Staying cool in an RV in the Phoenix area in August...

We arrived back in Mesa, AZ the weekend of August 10 and it was a hellish 100-teens degrees.  I was not looking forward to this aspect of our adventure.  I questioned whether our Mesa Ridge would be able to keep us cool even with the two air conditioners because of the huge slides.  Thankfully we already had our custom window shades made and we added insulation by sliding reflectix behind the shades on the outside of the window (we had already cut the pieces prior to leaving and they were all numbered for quick installation).  We left two windows without the reflectix so that I could look out of the window looking towards the front of the trailer and the one by the kitchen sink.  Being able to look out of a couple of windows helps my mental health - otherwise I feel like I am all boxed up.  Some people put the reflectix on the inside of the trailer, but this allows the windows to get hot - ours were cool to the touch from the inside.  I have also heard of the molding around the windows on the outside getting so hot that they melt or cause problems.  By having the reflectix on the outside between the window and the solar shades we protected the windows from the sun. 

We had placed some orders through Amazon and one of our two packages was waiting at our lot when we returned (the other never showed up and we ended up getting refund).  We then spent a great deal of time at Lowe's purchasing the rest of the items we needed to build our shade structure.  The slide side of our trailer faces the afternoon sun and we wanted to put that side of the trailer in the shade.  I knew the first shade cloth I bought was not long enough, but I wasn't sure how much more to buy prior to building the frame.  We were up half of the night of the 11th putting this together...

We ended up pounding six fence posts into the ground and then sliding the 1" galvanized chain-link fence posts over the pounded ones.  We connected the corners with PVC fittings.  I don't think we would have been able to stay cool without the shade structure.  The difference in temperature between the shaded and unshaded siding was significant.  Also, before I put up the second shade cloth, I could feel the temperature difference inside the trailer along the top molding of the large slide between the shaded and unshaded portions. 

A couple of weeks later we also added bracing between the 3 sets of two vertical posts after the wind of a monsoon storm wreaked havoc on the structure.... It has held up much better since then...

The last piece of our shade structure was shade canopy from Shade RV.  They took forever to produce it and mail it to us...it took about 45 days from when we ordered until we received it, but we finally got it up in September for the last couple weeks of extreme heat.

The shade canopy was expensive ($700) - but it is something we can put up and take down depending on the weather.  It certainly keeps the blazing sun off of the roof.  We have two skylights in our unit and having the shade over them keeps them much cooler.  I am not sure if we realized any cost savings in terms of running the air conditioner less....I don't think so - but it is hard to say.  One thing I can say is that it was a pain in the butt to put up without our ladder!  We had left it up at the Rancho.  The canopy has been through a few storms and the straps hold it well to the trailer.  I am glad we have all of the components of our shade structure for next summer.  Our small cargo trailer serves as a shed where we can store everything while we are traveling. 

Thankfully we were able to keep our indoor temperature at 78-80 degrees even when it 100-high teens degrees.  This is a huge win because as a general rule RV air conditioners can only bring the temp down 20 degrees from the outside temp.  Consider that when it was 115, 30 degrees cooler is 85 degrees!  So we were doing better than 30 degrees cooler on the hottest days.  There are a few caveats and actions we needed to take as well.

1. Lessen the time and frequency of the front door being open.  We line up.  "Is everyone ready?"  Then we make a mad dash in or out of the trailer. 
2. No heating up the place.  No cooking on the stove or in the oven when both ACs are working overtime.  We could use the microwave and, when brave, cook outside.  (I admit that we mostly ate out)
3. The RV fridge had a hard time keeping cool in extreme heat. We used the outdoor electric fridge to supplement.   
4. Run a fan all the time.  The rear AC for the bunkhouse has a smaller area to cool and we blew the air from the bunkhouse into the main living area all summer.
5. No hot water!  It may be hard to believe but we didn't turn on our hot water heater for about 6 weeks after being back in the valley.  When it is that hot outside the tap water is hot too - plenty hot for showers/baths and dishes.  In fact, when you are using a hose you have to be careful not to scald yourself when you first turn on the water during the heat of the day.  The water in the hose gets really hot.  

Our electric bill for dealing with a month of AZ heat was $200.  

Putters Paradise RV Park, Snowflake, AZ

We stayed at Putters Paradise RV Park for six weeks total.  First for a month at the beginning of the summer and two more weeks at the end.  The majority of spaces seem occupied by full-timers and/or seasonal residents.  There is a friendly, albeit older, vibe - meaning that kids are tolerated, but certainly not encouraged or catered to.

There were a few manufactured units like the one next to our site in the park.

Clubhouse

This may be my biggest complaint - how they handle and talk to visitors with kids.  On the issue of kids - we were told that we could not stay more than a month due to the kdis, but then realized that some children who were there at the beginning of the summer were also there at the end of the summer and clearly lived there full-time.  Secondly, there is a very nice clubhouse, with a ping-pong table, games, exercise equipment, theater seating and large TV, but I was told a number of times that the kids need to be supervised at all times.  Such repeated warnings and directions are unnecessary because I would never let my kids hang out there unattended!  There is a pool, but kids are only allowed in it during certain times of the day.  When we returned to the park for the second time and we were parking the rig Brother went to the clubhouse to use the restroom and was asked where his parents were.  There is a general uneasiness about kids at this park.  This gave me the sense that our presence was not welcome despite the fact that many of the neighbors were pleasant and friendly.  Also, as this location marked the beginning and end of our trip I wanted the kids to enjoy the place and play outside, but there is little for them to do.

Upstairs at the clubhouse

The facilities including the laundry, public restrooms and the rest of the clubhouse are very nice.  It is clear that a lot of care has been put into the place and I understand the desire to keep it in good shape.  I was especially happy with the reasonably priced laundry facilities.

We will likely be back given the reasonable proximity to Rancho Status Quo.  This is a nice park and Snowflake-Taylor has decent shopping, restaurants, and parks!  It would be great if Putters Paradise had a small playground for the kiddos. 

Snowflake City Park

Santa Fe, NM to Snowflake, AZ - 2019 Trip summary

From Santa Fe, NM we drove back to Snowflake, AZ completing our approximately 3000 mile trip through five states (AZ, UT, WY, CO, NM).  We stayed at the same park, Putter's Paradise, that we stayed at during the start of the summer (review forthcoming).  Our road trip took 7 weeks and we stayed at nine unique overnight locations.  We avoided the heat of Mesa, AZ for a total of 13 weeks staying in Snowflake for a month at the beginning of the summer and two weeks more at the end.

The Ford F150 paired with the Mesa Ridge 3110BH by Highland Ridge rig was the perfect balance of interior trailer space, lightweight for towing by a F150, and gas efficiency.  We were able to average 12-13 miles per gallon when towing and the truck gets up to 25 mpg when not hitched (when touring the parks).  We drove some very mountainous paths with the rig and the Ford performed beautifully.  The amazing thing is that last summer when we used our Toyota Tacoma to pull the much smaller Keystone Hideout, we got around the same mpg when towing.  It is amazing that we were able to upgrade our interior space 57%, from 200 square feet to 315 square feet, and not spend more on gas while towing.  We had hoped for this outcome when purchasing this rig and when put to the test we were really happy with the results.

The other thing that went really well this summer was that, on average, we stayed longer in each place and we didn't drive as many miles as last summer.  Being out the first year and wanting to see everything we headed west and then east when we should have probably just done one or the other so as not to wear ourselves (and the kids) out with all the driving.  This year, the plan to make a loop worked out great and we visited some of the most National Park dense parts of the country!

We returned to Snowflake in large part to check out the construction that had taken place at Rancho Status Quo as we had worked with a contractor at the beginning of the summer to sketch out the plans for building a bathroom, kitchen and loft in our quonset hut building.  We are really happy with the progress that was made.  Here is a before and after picture:

I will share more about our progress at Rancho Status Quo in future posts, but suffice it to say that being able to live/work out of Snowflake for six weeks this summer really helped us move our project forward.  This "tiny house" quonset is 500 square feet (plus the loft) and seems absolutely enormous when compared to our primary residence of 315 square feet! 

Husband was able to work remotely for eight full weeks.  Although he did not get to visit all of the National Parks with us, he was able to see a lot and we were together every day.  In a few cases we knew internet connectivity was going to be a problem (like at Medicine Lodge Archaeological Site in WY) and in other cases the crappy connection was an unfortunate surprise we had to deal with (like in Estes Park, CO).  The weBoost was used during the week we were at Ancient Cedars RV Park in Mancos, CO - without it he would not have been able to work from home.  Despite the challenges we were able to find a suitable location from which he could work no matter where we were.  Libraries worked well.  I also worked from the road and needed internet for participating in meetings and teaching an online class.  I was also able to work around poor connectivity in some locations - though I will say it can be stressful at times.  The lesson learned is that Verizon lies about its 4G coverage, so you can't rely on the map.  Estes Park was a prime example.  But with a little flexibility and creativity we adapted and found service, albeit less convenient. 

We celebrated two years of full-time RV living in June and I have to say that we are really happy with our current situation.  The biggest plus is the fact that we are growing together and learning together every day.  Small spaces bring people closer, both literally and figuratively.  We educate our kids, we live with minimalist values, we save our money.  I want to devote some future posts to our homeschooling adventures, but that aspect of our life is really going well for everyone.  The kids completed 19 Junior Ranger books (a mixture of science, social studies, and history lessons) during the 7 week trip and they never once considered it work.  They love doing them and collecting the badges.  This summer we collected hiking medallions and a few patches (their vests were very full from last summer but I did manage to sew a few new ones on). 

Looking forward to the next adventure!

Petroglyph National Monument, Albuquerque, NM

Petroglyph National Monument was established in 1990 after many years and previous efforts to preserve the cultural history of the area.  The park is divided into four areas that are not connected and require a visitor to drive through and around the city to find the trails.  For us, as the last National Park stop on our adventure it was a return to the desert in a real way - it was the end of July and even early in the morning the temperatures were reaching near 100 degrees Fahrenheit. 

Here (above) you can see how the city reaches into one protected are where untold numbers of volcanic basalt rock, dark with a desert patina are carved with ancient images.   

The trails here in the Boca Negra Canyon snaked up and down the hills taking you by some really amazing artwork.  The meanings are lost to time, but the images are stunning and stand out brightly on the dark rocks.  The visitor center had an excellent movie about the history of the park, efforts to protect the petroglyphs, and contemporary perspectives from native people about the meanings of the pictures. 

There were some obvious signs of vandalism and destruction.  It is so disappointing to see initials or other modern things carved in the rocks. 

The weather was against us the day we visited as it was difficult to be outdoors for long due to the heat.  We had avoided the heat so well during the summer - even playing in snow and using our heater many nights - we had not adapted as one does when they spend the summer in the Phoenix area.  Being in Albuquerque, we found a great restaurant and enjoyed a wonderful lunch before heading back to Sante Fe, but we were only able to see one of the four areas in this spread out park. 

Pecos National Historical Park, Pecos NM

At the height of the pueblo's use probably 2,000 people lived and thrived.  Pecos was a cultural center and there was a sophisticated trade network extending far and wide.  For visitors there are a couple of rebuilt kivas that provided a special look into the architecture used by the puebloans.

When the Spaniards came they recognized the importance of the place and this is probably why they decided to settle right next to the compound.  It is astonishing that despite the vast expanse of land surrounding the pueblo how close to the pueblo the mission was built.

Unfortunately, like many missionaries before and after the religious settlers did not believe in cultural relativism and instead insisted that the puebloans adopt a Christian view of the world.  This caused a great deal of conflict and eventually the puebloan people rebelled and burnt down the mission and drove the Spaniards away for a period of around 8 years.  Ultimately the Spaniard missionaries returned (probably with force) and rebuilt the mission over the ruins of the previous one.  To this day the ancestors of the place include adherents of both Christian and traditional faiths and they hold festivals and ceremonies at the site.

The legacy of powerful forces imposing their will upon native people would be a curiosity of the past if it were not continuing today.  I kept thinking of Standing Rock and the Lakota Tribe's efforts to stop a pipeline through their land in order to preserve the natural resources.  Their efforts failed and their worries about oil spills were not unfounded.  We like to think imperialism is a thing of the past, but the facts clearly point to the fact that the Empire building is the business of America.

These sites tell an important story and they are a warning to us.  There are other ways of living and thriving in nature, but these ways and understandings continue to be relegated to the past in favor of  an approach that favors force, technology, and dogmatic understandings.  Climate change is the result of our current approach and we need to uncover the methods and understandings of the past in order to bring balance to our world on fire.  Perhaps there is a middle road, but we can't act like the knowledge of the past is worthless.  Civilizations were built and thrived before Europeans destroyed them.  I hope we can learn some lessons from the past instead of continually repeating mistakes.

Manhattan Project National Historic Site at Los Alamos, NM

So....this is a strange one to take a five-year to, and it is an emotionally heavy one for a nine-year old.   As you probably know this is the birthplace of the atomic bomb and is where the Fatman and Little Boy bombs (that were later dropped during WWII on Nagasaki and Hiroshima respectively) were constructed.

So the Manhattan Project National Historic Site at Los Alamos was established in November of 2015 and was a partnership between a number of agencies that were trying to preserve this history.  When you visit there is a walking tour through the town that takes you to a number of sites ran by a different entities (NPS, historical society, the city, and the Los Alamos laboratories).  Through the various sites there are a number of movies and exhibits that tell the story of the area.  Of course the story is one of people being displaced so that the town could be set up as a secret base.  The main set of buildings that were taken by the government were those belonging to the Los Alamos Ranch School - a lot of history there.

Of course the whole point of converting this area into a secret base was so that the nuclear bomb could be developed.  I am quite a pacifist and my view on the dropping of these bombs is not positive - of course the way history is told is that the dropping of these bombs ended the war - which is a debatable point of view as there were other factors that contributed to the end of the conflict.  Anyhow, this visit took a great deal of contextualization, explanation, and emotional conversation.  Additionally there is the legacy of nuclear weapons on the planet and the nuclear weapons in the U.S.  ...conversations that needed to be had.

Here are some pictures of the Ranch School:

So....quick story, on the way home I asked Sister, "what did you learn?"  She said, "I think there was a war?"  She wasn't quite sure after talking about the war all day....So, yes, she was exposed to some information, but it wasn't exactly a five-year-old friendly day.  Also, as Husband has a better memory for history, I really missed his contribution to the conversations Brother and I had.   So, the take-away is that this is a very important part of U.S. history and it was very educational for Brother and I, but it was also a troubling and difficult visit due to the mass murder perpetrated by BOTH the allies and the axis powers.

Bandalier National Monument, Los Alamos, NM

Hello dear readers - My free time is so limited these days between teaching at the University, homeschooling, and our other projects!  I will be talking more about those soon, but the immediate reason I haven't written is because I spent my free time putting together a memory book with our pictures from the summer.  I made one last year and love it.  I used Shutterfly this time, but I have also used Mixbook and don't really notice a difference between the two.  Going through all of the pictures and trying to narrow them down took some time!  Anyhow, back to documenting our summer travels!

Bandalier National Monument was a trip I made with the kids while husband was working.  This is another park that has limited parking and requires the use of a shuttle.  When you get there the rangers provide an orientation and you can check out the guided tour book and then you can go hiking to see the amazing ruins.  In this park you can climb up into caves which were once used as part of the pueblo and look down over the rest of the compound.

What is amazing here is that the pueblo once was built to include these naturally occurring caves and they served as additional rooms...in this picture you can see the holes that once held the floor beams for the upper stories.

One of my favorite things to see at ruins is the pottery and other artwork that was produced by the ancestral people.  At this site there was a small section of plaster with art that has been protected with a clear cover.  I just imagine how cool this would have looked when the plaster was all intact.  

This was a beautiful place with a really great hike and things to see all along the walk.

Just to recap, we saw Bandalier while were were staying in Santa Fe, NM.  There are a number of wonderful sites within an hour drive - actually too many to see in a week - but we really enjoyed this one!

Meow Wolf, Santa Fe, NM

In a drastic departure from our "National Parking" we visited a very unique artistic space.  There really are not words to describe this experience as I am sure some of my pictures will highlight - but it was a worthwhile and unique experience.  We were directed to this place by the manager of Pinon RV Park.  I had asked about local places to take the kids - I was actually thinking about a community pool or water park...but when she asked me if I had visited Meow Wolf I had a vague memory of reading about it when I researched area attractions in Santa Fe....later she brought over a brochure and I was sold on a visit!  Funded by George R. R. Martin (author of the Game of Thrones series) and created by an artist cooperative it is an immersive, colorful, trippy alternative reality where you explore space, get lost, find things and lose them again.  There are multiple levels of understanding the "exhibit" and though I spent a great deal of time there I did not try to follow the actual story but rather I got lost in the whimsical and metaphysical.

What are you looking at?  That is totally the question.  It's an alternative dimension full of amazing places, odd characters, unique sounds and sights.

When you first enter you start in a two-story house, but you quickly find that the house is a portal to the hidden realms.  Some of the kids' favorite ways to enter the alternative realm(s) were through the fridge and the dryer.  Here is Sister going down the rabbit hole and a shot from inside the fridge.

This is a place to be experienced, not talk about.  I love sharing my pictures, but really they don't do it justice at all.  I took the kids to Meow Wolf on a day Husband was working, but it was so amazing we went back home, waited for him to get done with work and then the four of us went back so that he could experience it too.  I couldn't imagine trying to tell him about it and it really felt wrong for us to experience it without him!  He was just as blown away as we were - it is a total trip.  In short, if you are in the area - you should totally go.

Pinon RV Park, Santa Fe, NM

I can't believe that I didn't take one picture of Pinon RV Park!  This park met all of our needs and at a good weekly price of $200.  It is located approximately 20 minutes southeast from the center of Santa Fe, so shopping and restaurants are all nearby.  We had full hookups and a spacious site with a nice shade tree.  It appeared that most of the sites were occupied by long-term residents.  There was very little (if any) movement of RVs in and out while we were there.  I'm not sure why I didn't take pictures, except that it felt more like our site in Mesa / a home, not a campground!  At this point in the travels I was also thinking about returning to AZ and might have been getting out of tourist mode!

Verizon service was strong and they offered WiFi, but we didn't need it.  They have community restrooms and showers.  I only entered the restroom once when were were leaving and it was not very clean, but I am not sure if that was the norm since we generally only use our own facilities.

There was a covered community picnic area with a grill and tables and that seemed to be the only other amenity.  This is a straightforward full-hookup place near Sante Fe.  I would certainly stay there again.  The only other thing worth mentioning was that they only take cash or checks!  I forgot about this when we checked in but the manager was very nice and allowed me to pay the next day after I ran to get cash (as I don't even have checks)!  The manager was also very helpful in directing me to attractions in Santa Fe...more on this in the next post!

Pros:

• price
• proximity to Sante Fe
• Full-hooks ups
• WiFi and excellent Verizon service
• no traffic (settled RVs)
• kind & helpful park manager

Con:

• the one time I used the bathroom it was not very clean