Mid-October

Here we are once again bumping up to mid-October.  "Time keeps on slippin'"....as the days dwindle down to departure.  The current Plan A is to leave on November 10th.  That's a Saturday.  Yep, you guessed it--we'd drive down to Exit #357 on I-15 and spend the night at Willard Bay State Park just north of Ogden.  Then we'd beat feet through the Salt Lake gauntlet on Sunday morning when The Faithful are in church.

Plan B would be to leave during the week and visit with BTB and Friends.  Either way, we'd be heading out of the Salt Lake area on Sunday morning, Veterans Day.  That would put us in far southern Utah by Sunday night.  Last year, we made it from Bryan's house to Lake Powell in a single day.  From there it's a leisure cruise into the Verde Valley on Monday.  We're not sure if that's the route we're going to take this year.

We might hold up farther north Sunday night and then drop down over the North Kaibab to Susan Kliewer's Place at Vermilion Cliffs. It might be fun to make that a "going and coming" tradition.  We know for certain sure that if Susan is hosting a late-April party at her Place, that's where we are going to be.  Our trip north this year was easily The Best such migration we've yet enjoyed.  A few days at Susan's; a few days at Bryce; a nice Saturday night camp at Utah Lake near Provo and then a pleasant Sunday morning drive through Salt Lake to arrive home in late afternoon.

Naturally, there's lots to do before we can drive out of here in early November.  One thing we've learned is that there will ALWAYS be lots to do twice a year as we prepare for our semi-annual migration.  There's no way around that fact.  We just can't magically put on our fairy slippers and flit south or north.  However, after a few years, things are becoming somewhat routine and we're confident we can handle the typical crush of last minute details.

We've had many hard freezes here since early October and Susun put her vegetable garden to bed yesterday.  Today will be the last mowing of the yard and then the annual application of fall fertilizer.  No, the leaves have not yet started to fall to the ground.  However, the colors are now becoming brighter and more vivid with each passing day.  Chances are we will have the leaves under control by ourselves this year and not have to pay someone to deal with them.

We're taking the poptop out for a shakedown cruise next week to the Stoddard Creek Campground up near the Continental Divide about 70 miles north of here.  We will spend at least two nights making sure the truck is rigged properly for its upcoming road trip and the Arizona Season Guest House duty.

That's really about all there is to report about our impending road trip.  Things are going well.  Many Cheers, jp