03-2010 Leaving Tucson Arizona

What I thought was going to be a week of winding down has turned out to be a whirlwind of activity before heading out on the road again.  For those of us who travel in our campers, whether full time or part time, anytime we stay in an area for more than a couple of weeks, we often get to know our neighbors and fellow Rv’ers.  The hard part then is leaving all these new friends.

Monday brought friends together for a Mexican shrimp boil.  Kathy and Randy had purchased fresh shrimp from Rocky Point, Mexico and decided to share it with half a dozen of us.  Glad I was included.

To ease the leaving a bit, Christine and Tom organized a tour of a local open pit copper mine.  Our tour guide had a most unusual cadence to his voice, causing much of what he said to blur from one sentence into the next.  I sat in the back of the bus between tour stops and at one point the guide was describing the holding tanks where the copper is separated from the chemical liquids.  I piped up that all I could see was a green out house, as the driver had parked right in front of it.  Everyone in the back of the bus began to snicker and giggle.  May as well have fun eh.  Amazing the amount of stone and rubble that has to be removed, crushed and separated to obtain a pound of copper.  The mine operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and is one of the better paying jobs in the area.

On Wednesday I attended my last Writers Club meeting and heard more great stories from many folks who have been writing for more years than I can claim.  Great inspiration to continue my quest  to write better stories for you to read.

Thursday, Chris and Tom and Laurel organized a Farewell party for me.  Gosh what a huge crowd of fellow campers that came out to wish me well on my journey.  Tom said by the end of  March when they leave, they will have gone to over a half a dozen of these get-to-gethers.   We campers do like to party and what better excuse to get together  than sending our new friends off on another adventure in life.

The campfire was lit, the tables were filled with snacks, appetizers and drinks.  The conversations were flowing.  All making it harder and harder to say good bye.

I’ll attend a going away party lunch today as well as a dinner party tomorrow evening and then I head out.

Dropped by a McDonnell’s  today and saw a number of young boarder patrol officers ordering breakfast before heading out on their patrols.  The driver of the Wackenhut bus, a commercial bus operator,  that transports all the illegal’s back across the boarder was also in line.  The young clean cut white boarder guards looked happy to be doing their jobs.  One of them said on a good day they catch about 1,000 illegal’s coming into the U.S.

I dropped in a bit late to the photography club.  One of the last questions asked, was directed at a picture I had taken in Ruby, the ghost town we had gone to the other week.  The photographer asked how I captured the image of the kids slide so well.  I described how I often go around a particular scene taking a number of pictures along the way.  When I saw the slide, I already had an image in my mind of the composition I wanted to capture.  That being the slope of the mountain mimicking the slope of the slide.  When I finally was positioned correctly to capture the image, it all just fell into place.  It was also important to make sure the kids slide was not obstructed by anything, hence the angle of the slide so that it appeared above the slope of the mountain.  The photography club has really helped me in composing a picture.

I’m hoping to be able to capture many more great images to share with you.