Day one. Trip mile 0.

Launch day. May 31, 2010. Trip mile 0.

In a few hours we’ll head north on hiway 95, hang a right at I-40, and continue on to Flagstaff where we’ll be spending the night at Fort Tuthill Community Park.
En route we go through the town of Williams, named after Bill Williams. There’s lots of stuff around here named after good ol Bill: a river, a mountain, a town, and who knows what else. It bothers me that Bill’s folks couldn’t come up with a different first name. Not much imagination there, reminds me of that one-time UN secretary Boutros Boutros-Ghaly.

“Well, Martha, what should we name our baby boy? Let’s see, our last name is Dip: let’s keep it simple and stay with that. We’ll call him Dip Dip, aka Double Dip. Now, how about a middle name? Hey, I got it: Dip. We’ll nickname him ‘3D.’ If he’s slim of stature, we can call him Dipstick. Hope he doesn’t stutter.”

Sorry, readers, I do get carried away at times. Stupid-ass names are one of my pet peeves and that’s because I myself have one of those ambivalent first names, one that’s more often used on the fairer sex than not. I’ve always hated it and don’t use it. So, I can empathize with Bill and a boy named Sue and whoever else has been saddled with names that guarantee them endless taunts and harassment in the early school years.

So, who was Bill Williams anyway? I Googled him: well known trapper and scout in the mid 1800s. Care to guess what his folks gave him for a middle name? Would you believe Sherley? Good grief! Double Bill-ing wasn’t bad enough? Okay, here’s the scenario: I’m a judge and Bill Sherley Bill is in my courtroom, charged with two counts of murder one. He finally took a shotgun to his folks in retribution for the lousy names. My verdict: justifiable homicide.

The first leg of our trip will take 3 weeks, destination Minnesota. We’ll be visiting several national parks and monuments along the way, the first of which will be Petrified Forest NP in northeast AZ. From there we head to Window Rock to see the famous rock itself and to visit Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn of the Navajo Tribal Police.

If you’ve read Tony Hillerman you’ll realize, of course, that we won’t actually see Jim and Joe, they being fictional characters. Tony was (he died in 2008) a prolific best-selling author who wrote 18 mysteries featuring Chee and Leaphorn. I’ve read most of them and so has Trish. It’ll be kinda neat to be at the scene of the crime – so to speak.

Gotta hit the sack now so I’m ready to shut down the house and put the pedal to the metal later this AM.

Launch day + 1

Launch day + 1.
It’s Memorial Day weekend and LHC is a major holiday destination for lovers of sun and boating. By 9 AM there were already thousands of boats on the lake, many vying for the prime parking spots along both sides of the channel. The channel was dug so London Bridge would have something to bridge; it’s about a mile long and has nice parks, hotels, restaurants and sidewalks on both sides. The boats, many of them ‘cigarette’ style boats boasting 750+ horsepower, park side by side along both sides of the channel where they can access the onshore services, rest rooms, shade trees, and where they can see and be seen.

Trish and I speculate that the main reason for having one of these loud overpowered expensive boats is to offset having a diminutive penis. Of course, there are plenty of practical reasons, ya gotta have something to haul your beer cooler, lawn chairs and barbie to the park for cripes sakes. So, hundreds of boats are parked shoulder to shoulder, radios blaring, motors revving, young studs in swim trunks and women in bikinis posturing. Now, add a constant stream of boats through the channel and two constant streams of people strolling back and forth on the bordering sidewalks, and you got the picture. It’s draggin’ Broadway, LHC style.

It’s not entirely a mating ritual though; there are plenty of families in the mix. And there are many folks who just stop by for awhile to enjoy the spectacle and hoist a brewski. That includes Trish and me occasionally - cheap entertainment and some of the passing scenery is quite spectacular. “Holy crap, look at the ____on that one!” Insert word of choice in the blank, it’s all there: tattoos, muscles, and paint jobs, boobs, butts and beer bellies.

It’s our last day of trip prep, still much to do and I better get to it.

Launch day + 2

Hooked up the RV to shore power yesterday AM, turned on the fridge and set the A/C. For you landlubbers and non-RVers shore power is AC electricity, as in houses and campground hookups. The fridge needs 24 hours of chill time before you put the food in. And, I turned on the A/C to a low setting; it's forecast to be 100 degrees or so in LHC the next couple days, don't want things melting before we even hit the road.

Today we move stuff from patio to garage: Pancho, Grunt, Barbie, patio furniture, Trish's exercise bike (Q: What's Irish and lives outside, near your back door? A: Paddy O'Furniture). Also, it's RV loading time. My clothes are mostly loaded but Trish's aren't, also gotta load food and all the misc crap we'll need for the next 4 months. Well...not all the crap we'll need but enough to hold us a few days. It's not like we're going to Lower Slobbovia with no grocery stores.

Gotta empty out the home fridge since it will be turned off. Been systematically using up dribs and drabs of condiments, reducing frozen goodies to quantities that will fit in the RV fridge. May end up giving a few items to our 2 elderly widow neighbors - both neat people, by the way.

Most people who leave AZ for the summer seal up their drains and toilets before leaving. Otherwise the water evaporates from the p-traps, allowing sewer gas to come up; yucko! They also leave large containers of water in the tubs and showers to keep things from drying out too much. We'll be leaving the containers of water, but won't need to do the seal up thing cuz we've got a home services outfit coming in twice monthly to flush toilets, run water in all the sinks and drains, and check on things. Adds a little peace of mind.

I've included pix of Pancho, Grunt and Barbie for those who've not met them. You'll be able to figure out who's who I think.

Logbook Setup

Launch day + 4: logbook setup and introduction of crew and equipment.

These are the voyages of the EDGE, its 4-month mission to explore western North America, to seek out scenic places and interesting people, to leisurely go wherever the spirit leads.

EDGE is a travel trailer, a 2010 EDGE M21 by Heartland, to be exact. Our crew includes Mike, pilot/engineer; Trish, navigator/copilot; Ranger, PR manager/security chief. The tow rig is a 2009 Toyota Tacoma crew cab Pre Runner pickup. Equipment pictures are above; crew pictures will be in a later posting.

We launch on May 31st from Lake Havasu City, AZ, and will log about 15000 miles. Our northernmost destination is Fairbanks.

This is the opening logbook entry and introduction to crew and equipment: pretty boring stuff at this point but I promise it will get better so check back later.