Hope you are all safe and well while sheltering in place. We spent most of March and all of April doing the same thing!
We left Yuma, AZ on March 15th and spent a week in Quartzsite, AZ. We were then supposed to spend two weeks in Palm Springs, CA. But as we watched the events unfold in mid March it became very clear we needed a safer area to shelter in place. We were following the daily statistics on the progression of the virus around the country and knew Palm Springs with its high density population was not the safest place to stay. We canceled our reservation and chose Needles, CA, a very small town right across the border of Arizona and California. From our campsite we could look across the Colorado River and see Arizona. The Walmart where we ordered groceries online for pickup was located in Arizona, ten miles away.
The campground did a nice job of protecting people by spacing everyone out so we didn’t have anyone near on either side of us. We were there a month, basically doing what everyone else was doing, watching the news, hoping for the end of the virus and for things to get back to normal.
By mid April restrictions were still not being lifted and while we would have been content to stay in Needles longer, but we faced a new problem. A Mohave heat wave was forecast to hit the area with daily highs well over a hundred degrees. It is not easy to stay cool in an RV with those temperatures. It was time to move on. We decided to cancel our reservation in Las Vegas because the city has a large population and it was due the same hot temperatures.
We found a campground on Indian tribal land in Cedar City, Utah. We wondered if they were accepting new people there since the country was still under quarantine. We held our breath and called. Thankfully they gave us a reservation! Bill continue to binge watch the TV show Nash Bridges and completed it.
On April 22nd we left Needles and headed to Cedar City. The 280 mile drive was interesting as we left California, passed through Nevada, then a small corner of Arizona and finally into Utah. The traffic was light except for a little congestion around Las Vegas. As we entered Nevada there were traffic signs reminding people to shelter in place.
It was a lovely drive with snow capped mountains in the distance and the beautiful red rocks of Utah.
Utah is such a beautiful state! Utah has a website that all visitors must submit their information on upon entering.
We stayed at the Cedar City campground for two weeks. We had a no contact check-in process and once again they spread everyone out so there was distance between us. We had beautiful views of snow capped mountains from our campsite.
With pleasant temperatures in the 70’s, we felt very fortunate to be there. We had avoided the 110 degrees temperatures in Needles CA. While there we continued to isolate ourselves and ordered our groceries online for pickup from Walmart.
We heard on the local news out of Salt Lake City that one day four Air Force F-35 planes would be flying over Salt Lake City to honor health care workers. The flight path would take them over Cedar City and then down to St George before flying back toward Salt Lake City. We waited outside during the time they were scheduled to fly over us. We were slightly disappointed because they flew so high they were barely visible but we could still hear them approaching. But still nice to see and hear!
Next up: Continuing our summer plans to Bryce Canyon, Utah