Can't Get Enough of the Wild West!

Most folks that grew up in the 50's and 60's watched westerns on their TV's and at the movies. We played "Cowboys and Indians" regularly and experienced the stagecoaches, the trails, the saloons and wide open spaces of the West through the shows and our own imaginations.

Last week we visited Tombstone, where the Earp brothers presided over the community.  That town....their buildings and the character actors everywhere....do a great job of letting you feel that you are truly in the Old and Wild West!  

So, to continue the experience, Sunday, we drove to the western boundary of Arizona to Parker.  There we met up two of my cousins and their hubbies at The Desert Bar and Nellie E. Saloon.  Mind you, it's a five miles drive off the main highway to get here... a very rough road at that.  Not a road for low-riders or sedans!  Some guy built the five stool bar out in the middle of nowhere in 1983.  See picture below.  When he applied for a liquor license, the county clerk asked, "Who you going to serve out there?  Coyotes?"

Now, it is quite the operation, open only on weekends for the months of November - April. Here's the "modern" version.  This photo was taken later in the afternoon when there were a few empty seats.  Not the case for most of the day. 

You notice that church/school in the background?   That building shows up from a distance and you wonder if it's the remnant of a ghost town.  Here is what this building looks like up close.

A facade!  I thought it was ingenious! 

After leaving here, my cousin (who is staying in Lake Havasu) showed us more hot spots on the cool waters of the Colorado River, that creates the border between much of Arizona and California.  These hot spots were floating bars, bars built on pontoons, that rocked and rolled when a boat raced by.  We did see a coyote along the road, it was nice enough to pose for us.

The next day we drove up to Lake Havasu and on the recommendation of our cousin, we crossed over to California at Parker and drove north to the Parker Dam and crossed back over to Arizona.  It was an interesting drive because .....

Yep, we had just passed this sign and there were a herd out in the field and a couple on the road.  A young one came up to my side of car and bared his teeth at me.  He was so close, I could not get my camera to focus on his snout!  I wonder if these guys are descendants of the burros used by miners 100 years ago?  Here are some photos that we did get.

They still get rather wild out here.  We saw evidence of a wild.... not sure how this occurred.... scene on a mountain top.  Do you see the white speck on this mountain?

I thought it looked like a white plastic lawn chair, so I grabbed my telephoto lens.  Lo and behold, it is.  How did that get up there and stuck between the rocks?  Like I say, it must get wild out here.

In Lake Havasu, I drove over and walked the London Bridge.  I thought it was unique...hubby says it was "under-whelming."  I guess it was not WILD enough for him!  

It make a pretty picture, right?

We headed back to Mesa on Hwy 93 which travels through a desolate area of Arizona.  That highway is called Joshua Tree Parkway, so we got too see lots of Joshua Trees.  It was getting to be dusk, so I didn't get too many photos.  This was one of the larger trees we saw near the road.

Also, lots of Saguaro cactus.  This one had so many "arms" and such a weird shape, I had to turn around and get some photos.  Totally funky!

Here's the same cactus with the sun setting behind it... I like it.

So another day, another day trip in the Wild West has ended.  Adios Cowboys! 

Aging

"Aging is not for the faint of heart."

"I will never regret getting old.  I know too many people who never had that privilege."

Both quotes are true!  Yet, they almost seem polar opposite sentiments.  Now that I am officially getting old, err older, I realize more and more how fragile life is.  But, I know some very strong people that are getting older.  

In the past couple months, I have heard of several acquaintances or relatives of acquaintances that have died.  They were all younger than me.  They were denied the privilege of getting older. Right now, my prayer list consist of four people with cancer, all my age or older.  Another person with Valley Fever complications and another with Blood Loss complications.  They are fighters and are not faint of heart.  How many more months or years do they have?  

Why?  Why do some die young and other live long lives?  Some of those who live long lives are burdened with ill health and others are not.  Some die even though they have done the "right" things, eat well and exercise.  People are often flabbergasted when they die, much younger than expected.  Others live a long life and have done the "wrong" things, smoking and excessive drinking.  People are often flabbergasted when they die, much older than expected. You may have noticed that I am referring to the physical health of these people.  There is another aspect of our health that affects our livelihood, emotional. 

Emotion: state of mind deriving from one's circumstances, mood, or relationships with others.
How do we react and interact with others?   How much does that affect the number of days on this earth?   The lack of emotional well-being (health) may lead to addictive behaviors, suicide, or broken relationships.  An emotionally healthy person may react to a disease in a different way than someone else and therefore, may live longer.  

Regardless of our physical or emotional health, or lack thereof, our days are numbered.  The Bible says in Job 14:5,  "Since his days are determined, The number of his months is with You; And his limits You have set so that he cannot pass."  The "you" is referring to God.  

If you believe or don't believe in God and His determining our days, that fact remains that our days are still numbered.  It may come down to being healthy in all ways and your time on earth ends in accident.  We just don't know, do we?  Another saying is "Live your life as if today is your last."  My hubby's motto is "Life is uncertain, eat dessert first."

Wild West & Wild Weather

I never expected to wake up in Southern Arizona and have temperature be 26 degrees.  Then I checked my weather app and the temperature in our hometown of Hudson, Wisconsin was 29 degrees.  Warmer than here!  

Had a hearty breakfast and then walked downtown passing this quaint window display.

Browsed through the gift stores and went to the re-enactment of the Gunfight at the OK Corral.  Here's the four law enforcers that participated, Wyatt Earp, Doc Holiday, Virgil Earp and Morgan Earp.  

After this show, we had lunch in a local saloon.  Here are some of the locals at the end of the bar.  There were certainly a lot of people in town dressed this way and I don't think they were all actors

We took a tour around town in a stagecoach and another mode of transportation was crossed off my "bucket list."

The gunfighters museum was full of information on the many gunfighters of the Wild West.  My cousin and I were discussing how much traveling these gunfighters did back in the 1800's ....on a horse.  Makes our cross country trips by cars going 65 miles an hour seem like a piece of cake!

The county courthouse, now a museum, highlighted that the first person to try mining in the Apache country was advised by the Army personnel that he was "seeking to find only his tombstone in that country."  He found silver and lived to name the town that grew out of the desert, Tombstone.  Also, at the courthouse were the gallows.  Yes, several people did end their lives here and then were buried in Boot Hill Cemetery.

All the walking around and learning about town, it made us thirsty, so we headed to a local establishment for a cold one.  I noticed that the doors were swinging doors like the Wild West bars and I got into the action.  

 

Nope, I did not fall out onto the street nor was I kicked out of the bar!

Speaking of streets, tonight after dinner we listed to karaoke and then walked home through the deserted and quiet streets of Tombstone....no longer the rambunctious and raucous Wild West of Arizona!

Graveyards

Today, my hubby and I got our fill of graveyards, as a couple of the graveyards were very unexpected. We traveled from Mesa, AZ to Tombstone, AZ to spend a few days touring the area and visiting with my cousin and her husband.  I had planned to go to Tombstone's Boot Hill Graveyard full of dead people from the 1880's, so here are some interesting facts about that graveyard.  There were a large number of markers listing the person as "unknown."  In the 1880's, Tombstone had a population of over 5,000 people and 110 saloons and gambling places.  Many times a cowboy or miner would end up on the wrong end of a gunfight and died.  Often, they had never told anyone their name (or they had a nickname like Stinging Lizard) and had no identification on them, not even letters from loved ones back home in the East.  So the undertaker would lay their body on a slab in front of the bar or establishment where killed, awaiting someone to identify them.  Of course, this laying on the slab was only for one day and if no one identified the poor soul, he was buried with a marker listing him as Unknown. 

There was even a "relative" of my hubby's ... just joking....that was hanged!

I know you're not supposed to smile or laugh in a graveyard, but couldn't help it when viewing this marker.

Now, the other graveyards, I had never heard of before.  North of Tucson off Interstate 10 is Pinal County Air Park which had over 110 larger airplanes that have used up their lives.  Some were being taken apart for salvageable parts.  We could not get really close, but here's a photo of a row of airplanes with their Delta graveyard markers all in a row.

The other graveyard was south of Tucson off Interstate 10 and it involved 292 locomotive trains that were lined up on an abandoned section of railway ties.  This graveyard is due to a significant decrease in railway usage.  This photo was taken from the a car going 75 miles/hour, but I hope you get the idea.

When today began, I never would have guessed that my next blog would be about graveyards, but some days I need to be reminded that all lives, human and mechanical, come to an end. 

Rodgers and Rayna

I know it's early in the morning here, 4:05 am, but I just got a break in the action.  We did it!  We found Aaron Rodgers (quarterback for the Green Bay Packers) and released him from his captors  I was part of  team of people that had to find him among hundreds of bungalows in a village where every house looked the same as the others on multiple streets...kind of like the Park Model resort we are staying in.  A person could get lost, easily, if you didn't have landmarks like the name of the street and there are two palm trees by our place.

To get back to the dream, er story... our team was challenged with finding Rodgers and getting him released from his kidnappers.  Fortunately, the team needed my analytical and "Criminal Minds" imagination to help them find Rodgers.  I did it!  We nonchalantly drove past the house he was in and did our surveillance.  Luckily, other members of the team were responsible to figure out how to deal with the kidnappers and get Rodgers out of the house safely and in time to get to stadium and play football.

The team did it!  He came out of the house with his hands held high, looking just like a referee that signals a Touchdown after his Hail Mary pass!  He was surrounded by the team and I woke up as he was being whisked away to safety.   Now it was time for a break, potty break that is.

Oh yes, I do! I do have vivid dreams and I call them my night movies. I rarely recall all the details so I won't be able to tell you HOW I knew which house Rodgers was in, but I sure have a good feeling now that I can go back to bed, knowing I have done my civic duty to the millions of Green Bay Packers fans.  Rodgers is safe and we will have more games to look forward to, next year!

A Long Time

It's been sixteen months since I last posted on my blog.... a long time!

A lot has happened in that time frame.  First of all, why am I back on this blog?  My hubby and I are in Arizona for three months (January - March) renting a park model in a resort and I joined the writing club here.  About 12 years ago, I was part of a writing group and then we moved to Texas, I did not find or create another writers group.  

I think I decided to join this writing group when I realized that I was bored and did not have enough creative outlets other than getting frustrated with all the political post on Facebook. And that is not "creative."   I feel, regretfully, that Facebook has lost the original intent of sharing parts of our lives with each other.... what are we doing, who are we visiting, where are we traveling.  Today, it's sharing posters (though some are cute or nice) and links to political slandering.  Just my opinion, folks!

The first week of writers club, I wrote a short piece about a friend.  Last week, the assignment was "memories."  One night, I dreamed that I was having a memory about building a shelf. However, I never had that experience of building a shelf.  But I was able to take that seed and grow a story about three children and their father that did build a shelf.  It was fun using my brain and putting words together into sentences that created a story.  After reading my story to the group, I was pleasantly surprised by the smiles, hand clapping and words of encouragement I received.  It definitely gave me encouragement to continue writing.  Now, I don't claim to be a good writer, just a writer that hopes to improve my skills as I write.

So this "old" blog is being rejuvenated....if only as a way for me to share what I doing, who I am visiting, and where I am traveling.  Come along for the ride if you wish as I will not be sharing this blog on Facebook, so you will need to go to the website and read about my thoughts at www.thepesproject.blogspot.com