May 8, 2017
Grand Canyon Railway RV Resort
Williams, AZ

Today we said goodbye to the Kingman dust bowl and headed east on I-40 about 111 miles. We climbed 3,400 feet in elevation and are definitely in the mountains. This location reminds us of the Rocky Mountains west of Denver. We are at 6,750 feet in elevation and the weather is much cooler.  We got to the park around 12:30 pm and got set up on our site just ahead of the rain.

Nice paved roads and sites with lava rock and picnic tables

Right by the railroad tracks........ Isn't the train cool, next week it will be isn't the train quaint, the week after that it will be those @#$%$ trains..... ;>)

Nice pavilion....

Beautiful office and store...

Nice views of the surrounding mountains everywhere you look...

by the train depot they have a daily old west show...

The RV Resort is one part of the complex. They have a Hotel, several restaurants, gift shops and they even provide shuttle service around the complex.... pretty cool place.

This town is all about trains....

Even the main hotel entrance has a train exhibit....

Here is a shot going down the main street in Williams. Very old west, route 66 flavor.

As expected they have many different train ride packages going over to the Grand Canyon. This train is the Polar Express.......

 Here is the Train Depot and Café.....

This is a very cool place and we can't wait to see all the sites and take the train over to the canyon. We'll be here for 2 weeks so there should be plenty of time to see everything.

May 3, 2017
Grand Canyon Skywalk

After doing some research for our upcoming trip to the Grand Canyon, we discovered the famous "Skywalk" is not on the North Rim, but instead in an area, previously unknown to us, called the Grand Canyon West. I quickly checked out the location on Google Maps and discovered it is 72 miles straight north of Kingman. So today we made the trip to the Skywalk....

Grand Canyon West is located on the Hualapai Indian Reservation. The area and Skywalk are owned and operated by the Tribe.

There are two main overlooks.... Eagle Point (where the Skywalk is located) and Guano Point.

They have authentic villages depicting the various forms of housing...

Here is the main Skywalk facility with restaurant and gift shop....

You park your car at the main visitor center, buy your tickets, and ride the shuttles to the 3 main stops.

You aren't allowed to take any cameras or phones out on the Skywalk, so the only way to get a photo is to buy the ones the photographers take. You also have to put on booties over your shoes to protect the glass floor.

Here are a couple of the professional shots....

It was a lot of fun and the Skywalk was very unnerving.... even if you're not afraid of heights, just the thought of standing on a glass panel 1,000 feet up will make you think twice....

Another check off the bucket list (and another fridge magnet).

April 27, 2017
Kingman KOA
Kingman, AZ

Well after counting the days, minutes, and seconds until we left Havasu the countdown hit 24 hours and we pulled the trigger early. It's not that Havasu is such a bad place but a month anywhere is just too long. We were planning to take the RV into a Freightliner Service Center in Kingman so we decided to leave a day early and try to get a jump on the repairs.

We drove north on AZ 95 to I-40 and then east. The total trip was just 58 miles. We found the Service Center and cheeked in around noon.

Waiting our turn......

Great West Truck Center.......

I wanted to get 4 things checked/repaired. Excess play in the steering, alignment pulls to the right, dash lights blink off every 30 seconds, and rear outer tire valves need to be pointed outward (instead of inward where I can't hardly get to them). After lunch they had us take the RV down the street to their tire facility. They checked the valves and suggested they might leak if the turn them... what do you say to that? I seriously doubted their assessment but wasn't willing to push it. We brought the RV back and started to wait for someone to look at the other issues. An hour later I asked them how long it would be and we were told another 3 hours (what????). We told them we weren't willing to wait and they promised they would take care of us if we brought it back next Tuesday when their Alinement guy would be back from vacation.

We left and drove the 4 miles to the Kingman KOA and got set up.

Not a real pretty RV Park but it is a typical KOA. Apparently there is a big motorcycle rally in this area and there are bikers everywhere (hey Howard, you and Vickie doing the Iron Butt out here?).

Anyhow, we are expecting big wind here tomorrow (up to 40 mph), can't wait. We'll be here for 10 days before heading east to Williams (Grand Canyon Railroad).... we expect this trip to will greatly improve when we get there.....

April 8, 2017
Havasu Falls RV Resort
Lake Havasu City, AZ

We've been here at Havasu for almost 2 weeks now and have been doing our part to re-energize the local economy ;>)
We've tried several of the local restaurants and done some shopping at the local retail stores. We went back to The Island and visited the English Village.

This tourist area lies beneath the London Bridge and has several restaurants, gift shops, boat tours and rentals, and marina.

The Lake Havasu Visitors Center is also here and they can help you with tours and events. They even have a small gift area, so we picked up a fridge magnet.

We've been driving all around town to get a feel for the community, housing, economy, and layout. It seems to be kind of a scattered design with no real development plan. You have nice, new, beautiful homes next to trailer parks or concrete plants. There seem to be few large housing developments but a street or two of newer homes built within an area with much older homes. Also, the main attraction is the lake and there is no housing near it anywhere. We think this is because it is all BLM land....the best you can get is a distant view of the lake.

The weather has been very warm and dry (as you would expect) with highs in the upper 80s to low 90s. The wind can spring up at of nowhere and be very strong (20 - 40 mph).

You get some beautiful sunsets with the distant mountains as a backdrop.

...but you have to be ready for strong winds and dust storms....

After the dust storm last week we decided to get the rig washed...

It's great... you just give them a call and they come to you. An hour later they're done and your RV looks great. Our cost was $114 and it was worth every penny ;>)    We've used mobile washes several times on our journeys and they are great.

We also had Shade Pro come out last Monday and give us a quote for installing our window shades (the ones we had so much trouble with at Holland Motor Homes). We got the quote, placed the order, and they were installed 4 days later (yesterday).

We think they turned out great, we saved a lot of money, and we have already put them to good use.

Well, that's it for now. As I said, we'll be here for another 2 weeks so I'm sure no restaurant is safe...