West on I-10

This post depicts events from July 2006.

We awoke at the River Bend RV Park in Luling, TX on Friday, July 7, 2006 and got everything ready to move. We planned to move on to the Circle Bar RV Park in Ozona, TX when our mail arrived. The mail arrived around 11 am and we hit the road for our 260 mile trip west on I-10, except for Loop 1604 around the north side of San Antonio. We drove straight through with no stops and arrived a little before 4 pm. The park was almost empty. They had a lot of pull-thru spaces and we thought they might pick up some business in the evening with travelers stopping over for the night. It was too hot there for permanent residents in the summertime, especially if you had a choice such as moving on in your RV. We paid $18 per night for a two-night stay. We spent Saturday inside to avoid the heat, but it did seem to be a little cooler than it was on Friday – but it was still July in Texas.

We moved to the El Campo RV Park in Van Horn, TX on Sunday. This was another trip over two hundred miles and we were still in Texas. The Texas – New Mexico was about half way to California coming from the Houston area. We like getting into Van Horn because there are a few spots around that are high enough to be considered mountains and we like the mountains. We paid $14 for a one-night stay, because they only had 30-amp service. That only allowed us to use one compressor which will not keep us cool in Texas in July. 

A motel in Deming. All pictures are from a later trip to Deming.

A church in Deming

Street Art in Deming

 Monday morning, we got out of Texas and into the mountains. We moved to the Dreamcatcher RV Park Deming, NM. This was another Escapees park and we paid $19 per night. It was another 225-mile trip and we had to travel straight through El Paso. Fortunately, traffic was light in the middle of the day. Kathi called for our mail again, so we were going to spend a few days in Deming. We were glad to have 50-amp service again. We stayed in and read, checking every day to see if our mail arrived. 

Sunset in Deming

Akela Flats is a few miles east of Deming

 Our mail finally arrived on Monday, July 14^th. We moved on to the Valley of the Sun Motorhome and RV Park in Manana, AZ. Marana is about 25 miles northwest of Tucson. Total trip was about 240 miles and we expected to be on the road 5 hours. The park was nice. They had a lot of permanent residents living in mobile homes and many pre-fab homes about the size of a mobile home. We paid the Passport America rate of $14 per night. After we got set up we went to the Texas Roadhouse for lunch/dinner. It was warm everywhere, including the restaurant, but we enjoyed our meal very much anyway. We spent the evening reading and watching TV, using our fans to supplement the A/C. It was hot, but bearable, if we did not move much.

It rained Monday night which made it a little cooler. Tuesday we went to see “Superman Returns” at the movie theater. We enjoyed the movie and the cooler temperature in the theater. On the way home we dropped by Walmart to pick up another fan.

July and August in the south was one of the main motivations for us having a motorhome and here we were driving from Houston through the desert in New Mexico and Arizona to get to the desert in California. Best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. Next time?