Joan and John: Week ending Mar 19, 2020 Midland LTVA

Thursday evening we were watching Jeopardy when we got an emergency alert. It was on our phone, since it is a USA provider, warning about flash flood possibilities for our area. This was the first time we have had an emergency alert.

Friday, we got a few things done to prepare for leaving.

Saturday we packed up, dumped our tanks and filled the fresh water. Then we drove west across the Colorado on I-10 to Blythe, California. After picking up a few groceries we headed north on Midland Road to the Midland LTVA, another long term stay area. It has a sewer dump, garbage, but no fresh water. We plan to stay for a couple of weeks, before heading for home.

Sunday morning we headed roughly north toward a mine area we can see on the edge of the hills to the north.

mine area from a distance

We started by heading north up the road we are on. It follows a wash that forms the east boundary of the north side of the LTVA. After about a mile the trail we were on headed east, so we went over a ridge to the north. From there we crossed at least 3 major washes running southwest from the hills. Our target was to go below a ridge ahead that ended abruptly, but had several large boulders below its end.

rock blocks

These were large structures of conglomerate gravel that probably got undercut at the bottom of the ridge by two washes coming together.

budding hedgehog cactus

About .7 mi further, we got to a road heading toward the mine. By this time we had come 3.6 miles, and we still had lots more to go (turned out to be another 1.6 miles when we located the spot on Google Maps satellite view). We decided it was time to head back. The road we were on headed pretty much straight back toward the LTVA. Once we got down into the large wash crossing Midland Road, after passing a pile of tires dumped out here, we came to an ATV trail that paralleled Midland road, and saved us about a third of a mile.   7.2 miles total in 4.25 hours. We were sure glad to be back to the trailer.

Monday morning, we saw a text from Trev. He wanted to make sure we knew that there might be issues with our travel health care due to COVID-19 if we don't head back to Canada ASAP. We checked the Medipac website. Nothing on it. We sent them an e-mail to get clarification. Then we got an e-mail from Carol saying it seems we will have to self-isolate for 2 weeks when we do return.   Karen called to say her cruise from San Juan to Barcelona next month is going to get cancelled.

We went for a reconnaisance walk around the edge of the LTVA to see where things are. We read the plaque marking the "Desert Strike" military exercise in May 1964. Along the way we got greated by 3 dogs in one of the corners. We chatted with their owner for a few minutes.   Further north on the west side of the LTVA we had a long conversation with a couple from Oregon.

fancy boundary marker

Monday evening, we got a response from Medipac. They let us know that since we started our trip before the Travel Advisory was issued, we will be covered if we happen to get the COVID-19 virus. We have decided to return a bit early, by April 9, in case we are directed to self-isolate when we return to Canada. That gives us 2 weeks until our dental and medical appointments later in the month.

Tuesday, we resumed our walk around the edge of the LTVA. This time we did the west side. One stretch of it, the signs are at the top of parallel ridges with steep sides. At the north end, it is along the edge of a the wide shallow wash, with lots of space and only a couple of units. In this area, there were 3 big concrete based picnic tables, an unusual amenity in the LTVAs. We deduce these must have been here in a rec area prior to the LTVA being created.

Along the way we came across a desert lily.

Desert Lily

At this point, Joan headed back to the trailer to bake oatmeal raisin cookies. John continued across to Midland Road, which runs down the middle of the LTVA. There was a sign to Moreno Ranch just north of the west side of the LTVA. Continuing on to the west side of the LTVA, John was coming toward a trailer in the corner. The occupant came out, and John explained he was scouting out the edge of the LTVA. "Okay" was the response. John finished up the route around the LTVA that was left on the south end on the east side. Along the way he chatted, from a safe distance, with a lady from Montana. She is avoiding grocery stores, but goes into McDonalds regularly to buy a small item and use their wifi.

Wednesday was a rainy day, again. We took the opportunity to go into Blythe to get some groceries and arrange to get our axles greased on the 27. Ann called in the afternoon to let us know the borders were being closed. We assured her that we would still be able to return to Alberta. They are just stopping non-Canadians from coming into Canada.

Thursday, drove to about 2 miles from the Calcium Carbonate Quarry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calcium_carbonate, that we had stopped before reaching on Sunday, since it was too far. The white layer on the mountain is the calcium carbonate.