A drive to Alpine

Our friends from Venture Out, Don and Linda, had told us that they previously stayed in a campground in Alpine during the summers -- they had talked about how pretty it was around there, so we decided to take a drive there from Show Low.

Don suggested that we take the route from Show Low through Pinetop-Lakeside -- the drive took us to higher elevations... 

Pine forests with very clear understories

It appears that there have been fires through this area in not too distant past.

There were also broad meadows. I think that this is still considered to be high desert, but there were shallow lakes and cautions about flash flooding in places.

We ate at the Bear Wallow Cafe and enjoyed our lunch!

Looking down the main drag in Alpine

On the way back, we took a less scenic part of the loop, heading north out of Alpine -- the land looked much more like desert...

This is along US-60 heading west back toward Show Low -- we were almost to the New Mexico border when we started heading back west. In this area, very low grasses and shrubs...

As we continued west, larger shrubby-type trees.

We enjoyed the drive -- it was about 3 hours of driving with a few stops along the way.

Sights in the sky

We're always looking for interesting things to see in the sky... recently, two planets, Jupiter and Venus, appeared to be close to each other in the sky...

We didn't get the tripod out, but the picture still came out pretty good.

I think the information I read indicated that the two planets were 1.2 degrees away from each other -- appearing to be separated by about the width of your index finger when held at arm's length away from your eye. They were closest together on 6/9, I think, but will probably still be close over the next few nights.

Meeting up with friends

We met up with friends from the Venture Out Amateur Radio Club who are also in Show Low for the summer. The local Ham Radio Club had its meeting on Tuesday evening,

... so we met at Cattleman's Steakhouse for supper before the meeting.

We got steaks and prime rib and good side dishes, and enjoyed the company!

Games night

On a recent Sunday night, we participated in "Games night", hosted by the Venture In Chapel. There were various games available - bocce ball, cornhole, ladder golf, ping pong... we elected to try Wii Bowling...

We played with two other ladies -- it seemed that setting up the names of players could take a while, but we decided to just use player names that were already set up!

Look at that follow-through!

It is interesting to do bowling on the Wii -- you position where you want to be on the approach to the lane by moving pointers around, and then deliver the ball. Once you find the correct approach position for your delivery, I found it pretty easy to be consistent. And, you're not lugging around a 10+ pound ball, rather just swinging your arm with this controller in it -- you release the button when you want to release the ball -- both Carl and I lofted the ball a number of times -- in a real bowling alley, we would have gotten angry looks from the management! Thankfully, on the TV screen, the alley did not seem to get any damage!

Exercise at Venture In

Similar to our experience at Venture Out, many of the activities at Venture In are volunteer / resident driven. There are morning exercise options 4 days a week -- Monday and Friday we "Walk off the Pounds" with a video by Leslie Sansone (one of the residents takes on the responsibility of getting the DVD into the machine and getting it started), and Wednesday and Saturday we have "Chair Yoga". 

Chair yoga also is a video that we watch and follow. 

We find that it gives us good stretches, a good complement to the more aerobic "Walking off the Pounds".

We like this particular implementation of yoga as it does not have a lot of religious or meditation aspects to it. Being that it is "chair" yoga, we are either sitting or using the chair for balance most of the time, so it is also safer for seniors.

Carl says that, as we age, our bodies tend to just want to curl up in a fetal position and we have to combat that as much as we can!

On Tuesdays and Thursdays we have line dancing -- which exercises our minds (trying to remember the steps) as well as our muscles!

There aren't as many activities here at Venture In as we experience during the season at Venture Out, but it is enough to keep us busy without making us feel like we have to rush from one activity to another! 

Sunday pot luck at the park (and Happy Birthday, Carl!)

On Sunday morning, we joined the Venture In Chapel for Sunday morning chapel service. They were then going to have a pot luck in the evening,

Our contribution was Eclair Cake -- Carl does an amazing job of putting the frosting on the top!

The pot luck was sponsored by Venture In Chapel, but everyone in the park was invited. We enjoyed meeting some of our fellow residents and eating delicious food!

And a picture of a cake is a great reminder to say "Happy Birthday, Carl!" -- since today is his birthday!

Saturday night "barn dance"

The folks at the White Mountain Square Dance Hall had arranged for a "Hot Dog Barbecue and Fun Dance" on Saturday night. It was a free event, and Jenn, the president of the White Mountain Rim Rompers Square Dance Club said that it would be like a "barn dance", so we decided to go.

Jenn and her husband, Blake, welcomed us to the event. Blake would be calling the dances -- not square dances, but other round dances, country dances, and folk dances.

The event was hosted by the White Mountain Rim Rompers, who, I guess, own the dance hall, or at least run a lot of the events held there.

Circled up to try a circle dance. It had a lot of calls like a square dance, so we were lucky that there were a number of square dancers in the group who knew the lingo and could help those of us with less knowledge!

"Allemande Left your corner!"

The Virginia Reel (we didn't do it quite the same as I remember learning it in school in Virginia when I was a child, but it had a lot of similarities).

We are finding this group of folks are very nice and welcoming. The dance hall does not sell food or drink (other than that they do sell bottles of water for $1); you are allowed to bring your own drink (non-alcoholic, and no drugs allowed). For the Friday night dances, people bring snacks to share and they are all placed on the counter at the kitchen for all to enjoy. For this Saturday night event, they provided hot dogs with all the fixin's (including chili), beans, watermelon, lemonade, and cake and probably other things that I'm forgetting!