November and December 2012, Apache Junction, AZ
Business on the Dolly Steamboat has been slow and Rex has
not been scheduled to work in November so he has partnered with Charlie, a
handyman in our park. He is keeping busy
washing the outside of park models, doing repairs, building steps and other handyman
stuff. He is enjoying the work and
getting to know a lot more of the park residents.
Tom, a friend of ours, opened the Desert Dwellers Express
this summer and asked Rex to work with him as a conductor during the
winter. This is a trackless train that
provides rides at street fairs, school and church functions, birthday parties,
etc. Rex is enjoying working on the
“train” and even gets to wear his train hat.
Nancy’s mom and dad again joined us for a very nice Thanksgiving dinner sponsored by our park. The park furnished the turkeys and we all brought side dishes. We had a lot of really good food and as always we ate too much!
Rex turned the big “60” on November 27th. Nancy tried to surprise him by having a party
at a restaurant. It is very hard to
surprise Rex and he knew something was up but at least acted surprised when we walked into
the restaurant.
We
all enjoyed a great Italian dinner and Rex's favorite - pineapple upside down cake – here is Rex
with our friends; Pauline, Randy and Wendy.
The balloon says it all!
This year Rex is again leading the Friday hikes in our park. We started hiking the first week in November
and have had great weather except for one day in December we had to cancel
because it was raining.
We went on a hike with group from Superstition Mountain
Museum to the Aravaipa Canyon Wilderness.
This is a wonderful place to hike but, unfortunately, is about 90 miles
from Apache Junction so we will not hike there very often. The hike crossed Aravaipa Creek many times and
we also had to hike in the creek a couple of times. The area was beautiful – lots of green along
the creek and the leaves on the trees full of fall color. There were lots of huge cottonwood and
Sycamore trees along the creek.
After
hiking a couple of miles upstream, we stopped for lunch and enjoyed the
beautiful view.
We really enjoyed the hike and meeting some new people.
As the holidays approached, the Desert Dwellers Express got
pretty busy. Here the train is decorated
for the holidays as they work a street fair.
About the middle of December our park manager offered both
of us part-time positions in the park.
We are now working as camp hosts after the park office closes for the
day and on weekends. We check in campers
who arrive in the evening or on the weekends, show them to their sites, tell
them about the park and area, etc.
After the first of January there will be 3 camp hosts so we will only be
on call every third week. Nancy is also
working 3 days a week in the park office helping out with whatever is
needed. She enjoys the work and the
challenge of learning the computerized reservation system being used here. This is a great way to meet the park
residents that she doesn’t already know.
Rex is also locking up the building at 10 pm every night and doing a
security check. He drives the golf cart
down every street and looks for anything that might be suspicious.
We are both keeping busy with these jobs and Rex is so busy
with the handyman jobs that he decided not to continue working on the Dolly
Steamboat. He hated to give us that job
because he enjoyed it so much but now he doesn’t have to drive 15 miles on a
curvy mountain road to get to work.
Rex was helping Nancy’s dad trim trees at their place when
he fell off the ladder. He received bad
bruises on both his heels, hit the side of his head pretty hard, and scratched
one arm pretty good. He was hobbling
around very gingerly for a week and is slowly getting better. We were concerned that he might have re injured the ankle he fractured in September as it was hurting him some, but
it seems to be getting better. We keep
telling him that now that he is in his 60’s he doesn’t bounce as good as he did
when he was younger!
Wishing everyone a Happy New Year!
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