Christmas Trip in 5th Wheel

We were headed to the Rose Parade with the Escapees HOP. We spent a week in Palm Springs over Christmas and then went to Castaic CA to meet up with the group for our rally. It was 6 days packed with excursions everyday and a catered dinner every night and they were outstanding meals! First up was helping to decorate a float. This company was building 5 floats and we had a tour with the manager. They start in January with the designers drawing up lots of plans. These are submitted to a committee and some are approved so that no two floats are anything alike. The approved plans are given to sponsors with a cost estimate and they choose the one they want. Costs are anywhere from $85,000 to $400,000 depending on the complexity. Then engineers do the design and specs to make it all work. It is now April and work begins on building the structures. Once built they are covered with different materials (wood, foam, mesh, etc.) depending on what will cover the area in the end. All of the float is painted to match the final colors. Every surface will be covered with something natural and not dyed. All types of flowers, seeds, nuts, feathers, fruit and other "stuff" is used. They begin to apply all of these things the day after Christmas and have to be finished the morning of Dec. 31 for judging. Hundreds of volunteers put in hundreds of hours to get it done. Some of it is painstaking work of gluing small seeds and nuts individually in patterns. Once judged on the morning of Dec, 31, they begin the long, 10+ hour journey for these floats, to Pasadena with police escorts arriving in the early hours of Jan.1. They are towed and travel 3 to 5 miles an hour and they have 30 people that meet them to fix anything that broke on the trip. For the parade they have a driver, that can only see the pink line down the middle of the road, an observer that tells the driver what to do and a computer operator for the animation. After the parade and two day display, they are towed back to the factory at a faster pace since they do not care what breaks. They are then torn down, parts that can be reused kept and they rest thrown away and the work begins again. Some of our group glued seeds and popcorn for the pagoda on China Air. the rest of the group that included us, cut and put together statis flowers to go on the final float of the parade. It is the blue of the rainbow.

Second up was Equestfest. All of the horses and horse groups that will march in the parade do a horse show and show their riding, roping and trick riding talents. They do not get to do these things in the parade, so it is an opportunity for them to show just what they can do! It is held in a roof covered arena with open sides. This was the one day it was supposed to rain and it did. We got very wet getting into the arena and then the rains quit, but it was cold!

Bandfest allows all of the bands in the parade to play several songs and march in formations on the football field at Pasadena College. This includes their dance teams and flag teams. There are three different shows so all the bands get a chance to play at one of the shows. They fill the football stadium for each show. The show we attended was in the morning and it was sunny, but cold!

The highlight of our show was the band from New Orleans. This band was formed after Katrina with donated instruments and volunteers to teach the kids to play. It is all age groups whereas the other bands are usually high school or college kids. Marching in formations was not their strong suit, but they played very well. One little 5 year old stole the show. Toda was a majorette marching between two much older kids and he was working hard to keep up. Then he got his drum that was as big as he was and he stood proudly with the band and played drums. He couldn't march with his drum because he was so small and the drum so big. He marched proudly in the parade with his little legs working hard. We saw the group after the 5 miles of walking in the parade and they were all still standing!

From Bandfest, we went for lunch and a tour of The Huntington Library. It is a huge estate with the many buildings being used as art galleries, special displays and books. It has many gardens and sculptures.

Then it was the big day! Buses have to be parked for the parade by 7am so it was an early start. The parade starts at 8am and would not reach our grandstand seats until 8:52. Yes, everything for this event is planned down to the precise minute. We were just above the hundreds of people on the street and so close that you could not get all of the long floats in one picture. It was really fun to see the horses and bands that we had already seen perform come past us. There are 1.2 million people on the 5 mile route and yes, it is gridlock getting to your seats and leaving at the end, but what fun to see it all! There were all kinds of horses, but the cutest were the Gypsy horses with their small size and large feet. They were costumed walkers and dancers and of course all the bands, dignitaries and floats.

Right after the parade we headed to the float viewing place where we met thousands of people. They put all of the floats on display for two days so you can see them up close. In spite of all the people, we were able to get up as close as they allow and get lots of pictures. The detail is amazing and you can see what they used to cover the surfaces. Here is just a sample.

I have wanted to see this parade all of my life and I was not disappointed! With a quick stop in Indio to see friends, we will be in Casa Grande for the rest of the winter enjoying retirement! Some pictures of special floats for special people. Karen, here is the float dedicated to you and your fellow nurses.

And for our granddaughters, here is Dr, Seuss on his float just for you.

Home Activities

Once we arrived home, we found that the electric company had not turned our power on for our lot. Since it was very warm, really HOT, we moved to the park model that day. The inside was not all that bad as I had cleaned everything before we left and covered just about everything or put it in the closets. So while I readied the inside, Ralph was pressure washing the outside. When we left, the doves and pigeons moved onto our front porch rails and what a mess. Since we have to walk over the front porch to our front door, it needed to be cleaned immediately. Everywhere else we had mounted bird spike and fishing line so only the front porch was invaded. We have now figured out how to mount bird spike on those rails for the summer and remove it when we return.

It is fun to get back home and then watch as our community begins to grow for the winter and everyone returns. We each volunteer on some committees to give back to the community. We enjoy riding our bikes around and visiting with everyone. There are now three pickleball courts so we decided that would be good exercise and play with 10 to 20 people just about everyday for 1 1/2 hours to 3 hours. We once again helped build the Christmas float. We enjoy meals out with different friends and groups. Once a month we head to Phoenix for lunch and Costco shopping. They have evening shows at the park and tag-a-longs. We definitely stay very busy.

The Final Part of Fall Trip

We spent a few days near Santa Fe New Mexico at a Corps of Engineer Park. We had been to Santa Fe before, but for the rest of the group it was the first time. We had three rigs that had been traveling with us since Oregon and another rig was joining us here and we were all headed to the Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque together. Then we had friends from Colorado join us for some of our activities in Albuquerque. We had early (4am) wake-ups to get to the launch field in time for the Mass Ascension. You are allowed anywhere on the launch field, can talk to the crews and watch the inflation and ascension or glows at night. You just have to listen for whistles to warn you a balloon is going up or a crew yelling for you to get out of the way as they run with ropes during inflation.

Balloons come in all kinds of shapes and it was fun trying to figure out what they would be as they inflated. Since shapes are not as easy to fly as a regular balloon, the wind had to be just perfect for them to take flight. Otherwise they did a "static display", which means they just inflated and stayed attached to the ground. But, we were lucky and had good winds and away they went.

At night, they did a Night Glow. The balloons are anchored to the ground and at a signal, they all light their burners and the field glows. For this the balloons are touching each other and the field is full of balloons and people.

We were lucky to have good weather and only one Mass Ascension was cancelled. They usually have to cancel more events than that. A mass ascension has somewhere around 500 balloons going up in three groups. There are lines marked on the field and the balloons line up on their line and inflate while others are laying out next to those. The field is covered with lines of balloons. Once the first group is inflated, they launch and the next group inflates and another lays out. It is an amazing sight! And there are so many people you can hardly move on the launch field. My description was you are face to face, shoulder to shoulder and backside to backside with a million of your closest friends. Everyone was polite, however, and they did open up pathways so you get through. This is a once in a life time must see. It is awesome!

We also visited Old Town Albuquerque and went up the Sandia Tram to view Albuquerque from the mountain top ski area.

Last stop was northeast Arizona and the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest. The Painted Desert had many different colors and changed with the sunlight.

There was one area with lots of Petroglyphs.

Then the Petrified Forest with hundreds of logs scattered everywhere.

From there, we went home to Casa Grande AZ.

Moving on to Colorado

Next stop was near Durango Colorado. We stayed at a Dude Ranch at an elevation of 7,000'. Beautiful place! Here we visited Mesa Verde National park. There are hundreds of ruins throughout this park, some are fairly well preserved and others not so much. We hiked down to Spruce Tree House and walked through the ruins.

We spent a day driving and looking at all the ruins we could see from the road.

We spent a day going on the Durango-Silverton train.

The scenery was beautiful with the gold aspen, the river and snow covered mountains. We had lunch and shopped in Silverton, which is about 8,000' elevation, before boarding the train to go back down to Durango. It reminded us of the scenery on the Copper Canyon train in Mexico.

Catching Up Finally Starting with Utah

Seems like we are always busy and I never get to the blog. However, I have been encouraged by family and friends to get it caught up! So, will start with the rest of our fall trip. The first place we visited was Golden Spike National Park near Ogden Utah. This park is all about the driving of the last spike on the railroad when the east and west met at this spot. They have engines arrive that are replicas of the originals.

Then they have a reenactment of the ceremonies and the driving of the Golden Spike.

Next we were off to Moab Utah, red rock country and any outdoor adventure that you would like to do. We decided on a Hummer Adventure and White Water rafting with lunch, all on the same day. The real Hummer adventure is 4 wheelin in style with an experienced driver. Up and down steep rock faces, sliding through the sand and fast corners made picture taking impossible except when we stopped. But what a view from the top of one of the rocks.

Then we were driven up river to meet our raft and guide, a very small gal that grew up on the river and had lots of muscle, who did most of the rowing. Halfway down the river we stopped at a ranch for a delicious lunch and then on down the river just ahead of thunder storms. Through the rapids we all had to help paddle and when the wind came up trying to blow us the wrong way we really had to help out rowing. We had a good workout and made it to shore before the rains came! No camera on this trip cause we did get very wet! We visited two National Parks near Moab. The first was Arches and yes, it is full of natural rock arches. Some we had to hike to see, others were just along the road and a few were just to far and the trail to difficult for us.

Canyonlands was next and most of this park is only accessible by 4 wheel drive on dirt and gravel roads. There is only one small part that you can see on paved road by a regular car. There are a few arches and vast lands.