Sunday, 17th May 2009 - Leaving Tucson

We’ve spent the last 6 months in Arizona. It hadn’t been part of our plans when we decided to tour the States in our new rolling home, but the expectations of such a journey and the reality are often poles apart.

My husband and I stayed in Tucson to help with the wedding of our beautiful younger daughter, Anthea, to Todd, which took place a month ago, on the 17th April.  Her equally beautiful elder sister, Elisia, flew from MA with her husband, Kevin to stay for 6 days during that time. I don’t say that they’re gorgeous just because we are very proud of our daughters; you can see for yourself from some of the photos I’ll be posting.

Our mileage has reached 24,388 in Rex, our rather long (22’) truck.  Just this morning my husband got a delightful comment from a complete stranger at the RV resort when we were due to leave: “your truck is by far the best looking one in the park” - wow, we felt the same way!  I never thought I’d love a truck so much, or that we’d ever be driving one until we had to, but we both think highly of Rex with its extremely comfortable creamy leather seats and deep burgundy paint job.  Not all of those miles were covered pulling our trailer; we unhitch, leave it behind and explore using the truck.  

The last couple of weeks in Tucson have been too hot for us; mostly 100°F (38C) so we were quite happy to move to cooler climes and higher elevations.  The mountains all around the city looked hazy as we travelled east through the wide desert area of cacti, small scrubby bushes and the pretty yellow blossomed trees.

Shortly after reaching the New Mexico state line, we stopped at the visitor center in Lordsburg for a free state road map, a free cup of coffee and several free brochures, particularly of Santa Fe, the capital, our next destination. The state’s motto is “Land of Enchantment” and we shall surely find out why.  

A few miles later we crossed the Continental Divide, which runs jaggedly from Canada through the Rockies down to Mexico.  Amid blue skies with wisps of cloud, the scenery changed to flat scrubland with small yucca plants where cattle grazed on tufts of flaxen colored grasses. By mid afternoon after covering 218 miles, we stopped for the night at Deming, about 30 miles north of the Mexican border.