So, Phoenix is one of the warmest places in the US .. not on the few days we stayed there. In fact, Duncan and Mary have lived in the Phoenix area for about three and a half years, and they said that the time we spent there was the coldest/wettest stretch they had ever seen. No matter, this did not dampen our spirits in the slightest. We were just happy to be in a highly civilized environment (house .. and a VERY nice one at that). The trailer does start to wear on you after a while and it is nice to get a little space. Of course, the comforts of a house includes advantages such as very nearby bathrooms, a shower where it is warm when you get out of it, and the usual TV/VCR/access to phone line and internet, e-mail, etc.
We had a very memorable stay. The Glendinnings are such wonderful hosts. Our first meal was a magnificent ham dinner with all the trimmings (and it wasn't even Easter dinner!).
We mostly just hung about while in Phoenix. We probably should have gotten out a bit more and done some of the sights, but we were fairly worn out from a stretch of tent trailering, so we were very laidback. The weather was also a bit cool and rainy (as mentioned above), which did not cause us to want to rush around too much.
On Saturday the weather perked up, everyone was happy because the annual Easter egg hunt could be held just down the street. Breakfast was included (the most wonderful fruit smoothies were served), and the kids had plenty of egg-hunting and eating (afterwards):
When we purchased the trailer back in early January the person who taught us how to set it up and take it down suggested we use the little lock box under the step to store things. In particular, back on that cold Saturday afternoon on Jan. 9 we put in the adapter plug that takes the trailer plug (funny 3-prong plug) to a standard 120V 3-prong plug. Well, when we finally tried to open this little metal door in early February (after our stay in Hilton Head), the lock was corroded and 'frozen' (not literally) shut. Pam and Dave tried almost everything to get that lock undone. We did have to go out and purchase another adapter. Periodically over the time of the trip up until now we would try to unfreeze the lock.
Well, once Duncan found out that we had a problem he determined that we would not leave without giving that lock a try. Now what is very funny is the Glendinnings have almost the exact same trailer (a slightly fancier earlier year model of the same design) in their garage. In fact, as a further aside, they even have a Ford Windstar (like we do) AND a Ford Taurus (again, like we have). All this had been very unintentional, but we got a kick out of our similar tastes. Anyways, back to the story. We applied some special grease that Duncan had. No luck, but the lock might have moved ever so slightly. We then tried high heat! Once I put the key in the lock we got significant movement of the lock, that is until the key snapped off, leaving the main part of the key still 'fried' into the lock. The good news is we could see that we had made progress, so, we got a large screwdriver (remember, the key is still in the lock) and just turned the broken off key and voila, the lock opened! And there was our adapter plug, not really much worse for wear (now we have two). Well, fortunately we had two keys when we bought the trailer so no big problem. As it turns out, the Glendinnings trailer key worked on our trailer as well! Tight security (ha). Well, no big disaster, because I was able to visit the Coleman dealer in the Phoenix area and pick up two more keys to our trailer, so we now end up with a fixed lock box and three keys!
One of the things we really enjoyed at the Glendinnings were their purebred boxers. They own two, Juno and Chaffey (hope I spelled those correctly). Juno is a male and is two years old (right one on picture below) and Chaffey is an eight month old female. This picture includes Corbin (guess which one):
On Sunday we all went to the local baptist church in Chandler and had a nice Sunday brunch at a local restaurant. After a relatively quiet afternoon, we were treated to another wonderful meal .. this time the Easter Sunday dinner (how did we get so lucky to come on the Easter weekend?). Here we all are just prior to digging in:
Well, the Glendinning visit was wonderful. Reba really did not want to go since she made good pals with Brianna (and Kaitlin). But, the Sigler Six must move on in our trek to cover more US ground ... Thank you Duncan, Mary, Brianna, Corbin, and Kaitlin for a wonderful stay!