Tuesday May, 10, 2016 Clifton, AZ

Up early and got the coffee made.  I spent some time with computer chores and re planning parts of our tip.  We have to swing by Kevin's in Celina, OH for some repairs and also want to get to Kyle a day earlier than originally planned.

The view from a cache in the Blackjack campground

In the late morning I went geocaching.  I did a virtual downtown  to make my first in Greenlee County.   I then drove north on AZ-78 toward Alpine which is in Apache County.  I found a cache in a Park Service Campground about 13 miles from Clifton.  The highway went into New Mexico before getting to Alpine, so I turned back.  I looked for a cache near a landfill in a community called Loma Linda, with no luck.

Mines in the distance

I went back to the coach to pick up Gerri and look around the area.  This is a great little RV park but there isn't a lot to do after seeing some of the old downtown and the pit mine to the north.

While I was gone Gerri got some pictures of the RV and some birds in the trees across the street.

We drove around town and saw the jail in a cliff near the railroad station and the flood gates.  I remember flood gates from West Virginia when I was a kid.  I didn't know there were any left, let alone in Arizona.  The manager of the park told me that the gates are tested every month.  The last time they were used during an actual flood was 2003.  It was a reminder of one of my childhood fears, being caught on the wrong side of the flood gates.

We headed north on US-191.  The road has vehicle size restrictions, both length and height that prohibit our coach from going in that direction.  The highway actually goes through the Morensi pit mine.  Huge mountains dug away into huge pits in the ground.  The mining area went on for miles.

We returned to the coach  after going by the Greenlee County Court House.  Built in 1911.

A view of a flag display from the court house

This shovel was used from 1959 to 1984

Back at the coach I drained the holding tanks and took on a little more fresh water. I also cleaned the windshield.

Gerri warmed up our left overs from La Fonda in Flagstaff and prepared a dish from my left over steak from Black Bart's.  An excellent meal and some more left overs of the re purposed steak.

We have made new travel plans.  We now plan to by-pass the stop in El Paso.  We will drive enough the next two days to make it to Kyle in time for Vanessa's ball game on Thursday evening.