Waiting in Ajo, Arizona.

At Ajo Heights RV Park we soon got parked, leveled and connected. Art poured himself a large whisky while Gillian walked the dogs. She then walked across the highway to the IGA store to stock up a few essentials, such as the apples and oranges we had been relived of at the border.


Fortunately we were only two doors away from a Napa Auto Parts store part of  which is Kord's Automotive Center. At a few minutes before 8:00 Saturday Morning Art was out front waiting for the doors to open. His fears were realised: No mechanic on until Monday.

The park has a small but nice cactus garden with quite a few birds, including woodpeckers and the cactus wren (in the photo) which nest in holes in the cactus plants.

We passed the weekend mostly just lounging around, though the first chore was to take the Jeep to the car wash. Lots of quarters! (Why don't the Americans like the dollar coin? We came across a few in Alaska several years ago but never in the lower 48).  A bottle of degreaser and lots of work with the foam brush later, the Jeep, and Art's electric bike on the, appeared to be free of the oily diesel film. Time will tell.

Oh! And Gillian baked some oatmeal raisin and walnut cookies. (Art cracked the walnuts!)

Ajo is a small town, dependent in large part on winter snow birds; some in RVs and some who have bought house here. It seems a large part of the population escapes the cold and snow of the northern winter here then then move north to escape the desert heat in the summer.

The town has obviously seen better days, there was once a large copper mine here which was a major employer. There are many empty houses, stores, restaurants and service stations. Yet the main part of the town is quite bright. One of the bright spots was the combined  IGA grocery and Ace Hardware store. Very nicely laid out, good stock of groceries, beer, wine and Scotch Whiskys. Even one of Art's favourites, Old Pulteney!

Monday, 8:00 AM again; too busy today, (the shop and the lot were full) but we were booked in for 8:00 AM Tuesday. Art was told that when he brought the rig over to park on the dirt next door not the asphalt out front!

Next morning, 8:00 AM sharp (This doesn't sound like retirement!) The rig was parked and Art was inside at the counter.He filled out a work order and Kord came out to drive the rig into the work area. He said that by the sound of it one of the injectors wasn't getting enough fuel.

Art left the rig there and we went looking for breakfast. Gillian had seen a sign in the IGA for breakfast burritos so that is were we went. Following our recent string of luck there were no more breakfast burritos! Gillian chose a  bean and cheese burrito  while Art went for a breakfast biscuit; ham and egg on a biscuit. Not the Ritz but fresh and quite nice.

We then went for a drive through town, parking near the Plaza and visiting the Oasis for a double Americano Coffee. We expected the double Americano would be a double espresso with the hot water. What we got was a double espresso with double hot water. In other words, a very large coffee! Nice enough though.

We later went to the Desert Center, picked up some local information, watched a very interesting video about the Sonora Desert then set off in the Jeep on the 10 mile Ajo Loop. There is a very large protected area here which closed for the season last Friday! It closes for spring and summer to allow the wildlife and plants to reproduce and grow undisturbed.

The loop starts along side of huge piles of rock and rubble which we assumed to be overburden from the mine. We didn't see much of the wildlife, just a few birds that were too fast for the camera. Fortunately, the various cacti and other plants were a little slower moving.

 

 

 

Back in town we decided to return to the shop to see how the motorhome was doing, and as we drove past the RV Park we spied it parked in a site at the RV Park next door ! We pulled in and stopped at the little booth at the entrance. A lady arrived, we told her that Kord had parked our rig here so she said welcome to the park and left!

Art walked over to Napa to see what the results were. Sure enough, a broken fuel line to one of the injectors. Not just any one, but the most inaccessible one. It would require the removal of the others. Art elected to go with all new lines, since the labour would be the same in either case. The failure was probably due to years of vibration (and not directly caused by his ill advised manoeuver of the other day!) so who knows how far behind the rest of them would be?

He made a small deposit for the parts and was told that they should arrive Thursday, the work done Friday, pretty much a full day's work. Art asked Kord about checking in to the RV Park and was told "I'll take care of it, it's my park."

Friday morning, YEP! 8:00 AM again, the motorhome was dropped of next door and we went looking for breakfast.  A couple of people suggested a place called Marcella's, a mile or so back down the highway. There were several vehicles parked out front so we though we'd give it a try.

The waitress was a Mexicana, we automatically spoke Spanish too her! She was often singing along with the background music with a lovely voice.

We decided to go with the Mexican choices, Gillian with huevos a la mexicana, and Art the huevos machaca, scrambled eggs with shredded dried beef. Both were delicious. Art thought the machaca the best ever! Nice surprise.

We spent the rest of the day at the the plaza, going for lunch at the golf club (enough sandwiches left over for tomorrow's lunch), checked in with the shop, back to the plaza via a stop at a junk/antiques shop were we spent one dollar on four paper back novels, then back to the plaza.

At 4:00PM we returned to the shop to find it parked out side. Gillian dropped Art off then returned to the RV Park to take the dogs for a walk. Art went in, paid the bill, discovering that they had washed the rear cap as well as the engine and radiator.

Now we had to put everything back under the bed. Gillian decided to take the opportunity to get out the cold weather (we refuse to say winter) clothes for the trip home.

The rest of the evening was spent catching up on this blog, watching some TV and nibbling on cheese and biscuits and a glass or two of wine. Art of course uncorked the Old Pulteneys as well!

Time to post this now, we'll be off tomorrow to Yuma to look for a new GPS unit then hopefully to Desert Hot Springs for a night before hitting the I 5 northbound for home.

In the words of Samuel Pepys, "And so to bed."