Day 82: Poky Plants and Understanding Park Rangers

Back on I-10 and on to the next state: Arizona! We passed many signs warning about the dust storms on the freeway and felt very grateful that today was not a windy day, unlike yesterday.

The GPS directions continue to be a challenge for me. At the beginning of the trip my phone would stop working and freeze so I missed a few turns that way. I have also been challenged by the “1000 ft ahead” direction since that distance perspective is something I don’t ever use. These last couple of days we have switched to Apple Maps where they use terms like “at the light turn right” instead of measuring the distance in feet. I thought it might be my golden ticket to use the rest of the way home…until today. Twice this map system had me on roads that weren’t the correct way leading to making even more U-turns in our 55 foot traveling circus.

The drive was pretty uneventful with a beautiful leg stretch at this gorgeous rest stop.

After driving a bit longer, Rob commented I didn’t take the exit he had in his phone, but that the one in mine would also work, so we kept going. We were headed through this amazing mountain pass in Saguaro National Park, covered with more saguaros than we have ever seen. Cooper was up front and noted the 12,000 pound weight restriction and noted that he was pretty sure we were over that. We forged ahead anyway and took the steep/sharp turns at a snail’s pace, but made it work. Then I saw the red and blue lights in the side mirror: we were getting pulled over. When the park ranger approached and asked for the registration, ID and insurance, I shared it would take a bit as I had to dig it all out. He walked around to the door to find our RV weight, which Rob found inside and it said 18,000 pounds–oops. They ran our information and came back to kindly just give us a warning and tell us to use a different road to leave the park. It rattled the kids a bit, especially Cooper, but after about 10 minutes total, we were back on our way to visitor center.

After many miles of “dips” in the road, which the boys LOVED, we arrived at the Red Hills Visitor Center and unhooked the tow car. Moments later I was stung by a bee. So bizarre.

We left the visitor center and took the 6 mile dirt Bajada Loop Drive road in the car to hit three great hikes: Valley View (less than a mile), Signal Hill Petroglyphs (half-mile), and Desert Discovery Nature Trail (also half-mile)

Leaving there, we pushed hard to get all the way to Nene’s house, on the west side of Phoenix. We stopped for dinner at a rest stop and had another first: we had extended the motorhome slide out a few inches to get clothes packed for our two days away. As we were getting ready to merge back on the freeway, we realized our slide was still out. Oops. We stopped on the shoulder to get it back in, and then Rob drove us a little over an hour to Goodyear.

First words out of the kids mouths when we saw Nene, “we got pulled over today.” Yes we did, kids, yes we did. I got the boys into their beds while Rob and Nene caravanned to park the RV in the designated lot in her complex. This was our first night in 80+ days not sleeping in the RV.