Getting Dental Work Done in Los Algodones Mexico

Before I get to our time in Los Algodones, I need to mention our time in Casa Grande. We had driven through the Casa Grande area several times over the past few years but have never stopped to take in the area. This year we decided to spend a couple of days while waiting for my dental appointment on the 16^th. We had two sets of friends staying at Palm Creek Golf & RV Park so we looked into their “first-timers special” in hopes of staying there during our visit. But at almost $60 a night it was over what we were willing to spend. Instead we opted for High Chaparral a few miles outside of town. At $15/night (Passport America) this fit our needs perfectly. Our friends Steve and Dianne had recently stayed here and highly recommended it.

The park itself has almost 200 sites that are closely packed but still far enough apart that you don’t feel too crowded. They have a pool, hot tub and a couple of pickleball courts. The park allows you to wash your rig at your site so that it is what I did for a few hours the first two mornings before it got too hot. Daytime temperatures were in the mid 70’s, something we have not experienced in quite a while!

The first afternoon we were there we met up with Nancy and Greg both former co-workers of Barb’s back in Minnesota. We met them at we are now calling “Our New Favorite Bar”. After reading Steve and Dianne’s blog post of their stay in the area we just knew that we had to visit The Thirsty Donkey. It is unlike any bar we have visited in that it is a self-serve bar with 40 taps lining the walls.

A few of the many self serve taps

How does it work? Well, you give them your driver’s license, they scan it and return it to you with a wrist band with a proximity sensor on it. You are then free to get beer from any one of the taps along the wall. When you find a beer you want to try you hold your wrist band to the tap, it turns green and you pour your beer. As you get more beer, it tells you the total ounces that you have poured so far. When you are done, you give your wrist band back to the server who scans it and give you an itemized listing of each of the beers/ounces you had. Very cool! The beers probably range anywhere from .20-40 an ounce. It is a great way to sample a bunch of different beers at your own pace without having to wait for someone to wait on you. We had a great time visiting and catching up and made plans to see them on Sunday as well.

The next day we traveled over to Palm Creek to visit with Dave and Diane who we had met in Quartzsite a couple years ago. We were totally unprepared for what we encountered when we got there. We knew their site number and just thought we would drive around until we saw their rig. When we got there we knew we were in trouble. There are over 2,000 sites covering a multitude number of blocks! We were driving pretty much aimlessly when this guy pulls up to us on his bike and asks us if we are lost….. it is Dave! As we follow him back to his rig it is obvious that we would have never found them! As we see Dave turn into his site on his bike we look out the window and who do we see standing outside her rig? Nancy! Out of 2,000 sites, they are basically neighbors. Barb gets out and I pull into Dave’s site.

Dave and Diane are very active with biking, golfing and pickleball so they are really getting the most out of the amenities of the park and have planned a 4 month stay this year. We visited for about 3 hours before making our way back home. Palm Creek is a great park for those who take advantage of everything they have to offer and is more affordable with their monthly (~$900-$1,000) or multi-month (~$800) rates……Someday maybe but right now we just would not get our monies worth out of it. Casa Grande is a great little town and we could definitely see ourselves spending more time there.

Diane and Dave outside their rig

Sunday we traveled back over to Palm Creek to watch the Vikings game with Greg and Nancy. The first half of the game was great and the Vikings dominated Saints. The 2^nd half a totally different Vikings team came out of the field and it looked like they were going to implode in typical Vikings fashion. For those of you who are lifelong Vikings fans you know what I mean. What happened at the end of that game is still a shock, I just sat there staring at the television unable to process what actually happened!

Nancy, all ready for the Viking's game!

The next morning we packed up and drove the three hours to Yuma. Our only reason for coming here was to go to the dentist and pick up a few prescriptions. We pulled into the Quechan Casino which has a section of their parking lot where they allow RV’er and truckers to stay during their visit. No hookups, no organization, just a large dirt parking lot where you can park.  Some are there for just one night while others look like they have been there a little while. Although a little noisier than an RV park, it is a great spot to spend a few days for free. We planned on staying for….. well, we really didn’t know. We had set aside up to 5 days but it all depended on exactly what I needed done for dental work.

The next morning we jumped in the truck and drove 2-3 miles down the road to the border parking area. For $6/day you can park in a secured area for the day. There is free parking along the road a mile or so before the parking area as well for those who want to walk a little bit.

Headed through the turnstiles! 

There are so many dental options in Los Algodones it is mind-boggling when trying to decide which ones are reputable and reliable. We (by "we" I mean Barb) did a lot of research online. Blogs, articles, reviews.... and we decided on Sani Dental. We have friends who have used Bernal Dental several times and are very happy. Since we were happy with Sani the first time, we went back there again.

We had made an appointment with our anticipated arrival date more than a month ago and changed the appointment twice as our arrival date changed. On the appointed day we arrived at Sani Dental 40 minutes prior to my 9:30 appointment. As it turns out they could not find me but got me in right away. In fact, I got in before the guy who was there for his 9:00 appointment.  So far so good!

Waiting patiently!

One of the many doors 

The first step was a consultation where they explained everything that was going to happen today. Next up was x-rays ($60). I was escorted into a room with a stand up x-ray machine where I was asked to stand in a certain position and bite down on a mouthpiece and hold still. The machine then spun around my head while I stood still and within a minute I was done.

Next up I was taken to a room where they went over the results and gave me recommendations. In my case the recommendations was 2 crowns and a filling for which they quoted me a little over $1,000. When I told them I wanted metal/porcelain instead of full porcelain crowns and to take off the cleaning (I get those for free with our preventative insurance) the total went down to $465 for everything.

Once that was worked out I was taken back up front where I was asked to put down a deposit. They take cash, check or a credit card (4% fee). While I was paying for my dental work I overheard another customer ask if they covered hotel fees which apparently they do and she got $360 off her bill. I am not sure if they do this for all hotels or just certain ones. 

A short time later they called me in for the work. The dentist herself spoke very little English but the assistant spoke it fluently. An hour and a half of drilling, impressions and whatever else they do I was out of there with two temporary crowns and told to come back the next day at 11:00.

From there we went to El' Paraiso where we had tacos and beer. The beer was good, the tacos were  just okay. 

These two were dancing to a little Elvis music

Then it was onto the pharmacy and liquor store. At the pharmacy we got Z-packs ($3.99), 800mg Ibuprofen ($3.99), 100 ct Amoxicillin ($5.99) and Mucinex ($8.00). At the liquor store we each got a bottle of Tequila as that is about the only thing it is worth buying down here.

We were back at the rig exactly 4 hours from when we left it.  

My next appointment was the following day at 11:00. We arrived at 10:15 hoping to get in early. I sat in the waiting room while Barb went and wandered the streets of Mexico. That is one nice thing about Los Algodones, you feel safe walking the streets. The vendors are assertive trying to get you to look at their goods but not overly aggressive. You get used to it and mostly just ignore them. We did not feel nearly as comfortable when we visited Nogales last year. Barb was back with her treasures before I was called in for my appointment. She had bought two blankets and one table cloth. She got the blankets for $7 each (she had talked them down from $15). The table cloth started out at $25 and she got it for $18).

Many of the vendors have the same thing

One of the many corridors with vendors and goods

This place was filled with stained glass

At 11:00 they called me in for my appointment. I was greeted by the same dentist and assistant as the day before. I was not sure what they were going to do and did not know what to expect. The first thing the dentist did was pop out both my temporary crowns and then I think she tested the new crowns for fit. She then put the temps back in  said to come back the next day at 9:00 for the final crown fitting and the filling. We were back in the truck and headed back to the rig by noon. 

The final day we arrived 15 minutes early for my appointment. When I was called in they fitted the crowns, did some grinding to touch them up and send them out to be polished. While we waited for that they worked on my filling then cemented the permanent crowns in place. They followed that up with more x-rays for their warranty record. The crowns and filling have a 2 year warranty if anything happens to them.  We were out of there and headed back to the truck in about and on the road headed to Quartzsite by noon.

Overall I was very satisfied with the work done here and saved over $2,000.  Time will tell how it stands up compared to a dentist in the U.S. but I have not had any issues with the work I had done a few years ago so we are hoping for the same.

We hurried back to the casino where we packed up and drove the 82 miles to Quartzsite where a whole new adventure awaits us!

Boondocking at Tucson's Snyder Hills BLM

A coyote pauses at the edge of the road and waits for me to pass before he saunters across and into the drainage on the other side. It is good to be back in Arizona. Our eventual destination is Quartzsite or “Q” by those who have been there a time or two. But right now we are on the southern edge of Tucson. This is the third time we have stayed at the Snyder Hills BLM Area (32.156941, -111.116493) in the almost 4 years we have been on the road. We originally found this site on Free Campsites.Net where it get mostly favorable reviews. I don’t know how to accurately describe Snyder Hills. There are good parts and bad parts, I guess that is true with almost everywhere we go but the degree of good parts and bad parts tends to vary.

An over head shot of the area

Our rig is in the top center

Plenty of room in this area for another rig or two

The good parts is that it is free, it is warm and it is centrally located to almost anything you need to get to in the Tucson area. The bad part is that not everyone takes care of the area like they could. There are a variety of rigs, campers and tents in the area and although it has a 14 day limit, I don’t think that is enforced very strictly. There is one porta potty but it is obvious that not all bother walking that far to use it. Some would probably never stay here for those reasons or fearing that someone might steal something in the middle of the night but we have never had a problem. People here tend to leave each other to themselves so are fine staying here a few nights.

Here are a few shots of the more "interesting" set ups:

Tent/trailer combo, we never saw the tenant

This trailer had a wood burning stove!

We do take precautions like we do anywhere we boondock in remote areas. We park the truck right outside my side of the bedroom window so I can see or hear anything during the night. I have a flashlight on the shelf above my head should I feel the need to shine the light out the window. I keep the truck keys there as well. Why you ask? Do you ever lay in bed and wonder: “Did I lock the truck?” A quick push of the button on the remote answers that. It also turns the lights on momentarily and lets anyone in the area know you are awake and aware.  The remote also has the panic button on it if the need ever arises. It never has but it is nice to know it is right there.

We have never felt unsafe anywhere we have parked….wait I take that back. A year or so ago we parked in a Walmart parking lot and went into the rig for the night. As it got dark the parking lot got crowded and it became obvious we were in the wrong area. So we packed up and moved (to another Walmart just down the road). But other than that we have always felt pretty safe.

For those visiting the area for the first time, there is plenty to do in the area. Top of our list is Saguaro National Park and The Desert Museum. We attended both of those on previous visits and will do it again when we are in the area. Old Tucson Studios where  movies like 3:10 to Yuma, The Outlaw Jose Wales and Rio Bravo were filmed, Pima Air Museum for those who love air craft history and miles and miles of outstanding hiking trails also await those visiting this area.

There were two other bonuses for us stopping at Snyder Hills. The first is that it is near our 2nd favorite donut shop (Queen Donuts) we have discovered so far. The criteria for what makes our favorite donut shop list is quite simple; they have to have buttermilk donuts and they have to be good and this one fits the bill. Our favorite donut shop is in Henderson, NV (Friendly Donuts). The second bonus for stopping here is that Red and Pam were at Diamond J’s just a few miles down the road! They too are slowly make their way to “Q” so it was nice to cross paths with them for a couple of days. Barb and Pam went shopping a couple of times, we did happy hour one night but unfortunately Red had a nasty cold so we were not able to get together as much as we would have liked.

The other nice thing about spending a few days here is that we can get caught up on some of the things you just cannot do in a lot of the smaller towns or more remote areas we stop. We stocked up on groceries, beer and booze for one. It was during one of these outings that Barb and I had what I would call an interesting incident. Barb on the other hand would call it scary. We were just finishing up our grocery shopping and heading to the registers when we hear someone yell “Call the police!” A few seconds later “I am not kidding, call the police”. Then this guy walks within 10 feet of us gets on his knees, puts his hands behind his back and again yells, “Call the police”. You can imagine, he started to gather quite a crowd. Curious on lookers were staying a safe distance back, some continued to shop while others gathered up their small children, abandoned their carts and scurried for the door.

Since we were done shopping I skirted the man and went to a register as far away as we could, got in line and kept an eye on him. He continued to yell. This went on for a few minutes. Pretty soon the guy gets up and is walking towards us. Barb gets this panicked look on her face and slowly edges further into the checkout line. The guy walks by and continues to yell. This goes on for too long, (seemed like 10 minutes). The guy walks up one side of the registers then down the other side sometimes yelling, sometimes silent. A stream of employees are following him, a couple of them on the phone (with the police I hope). Then the guys breaks into a run and sprints out the door. While Barb waited in line I went out to see where he went and see him running towards a Planet Fitness and disappears from view. Sirens are approaching but it appears the immediate area is safe so I go back inside and we pay for our groceries. As we are driving away we see the guy in the parking lot of the Planet Fitness on his knees, hands behind his back surrounded by squad cars. Scary, but you also cannot help but feel sorry for someone who is so racked with torment that that is what their life is like…..

I also spent 3 hours at a Discount Tire store getting the tires rotated and balanced. This may seem like an extraordinarily long time and you would be right. It started out as an hour and a half, rotated, balanced and down the road until I got to my next stop and inspected the tires. One of the tire pressure monitors was missing! So back I went. The tech remembers putting them on the running board of the truck so he would remember to put it back on that tire…..gone. Luckily they were really good about it and gave me $50 out of the register to buy a new one. 

Although we did not do a lot of "touristy" things during this visit, we did get a lot done and enjoyed our time here. Next up our first visit to Casa Grande! 

Lake Mead Government Wash Free Camping Area

It was a good week, it was a bad week…..but that’s life right? There is a little good and bad in just about everything. That really sums up our week at Government Wash in the Lake Mead National Park in a nutshell.

Let’s start with the good…..

The Good….

·         We stayed for a 5 days at the Government Wash for free!

The short drive from Lake Havasu City to Lake Mead was uneventful. We pulled into The Boulder Beach Campground and drove around looking for the perfect site. Boulder Beach is a nice quiet campground just inside the park with no water, sewer or electric. Basically boondocking but paying for it. They do have nice bathrooms as well as water and dump stations.  After picking our spot, Barb went and got a payment envelope and we were about to put the $100 in it for our 5 night stay and we just couldn’t do it! Just up the road within the park is a free boondocking area we had explored last time we were here, let’s go there!

We arrived at the Government Wash camping area and set up in the beautiful spot at the end of a point.  

Our home for the week. Dino & Lisa on the left, us on the right

Daisy is not spoiled at all!

·         Barb had a birthday!

Thursday dawned bright and sunny as well it should….it was Barb’s birthday!!!!! What did we have planned on this special day? First up was to get Barb her birthday donut! Last time we were here Steve and Joan had told us about a great little donut shop in Henderson. Barb loves their buttermilk donuts so off we went. We pulled in with great anticipation, walked in the door and the donut case was almost empty! Barb walked up to the counter….no more buttermilks left! What a disappointment!

·         We got to see Dino and Lisa!

I stole this picture from Bill & Kelly's blog....

Dino and Lisa were reported to be staying at Sam’s Town RV Park in Las Vegas so we thought we would surprise them by dropping by….. after all we had not seen them in 3 long days! We found their rig and were chatting outside when I looked next door and thought I saw a jeep I recognized…. I walked over to get a closer look and sure enough it belonged to our former boss’ Chuck and Claudia from our road mapping job last spring! What are the odds? They came out and the 6 of us visited for a few while before saying goodbye.

The next day they moved out to Government Wash and parked next to us! (Wait….maybe I should have saved this for the “Bad”!)

·         We got to see my sister Judy!

      My sister Judy, her husband Mike and a few friends were coming to Las Vegas for the Nascar race. We met them at Margaritaville and had a great dinner.   They had traveled from Florida getting up at 3:00am (ET) so by the time we got done with dinner about 6:00pm (PT), they were beat. After saying goodbye to them we walked the strip to take in some of the sights.

Marvin, Judy, Mike, Barb and I

The Birthday Girl!

Bellagio Water Show



·         Barb got a donut!

Friday morning I woke up at 5:20am, got up and was getting dressed when Barb woke up and said, “What are you doing?” I replied, “Going to get you a buttermilk donut!”. So off I went into Henderson and scored on two buttermilk donuts!

·         We got to go kayaking again!

After our initial kayaking adventure at Lake Havasu we had the itch to get back on the water again. We put the kayak in just below our camping area and spent about an hour on the water. Of course Daisy fell in again, 6 times! I am beginning to wonder if she is doing it on purpose. We tried to go with Dino and Lisa later in the week but it was too windy.

Daisy....all wet!

Cool rock formation

Cinnamon Teal

 ·         Barb got her hair done!

Before we hit the road Barb worried about how she was going to get her hair cut and colored. She had been going to the same stylist for years. Her stylist prepared her for life on the road by giving her all the makings to color her hair on the road, in fact she offered to teach me how to color it. Barb wanted nothing to do with me touching her hair so she would get it done the infrequent times we were back in Minnesota.

Fast forward to now, the coloring has been sitting in the box for two years until this week. Both Dino and Lisa are former stylists and were nice enough to color Barb’s hair for her!

Theres my beauty!

  ·         We fed the fish and ducks at the Marina!

We had stopped by here on a previous trip but did not have a camera with us. There are fish and ducks everywhere. Very cool spot to stop if you are in the area. The fish just get into a frenzy to the points where they climb over each other right out of the water! Lisa and Barb were seriously grossed out by all the sucking mouths at the top of the water.

Stripe Bass and Suckers were everywhere!

See the Redhead diving under the dock?

Lips only a mother could kiss

Feeding Frenzy!!

Hen Redhead

Drake Redhead

Drake Ringbill

Drake Common Merganser

·         We got to hang with Steve and Joan!

Over the course of the 5 days we saw Steve and Joan several times......Bowling, jeeping, hiking, eating out and game night!……

Nice form!

We had not been bowling for years; Barb did pretty well, while I on the other hand….not so much.

At $40/person, the seafood buffet at M casino was very good and well worth the money. Afterwards we walked the casino gambling a bit; Joan played Pai Gow while Barb and I walked around playing some slots. We walked out $9 ahead ………

Along with Dino and Lisa, the 6 of us went on a jeeping/hiking combo adventure. Leaving the park to the south, we crossed the dam and turned off onto a two track dirt road that led to a wash. It was a really cool trail leading in and out of the wash through some very scenic areas.

Steve and Joan led the way



Dino and Lisa rounding the corner

There we go!



Very rugged terrain



We even saw a few sheep!

After a few miles the jeep trail ended and the hiking started. The hiking trail led down the wash to the Colorado River where an old River Gauger's Station. In the 1920's this location was used to measure the impact of the dams on the Colorado River; depth, flow, silt..... really an interesting piece of history.


The trail head where we parked

Dino squeezing through a tight spot

Headed down the wash....

Joan and Lisa headed up to the station

View up river

The whole gang!

A couple more great views while jeeping

Game night! We played several card games......

Golf!

Fruit Salad.....Barb was the big loser!

The Bad….

·         The wind, partying and litter is out of hand in Government Wash.

Wind is expected when you park at the end of a high point next to the lake but when it came up at 1:45am blowing over tables, chairs, our grill and rocking the trailer that really disrupted our sleep. The next day it was so windy we had to pull in our slides!

There seems to be quite a bit of partying out here on the weekends. During the week it was fairly quiet at night with an occasional car driving by after dark but on the weekend about a dozen cars pulled in on the adjacent point, built a huge fire and started partying until the wee hours of the morning. The noise isn’t too bad as it is temporary but the subsequent litter is everywhere. The shoreline is littered with bottles, cans, fishing line, diapers and other debris.

·         Barb is black and blue all over!

Over the course of the past week Barb bruised the arch of her foot after stepping down on a rock wrong. She scraped her elbow and both palms of her hands when trying to ease down a smooth rock. As she explained it to me… “The coefficient of friction was overcome by mass which turned into velocity when combined with gravity”. And she was bonked on the head at 2:00am when I reached for the phone on our overhead shelf to see what time it was.

Ouch!

·        Trying to park a crew cab dually truck in Las Vegas sucks! We eventually found a spot but we   had a frustrating and intense 20 minutes.

The good’s far outweighed the bad in both quantity and severity providing us a great week. Time to continue our journey north, we said our goodbyes to Dino and Lisa as well as Steve and Joan.  We won’t see either of them for months if not a year or more L.