A Rest Stop, Anyone Need to Stop?

Rest Stop, on in the middle of Golden Valley, AZ. Isn’t that hilarious? We just laugh out loud every time we see it.

As you read in our post last week, we are now traveling full-time. We sold our house, quit our jobs, Kevin got a new one (so he can work remote from anywhere), and we are starting our new adventures. Since we want a home base, we are having a house built in Fort Mohave, AZ. Home is “where you park it” and our home is named HOWE. It is our 25 ft travel trailer, named for Home On WhEels and pronounced How-ee.

We decided to start our full-time travels in Needles, CA. The campground is named Desert View RV. The picture above was taken from inside HOWE. You can see the blooms on the Oleander bush and this is February!

This area’s growing season is October – March. I found a farmer’s market at Triple Farms Produce. The fresh salsa I made was delicious. Again, in February. I smile.

We got tired of locking and unlocking HOWE with a key. So Kevin researched and found this keypad. He bought it and it makes locking and unlocking much easier. The install was pretty easy with great instructions.

Kevin order a “Bak-Flip” for our truck. He had thought about buying a shell but we looked at them and decided this other way was a better way. Since Kevin had to work at home (Home Is Where You Park It), I went to Lake Havasu, AZ, about 40 minutes away. We had been to this place last week so I knew where I was going. He was nice to tell the worker on the phone that I am deaf. As I got there, I parked across the street because the tiny parking lot was full. As I went through the front door, the nice man walked out with another customer. He smiled and I handed him the keys and pointed to the truck. Then I plopped myself at the end of their counter where there was a bar stool. I got out my pad of paper, my iPhone and my iPad and started reading my book. The guy gave me a thumbs-up when he came in. It was very nice and it took about 1 1/2 hours, which we knew. After I paid, I wrote on my pad is there anything I need to know about the new thing. He wrote did I want him to show me how it works? Yes, thanks. Back at home, Kevin was very pleased with it and started loading up totes for the “warehouse” – what he called the back of the truck. 🙂

We like to look around the area, wherever we are. So many things to see and discover. We decided to try Wagon Wheel Restaurant in Needles. Inside there is a lot of memorabilia about Route 66. We ordered our Diet Pepsi drinks and then another lady, Kim, came over. She saw us signing American Sign Language and asked if we are deaf. We told her I am. She said she is hard of hearing, 40%, has hearing aids but doesn’t use/like them because it makes everything too loud. Her parents and siblings all have hearing loss. We connected right away. She was interested in us and we in her. Soon she took our order, haha, and then brought back her 8 year old girl, Minnie. She is a firecracker and full of life! She asked a ton of great questions. She asked me to teach her everything in ASL. HAHA I told her to give me 3 words and I would teach her the signs. She wanted Minnie Mouse, wheel, and I can’t remember the last one. After visiting for awhile, Kim said they needed to go and let us eat our food. I signed the whole time I am talking. I signed and said to Minnie that it was very nice to meet her. She said, with a dramatic brush of the hands as she pointed to my hands, “Oh, you don’t need to do that stuff…I can hear you!” Kevin, Kim, and I about fell over laughing so hard. As we left, Kim gave us big hugs and was so happy to meet us. We told her we would be back. As we left, Kevin told her “Don’t settle” on hearing aid settings. Go back, get it adjusted. It is a great speech he gives a lot of people with hearing aids and I think it is wonderful. I told Kevin in the car, “Well, there is our community.” We found out later that they have a YouTube channel. You can check it out here: RealTruthTalk

One Saturday, we got up at 5:45 AM and started driving the car to Overton, NV (2- 1/2 hours away). We went to watch our friend, Bryce, a senior in high school, play a baseball tournament. We have attending a lot of his baseball games over the years. We stopped at Searchlight, NV for drive-through breakfast at McDonalds. We had quite a shock because the total was $20. Two breakfast burritos, two egg biscuits, and two drinks. Where we used to live, that would be a dollar per burrito and drink and about two for each biscuit. He double checked at the window and the order was right. The receipt showed the biscuits were 2@$10.98, the burritos were 2@about $6. My goodness! We wondered if all the McDonalds have jumped in price. Kevin said he would put his brother, who likes McDonalds and lives in the Mid-West, on a search-and-learn mission. HAHA Bryce’s team played two games, one at 9:00 and one at 11:00.  They lost the first one and won the second. He is always a joy to watch. He has a great attitude and encourages his teammates. The weather was perfect, sunny, slight breeze every once in a while but not cold. After the games, we decided to go home the back roads and it was great. We went south out of Overton past the east entrance to Valley of Fire, which we went to last year. The road is a great, paved, two lane road. At times we could see Lake Mead. The landscape would be flat and then climb through a canyon. At one point there are some red rocks, like Valley of Fire. A lot of people where parked there. In front of us, there came a pack of people on bicycles. They were going 40 mph. We passed them and then came around a corner where the traffic was completely stopped. We could see flashing lights way ahead of us. Thankfully, we only had to sit for 5 minutes and then the traffic started up again.  We never saw what the problem was. The road ended up on the east side of Las Vegas Valley, at Henderson. I didn’t want to cook that evening, so we went to Wagon Wheel. They were very full but there was an empty table. Kevin had the western burger and really liked it. I had the roast beef skillet and let me say, it tasted as good as mine! Crockpot roast beef, shredded, in gravy, over mashed potatoes. Back home, we sat outside and read our books…in February! LOVE this weather. 🙂

We leave you with this beautiful sunset. Or…maybe we will make you hungry –

🙂