7 State Week!

 The ruling is in and apparently the masses say that I am indeed spoiled. You will get no argument from me. I am a very lucky man and in return, I try to spoil Barb as much as I can knowing the scales will never be balanced. Let's see, where did I leave off last week? Oh yeah, we were spending the night at Camping World in Anthony Texas, but that was a lie. We were actually in Anthony New Mexico, right on the border between the two states. 

The next day we drove to Odessa Texas where we stayed in the parking lot of a Bass Pro Shop. Luckily it has been cool enough at night where we do not need to be plugged in for the air conditioning. The meet up I mentioned at the end of the last post worked out! Well kind of. 

Our friend Chad who used to own the resort in Ontario we went to all the time often comes down to Texas to do some hog hunting so I had texted him and asked if he was by chance going to be down there the same time we were and he said, "No, but he could be!". He then jumped in his vehicle and drove 1,100 miles from Wisconsin to Texas to meet us!

The ranch we stayed on is a friend of Chad's that he met up in Canada at the resort. As a matter of fact, both Barb and I met her (Kim) and her daughter up there a couple times as well. The reason I said "Well, kind of" above is due to the fact that Kim was away on a wedding, so we did not get to see her. We were able to meet her mom and dad though as they invited us to lunch in San Angelo. The restaurant was one we had heard lots about but had yet to experience it, Twin Peaks. For those of you who have heard of it, the name is self-explanatory. For those of you how haven't, you can look it up, but you have been warned. Kim's parents are both in their 80's and it is funny that they picked this restaurant for us to meet at! The food was actually very good!

Back at the ranch, Chad, Barb, Caleb (Chad's son) and I waited for sunset to go out and hunt hogs. Hogs are a big problem down there wreaking havoc on crops, fences and pretty much anything else in their way. They are way out of control and need to be culled down. They hunt them at night with the aid of thermal scopes, something I have never down before. 

Caleb breaking apart of pallet

We drove out to the hunting area and waited for sunset and when it came, so did the pigs! About 20 of them came running out of the brush at once. We ended up getting 3, which will hardly put a dent in the population, but it was a start. 

Heading out to pig hunt!

We also saw a couple of aoudad. What a weird animal. Native to North Africa, they run wild in these parts of Texas after escaping from game ranches years ago. 

We hung out one more day before heading back towards Arizona for a follow up dental visit for Barb. A lot had changed since the last time we were in Mexico. I am sure by now; everyone knows what happened in Porta Vallarta and other parts of Mexico. Well, our trip back to the dentist just happened to coincide with the unrest, we must have received a dozen text/phone calls from friends and family questioning our sanity, but that has been in question for years so, while it is a little sketchy, it was not going to stop us. 

On our way back to Yuma, we timed one of our overnight stops so we could have one more meet up! Our friends Steve and Deb, yes, the same Steve and Deb who were at our house in September, just happened to be in the Pheonix area as we were passing through, so we stopped and had supper with them! Steve also brought a bunch of bourbons with him so we sat in the camper for an hour before going to the restaurant and sampled each!

We then went to BJ's Brewhouse for supper. Very good food! Two funny things about the picture below....Near the end I got the hiccups and could not stop! These went on for most of the night. When it came time for picture time, I was trying so hard to hold my hiccups in! The second funny thing was the bag behind Barb's head makes it look like she has a hat on!

Steve and Deb sent it to us asking why Barb was wearing a Pilgrams hat, so Barb promptly created an AI picture with actual Pilgrams hats!

After spending the night at Cracker Barrel, we were off to Mexico! This area of Mexico is pretty safe, and we called ahead to see if there was any trouble in the area. While the unrest did not stop us, it did stop about 90% of the other tourists as the streets were practically empty. Even some of the vendors had closed down. We went, got done what we needed to get done and headed back to the border check station. 

Remember how I have written that in the past it has taken us up to two hours of waiting in line to get back into the U.S.? This time there was absolutely no line. I mean like no one. We were the only ones going back across. Crazy. 

We spent the night at the same campground about 1/2 mile up the road on the U.S. side of the border. We thought about dry camping, but it was almost 90 and we needed the AC. It also gave us a chance shower, dump our tanks, and do laundry. 

So, here is a quandary for you.... both times Barb went to dentist, first on 2/2 and again on the 24th, she got super sick for 24 hours and then just nauseous for the next 72 hours. No fever, just puking and then nauseous. We do not know if it was a reaction to the Novocain or something else, super weird. 

After all that fun we made a beeline for home driving 290, 395, and 658 miles on the final day getting home at 10:30pm on Friday night. Along the way we stopped by High West Distillery outside Park City. 

I did a tour while Barb rested in the camper with the girls. It was a very interesting tour that talked about the history of alcohol in Utah, which many of you know has had a tumultuous past. I already have many of their whiskeys, so I did not do a tasting, plus, we had many more miles to drive that day.

It was a long week; it was a quick week. Barb not feeling well made it long, all the windshield hours make it quick. We drove over 2,500 miles and hit seven states but now we are home!

So here we are, back in South Dakota, the weather is in the 40's and 50's during the day, 30's at night. Perfect weather to get some work done outside!