May has come and with it comes the warmer weather. Right now the weather here at our home in MountainBrook, Gold Canyon, AZ is just about perfect; the nights are cool and the days are sunny and warm. None the less, we must be heading back to our summer retreat in Gig Harbor, WA. It seems as though our son will be getting married over the Memorial Day weekend, and of course we want to be there for the wedding.
Our granddaughter Julianna, who just graduated from Washington State University, has flown down to AZ and will now be accompanying us back to WA with us in our 5th wheel RV. We have taken our grandkids on many of our RV trips, but for the most part it has been Juliana who has been our traveling companion. Now that she is graduated and starting out her own life and career, I think that this trip may be our last chance we will have to travel with her. She will be moving on. Julianna is a free spirit, and the maker of her own destiny.
When we arrive at one of our mid-day stops or find an RV site for the night, I never have to ask “Want to go explore”? It is more often something like “Hey, wait for me”. We’ve been rafting down rivers together; climbing mountains; flying down the roller coaster ride on Magic Mountain in Disney Land, as well taking a ride in the Dumbo Tea Cup. We have been on a cruise to China and a train ride up the Oregon coast. We’ve spent the night watching meteor showers, then searching out the moons of Jupiter and the Orion Nebula through the mighty Hyde Observatory telescope. And of course there were the things where I had to take the initiative and say “Let’s go”! Ah yes, those were the operas and the symphonies; enjoyed, but really something that does not need to be repeated.
And so our next adventure begins. The plan was to leave our summer home in MountainBrook and travel north through Arizona to Lake Powell and the Glen Canyon Dam. We arrived at about 4:30 pm at the Wahweap Campground at Lake Powell and set up the 5th wheel trailer. When we finished we headed down to the office to register our campsite for the night and get tickets for a tour boat ride on the lake to the Rainbow Bridge the following day. We were successful with the evening reservations, but the tour boat ride was all sold out for the following day. Bummer! As a consolation prize, I suggested we take a drive down to the Horseshoe Bend overlook on the Colorado River. Located on Hwy 89 about five miles south of Page, Horseshoe Bend is a magnificent overlook which gives breathtaking view of a horseshoe shaped bend in the Colorado River. It only took us about twenty minutes to get there. There is a well maintained trail of about ¾ miles to the canyon overlook which gives you a 1000 foot view, straight down, to the Colorado River. The river makes a wide sweep around a sandstone escarpment forming a horseshoe shaped bend, hence the name. The park brochure suggests instead of walking out to the edge (which has no guardrail) that you crawl out to the edge on hands and knees, lay down prone on your stomach and peer over the edge, down, down, down, 1000 feet straight down to a beautiful horseshoe shaped bend in the Colorado River.
After that exciting little jaunt it was time to get back to the RV and have dinner. When we arrived back at the campsite we turned on the lights and started the stove. I noticed that some of the lights did not work, and when I tried to start the gas hot water heater it did not work either. Bummer! I had had the trailer in just the week before to get a short in the tail lights fixed and I now suspect that he screwed up some of the other lights. There were only two or three lights that worked, no hot water, and we all smelled like some of the road kill we had passed along the way. Oh this was going to be a great vacation alright; A VACATION FROM HELL that is!
I spent the rest of the night testing the lights and trying to find the master fuse, which I suspect is buried deep in the bowels of the RV. Well, that would have to wait until tomorrow. I was tired from all the driving and disappointed that we would not be seeing the Rainbow Bridge, so we fumbled around in the dark and finally slipped off into the safe imaginations of our dreams.
The next morning I was up at dawn, took the dogs out for their walk, and was now ready to tackle the electrical problem by a thorough inspection of the innards of the beast. I started taking out tool boxes, boots, packs, and whatever else I had to remove from the undercarriage of the RV to get at the master fuse. I removed a box with a 24 foot sewer hose support in it; next was a 24 can box of Coke, when all of the sudden Julianna yells out “We have lights”! “We have lights”, how so I asked? I peered at the wall next to the cargo door in the underside of the rig noticed that the two push-pull power-off switches had been pushed to the off position; probably when the box of Coke had been thrown up against the switches during one of my smooth accelerated starts. I had pulled out one of the switches during my inspection, which allowed the lights to go on, and now, pulling out both switches I proudly announced that once again, Master Mechanic Hyde had solved the problem.
After being made whole again, we traveled on to our nest destination, Zion National Park. On the way we passed through the small town of Kanab, Utah. Our good friends the Sterling’s live in Kanab, but we knew they would not be at home.
Being overcome by a minor case of the hungries we stopped in the town for lunch at Parry Lodge. Parry Lodge was the center point for moviemaking during the golden age of Hollywood. Many a fine actor has holed up at Parry Lodge to sleep, eat and to socialize during the shooting of a movie. Such notables as John Wayne, Frank Sinatra, Olivia De Havilland, Gregory Peck, Maureen O'Hara, Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Robert Taylor, Anne Bancroft, Dean Martin, Lana Turner, Clint Eastwood and Barbara Stanwyck are just a few of the hundreds of stars and character players that stayed at Parry's while filming in the many scenic locales in and around Kanab, Utah.
I was not only in shock and awe at the possibility of sitting in the same chair that John Wayne may have sat in, but the grilled shrimp lunch was great also.
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