Scenes from the Road - South Dakota to Utah

After a leisurely 3 month summer stay in the Black Hills of South Dakota, our introduction to Fall significantly sped things up.  You already know that we almost bought an RV lot in Irwin, Idaho last month.  What you may not know yet is that we sold our New Mexico lot this month.  We bought that New Mexico lot a dozen years ago thinking of a retirement spot.  That was before we knew that we would be living full time RV.  Unfortunately the NM lot does not allow RVs, so it has been of no use to us.  Since being on the road, we also have determined that central New Mexico is not where we want to be permanently.  Below we have assembled a collection of pictures that we have captured over the last four weeks as we relocated to Yakima, Washington and Panguitch Utah via Wyoming, Idaho, and Oregon.

This post will be like one of those movies that jumps around in time.  We start in Irwin, Idaho at a herd of Longhorns.  We see a lot of cattle out west, but this is one of the most interesting herds that we have come across.  The cows were very curious and wandered over to see what we were doing so close to their fence line.  They probably thought we were there to feed them something good.

While we were in Irwin we rode around to put an eyeball on other available lots. In the shot below Gari looks over several 2-4 acre tracts located up on the "Shelf".  The shelf is the area that is up 500-1000 ft from the Snake River valley floor going up into the surrounding mountains.  None of these lots allow RVs so this is not the spot for us either.

One more shot of a couple of the young Longhorns...

Now back to how we arrived in Irwin; we did that via Rt 18 out of South Dakota and onto a central path through Wyoming on Rt 26.  Below we spied many giant bales of hay freshly harvested, and oh the sweet aroma that permeated the entire area!

Passing through sleepy Crowheart, WY we see the lone Sinclair filling station proudly flying Old Glory.

Scene of colors and layers on the Wind River Reservation.

We enjoyed the pastoral scenes of growing hay amid the spectacular mountain scenery.

 Below a case in point.  Literally.

Of course we cannot omit mention of the Grand Teton Mountain Range near the western border of Wyoming.

After leaving Idaho and headed for Washington State, we stopped overnight at a small campground nestled on the banks of the Snake River in Oregon.  Below we are actually drinking our coffee on the banks of the Snake River....finally!

Passing a smallish wind farm in northeastern Oregon.

Romeo and Penelope taking a pit stop at the Deadman's Pass Overlook above Pendleton, Oregon.

We made it uneventfully to Yakima, Washington where we were able to visit with family and friends.  Below Gari assists dad with the operation of his new smartphone.

We got to visit sister Sandi and brother Sam out on their ranch.  New addition Cora peeks in the window as we finish a fine supper of home grown Delmonico steaks.  Cora has been fantastic working with the sizeable herd of cattle that Sam and Sandi manage on the ranch.

We were able to get up to nearby Cle Elum, WA and visit with close friends/relatives Quirt and Marilyn.  Quirt put on a clinic with his new Treager Smoker and served up several racks of delicious smoked ribs.  We didn't get many pictures while there because we were too busy catching up with each other, but we caught an action shot of Quirt slicing the ribs for our feast.

Sam took a day and carried us over to the Town of Murals.  Below is a shot of one of the many murals that can be seen around Toppenish, WA.  The purpose of our visit was to experience the animal auction process there.  Sam sells his livestock there and everyone from the auctioneer on down were a friend of Sam's.

Gari and Sam are amused from the viewing platform overlooking the livestock yard.  What is it that is so amusing?

The answer is the cattle sorting process.  The cowboys below work to sort the cattle into like sizes and breeds for the auction block.  The problem is the cattle's instinct is to stay together, not be split up as the cowboys seem to want.  It can get real exciting down in the sorting yard as the cowboys armed only with rattle paddles work to sort the endless herds.  They really risk injury doing that dangerous job.  Think about that next time you are enjoying a nice cut of beef.

More dust up action from the sorting pens below.  Lookout cowboy!

Inside the auction arena.  The auctioneer stopped the whole auction process to greet Sam as we entered the place.  We just love small towns!  Below three feeder calves are up for auction in this shot.  The auctioneer is the fella in the window at the microphone.  These animals don't stay in the arena for more than two minutes before they are sold and the next group enters for sale.  It is a super fast process.  There are two cowboys in the arena, one opens the Enter door, and the other works the Exit door.  They both work to move the livestock into, around and out the door for all to get a good look at what is for sale.  It was a fascinating show for us.

On the way out Sam took us through the main office and Gari gets her photo with a majestic Longhorn that was mounted in there.

During our 2 week stay in Yakima we once again selected the RV park that was doing major work on their water system.  This seems to happen to us too often.  We learned immediately that when work occurs on a park water system, it dislodges debris in the system and that goes directly into our 4 layer water filtration system on Penelope.  That can and will clog about $60 worth of water filters in about 1 minute.  We saw the big drilling rig enter the RV park on our second day there and we thought uh oh!  Luckily for us, they did not finish drilling the well and did not break into the distribution system until the day before we left.  By that time we had disconnected from their system and were running off of our onboard water supply.  Below is a shot of the drilling rig all set up and drilling.  The existing well was set at ~100 ft.  The new well was expected to be set around 300 ft.

As curious engineers, we wandered over to check out the drilling operation and the well situation.  Below is the back and business end of the drilling rig.  The new well is seen at the "Tee" at the bottom of the truck bumper, appears to be about a 10-12 inch well casing.  A real commercial installation.  You can see a few RVs at frame left below; Penelope isn't far away.

The shot below is inside the existing well house.  The existing well is the tall black pipe at frame right.  The water is pumped out by a submersible pump and exits through the top of the well head.  The water pipes go from the well head over to a set of 4 accumulator tanks, which you can see one tank frame left.

The 4 accumulator tanks in the well house.

We have left the State of Washington!  The shot below is the first overnight at the Walmart in Island City, northeastern Oregon.  There was a little bit of everything in there with us that evening.  You can see Penelope at frame left.  And of course this was the same day that we received the offer on our New Mexico lot that was for sale.  We got to work those response actions as we traveled from Yakima, WA to Panguitch, UT.  We couldn't have made that any more inconvenient if we had scheduled it to be the most difficult.

We exited the southern border of Idaho south of Twin Falls.  The shot below was taken while crossing our favorite river, The Snake in Twin Falls.  At the far reaches of this picture is the spot where Evil tried to jump the canyon years ago.  RIP Evel.

Beautiful western skies snapped among the livestock ranges of Nevada.

Another overnight at the Chevron Truck Stop/Marijuana Dispensary in Ely, Nevada.  We had the place to ourselves that day.  A nice event for us compared to many of the overcrowded places we visit from time to time.  We always try to avoid the crowds, we nailed it this time!

Our final resting spot for the night in Ely.  When we pull into a place, we will get out and scout around for the optimum parking location.  We like to face Penelope's headcap the the south, which puts the refrigerator in the afternoon shade.  We find that the afternoon sun is the hottest part of the day and really heats the refrigerator up if it is in that full sun.  We also look for a fairly flat and level place, and of course closeness to neighbors is always avoided when possible.   The closeness part was not a problem here today.

And the last shot of the post, a foreshadowing of a very near future adventure.... our battery bank is failing and requires immediate replacement.  Without 12 volts in an RV, the refrigerator, furnace and thermostat, hydraulic jacks, room lights, and room slides all will not function.  As soon as we arrive in Sun City, this will be our first project.  We have already been able to locate the correct batteries at a good price in Sun City West, AZ.

Idaho Real Estate

Because RV parks are crowded, expensive and often unavailable in the summertime, because we love Idaho, and mostly because we are crazy RVers, we recently bid on a 4 acre property in Idaho sight unseen.  We didn't think the seller would be interested in our unusual bid, because it was a mix of cash and a New Mexico property in trade.  To our delighted surprise, the seller accepted our offer after a couple of counter offers, so we left South Dakota early to see the lot in person before we signed any contract.  Long story short, we walked away from the deal because we felt the property had too much work to complete, far too much maintenance to bring aboard our program, and too expensive of an operation for us going forward.

The shot below is taken from the entrance to the lot (southeast corner) looking out the 600ft access road to the east.  A nice view of Mt. Baldy from there.

The seller is an excavator by trade and it appears he speculated on this lot, by improving the access road to the lot, installing a new well and septic system on the property, building up a road and circle driveway on the lot, constructing a major pond/water feature and by building berms around the perimeter of the lot for privacy.  Below is a view standing at the end of the access road from the public road and looking into the lot.  The drive enters the lot behind the For Sale sign which is the southeast corner of this rectangular parcel.

The map below locates the lot with a small 4 acre yellow rectangle in Irwin, Idaho.  For the fishermen reading this, the South Fork of the Snake River is just a stones throw from the lot to the southwest.

The shot below is taken from the northeast corner of the lot.  The tall fir tree at frame left, which was recently brought in by the owner, is dying.  We have seen this before in fir trees.  The tree starts to die from the bottom and the center of the tree.  It's just a matter of time before someone is removing this tree.  You can see Gari, the owner and realtors standing in the distance around "The Pond".

This shot below shows Romeo the Ram parked at the beginning of the driveway circle near the center of the lot.   The treed area inside the circle is where the RV pad is currently set up.

The shot below is taken from the northern property line near the center of the lot, looking eastward.  You can see the waterfall river of rocks that empties into the pond at frame right.

Panning a bit right or south you can see the entire water feature below.  What we thought was going to be a smallish pond turned out to be an extensive, complex water feature.  It was primarily this installation that caused us to turn and run away from this property.  First, the pond was much larger than we had envisioned.  Second, it had a waterfall feature installed that required pumps, waterlines, valves, electricity, and even a gasoline powered water pump.  We thought right away that this pond would be a maintenance and operations nightmare, not to mention that there was still considerable work to be accomplished to make the water feature complete.  We think if this water feature had not been there, we would be under contract with this lot right now.

For additional info on this lot, the shot below is taken from near the center of the southern property line looking westward.  You can see the berms back there (which is the material that came out of the pond excavation) and just before the berms the septic drain field is installed.  The 1,000 gallon septic tank is under the tan shed at frame right.

Below is a shot of the RV pad area taken from the same position as the photo above.

More about the water feature... The shot below shows the 2" PVC lines that are used to carry the pond water up to the river of rocks where it flows down and back into the pond as a double waterfall. Those large lines all need to be concealed.... somehow.

Zooming out you can see the pond and where the lines goes into the pond to the electric sump pump.  We must admit that we do like the views from this lot.

The shot below is looking down the river of rocks, where the pumped pond water heads to the double waterfall.  The owner said that he spends about $160 per month in electricity pumping water to the pond from the well, and then up and over the waterfall with an electric sump pump.  This does not include the gasoline pump sending water to the irrigation system.  To us, all that is an operation nightmare.  In order for that pond to remain somewhat clear, the pumping must continue.  The water feature is a magnificent effort by the seller.  It looks very nice, but it is also certainly not for us.

This shot below is more material from the pond excavation no doubt.  These piles sit at the northern property line just in front of where any home or barn may be placed.  All that has to be moved, but not by us.

The picture below gives an idea how tight things are inside RV pad area.

There is also a 10x20 ft shed in the small RV area, and you can see the electric transformer frame right.

The electric power transformer is also located in that RV area, with the power stand at the right..

The electric power stand is a 200 Amp service which is more than adequate for the existing use.  Not the most attractive setup, but certainly adequate for any future improvements we may have wanted to add.  A plan to reconfigure the existing power stand into a more aesthetic installation would have been a requirement for our purposes.  In the end an adequate service, but significant rework and expense to put it into a final and more attractive configuration.

The well.  No accumulator tank.  No good way to winterize the system.  Lots of rework and upgrades need to be performed on this brand new well system.

The shot below is taken from the northwestern corner looking eastward.  The tall fir trees are the RV area.  The position of the photographer, is presumably the area that any new buildings would be added.  It is a fine view of Mt. Baldy from there.

And last but not least, the gasoline water pump.  You can't see the actual pump, but it is in the wooden enclosure.  The influent line enters the pond from just beyond the box.  This shot also gives a good look at the double waterfalls in action.

We still like an large number of things about this lot, but the pond was the major deal breaker for us. Even though the pond is quite a nice feature, we figured it was just too much work and expense to get things set up and finished not to mention maintain, so not the lot for us, but certainly a lot with great potential for someone else.  We walked away this time.  We are still looking, but probably not nearly as hard after this roller-coaster experience.