What's Up in Wikieup?

We'll tell you later about Wikieup. But first, here's a quiz: Where can you get a ham and cheese omelet with lots of fresh veggies for less than $3.50? Give up? It's Subway! Leaving Casa Grande yesterday morning we stopped in at Subway and ordered their Black Forest Ham and Egg sandwich without bread. The egg is precooked, but quite presentable. Then on go the ham slices, followed by your choice of cheese (we selected pepper jack, then asked for a little shredded cheddar on top). Those stacks went into the heating oven; when they came out we added fresh spinach, tomato slices, sliced onion, sliced olives, and some little yellow peppers. Topped off with Chipotle Southwest sauce, it was magnificent! With a senior discount, $3.37 each. (We could have had a bacon "add-on" for $1 more.) We could eat there regularly!

Then it was time to hit the road -- up through Phoenix. We had planned a late entry to avoid commute hour, but we remembered that when we lived there many years ago rush hour started at midnight and ended at 11:59 pm. However the Phoenix freeway system has grown into a very sophisticated plate of spaghetti. Suzy's skillful driving and my ability to read the screen on the GPS got us through without a hitch. Maybe a little scary at times, but still, no hitches.

What we failed to do was to stop for gas between Casa Grande and Phoenix. Once beyond Phoenix there was little opportunity for gas until Wickenburg, but our route turned the other way, and there was no gas anywhere until we arrived in Wikieup. The Shell station here has regular at $4.29 a gallon. We'll head over there as we leave tomorrow to pick up 10 gallons to carry us on to Kingman, where we'll fill up at a more reasonable rate.

A large stretch of AZ Highway 93 between Wickenburg and Wikieup is a National Scenic Byway, the Arizona Joshua Tree Forest Highway. Years ago we pictured Joshua Trees as wild looking plants that reminded one of the wild Biblical Joshua, waving his arms in the desert. Whether the Biblical Joshua looked like this is not important: the Joshua Tree looks like this, and it captures the photographer's eye:

So What's Up in Wikieup, beside the price of gasoline? Not much. Our friend Chuck, upon learning that we'd be stopping here, told us, "There isn't much in Wikieup." Well, there are two gas stations, but we found out the other one has bad gasoline, There are a couple of restaurants  but the one that also has the RV Park and the souvenir shop recently had a fire, and everything but the RV park is closed for remodeling.

The RV Park, Dazzo's, is a Passport America park; they charge $10 for PA members, and they are open with level full hookup sites, 30 amp electric, and saguaro cactus! This is where we are staying tonight.

This prickly pear grows right on the edge of our site.

Such fabulous blooms from a vicious plant!

Several other pictures of this part of the Sonoran Desert can be found in our web album On the Road to Carson City.

Another thing that's Up in Wikieup is wind! We had planned to leave today (Thursday) for Las Vegas en route to Carson City. But today is one of those windy, gusty Arizona desert days, with gusts up to 40 mph. Suzy is a great motorhome driver, but she doesn't want to navigate that new high level bridge over Boulder Dam with wind slamming into the rig at 40 miles per!

So tomorrow we head for Las Vegas where we will spend two nights. We hope to visit the Valley of Fire State Park, an exciting new place to spend some time in  ... Our Life on Wheels.