Settled in Sedona

Cottonwood, AZ   Thousand Trails Verde Valley    Site: J-6

Weather this week: Highs: high 50's to low 60's, Lows: high 30's

AT&T hotspots very good, T-Mobile mifi very slow.

Technically, we are in Cottonwood, AZ, which is 24.7 miles from Sedona but Sparky liked the title of "Settled in Sedona", haha. Because it's pretty chilly and we are only here for one week, we are going to do maintenance chores on our RV (cleaning jacks, trying to fix the bad jack, spot cleaning the outside) and cleaning the refrigerator vents. Sparky happened to think about how so easily dusty the whole RV gets, so she thought she better check underneath the fridge. Can't check behind the RV fridge, it's really in a tight space, so she looked down under the fridge, and OMG. It was crudded up (is that a real word? wonders Eldo) really badly with dust. How often does a 72 year old get down on her hands and knees with a flashlight to see how dirty and dusty things REALLY are??? We only see the dust flying around when the sun shines directly through the entire coach. So, not that often. There are some good things about getting older and having aging eyes. Harder to see those dust bunnies, dontcha know!

The vacuum attachments were not able to reach the deep vents, so Eldo found a hack on cleaning them while researching how to find and clean RV fridge vents-- USE A STRAW taped to the crevice tool! Brilliant! Problem solved for the time being, except it was a wimpy straw and kept bending in the middle.

We are going to try to get another mobile tech to come out and look at our bad front left jack, which is still not functioning properly despite brand new RV batteries. We are fairly certain at this time, that the jack has gone bad. It doesn't respond to the automatic leveling commands and continuously gives a fault error.  It feels like we are cockeyed and the coach isn't as level inside as we would like it. The front jacks are the key to the whole rest of the leveling system getting the RV level front to back and side to side. If the front ones aren't performing together correctly, then we can't use the automatic leveling system--which is a really neat feature. When it works, we push a button outside in one of the bays, and the whole coach levels itself from front to back and side to side with sometimes miniscule movements. It's neat to watch, except when it's raining. So far we've been told by three different techs including Lippert that it could be 1. the batteries, 2. a bad jack, 3. the motor, or 4. the motherboard (the panel that operates the whole leveling system). We replaced the batteries and knocked out solution #1. Eldy has gotten pretty good at leveling the rig manually, which is no small feat, as the control panel is a little complicated, and it's easy to hit the wrong set of panel buttons and forget to press enter in between commands on the panel, which is confusing to look at in the first place. A new jack costs around 400-800 dollars, so we're not too thrilled at having to get a new one. Maybe we will have to order one and then try and find someone to replace it for us. Cottonwood is not a major metropolis like Tucson, so it might be a little more of a challenge to get it replaced in a timely manner. In the meantime, we can live with manual leveling.

Well, we finally got to the bottom of this jack problem and it took a very capable and knowledgable tech to come out and DIAGNOSE for FREE the actual problem. We went to the park gate office and they gave us a reference of guy that came very highly recommended. We called him and he came right out to our site today. He is not going to charge us until he gets the part and installs it. We don't have a bad motor, we have a bad part within the motor, and in order to fix it, you can't just buy the little part, you have to buy a new motor. Well, naturally. Kudos to Jon Currier, of Currier Master Mobile Service, a fantastic mobile repair guy, trained and certified with MANY years of experience, who tested out several different parts of the system, who finally had a definitive answer by ruling out different scenarios instead of just semi guessing and saying we needed a new jack. AND--he also spotted some black soot on the outside of our water heater, checked the air flow tube, and it was too narrow, not allowing enough air to enter so the heater was burning hotter than it needed to be on gas, and spitting out soot above the panel. He adjusted it, and gave us a little lesson on how it should operate, again, at no charge. He said he was in this business to teach and provide mobile service at the most reasonable cost and wasn't in it to make a lot of money! What a nice man! We greatly appreciated his observance of our water heater and we learned something new about operating it. We always worry about so many things we DON'T know about and don't know how to fix, but we have been super lucky in finding great techs to come out and help us learn, even if they aren't always totally correct. Kind of like going to the doctor..."Well, I think it may be this, so let's try that...." This guy really knows his field. Eldo was impressed with everything he had on his truck! This was one of several he has, and it's a smaller one.

So now, we wait to hear the cost which shouldn't be outrageous because he is a Lippert dealer and has several suppliers he can work with to shop around to get us a decent price. Then he will come out and finish the job. Although we are only here a week this time, we will be back in two weeks for a three week stay so hopefully he can do it then.

View from the top of the park in "M" section

Thousand Trails Verde Valley is at an elevation of 3340 feet and is a big park, 300 acres, in the high desert spread out over rolling hills and land tiers. There are 371 sites. It is surrounded by the Mingus Mountains and Red Rocks. Sparky tried riding her bike a little the first couple of days we were here. Forget THAT! There is a BIG change in elevation from the most expensive sites with the best views of Sedona and the mountains at the top of the park, to down to the bottom where the cheapest 30 amp sites are crowded, tight, and there are no views. M section is the elite top view with the best 360 degree view of the mountains all around.

Another view in a different part of "M" section

It's almost impossible to ride up and down the park roads and NOBODY rides a bike in this park so that was all Sparky needed to wait for better days to ride. There are nice little narrow walking trails around the hills between the tiered sites and since we are at 3350 feet, it will be good exercise. And hey, the views.....wonderful! Sparky recommends a hiking pole--trails are narrow and very pebbly and rocky, you know, the slippery, sliding kind of rocks. You can easily get a couple of miles or more in for a hiking/walk by traipsing around the hills in the park and with significant elevation changes, it's great cardio.

The views where we are in the "J"- 50 amp section are not too shabby, either! This is the view out in front of our rig right out our "front yard".

The pool is shut down indefinitely for repairs. But who cares? It's really chilly during the day! This park even has a remote control raceway for the RC hobbyist. You don't see that very often at all. by the way, there are NO laundry facilities in TT Verde Valley. You have to go into town to do your laundry if you don't have units in your rig. We don't. Sparky has a craft closet instead, haha.

There are three major grocery stores in Cottonwood--a Fry's, a Safeway, and a Walmart. There are fast food chains to pick from, some decent restaurants and a vineyard nearby the RV park, the Alcantara Vineyards. There are several tasting rooms and wine bars in Old Cottonwood, a neat little portion of the city of Cottonwood, with cool shops and great little eateries. We ate at the Tavern Grille, a repeat from last year, which is a great restaurant with a great industrial vibe inside and great food. Highly recommend it.

We also recommend Bocce Pizzeria, a great Italian restaurant that makes all their breads and pizza crusts homemade with a cool indoor outdoor open air bar seating. A house salad was quite expensive, (11.00) but it was the most beautifully presented salad Sparky has ever seen! Everything coming out of the kitchen was beautiful. The pizza was thinner crust and not enough cheese for Sparky, but it was delicious as well.

We really do love this park because it's fairly close to Sedona, without all the tourist crowds, but has its own vibe seeming to be in the mountains and Verde Valley at the same time. Beautiful sunrises and sunsets seem to be the norm in Arizona, we've been seeing them almost every day unless it's cloudy. It's wonderful, too, to be seeing the red rocks in the distance, which are calling Sparky's name.

Sparky visited Dead Horse Ranch State Park. (Great name, eh?) For seven dollars daily use fee, you can walk trails there, bird watch and get some nice exercise. The Audubon Society fills bird feeders in a small area off Owl Creek Road. Sparky saw lots of finches, juncos and wrens the day she went.

Love the purple finches, or house finches, whatever they are! 

It's a beautiful park in January.....You can camp in an RV there, but no full hookups, just water and electric, unless you are the "lagoon host", a work camping job. The host's site is situated right in the center of the lagoon area under shady trees and has full hookups-- water, electric, and sewer. Nice! But it would be a super hot location in the summer. There are three lagoons where lots of locals come to fish. Usually there are lots of water fowl, but today Sparky only saw a lone pie billed grebe and a mallard pair.

In the park is a wonderful walk to Tavasci Marsh, a little over a mile, round trip. On the way you can see Tuzigoot National Monument off to your left of the trail. This view of the. monument, straight on, is from far away, there are closer views when you first start out on the trail.

This is a cool monument to visit if you are interested. It's a hilltop pueblo that grew into one of the largest villages in the area one thousand years ago by the Sinagua people. It's a great glimpse into prehistoric life of Arizona people. Here is a closer view from the trail.

Tavasci Marsh is just a marsh with LOTS of tall grasses and at the very end, a small body of water for the ducks and a viewing platform for you, but it was a beautiful walk back to it. Sparky likes looking up the names of local plants wherever she hikes, using the app, Seek. This is a barberry, like a form of holly.

Today there was a pair of ring necked ducks swimming around but too far away to capture it.

The trail markers on the way are a marvel to read. They have LOTS of information on them for whatever mode of transportation you are using on the trails whether a bike, a horse (!) or your feet. It tells you what the grade of the trail is, the cross slope--(the side to side elevation), the tread width, and what the trail is made of! Guess a lot of that might be helpful to a mountain biker, of which Sparky saw several heading out in other directions and other trails. They even give you a math example (Sparky needs that, haha) of what they mean, like if the typical grade is 2.6% and 5% of the trail is 10-22%, then 225 feet of the trail is 10-22%. That reference to slope vaguely reminded Sparky of a "rise over run" formula, a long distant math topic on which she probably failed and doesn't care to revisit. Oh, and by the way....8% is a standard ramp. HUNH? A mountain biker will understand. Sparky stood there for quite a few moments trying to digest all this, before heading on her way, because she was walking after all. Update: additional trail recommended at Dead Horse Ranch State Park is the Lime Kiln Trail. You can pick it up right behind the middle lagoon. It's a beautiful trail, with a little bit of elevation climb and gorgeous views of the valley. It is a shared mountain bike trail so keep your eyes peeled for bikers coming down or up. Sparky hiked it without poles the first time, but if a little bit of climbing up bothers you, then one pole is great for balance. Sparky used a single one the second time and liked it much better.

(Sparky will be visiting the trails in Sedona on our next visit to Cottonwood) and unfortunately, also a dentist, because a major portion of a tooth broke off the week we were here. Ugh.....

So we will see you down the road next in Mesa, AZ in our next blog. Until next time......Sparky and Eldo