Steve and Judy's Travels!

Off through Monument Valley. On to southern Utah. Stopped early to watch
football. Go Broncos! ***
We can always get an elevation reading from the copilot. Except the whole
time we were in California, the copilot thought we were fifty feet below sea
level. Guess it needs a calibration. ***
What a difference a state makes. Diesel in Needles was $2.60. We drove ten
miles across the border into Arizona and bought it for $2.02. Must be the
difference in gas tax. Seems like a lot of people in Needles would drive
across the border and pay gas tax to Arizona.

Off through Monument Valley. On to southern Utah. Stopped early to watch
football. Go Broncos! ***
We can always get an elevation reading from the copilot. Except the whole
time we were in California, the copilot thought we were fifty feet below sea
level. Guess it needs a calibration. ***
What a difference a state makes. Diesel in Needles was $2.60. We drove ten
miles across the border into Arizona and bought it for $2.02. Must be the
difference in gas tax. Seems like a lot of people in Needles would drive
across the border and pay gas tax to Arizona.

Headed north. Passed the town of Hope. Of course, on the other side of
town was the sign, “You’re beyond Hope now.” Highway 89 north from Congress
is a slow road. The surface is good, but it is scenic. 20 mph road, all
the way to Prescott. Very scenic desert mountains. Advisories posted for
vehicles over 40 feet in length to turn around and go back. No problem for
us. We’re 39′ 10″ (plus the tow car). No problem. Prescott is a mountain
town. Beautiful setting. It’s all weathered granite and pinon pine. It a
bigger town than we expected. Kept moving. Still north. Stopped for the night at Sunset Crater National
Monument. Saw a stellar’s jay. That’s it. One stinking stellar’s jay.
Beautiful campground. No birds. A pine tree forest. Black volcanic
cinders on the ground. No brush. An open forest. Nothing on the ground
but pine needles. 7,000 feet. What a difference a day makes. Same state.
Ninety-five degrees yesterday in the low desert. Twenty-nine degrees this
morning in the high desert. When we first got here, we asked for a bird list. We always do that just in
case. Sometimes we get lucky, and they have one. We asked. They looked
all around. They said they had one but couldn’t find it. By the time we
left, I could have volunteered to write the bird list for them. Stellar’s
Jay. One bird.

A really interesting thing happened. Well, it’s really interesting to me,
anyway. My blood pressure dropped 30 points. 30 points! I’ve been
struggling with the blood pressure issue for the last few years.
Unmedicated, my blood pressure was 150 over 100. I agreed that was too
high, but I didn’t like any of the blood pressure medicines. In some way,
each one interfered with my life. Well, things change. Now my blood
pressure averages 130 over 70. Unmedicated. Haven’t had a pill in months. So what happened? That’s not a question to you, that’s a question to me. I
don’t know. I haven’t done anything specifically designed to change my
blood pressure. There is an interesting coincidence with the change in my
work habits, however. The drop in blood pressure has occurred since we
started this mobile office, life on the road thing. That could be a factor. There are a couple other coincidences as well. Racquetball is gone. I
didn’t get tired of it; it just doesn’t work on the road. Not at the places
we stay while we’re out. We always look for more remote places to stay.
Racquetball is a lot of exercise, but it’s a high-energy, burst kind of
activity. Not a slow steady aerobic exercise. Since I don’t play
racquetball anymore, I run. Maybe a slow steady twenty-minute aerobic
exercise every day makes a difference. Then there is diet. We have changed the way we eat in the last year. I
discovered the cause of food-fades. My food-fades are related to blood
sugar. Protein and fat don’t have much effect on blood sugar. It’s all
about the carbohydrates. Particularly, it’s all about complex
carbohydrates. It’s easy to make the connection with sugar. High sugar
stuff makes my head buzz. It was harder to figure out complex
carbohydrates. Complex carbohydrates, like bread and pasta are supposed to
be the building blocks of a healthy diet, but they can produce a glycemic
reaction just like sugar in the blood stream when they digest. Eliminate
the starchy complex carbohydrates, and my food issues go away. I just feel
good all the time. Maybe the change in diet does more than just make me
feel better. I doubt that weight is much of a factor. With the change in diet, a few
pounds fell off. Not a significant percentage change, not much more than
5%, but that couldn’t hurt, either. Whatever the reason, I’m delighted with the change. Avoiding any kind of
medicine is a good thing.

Morning bird walk. Got to listen to the quail and see a roadrunner.
Bendire’s thrasher. Just like the curve billed thrasher, but it’s smaller,
with a slightly different habit, and without the sharp whistle call. This
has been the most productive birding trip for us in years. An eighteen-bird
walk this morning. 332 on the life list. I’ve been reading a wonderful book about birding: called the Big Year. I
don’t usually take the time for “sport reading”, so this is a real treat.
It’s a fun account of how crazy people can be. People record their
life-lists, and see how many birds they can get. Some people embark on a
Big Year, and see how many birds they can get in a year. We’re talking
about a North American Big Year. North America is carefully defined. North
of the Mexico border, and no more than 200 miles offshore. For a Big Year,
you need to be in the seven hundreds to get any attention. That’s more
birds than are normally found in North America. You have to spot rarities.
You have to chase birds. You have to tune in to the rare bird alert, and go
on a moment’s notice. We have a Big Day so far. Our Big Day is eighty-five birds.