For those who follow us around, I have to go back to my comment from last year and say, "We've been so busy
living the vagabond life, we don't have time to
write about it!"
A lot of followers request that we at least catch them up on our travels and lifestyle, so here goes...Our last post is from Albuquerque last fall. From there, we started out east towards Central Florida for a visit with brother Ed and sister in law Pat. But that trip was ill fated. As we were heading on Interstate 40 and crossing in to Arkansas, Mary Ann, thankfully a very experienced motor coach driver, noticed debris flying behind our coach and announced she was quickly pulling off to the shoulder. We both jumped out and couldn't believe what we saw next. The front passenger side of our Smart Car had blown off from a tire blow out! Within less than an hour, and an emergency call to Mercedes Benz roadside assistance, the car was loaded onto a flat bed tow truck for a trip backwards to Oklahoma City, the nearest Mercedes Smart Car Dealer. We followed it back in the coach and ended up making lemonade out of lemons and spent about three weeks there, getting reacquainted with what is a very interesting, growing mid sized city. Of course we got around all over town, and we hit on a couple of memorable eating places. One that sticks in the mind is Waffle Champion.
We visited this place repeatedly! Fresh waffles, made to order, are the headliner here, and are they fun!! OKC is burger central too. Oklahoma City differentiates itself from the rest, claiming that
Onion Burgers were invented there (a practical result of The Great Depression, when onions were used as filler for more expensive beef ). Tuckers has been around since then and claims to be one of the originals. You have to try one. They are tasty!
We also made several trips there during our unplanned stay in town. When the little car had been repaired we changed course and headed back to our apartment base camp (New Braunfels, Tx) to get some medical and dental attention (and finally a decent haircut for me!). Hair cuts for me and Mary Ann (
especially M A!!) could be the subject of an entire blog someday. So after spending a month or two in base camp, we headed for Palm Springs to catch up with our planned schedule. We stopped in Tucson for a week or so and continued west for the rest of winter. The Palms Springs International Film Festival in January has been a tradition for us since first discovering it's diverse programming in 2004. Most of the films are foreign (yes....
subtitles! for those of you who cringe at the thought!). We spend most of our indoor entertainment time watching those movies! It's a passion. Watching stories from other cultures is more interesting to us than most of the current fare coming from our own domestic film makers (although sometimes there
is an
exception). This year's festival did disappoint us though, and we think the Europeans, in particular, may be running out of steam too. The unusually windy, rainy, and cool weather was a factor for us leaving the area early this year and beginning our trek back east, towards Texas, where the weather all winter had actually been much nicer. So by the end of January we crossed back into Arizona to spend a little time in Quartzite, the winter gathering spot for thousands of RV'ers who want to immerse themselves in
everything RV! From there we homed back in to Tucson, where we had a revelation. We asked ourselves if it was time to move our base camp there from New Braunfels. After all, we seemed to keep being drawn there for all the outdoor activities and the way better than average food scene. We still love New Braunfels, it's small town charm and location between Austin and San Antonio, but we've been here and done this, and it's just time to move on to somewhere new. So in May we're relocating base camp to Encantada at Steam Pump, a beautiful new place in Oro Valley, a suburb of Tucson. I guess we'll report back in once we've gotten settled there and head out for summer Out West somwhere...
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