A little house cleaning and a trip to the Arizona wine country

We spent another quiet day here in the Southwest. It was a welcome respite from the hectic pace of the last few days during the reunion.

After a leisurely wake up, we had our breakfast (cookie and tea for me, cookie and coffee for Joan) and then I finished a project I had started yesterday, the outside washing of the trailer. I use a wash and wax mixture and with the RV park’s permission I cleaned a month’s worth of road dust off the Laredo.

It looks 100 percent better, especially with the absence of the bugs off the front of the trailer. Most parks do not allow rig and car washing on site, but the rules here specifically allow it. Not sure, I went to the office just to double check.

“We own the water,” the office receptionist said. “Use all you need.”

Dos Cabezas Winery

Anyway, with temperatures predicted to rise into the high 90s, I got about the washing and waxing early to avoid the high heat of the day. On Thursday I did the half of the trailer that was in the shade in the afternoon and today I did the other half early enough that I didn’t get roasted.

After finishing the washing, I washed all the outside windows as they were streaked from the soap and water I used to wash the trailer.

In the afternoon, we made the wine tasting trip that we try to make everywhere we stop for any length of time. Remarkably, there are several wineries in and around Tucson.

Kief-Joshua Winery

We chose four, but found that one of them was closed, literally because the owner had “gone fishing.”

Joan found a bottle of wine at Dos Cabezas Winery in Sonoita, another bottle she liked at Keif-Joshua Wineries nearby, but hit the jackpot when she found three wines she really, really liked at the Charron Winery just off I-10 near Sonoita.

Charron was off the beaten path on a rough dirt road, but its 20 acres of vines apparently produce a product that Joan really likes.

Charron Winery

I would have had more pictures, but SOMEONE forgot the camera today. That SOMEONE, would be me.

On the way home we got stopped in a random U.S. Border Patrol check point on Highway 83. This occurred about 50 miles north of the Mexican border and only took us a few extra seconds to be cleared through. Good to know the Border Patrol is on the job.

We also thought about the boyfriend of a friend's daughter who is down here somewhere training to be a Border Patrol agent.

The agents peeked in our open windows determined we were not bringing any extra garden help home with us and waved us on our way.

We arrived home from the wine adventure about 5 p.m. and sat down to the leftovers from Cousin Cynthia’s Taco Soup, which is really good. It was one of those meals that you are sorry when it’s all gone.
The heat is expected to return here tomorrow and we may hang close to home and watch a little football game, the Michigan State University versus Michigan annual rivalry contest.

As the days wind down we both find ourselves beginning to yearn for home a little, although we really love the Tucson area and have an appointment on Monday to talk to the property managers here about how their long term rentals and park model purchases work. We’re not anywhere near ready to settle in one place, but each of our trips is a kind of an audition for where we might like to land in the future.

Obviously, the audition for Tucson has gone very well.