Thursday was cold and rainy in Fort Stockton…a good day to hunker down inside…but we went out to lunch with Herb instead! Herb took us to Mi Casita in Fort Stockton as it’s his favorite place…ever! We really enjoyed our meals and Michael assured Herb that we’d be going back. More than the meal, we really enjoyed spending more time with Herb…such a good man.
Since we were already out we made a stop at Walmart to pick up a few items that we’ll need while we’re at the Quartzsite RV Show. We won’t have a whole lot of a chance to get out during the show and there isn’t a whole lot of choices when it comes to shopping in Quartzsite either so I’m sure we’ll hit the store again while we’re in Deming, New Mexico.
We had most everything packed up and we were ready to roll first thing this morning. We were up at 6:00 am, giving us plenty of time to ease into the morning and still get everything accomplished before hitting the road.
We had a long day ahead of us so we decided to start the day off with a good breakfast…at the park’s cafe! The cafe opens at 7:30 am and we were there at 7:50 am…a little later than we had planned as Michael got a phone call from a customer just as we were bringing in the slides.
We both ordered the same meals we had the last time we had breakfast here – eggs and pancakes for Michael and eggs with biscuits and gravy for me. Michael’s pancakes were plate sized and nice and fluffy…so tempting that I took a couple of bites too. Good stuff and reasonably priced to boot.
Herb met us for breakfast and also introduced us to a young man who does maintenance at the park and that may do some installs for us. Nice, knowledgeable guy who I think would do well. Would be a handy place RV Park to do some install work as it’s a nice easy on/easy off interstate location.
After breakfast we hitched up and pulled out of the Fort Stockton RV Park about 8:45 am, while dropping our trash off in the dumpster on the way out of the park.
We heard a strange sound when we brought in the off-door side slide…like something shattering. Yikes! Upon investigation we found a bunch of shattered ice on the ground next to the coach. After yesterdays rain and last night cold temperatures…the rainwater that had accumulated on the slide awning had frozen and gotten pushed off when the slide came in.
I made sure to take my laptop with me into the truck so that I could get some work done while we drove…why put it off, eh? I needed to put together a couple of orders from our vendors for nuts, bolts, screws etc so that our warehouse guys can put together some more install kits (they’ve been flying off the shelf lately) and Michael made a call to our vendor who makes our actuator brackets.
While the scenery of west Texas is kind of desert-ish and blah (according to some of our readers…LOL) I still find it mesmerizing and couldn’t resist taking a couple of pictures to share.
We missed a rest area exit as Michael was on the phone with a new distributor and neither of us were paying attention. Thankfully, just a few exits further there was a Lives so we made a quick pit stop and back on the road quickly.
About 50 miles outside of El Paso, Michael saw a discoloration in sky ahead of us. We couldn’t make out what it was but as we got closer we could tell it was moving…kind of pulsating.
We stopped at Kelly’s Kitchen for lunch…it had been awhile! A little too chilly to sit outside, we opted to eat indoors. We cranked up the generator and turned on the fireplace and got the inside of the coach nice and toasty. We sat back in our recliners and enjoyed a leisurely lunch. Just an easy, quick sandwich and chips was the special of the day. We relaxed for about an hour before getting back on the road about 12:20 pm MST.
I took a little time, during today’s drive, to look at our route on the way back from Quartzsite and finalized a few stops – pretty much just retracing our path…stopping at several of the same parks for overnights.
We pulled into the Roadrunner RV Park in Deming, New Mexico a few minutes after 3:00 pm and got checked in quickly. We found our site easily enough and got pulled in and unhitched pretty quickly. Set up went fairly easily except for Michael having to argue with the satellite dish for quite a while…it was really touchy.
While Michael and the satellite dish went a few rounds I got dinner ready (taco dip!) and got things squared away inside.
We are set up in site 69 for five nights. We hope to do a little bit of touristy stuff while we’re here and, of course, will be working and getting geared up for the Quartzsite Show.
The first time I was in Deming, New Mexico was roughly 32 years ago. Michael was stationed at Ft. Bliss (El Paso) on his first duty station and was on a field exercise for a week or so. My great-aunt Claire (my birthday buddy) and great-uncle Erv (funniest guy ever) were living in Deming as full-time RVers – they had a small Minnie Winnie.
19-year-old me decided to drive to Deming from El Paso to go and see them since Michael was gone. I had never driven 100 miles by myself..let alone in uncharted territory. I made it in one piece, had a nice visit with my favorite aunt and uncle, spent the night (in the over the cab bed) and headed back home in the morning. I honestly don’t remember a whole lot about the visit…but it’s a good memory nonetheless.