.

Norma’s birthday was December 1, and she invited a few friends to a Chinese restaurant in Yuma. She’s probably going to be upset with me posting this picture of her, but it’s so typical of Norma showing her bubbly happy personality.

Only 35 of her closest friends showed up. Oh darn!

On December 4, the border town of Alagodones had a “Welcome Back Winter Visitor” party where they forced margaritas on us and passed out free samples of old people drugs. My single lady friends, Frances, Bernie, Norma and the mariachi are singing “Cielito Lindo.”

Spending the winter in Arizona is a hard job, but someone has to do it.