Smoked Cream Cheese

We made smoked cream cheese for another pot luck while in Quartzsite and this time I got a picture of the final product:

Doesn't that look good? And doesn't it remind you of salmon?

It was all eaten at the second pot luck too... we like to have leftovers of what we serve (so we can enjoy later), but it is also nice to know that we have provided something that fellow participants also like!

Sunsets in the desert

We often have beautiful sunsets while in Quartzsite -- they weren't quite as magnificent this year, but still were nice!

From Sunday night -- we had clear skies most of our first days so the sunsets weren't as interesting.

Monday...

10 minutes later on Monday...

Yet another 10 minutes later on Monday.

Tuesday looked like a pathway to heaven!

Wednesday was again mostly clear...

... but we also enjoyed a campfire and viewed the International Space Station as it flew by.

Having the ability to see the full sky without buildings or trees makes us appreciate it even more!

Some pictures from our SKP Christian Fellowship gathering

We always enjoy getting together with our friends at the Christian Fellowship Rally near Quartzsite...

Pastor Jerry faithfully led us in the study of James each morning.

We enjoyed potlucks!

James and Amanda with two of their children and another friend led us in worship one morning.

Our group!

One afternoon, James and Amanda along with their children (minus the youngest who was busy with a nap on a convenient lap) provided a concert. James' mom and dad, Nancy and Bob, with friends the Fasts, also shared in song.

What a blessing!

SKP Christian Fellowship parking area in the desert

While I was on the roof of the RV, I took some pictures of our fellow SKP Christian Fellowship RVs in the desert...

Looking west...

... a little north...

... and east.

We are grateful to have this part of the desert to meet up with our Christian brothers and sisters!

Oh no! Fire! (thankfully not anything of ours)

On Sunday afternoon, we saw black smoke coming from a spot in the desert about a mile away...

I climbed up on the roof to try to see better -- we figured the black smoke meant that it was an RV fire.

 I searched for information on Facebook...

From someone closer to the vehicle involved... 

Aftermath

Evidently there was an RV fire at New Years too, also close to the area where we are parked -- these pictures were shared on Facebook...

At the time of the fire

Aftermath of the New Years fire

Another view of the aftermath

For the fire that we saw on Sunday, there was no one in the rig and no one was injured (no people, no pets -- the owner was in town at the time of the fire and came home to his rig destroyed). For the New Years fire, we have heard that a man and his puppy were killed.

Fires in RVs are very fast and there isn't much that can be done to fight them. Depending on where it starts, you may not have enough time to escape. It is scary, but we try to be as prepared as possible (fire extinguishers, escape plans). 

Sharing meals in the desert

We get together with our Christian Fellowship Group for Bible Study each day, and usually for a meal of some kind. On Saturday, Nancy had scheduled "Burn your own" for the evening meal, asking us to each cook our own meat, and bring it along with a side that we would eat together. 

Since we would need to have to grill going to "burn our own" (hamburgers), we decided to fire up the smoker and fix smoked cream cheese.

I was scoring the top of the cream cheese with a knife, and then sprinkled a rub seasoning over each block (we did two blocks with Sriracha & Onion, and two blocks with a garlic and brown sugar seasoning).

Carl smoked them for about two hours, and then we took the cheese off and used the smoker to cook our burgers as well as brats for a fellow attendee at the rally who did not have a grill.

No pictures of the completed cheese -- it is always funny when we bring this as people initially think that it is salmon. It seemed to be popular as there was none remaining at the end of the meal time!

Our spot at Plomosa Road BLM

Our SKP Christian Fellowship Rally is held in the desert outside Quartzsite, Arizona, at a spot near mile marker 2.2 along Plomosa Road on Bureau of Land Management land.

We parked near the end of our group with views behind us of mountains to the south and east...

So pretty with the setting sun painting the hills pink!

It is always a blessing to join with our Christian brothers and sisters!