The Good, the Bad and the Bizarre!!

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'Jacob's Tails' soon to be published as an E-Book

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For almost 10 years we heard about The Slabs or Slab City (as it is called) and for almost ten years we avoided staying there. But when Diane and Andy (valued Escapee buddies) said how much they enjoyed their time there and we really hadn’t planned where to go next, we thought – what the heck!!
Slab City is situated about 3 miles outside Niland, California on an old military installation Camp Dunlap that was built during Second World War and abandoned shortly after. It may be the time of year or just the time of man, but everything around there – the buildings; the desert; many of the people – give the impression of being worn out, burned out and/or abandoned.

In 1946 most of the buildings and everyone and everything that could be moved were taken over to Camp Pendleton, California on the west coast. So, now we have a section of desolate land (one mile square) with nothing on it but the occasional water tank or bunker that couldn’t be sold or moved and a collection of concrete slabs where over 30 buildings used to be – thus the name Slab City or The Slabs.
We followed Diane’s and Andy’s directions and found Ray Hound Road, Chili Bob, Mary and Rich and a very welcoming evening fire.







“Of course we remember Diane and Andy,” they told us, “What a great, fun couple.”

“Have you been at The Slabs before?”

“We’ve visited here but never stayed.”

“Would you like me to take you on a tour?” asked Chili Bob.

You betcha!!

There is nothing official about Slab City being a city. In fact part of the attraction is that there are no rules and no fees – so they say.

The first place Bob took us was the main Library. The woman who started the Library died and is buried right there in the front yard.






Next we went out to Gopher Flats, the 18 hole Golf Course next to the military Bombing Range. Each (gopher) hole is marked with a red flag. It is reputed to be quite a challenging course.

Bob was going to take us out to the Mud Volcanoes but we had been out there last year. Instead we visited The Queen of the Slabs and her daily Yard and Tool Sale.





Many, many of the folks who stay out on the Slabs have pets – especially dogs – and like most living things, pets die. There is a Pet Cemetery dedicated to the memories of these treasured friends and (I was told) that there may be some people ashes there as well who wanted to spend eternity with their best friends.





It’s interesting how communities evolve and how various social conventions develop. Selected sections are cordoned off – some with yellow tape; some with old tires outlining the parameter and some where you are made to feel uncomfortable if you are not part of the group.

Still others have signs posted – like: the area where the LOW’s (Loners on Wheels) stay; another where there are mostly Escapees; others that people with ATV’s gather; and still others for naturalists who reject the use of generators. There is one area that has been tagged Poverty Flats; another Beverly Hills. Almost every form and description of housing exists. Dwellings constructed from recycled, rejected materials stand beside Motorhomes valued at close to ¾ of a million dollars.






There are two separate music stages, two libraries, a church, a café and various businesses including a solar sales place.







If it stands still long enough, it will have graffiti on it, be decorated or painted (usually with some gawd-awful colour of donated paint).

The Oasis is one such gathering place. This is the place where a bunch from our group goes to have breakfast and play poker once a week. The trailer that sat out front used to be white but someone donated some cans of paint and just before we left it became interesting shades of pink, lavender and yellow.

Not that the folks are not creative – where else would you see vehicles decorated with absolutely everything imaginable?





The most famous construction at Slab City is the Salvation Mountain that stands on your right just before you get to the Welcome Guardhouse entrance to Slab City. It has been featured on a number of documentaries and is Leonard Knight's tribute to Love and God. There are always vehicles parked and people walking up to see the mountain.







Our stay there was fascinating and an experience I wouldn’t have missed for the world but we’re off to Anza-Borrego Desert State Park to stalk the illusive desert wildflowers.

Finding Joshua Tree - Remembering the Sneaker Tree

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'Jacob's Tails' soon to be published as an E-Book

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Our plan was to go to Joshua Tree NP and/or Borrego Springs from here so we decided to do some site and trail scouting before we moved. Off we went into California along Interstate 10 and realized we’d never been west of Blythe on this road before. One the map, it looked like the next major spot was Desert Center – a good place to stop. Only the signs on the road said that there were no services for 60 miles and Desert Center was only 30 miles. The road signs must be wrong, right?

Yeh, we’re going to check it out anyway. The signs were not wrong! Really, there was nothing there. Now, that’s not entirely true. The first thing we came across was dozens upon dozens of dead palm trees lying stretched out along the sides of the entrance road to the town. A town that looked totally abandoned – another Ghost Town wanna-be.

We kept going along Highway 177 and found out there was very little else. A couple of roads went off to parts unknown: one was the Kaiser Road; the other was a road that led to Lake Tamarisk Desert Resort. What the heck – we went off to Lake Tamarisk. Our first sighting was four ladies doing their morning walk along the road. Then we came to a road, not unlike every other road that takes you to a private community, and turned in. We entered an exclusive-looking community with their own Fire Department, Golf Course and street after street of houses, park model trailer and RV’s (some 150 lots).

We stopped in at the office to get the scoop on the place. Apparently there had been a large mine owned and operated by Kaiser Industries (thus the Kaiser Road) and they had built the Resort as a retreat for their executives. When the mine closed, the Resort was bought out and became an “active senior community”, as the brochure calls it.

Curiosity satisfied we went back to Interstate 10 and onto the next stop at Chiriaco Summit – the site of the General Patton Memorial Museum and a route we had been on before with Anne and Eldon. This was the area where Patton set up a training center for the American troops being readied for battle in North Africa during the Second Word War.

The Chiriaco family set up house, home and services there just after the First World War. They were responsible for getting the General Patton Museum established and to this day, the family operate the restaurant and services.

Joshua Tree National Park covers almost 800,000 acres in both the Colorado and Mojave Deserts. According to the gal at the Visitor Center, Joshua Trees only grow in the Mojave at a higher altitude. You see very few travelling the main road of the park because it is mainly in the Colorado Desert.

The Joshua Tree is not a tree! In fact, it is not even a cactus. The Joshua Tree is part of the Yucca family which is part of the Lily family. The Natives recognized the value of the Tree and were known to use the leaves for baskets and sandals and the blooms and seeds for their nutritional qualities. Word has it that on their trek westward, the Mormons encountered the tree and named it the Joshua Tree because of its seemingly outstretched arms.

To me, one of the most fascinating features in the park is what they call the “Rockpiles”. What you see are these huge, smooth boulders that sit one on top of the other.

Hundreds of millions of years ago hot lava repeatedly oozed up through the surface of the earth and cooled. Over time one surface bubbled up and built on the last one. The wind and water eventually eroded away the soft rocks and vertical fissions or joints were created. The moisture seeped down through the cracks and the formations became almost rectangular. Some of the hard minerals were transformed into soft clay and others loosened and drifted down. Wind and water are forever constant and constantly attack the rocks to create the rounded smooth surfaces of the boulders. There are places out there that look like God took a massive dump in the middle of a huge flat.

The perfectly balanced 800 pound moving GeoKenetic sculpture at the Twenty-nine Palms Visitor Center reminds us that “all relationships are at best delicate and everlasting change.”

Remembering the Sneaker Tree

Way back in 2001 when we travelled with Anne and Eldon, we came across a couple of strange phenomena: the rock graffiti on the banks leading up to the bed of the train tracks and the Sneaker Tree. And there they were on Route 62, west of Vidal Junction on the way to Parker.

Graffiti found – Sneaker Tree, gone!

This whole experience was so surreal: from the rows of dead palm trees; to the resort to the rock piles in the middle of Joshu a Tree NP; to finding the Railway Graffiti and not finding the Sneaker Tree; and finally how everything looked and felt like we were

living in a landscape painting.

Yuma is Yuma is Yuma is Yuma!

Yuma tends to be shopping and eating and eating and shopping and maybe more eating. I seem to do a lot of that since I quit smoking. It’s not that food tastes so much better; it’s just that I need something that continually goes from my hand to my mouth. It can be almost anything. I started out being so-o-o good munching on celery but do you know how boring celery can get? I still can’t think of anything that has as few calories as celery and so the pants get tighter.

Anyway three weeks in Yuma was enough. We can’t complain: Sallee and John are great friends (and they tried to teach us pinochle – mission impossible); our site in the Foothills is in a great neighbourhood, but you know how we are about cities! Doing Laundry twice was enough to encourage us to leave!!

We spent our travel time going out to Holtville and the Imperial Valley in California and, of course, down to Algodones, Mexico.

We stopped at the BLM near Holtville called the Oasis Desert Hot Springs to meet with George and Gaylene, folk we met a couple of years ago. There is a core of Canadian Snowbird residents mainly from Alberta and BC but some like George and Gaylene make an annual trek from Ontario. Like any gathering of people they have formed various groups and you see rings of RVs around big fire pits where they meet for nightly get-togethers.

The main attraction here is a mineral hot springs. The Springs are accessible to all. The temperature is about 120 degrees F and people claim there are healing properties. All I know is that it feels great. The people from Holtville (a nearby town) and the BLM residents have worked together to build and maintain the Hot Springs area to keep it clean and free of charge for everyone.

There are showers you can stand under – no soaps allowed; there is a pond surrounded by palm trees that isn’t as hot for swimming; a hot, hot tub; and a not so hot tub.

The water was so hot people go down, fill up containers and bring them back to do dishes and laundry.

After all these years, we finally got the chance to be in Holtville for the Carrot Festival. Unfortunately, it was cold and rainy but, damn we went anyway!!

Algodones seems to be getting a little more sophisticated. Some of the merchandise might be China-made most is still comes in from various parts of Mexico and Central America and no matter what – the people are charming.

Our favourite taco place has new signs and table clothes but still great food (at a great price).

We’re back in Quartzsite now for a couple of weeks.

Now That’s the Dessert!

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Woke up Tuesday morning to the smell of creosote . . . now that’s the desert I know and love!
It’s now going on Friday and it’s rained every night and all day yesterday. AND the wind!! I will never complain about Lethbridge winds again.

Monday night was a quite an ordeal!

Fred put up the room the day we arrived and for over a week, we enjoyed the extra space and protection.

Not to Last!

Monday night - a horrific wind swept in underneath the walls blew the eight inch spikes out of the ground and there we were with walls just a-flying straight out!

Adrenalin does it every time! We managed to get all the walls unhooked, down and in the trunk of the car before the winds took them off into the unknown. The awning got rolled snug up against the side of the motorhome.

We felt safe again for the time being. It rained and blew all night and Tuesday night and Wednesday night and all day Thursday and Thursday night. Friends, Sheila and Chuck lost their new awning to the desert storm but they did get a chance to see their first flash flood in the wash.

The wind calmed down during the days and we’ve put everything away and could leave at a moment’s notice but that doesn’t make sense either - who wants to be on the road with winds like this?

They call this a winter storm. According to what we have heard, winter storms are supposed to have gentle rains that saturate the ground. These violent rains and winds are supposed to accompany the summer monsoons - Aw, yes, the weather is changing all over.

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument

Surprisingly enough, this Ajo/Why area offers an abundance of things to do. Our first outing was to the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. We’ve been there before. In fact we’ve been there a few times before, but this time we decided to take the three hour guided tour. Good plan!

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument is about 830 square kilometres and sits in central of the Sonoran Desert that extends south into Mexico.

Our guide (Nancy) was a gal who just happened to be interested in how the Indians (the Tono O’Odham - Desert People) gathered and grew food in the desert. Her theory is that the Indian people are now so overweight because their bodies had adapted to binging when there was plenty of food and starving when food was scarce. Now that food is always available the Indians tend to overeat and consequently become overweight. That’s her theory, anyway.

She went into a lot of detail about the various plants and their seeds; how and where the Indians planted and gathered food; the fruits they gathered from the Cacti and the nutritional and medicinal qualities of many of the plants.

Nancy was also well versed in the different types of Cacti (I have a hard time say ‘cacti’ and usually use ‘cactus’). Of course, she pointed out the Organ Pipe Cactus and different types of, Barrel, Prickly Pear, Cholla, etc and explained to us so many of the features we had noticed but never learned about.

Most cacti begin their lives beside or underneath what they call a nurse plant. The nurse plant can be a mesquite or palo verde shrub or tree that gives the fledgling cactus shade and protection. The cacti have shallow root systems and eventually take most of the moisture and nutrition thus overgrowing and killing their protectors. Mind you, this can take decades as cacti grow very slowly. I’ve heard estimates of 75 to 90 years before a Saguaro will produce that first arm.

You never find the perfect cactus like they show in the movies. The Saguaro, which is the most common, typically looks all rotted out around the bottom and has holes up and down the length of the spine where the cactus wrens nest. It can have arms going up or arms going down; twisted or straight; growing around the trunk at one lever; or scattered up and down.

Sometimes you find cactus with very unusual growth like the crescents that can develop on Saguaro or Organ Pipe Cacti.

The Organ Pipe has all its arms coming out from the bottom. I haven’t been able to find out what triggers the growth of the arms. One source I read said that the cacti tend to grow arms during a drought to have more surfaces to gather moisture – who knows?

Cacti are way more interesting than I have ever given them credit for – a life-time study? Maybe in my next life

Kitt Peak Observatory

It all started with Steve – the fellow we met first at the Escapees Park near Wickenburg – whose whole life revolved around his telescope and astronomy. We talked about the Observatory at Kitt Peak and decided that this was the trip we just had to check it out.

We thought it was close. Well, we left Why at 7 am to catch the first tour at 10 am. It is about 90 miles from Why to the turn-off up the mountain to the observatory.

Aw - the road leading up to the Observatory! White knuckle driving for Fred – curves that compete with the hair-pin turns on the Going to the Sun Road through the Logan Pass in Glacier – only this time we had to drive up the outside lane for 12 miles up to 7000 feet elevation.

What a great view! Unfortunately, no pictures! When I suggested that we pull over to look – I got a VERY emphatic “I don’t think so.” Then I looked over at his hand and realized he was hanging onto the steering wheel like he was going to fall off. I offered to drive and got “that would be even worse.”

The Observatory is the largest in the world and consists of 23 separate telescopes (Only a very few are accessible to the public). Kitt Peak sits on peak of Kitt Mountain on the Tono O’Odham Reservation in the Sonoran Desert and is part of an International Astronomical Community Organization.

The one thing I can verify for sure is that it is damn cold up there!! They say at least 20 degrees colder than down below.

We ended up not taking any of the tours but wandered around on our own.

I can see why anybody who has any interest in the skies would be fascinated with it. The night observation tours must be incredible but I tell you - if we had a tough time with that road during the day – can you imagine what it would be like at night, in the dark? There are no light on the road at all and you would be travelling down in the dark. I don’t think so!

Oh, one more thing – J.A. Jance (yeh, the author) gave a lecture in Ajo and we went. I may not like all her writing but she sure gave a wonderful presentation.

Next Stop – Yuma, I think.

Quartzsite Before the Shows and Vendors

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When we left North Ranch for Quartzsite, our plan was to pull into the 14 day BLM area where Chuck and Sheila had been last season (Scaddon Wash). Hm-m-m pretty noisy being that close to the Highway – so we moved over to Hi Jolly to the site where we parked last year.

Still not what we wanted.

We ended up back at our usual site over next to the wash.

Aw-w-w that felt better . . . it felt like that was where we should be! And so we stayed there for a couple of weeks.

It’s interesting how much easier it is to meet people at the boon docking areas than in the regular parks.

The folks (Diane and Andy) we first met in Pahrump and then again at the North Ranch showed up at Hi Jolly a few days after we got there; there was a fun young couple from Washington; and even a couple from Alberta who were active in the Family Motor Home Assoc.

Quartzsite . . . before the shows . . . is just a small desert town getting ready for the major onslaught that happens when the Big Tent goes up and all the vendors move in.

A few permanents like the Readers’ Oasis Book Store; my favourite place KGK Kitchen Supply; J & B Tools; and The Gambler are always there. They carry on business as usual and are stocking up for the invasion.

This is when the artists and crafters start to appear: Elizabeth, along with her writer partner, John, is working in her Studio in Prospector's Panorama. John shares his great news with us. At least one of his books has been accepted for publication - Good going, John.

A new fella from California has arrived on the scene convinced he can make his millions collecting rocks and throwing together bright and shiny silver jewellery - good luck fella!

When you talk to most of the artists and crafter, they tell you they don’t expect to get rich plying their talent but they thrive on the lifestyle.

There was a horrendous storm while we were there . . . unusual winds, rain, thunder and lightening that managed to down a few cacti and destroy a few tents . . . but the next day - there was Curt working his pottery wheel and firing up his two kilns right there where his tent used to be.

They say you can get anything you want in Quartzsite . . . but you have to wait until the vendors show up. Before that all you see is an outline of what’s coming.

Off to the North Ranch and Wickenburg

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I’ve got this THING now – whenever I need to do laundry and we’re heading to an Escapees Park, I will put it off for a few days or even buy more underwear to stall til we get there. If there is such a thing as a good laundromat, it can usually be found at an Escapees RV Park. It happened again as we headed to ‘North Ranch’ near Wickenburg, AZ.

We took a different route to get there from Laughlin and went up through Kingman on Highway 40 and then south along highway 93. Fred calls that the kind of road that helps clean out the holding tanks as we went up and down and around through the hilly country between the Hualapai and Aquarius Mountains. Lots of Pinion Pine trees, Mesquite, and Palo Verde and still the Saguaro Cacti sticking out above the bush throughout the hills (are we not impressed that after nine years, I am finally remembering the names of the various trees and plants?).

Now, every Escapees Park is different but they usually have a few things in common like the afternoon social (or happy hour); the Sunday ice cream get-together; and laundries that are reasonably priced, clean and well maintained. ‘North Ranch’ turned out to be a bit different. Yeh, they had the happy hour but nobody came (as far as I know); there was no ice cream on Sunday; BUT the laundry was clean and well maintained.

Besides the laundry, we did manage to explore an area we had never visited before as well as re-connect and enjoy the company of a couple (Dianne & Andy) we met at the Escapees Park in Pahrump.

We went out to an old mine (the Vulture Mine) that supposedly was started by Wickenburg (the town was named after him) and were very disappointed by the guy who wanted you to pay, pay, pay to look at a bunch of junk and get your picture taken with a donkey. BUT the area around was hilly and speckled with Saguaro.

Fred is not one to like museums but even he will tell you that the Cowboy Museum in Wickenburg was fantastic. It has a lot of exhibits of the old days in Wickenburg and you can actually touch them.

Most impressive was the art work and sculptures . . . a great collection, mostly donated by one family.

Parked next to us at North Ranch was Steve. Now Steve was an interesting character. I would say he was just barely old enough to stay at a 55+ park. He had taught most of his working life seemingly with students who needed to be led through every step of every activity they ever did. What made him so fascinating was that his hobby was astronomy and he carried a humongous telescope – all automatic. All day long, Steve locked himself in his Motorhome with the windows covered and at night, he brought out the telescope and showed us all the wonders of the various celestial bodies . . . the craters on the moon; Jupiter; twin stars in the Milky Way.

We stayed at North Ranch over the USA Thanksgiving and then headed over to Quartzsite but not before I discovered Trader Joes. Gotta go there again!

Old Friends – New Friends

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The best thing about revisiting places you been to before is often revisiting with folks you have shared time with before. The dry-camping area at the Tropicana Express in Laughlin, NV is one such meeting place.

Mya – that gal we met at Avi eight or nine years ago who traded me a book for a Tin Man last year – was there and had phoned to see when we would be arriving; the two sisters – Julie (from Alaska) and Nellie (from Georgia) and their spouses (Bill and Joe) were already there; George and Gay from Ontario were there and Chuck and Sheila would be arriving any time. It was good to see everyone again and find out how the summer had gone.

Unfortunately (for us) the Casinos have tightened up considerably – no more Comp rooms; penny machines that take a minimum of 45 cents for each spin and watching $20.00 go poof in five minutes. It wasn’t quite the fun time it has been other years.

As someone said, “Parking isn’t free; you spend twice as much in the Casinos.”

But the food is good and you can still get a Prime Rib dinner for $7.99 (up a dollar from last year).

But there are usually new friends and when Don and Jan moved in beside us, it didn’t take long for Jan to whoosh me off to the mall to find a new jacket and Fred and Don to solve all the problems of the RV world.

Sallee and John came up from Yuma for a couple of days and we all went off to see what progress had been made on the Hoover Dam Bypass. The Dam was both the world's largest hydroelectric power generating station and the world's largest concrete structure when it was completed in 1936 more than two years ahead of schedule and supposedly under budget.
After 9-11 traffic over the Dam was severely restricted and construction on the Bypass was started in January 2005.

The Colorado River Bridge, nearly 2,000 feet long, is the central portion of the Hoover Dam Bypass. It will span the Black Canyon (about 1,600 feet south of the Hoover Dam), connecting the Arizona and Nevada approach highways nearly 900-feet above the Colorado River.
Needless to say, it is impressive and they expect to have it completed by 2011.










As we travelled along, we happened to notice this strange array of something off to the west so we went off to investigate. What we discovered was a complete field of solar panels and a few more being worked on. It turns out that what we saw is called Nevada Solar One. It is a 64 MW commercial-scale solar energy plant. They expect it will eventually have 19,000 receivers (panels) that cover 350 square acres. Unlike the solar panels we are used to, these are curved. Two panels face each other to create a trough that seems to extend for miles. There were hundreds of troughs in this one field.
This system collects the powerful desert sunlight and converts it into 750-degree F thermal energy, which can then be used to create steam for electrical power generation. The receivers are filled with a special synthetic oil that can withstand the intensity of the daytime heat as well as the much lower temperatures at night and still protect the sensitive glass/metal seals of the receivers.









They say the power produced is a little more expensive than wind power but is more reliable and can be built closer to where it is needed. Interesting, eh?!



Well, that’s our stay in Laughlin. We usually stay longer than the two weeks we stayed this year but it just doesn’t seem to be as much fun as it used to.