Wednesday

On Wednesday....

We stopped by to see our friend, Gayle's, "catio" -- you may be able to barely see Frosty peeking out the window, but he was too shy to come out while we were there.

We enjoyed the annual CARE auction, a brown-bag auction that benefits CARE (Continuing Assistance for Retired Escapees - https://www.escapees.com/community/c-a-r-e/) in Livingston.

We also enjoyed a baked potatoes and sides potluck, a walk in the evening, and a campfire at night. Unfortunately, network speed has now also slowed to a crawl in the mornings... so I cannot get any more pictures to upload!

Tuesday

On Tuesday, we enjoyed a morning walk with some of the folks with whom we are camping, morning devotions, and made soup for our evening soup potluck...

A view of the hills to the east while we were enjoying potluck..

... lots of good soups and sides...

... and desserts!!!

Good times!

In past years, another Escapees chapter, the Solos, have camped in the desert in the area next to where we park. They usually have quite a large group of folks who RV by themselves (solo), but this year, there are only a few folks in their encampment. A couple of nights ago, one of the fellows came up when we were having the evening campfire, and Nancy invited him and them to join us if they want for any activities. So, last night a few of the Solos joined us.

In the past, we have made biscuits and gravy on the Thursday morning of the rally and invited the Solos, but, we aren't planning to make biscuits and gravy this year... though we do plan a breakfast potluck tomorrow. It is nice that the Solos feel comfortable joining in with us with the activities that we are doing.

After supper, Carl and I went on another walk -- the sunset was SO beautiful. I know that my blog readers get tired of sunset pictures, but... well... here are the sunset pictures from Tuesday night:

 

God's Masterpieces!

On Monday

Monday allowed us to have devotions in the morning, and in the afternoon we had "Ain't it great? Visit with 8!" where we got together with 4-8 folks and just talked and got to know each other. No planned meals together so it felt a little more relaxing for folks like me who are preparation-challenged with potlucks!

Sunset Monday evening.

We went for a "walkabout" on Tuesday morning...

...when we got back, Miss Kitty was enjoying the sun on the front dash again...

... she likes the sun!

She looked like she was going to fall over while sleeping sitting up, but she never did!

 

We are using our solar panels to help keep the batteries charged, and running the generator when we need to use the stovetop or oven, but we haven't been able to get the batteries up to full charge. Yesterday, we tried turning off the inverter during the day so no loads would go against the batteries from 110V and solar got us up to 91% charged. The last part of the charging, when it gets to float charge, seems to take forever. In Miss Doozie, we could count on the house batteries getting fully charged when we were driving as we had a huge alternator, but that isn't a given with Gracie. We'll need to figure out the right combination (maybe more panels) to get the batteries fully charged at least every 3-4 days if we're going to do more boondocking.

Sunday in the desert

Some pictures from Saturday and Sunday...

Meet 'n' Greet time... some of the folks...

...some more of the folks...

Nancy sharing about some of the things that will be coming up in the next few days.

Saturday sunset

Sunday morning worship...

Singing

Pastor Gary sharing on, "Who will go? Whom shall we send?" 

"Will you go to the RV next to you and tell them that Jesus loves them?"

After Pastor's teaching and communion, we had some time to fellowship...

... and more fellowship...

... and yet more fellowship!

When we got back to Gracie, Miss Kitty was absorbing Vitamin D on the front dash!

In the afternoon, we enjoyed a Facebook Live concert by the Baleyat Family ... They had one song that had us all responding with hands up in the air like pulling a train whistle, "whoo whoo!"

We were blessed that Gracie has an outdoor TV - so we could hook up a computer to the display and watch and hear out in the beautiful weather!

On our walk in the evening, the sunset was a fire in the sky...

... with beautiful pinks reflecting on the mountains to the east.

When we got back from our walk, there was a campfire going...

... so we enjoyed being around the fire for a while.

Beautiful colors both in the east...

... and in the west!

It seems like the days are going so fast! 

Our UnRally Begins

Our UnRally began on Saturday with Meet 'n' Greet, group photo, and potluck with chili.

Carl figured out how to set up his camera for a timed photo - so he managed to be in the picture too!

We look forward to worship and a concert specially for us done by the Baleat Family from Missouri via a Facebook Live session today!

We are missing friends who are not with us... particularly a couple of couples who have stayed in Ohio this year...

And... another anniversary to celebrate today: 6 years ago today at this same event in Quartzsite, we first met as couples -- Carl and Sue and Dwayne and Patti. Carl and Dwayne and Patti had all retired from our working careers in 2014 and we were all on our first big trips in our RVs after retirement. How glad we are that God brought us to meet each other at that time!

2021 Escapees Christian Fellowship UnRally

Saturday is the official start of the 2021 Escapees Christian Fellowship UnRally. 

The speed of the internet in the evening has gotten really poor, so I'm going to try to post in the mornings -- so the information will be from the previous day.

Our sign at the "entrance" from Plomosa Road. The red rocks are the "sign" for another group who are parking further in from where we are.

We are in an area commonly referred to as a 14-day area...

The rules...

We need to register with a host for this area, but when we stopped in there, the sign outside their RV said "Host OFF". Other folks that we are camping with have gone down several times with no success at finding the host "ON"... we plan to try going down today to try to get registered.

We look forward to planned activities (meet-n-greet and dinner) starting this afternoon! It is wonderful to be with our friends.

*And* this is our engagement anniversary -- one year ago, Carl asked Patti to marry him and she said "Yes!".

Quartzsite day 2 pre-Christian Fellowship unRally

We did not get a real early start on Friday... but... we were watching to see if the solar panels were keeping up with the loads we were running in the rig -- and we found that they were not...

... so we raised the panels and they collected a lot more solar energy through the main part of the day.

Meanwhile, Miss Kitty was employing her own solar collection panels!