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Arco, Idaho

Mountain View RV Park and Restaurant. Friendly people. Widely spaced grassy sites. Trees. Birds. Full hookups.

Free mini-golf. Free horseshoes.

Baby robins.


Goats.

Volcanic National Monument full of hiking trails nearby.

Onsite restaurant for dinner. Free pancakes and eggs breakfast for RV Park guests. What’s not to like? Mountain View RV Park and Restaurant in Arco, Idaho. This place is a treasure.

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Rough weather in Colorado

Living in the motorhome, we’re one level closer to what is going on around us. If it rains or the wind blows, we know it right away. Didn’t see this weather coming one night in Colorado. It was after dark when it hit. Here is a video, not for the picture, but for the sound. This is what the storm sounded like on our roof. Marble size hail.

Trees down. Branches stripped bare. Windows blown out. Flooding. 50,000 people without power. Our roof got pounded hard, but nothing got blown out.

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Springville, Utah

  Didn’t look very birdy at first.  Still doesn’t.  Final tally:  13 birds.  Got another year-bird, though.  The California Gull.   Great blue heron Swainson’s hawk Killdeer Black necked stilt California gull Mourning dove Barn swallow American robin European starling Common grackle Great tailed grackle House finch House sparrow    
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Springville, Utah

But now we’ve moved on. West on Interstate 70. Across the Utah Badlands; the San Rafael Swell. 110 miles of no services, but nonstop desolate scenery.

Highway 50 to Interstate 15 north. We’re at an overnight stop at the East Bay RV Park in Utah. (We can’t see any sign of an East Bay from the RV Park.) We got a pull-through spot. (Not all pull-through spots are created equal. We were instructed to park between the lines. To get between the lines, we had to disconnect the car and push it up against the rear of the motorhome.)

The sites are so close together if we put our awning out, it hangs over the neighboring site.

So far, no close neighbors, so everything is working out okay.
1,870 miles into this trip.
Wait! I have a question: If you overeat at dinner, what’s the fastest way back to comfort? Is it better to go for a walk and walk it off, or is it better to go sit on the couch and let your body devote all its energy to digesting?
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Rifle Gap State Park

  Met up with Janis and worked with her a bit.  For all the work Janis has done for us this year, we actually just met her for the first time.  She trained on our software at the Denver office, so some of us had met her, but not Judy and Me.  Janis and her husband Brian are staying here at the state park while she does jobs in the Roaring Fork Valley (Glenwood Springs, Carbondale, Basalt, and Aspen.  It was fun getting to know her.  We’ll meet up again in November when we both attend the conference in Orlando.   Rifle Gap didn’t look like a very birdy place at first, except for the constant drone of hummingbirds exploring every crevice of the coach until we put out the feeders.  The nectar feeder got overwhelmed with hummingbirds; all Black Chinned with the exception of the magnificent amber Rufous Hummingbird flashing himself at us.  The seed feeders got house finches and pine siskins.  A walk in the sage, rabbitbrush, and juniper got vesper sparrows, blue gray gnatcatcher, and black throated gray warbler.  Bluebirds filled the fields.  A gang of fifty pinyon jays blew through the trees.  The lake and inlet got herons, blackbirds, and swallows.  Judy had a Wild Kingdom Moment.  A golden eagle overhead dove on a great blue heron and took it right out of the air.  He ate it on the ground.  There was an immature golden eagle around too.   Altogether we got 36 species: Canada goose Mallard Clark’s grebe Great blue heron Turkey vulture Golden eagle Mourning dove Common nighthawk Black chinned hummingbird Rufous hummingbird Northern flicker Western wood pewee Say’s phoebe Western scrub jay Pinyon jay Black billed magpie Common raven Violet green swallow Northern rough winged swallow Cliff swallow Barn swallow Blue gray gnatcatcher Western bluebird Mountain bluebird American robin Black throated gray warbler Green tailed towhee Chipping sparrow Vesper sparrow Red winged blackbird Western meadowlark Brewer’s blackbird Common grackle House finch Pine siskin American goldfinch