Stan and Connie Spielbusch's Web Site

StanAndConnie.com

December 2001 to May 2002

December, 2001

Mesa, Arizona

Now we've made it to Mesa. Although it's a really busy city here, the RV resort is great and we expect to really enjoy our stay. Connie is excited about the orange (or tangerine?) tree on our lot. Every lot seems to have one, and they're bearing fruit already even though they're pretty small (since we're in the new section of the resort). We seem to have beat most of the snowbirds here so it's pretty quiet on our street for now, which is just fine by us.

Sunsets in the desert can be really spectacular.

In the older section of the resort, the orange trees are more established and the fruit is plentiful. Connie is really envious and drooling!

There are plenty of things to see and do in the Phoenix area, but we'll be taking our time. I've plenty of work to catch up on and there are a number of activities here in the park that we hope to take part in, so I expect to be pretty busy this winter!

January to May, 2002

Winter in Arizona

Although we had only planned to stay 3 months, our stay was extended to 5 months in the same place. This was mainly so we could get some much-needed work done, but the weather has been so great and we like it here so much, we didn't mind a bit! After all, "Fulltiming" doesn't mean you have to travel all of the time -- it means being able to stay in nice places as long as you like, then move on to another nice place.

Most people think of the Phoenix area as hot, hot, hot. But November through March, it can get pretty chilly, especially at night. The typical day starts at about 45-50 degrees, and rises to the 70's or 80's (in March) in the afternoon. Even then, it can feel cool in the shade, with a nice breeze blowing. April and May start getting warmer, into the 90's in the afternoon, but now we know what they mean by a "dry heat". Basically the temperature is just right for anyone, at least part of the day -- you just try to go outside at the right time!

March is also a good time to see the cactus bloom all over the place:

(Click photos to enlarge)

By the way, many people don't realize that Arizona does not partake in daylight savings time. So we're actually on pacific time in the summer instead of mountain time.

Unfortunately we didn't get much sight-seeing done this year because of work. But there are plenty of activities to do at the resort, and we had time to do some things for fun. Connie joined the "Songbirds", a ladies' signing group which practices every week and has concerts. Connie didn't join the concert because she didn't feel like she was ready this year, but she did go with the group to sing at a nursing home. She also took a Spanish class, joined the ladies for coffee occasionally, and exercised in the mornings with the "Aquabelles", a water aerobics group. This all kept her pretty busy.

Meanwhile, I made good use of the lapidary shop to make things out of the rocks (umm, I mean semi-precious stones) that I collected on the way here. It was my first time doing this kind of craft, and I really enjoyed it and learned a lot. For one thing, I learned that the diamond-coated grinding wheels work great on the stones and won't grind the skin of your fingers at all, but they do grind fingernails real well. Oops.

Here are a few examples of my lapidary work... A mushroom and little mountain-on-a-lake scene, and various "cabs" and teardrop pendants with a heart for Connie (my Valentine's day gift :-):

Along with the traditional assortment of pot luck dinners, pancake breakfasts and ice cream socials, they also have an annual parade. It's a park-wide event, with all sorts of vehicles from horses and bikes to golf carts and cars. Various clubs make floats and presentations, and there are some "guest" entries like junior high school jump-ropers, ROTC weapons exercises (gun-twirling), and interesting floats like this horse made out of horseshoes:

Here are some of the other interesting parade entries:

Biosphere 2

Our one sightseeing excursion was a trip to the Biosphere near Tucson. Unfortunately we made the mistake of thinking "Desert, sun, high 70's...dress cool". We didn't know that the Biosphere is in high country. It was extremely windy and in the 50's at best, and cloudy. Half of the tour is outside, so that part was pretty miserable.

Even so, it was worth seeing. The engineering behind it is amazing, and even though the original project is long over and wasn't the success they had hoped, the Biosphere complex is constantly in use by the University researchers.

It's pretty impressive on the outside, but even more amazing on the inside. They have several individual sections with different climates -- a rain forest, a desert, an ocean, a swamp, and more. Below you can see the desert area and the indoor ocean.

While each section is relatively small, it's as authentic as you can get. The desert soil was brought in from a desert, and the ocean water was trucked in from the ocean. The ocean has transplanted ocean life, a beach, and they can even make waves just about any size they want. They have an "underground" viewing area for the ocean where one whole side of it is glass so you can see into it.

Another unique feature is the "lung" (actually 2 of them).

Each lung is a huge dome with a bladder -- when the air gets hot in the biosphere, it expands into the lung. As it cools down, the lung pushes the air back into the biosphere. No pumps or fans are used, it's all done with gravity and air pressure. However, there are huge air conditioners that keep the air to a reasonable temperature (after all it is a giant greenhouse in the desert). If it wasn't for the tours, they could keep the environment completely sealed (as it was in the beginning). It's even sealed off from the ground -- the entire complex has a stainless steel floor, so nothing from the local environment can get in through the soil.

Anyway, that was our "excitement" for the winter. Now we're headed for Las Vegas for a couple weeks, and then will continue north to cooler weather.

Thank you for visiting our travel site. Please visit our other sites too:

Campground Master -- A tracking program for your campground or inn. Easy to use and learn, but modern and powerful. One of the most inexpensive systems, great for small campgrounds. Designed by campground owners and full-time RVers.

MysteryPhotos -- Every week a new photo is shown, which may be a close-up of something, or a section of a common object or sight. Guess what it is and you might win a prize. Lots of fun for the whole family! Free screensaver and wallpaper too.

Awesome Screen Savers -- Cool photographic screen savers of the highest quality, for Windows PC's. Download FREE Lite versions of them all. Some are created with photos from our travels, some are awesome photos from NASA. (Contact me to have a screen saver made with your own photos!)

Cottonwood Software -- My shareware business site, currently featuring File-Ex 98: a Windows 95/98 dialog enhancement tool. Great for people who work with a lot of files.

Free -n- Cool -- Tons of Freebies, Giveaways, and Cool Sites -- all in one! You'll find a large selection of free samples you can get mailed to you, free games, screen savers, internet services, etc., plus hundreds of contests of all types, and a unique "intensely cool sites" list.