THIS ISN'T MINNESOTA

Happy New Year!  This is not the way I was expecting to finish 2014 and to start 2015.  The following pictures show our not so nice weather today.  At least we don't have to get out in it.  We are suppose to go out to dinner with friends tonight, that may get postponed.  Anyway, hope everyone has a nice 2015!

Our bird feeder already has snow build up on the roof.  The Palm trees are blowing in the wind and snow.  The birds are glad to have an easy place to eat this morning.

Snow building up on the ground already.  Probably won't be enough to shovel.

Neighbors orange tree in the snow storm.  Really a contrast to have an orange tree with oranges turning white with snow.

Patrick

Christmas day trip

We took a short trip to the Blue Water casino near Parker, AZ today.  It was a nice sunny day for a drive.  The following pictures are of the first Hummingbird on our feeder and some scenery shots of the trip to Parker.

He/she is getting ready to eat here.  Not sure what the color on the side of the head is.

He/she is chowing down now.  I sure we will see a lot more of the birds now.

This is a shot of the Parker dam from the down river side.  This is the dam that makes the Colorado river into Lake Havasu.

This is the river as it flows on south below the dam.

Just a scenic shot along the road.

 Another scenic shot that also shows some of Lake Havasu just above the dam.  The bridge you can see in the center of the picture is where we eventually get to as we are going home.

A shot of the lake above the Parker dam.   The lake was made by filling up the canyons
with the Colorado river.

Patrick

Trip to AZ

We left last Friday morning at 7:00 a.m. on our way to Lake Havasu City, AZ.  We made excellent time and arrived here at 3:00 p.m. Sunday.  Only had to spend two nights on the road.  Total mileage was 1759 miles.  By the way, we got 18.3 average mpg for the whole trip.  I thought that was very good for the Yukon XL with the size of the load we had in the back, see picture.   The following pictures were taken just before we left and along the way on the trip.

This is a picture from the rear of the vehicle showing how full it was.  Under all that stuff was two sets of golf clubs, two large suit cases, a large tote container that probably weighed over 50 pounds and a lot of other "stuff".

This is a picture from inside the vehicle showing the load in the back.  I could still see out the rear window to check on traffic.

This is a picture in New Mexico showing the wide open country we traveled through.

The road builders had a lot of work to do to get the road through this area.  I would imagine there was a lot of blasting to do the job.

This was the first we saw of the mountains in Arizona with the snow on the top.  You might also notice all the trucks ahead of us.  I-40 is a very heavily traveled road by trucks.

This is another closer shot of the snow capped mountain.

This is a shot of the wide open country west of Flagstaff, AZ

More of the wide open countryside.

Some cliffs along the way.

Our first view of Lake Havasu as we arrive in town.  To bad it wasn't a sunny day.  It was warm.

It was a tiring trip, but we are all settled in and ready for a nice winter.  Hope you have one to.  Happy New Year and the best to all for next year!

Patrick

Happy Birthday, Charles

Today is my oldest brother's 84th birthday.  Since it's too hard for him to leave his house, my sister, Joanne and I made the food and brought it to his house.  His son, Steve, stopped by to join us too. 

 Charles and son, Steve.

 Joanne and Jim (sister and brother-in-law)

 Two Pats

Charles seemed very happy that we remembered him too!