Sue said Full, I said Burp

Thanks giving day was hosted by our friends Kent and Carolyn Nelson from Twin Lakes. They have a beautiful home in Sun City Grand. Their patio is very large with some being covered ad some not. Their view is of one of the greens on the golf course. They are just past enough to not get any errant golf balls. Carolyn cooked two turkeys. One Wednesday for left overs and one Thursday for dinner. Here is before and after.








They had a house full. 22 in all as I recall. We all did the usual Thanksgiving stuff. Visited had a drink or two and then dove in to the turkey.

After dinner the clean up crew kicked in to do the dishes. We all rested for a bit and then went for the pie. I think there were about five of them. I got a picture of Kent taking a picture of me. Mary had me take a picture of here and her son with his girl friend. It was a fun day and we thank Kent and Carolyn for their hospitality.

Friday morning found me on the golf course with Kent, his son and Dan Gleason. We played One of the four courses that Sun City Grand has. We played the Granite North. They all did pretty good I was my normal bad self. It was a fun day. the weather was perfect just about 80. The course is beautiful.

Well we finally have it. We have been working on a deal to rent a golf car for a second mode of local transportation. My friend Richards ex wife lives here at Happy Trails and has a golf cart she doesn't use. It took a few repairs to get it going but now it's here. Now this thing is really old. I goes OK but not very fast. I dubbed it "Speedy" It does its job. Takes us to town center and the pools. I have our Noodles on board now.

After we went bobbing yesterday we just sat on the patio and watch the TV while we chatted. That's one of the nice things about being down here. You can spend so much time outside. Charlie likes it outside a lot. He does a good job of staying on the patio without his leash. He gets a bit dirty from the dust. I have to wash off the patio every so often. One thing Charlie has mastered is begging. Hope everyone had a great turkey day.

Getting ready for Thanks Giving

Today was getting ready for Thanksgiving. It started out with Sue going to the pool for water aerobics. I stayed home and answered the phone. I called all the people with the boats that Boats US want me to look at while I'm home. I think I will be busy. Anyway after water aerobics Sue wanted to get a Taco and a Margarita. So we found Las Mariga or something like that. A Mexican restaurant down Bell road. The service was great as was the atmosphere. Me being me I had a hamburger, which was very good. Sue had the local food and loved it. The Margaritas were good too. We had a choice of Small, Medium or Large. We went for Medium. Was plenty.

After lunch we got to the Thanksgiving part. We are going to Kent and Carolyn Nelsons tomorrow for dinner. That's the gang of 22. Our part is to bring Key Lime Pie. This is because we have a Key Lime tree in our front yard. It belongs to Jeanne next door. Now that she is back in Tacoma for the holiday, I get to pick up the limes every day. It drops about 25 a day. Sue found a great receipt for Key Lime Pie on line from Emerald Lagassi. Its GOOD. I even like it. So two are requested for Thanksgiving. I squeezed the lime this morning with our new lime squisher. Really works good. Key limes are about the size of a golf ball. This thing gets a couple cups of juice in about 10 minutes. Charlie helped with the picture.

While I went bobbing Sue baked the pies in our new portable toaster/convection oven. We can cook everything inside, but ..........well we don't need the heat inside so..............an outside oven. Really works well.

So we have the cook doing cross word and watching the pie cook. Charlie has been a good boy and hangs out on the patio with us. By the time I got back from the bobbers most of the cooking was done.

While I was outside I thought I would put in a picture of my pantry. anybody that knows me, knows I want to have food around. This is my outside storage place. If I were here too long it would get bigger as the prices are so good. Also some of the extra Key Limes we have.

Tomorrow will be a fun day with a bunch of our friends from Twin Lakes. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone. Just heard we get our golf car tomorrow. Then I can get better pictures for the Happy Trails Bog.

Short update

Just thought I would give a update. We haven't really done any thing but sort of hang out. Yesterdays quest was a new bathing suit for Sue. The word is that it takes two or three suits a year to weather the chlorine in the pool down here. Well, with advice from some of the bobbers and the water aerobic folks we found "Honeys" Buy one and get the second for 50% off. Sue said it was a good deal. Mine is just faded and still works. It's really hard to find a place that sells bathing suits down here because it "Winter"... Yea sure...Tell that to someone from Seattle. End result was Sue was happy.

After the swim suit adventure I was in need of food so we stopped at a place Sue saw on the way to Honeys called the "Bent Putter" This was a small restaurant at the end of a golf course. Not a bad deal. Really well cooked Hot Dog and a beer for $3.50. Lots of golfers coming and going. It really says "Bent Putter Restaurant" in the shadow. Darn sum makes those shadows. :)

That got us back home about 2:30 so I could go bobbing. Bobbing is kind of becoming a regular thing. I've been told that I need to get a picture of the bobbers. Yes there are also girl bobbers. From there it was over to Dan and Mary Gleasons house for a couple drinks. Thank you Dan and Mary for the hospitality. Got back home about 6 and had left over soup. It's amazing how you can just sort of fritter away the day.

Today Sue went Line Dancing class and did laundry. I (UGG) had to do some work. Seems Boats US wants me to look at some boats while I'm home in December. That will keep me busy. Tomorrow Sue will be cooking Key Lime pies for Thanksgiving at the Nelsons and a gang of 22.
That will be a lot of fun.
I'm still working on my "What is Happy Trails Post" Sue and I both agree that I need better pictures to get it across. So that is still to come. For now everybody have a great Thanksgiving.

A new adventure

Saturdays adventure was to find Lake Pleasant. Lake Pleasant is located about 25 miles north of Happy Trails. With the help of Google I found an address for a place called Pleasant Harbor Marina. So we plugged that into the GPS and headed out. Drove right to the place. Turned out to be a RV park and marina. They wanted $6.00 just to get into the place. I asked if there was a restaurant, as we were hungry, and they said no. So we kept our $6.00 bucks. Still no lake. So instead of giving up we took another turn and up another street. We came to a State Park gate where they wanted $5.00 bucks to get in. Same question. Only this time they said yes. So this is how we found Dillons Restaurant as Scorpion Bay Marina and Yacht Club.

As this is a man made lake used for power and irrigation there was a lot of watter missing. This made for a really long ramp down to the docks. They also have a powered tram which makes the trip much easier. This picture is of Sue after we came back up from lunch. I lazily took the tram while macho woman showed up and walked up the steps. She courted 161 steps. They are small steps like maybe 8 inches, but still 161. Lots.

The restaurant on the dock is Dillons. They are apparently a chain in the area. It was a really nice place floating at the end of the dock. Outdoor dinning at its best. They have a really nice bar. Food was good. I had a hamburger that must have had 1/2 pound of meat. Lunch and a couple drinks was only 30 bucks. I thought going down there that it would be really pricey. Waitress took our picture on the dock.

We took a walk out on the docks. Yea, like I have never seen a boat dock. I was surprised there were a lot of big boats. Met a guy going back to get my camera that had just bought a new 42 foot Carver.



After lunch we went for another drive up to a day picnic area. There were lots of Saguaro cactus around. Very beautiful country. We came back to a relaxing afternoon. I went bobbing up at the pool. Even though Jeanne next door has gone back to Washington for the holidays, the party still happens. So we went next door for a while. While she is gone I get to pick up the falling Limes from her tree. I got 35 this morning. I'll get a picture of that later.

Golf and Friends

Well now that the races are over we are getting into visiting with friends. Wednesday I went to the Safeway store to get a flu shot and ran into Carolyn Nelson. We had been talking to the Nelsons via phone, but it was still sort of funny running into her in the store. Ended up with Kent and Carolyn over for a drink that evening. Then they had to go and pick up Dan and Mary Gleason at the airport. We are going to their place for Thanksgiving. I'm sure there will be more on that later.



Yesterday, Thursday we got in our first round of golf. We played at Arizona Traditions with Virginia and Beau. Sue and I both played very badly, so whats new. Traditions is a nice course and not very long. Its really depressing taking double bogies on 271 yard holes.

After golf Virginia and Beau came over for dinner. I did it right this year. Last year I brought from home what I thought was spaghetti sauce. It turned out to be apple sauce. So I had to make spaghetti from scratch. This year it was sauce. Um Good!!

After diner we just sort of sat around and visited. Needless to say Charlie got in the middle of things. He even got Wofie up on the couch between Virginia and Beau.

Today Sue is off to Line dance class. She sort of treats it like work out class. Then she is going to do laundry. I'll probably go hangout with the Bobers this afternoon. The bobbers are sort of like what I do back home. There are about 10 to 15 guys that go up the street to the last condo and visit Bill Bates. Its kind of a daily thing. We show up at 4pm and leave at 5pm. The bar is open and so is the conversation. Down here its the bobbers. These are the people that show up and the NC2 pool, with their noodles, float and talk. Here there are some gal bobbers as well. The conversation changes daily, just like home. I mentioned them a few days ago. My next project is I'm, going to take my camera with me and try and capture the essence of Happy trails. We have had some people ask what this place is really like.

If you look at the side bar to the right it says NASCAR @PIR 2009. If you double click on that you will get a slide show of all the pictures I took out there, same with Tony and Christies wedding. The pictures are much bigger. Arrow at the top lets you click thru the pictures. So until then enjoy. Joe and Sue

What a weekend

What a weekend we had. We have to give most of the credit to Pat and Diana Dennen. They are the ones who got us the Hot Passes. Not only that but we were sort of adopted into their NASCAR family. They are fire fighters from California. Besides doing an awesome job as fire fighters they are really cool people. Thank you Pat and Diana and all your friends. Hope to see you next year.

While we were in the stands we got our annual "Dork" picture

Sunday was Jimmy Johnsons day. Looks like he is on the way to four championships in a row. That has never happened in NASCAR in its history. We went down to the garage before the race again. This time there were no moving cars. Well they were moving, but being pushed into inspection.

They say that one of the things that make his team so good, is that they are prepared for almost anything. Like last week when they had to almost rebuild his car to get it back out on the track. I noticed when were were in the garage that their team had a whole rear end ready just in case. didn't see that in any other of the cares garages.

Sue took a picture of me next to Jimmy Johnsons car for my friend Alan Forman. I could have touched the car if I had wanted to but I don't think I was suppose to. Sunday was just a lot of people looking around the garage. Mostly we just sort of walked around and looked. Here are the Jets that fly over for the national anthem. F-15s from Luke Air force Base.

As we were going back to the Track Side club, Diana caught us and told us where they had saved us seats. What friends..... The race was good, kind of a bit boring as it sort of ended up in a parade. Not too much action. Jimmy ran off with it. Here is one lap of the race. Remember the track is one mile around.

After the race we joined the neighbors and had the final night barbecue. Remember those steaks. After a nice night we hit the sack and got up in the morning to a lot less people around us. It's really amazing how the place goes from thousands of RVs and then empty.

We got back to Happy Trails around 9:30. Sue cleaned the inside and I cleaned the outside. Inside had been cleaned before, but outside was in need. I didn't worry about the outside because I knew what it would be like after 5 days of track dust.

We are now back settled in and watching Dancing with the Stars. Charlie is happy to be away from the noise. Overall the weekend was the best so far at PIR. Besides our friends from the past years we got to know Paul and his friend from South Africa. Every year at PIR is a new adventure. Again a really special thanks to Pat and Diana. You really helped make our weekend special. Hope to see you next year.

Another great day

Success, Sue accomplished her goal. We hung out all thru the final practice for the cup drivers. We did this so maybe we could get closer to Kasey Kahne. It worked. So now Sue has three signed hats.

It was neat watching the cars practice. They go out to the right and come back to the left. We have to watch out that we don't get run over. They get really close. Seems like most of them came and went a lot. They put on new tires, go out and run a lap or two and come back in and put another set of tires on and do it again. I think they are sort of scuffing them up for race day. It has really been fun being in the garage that close. Don't know if we will be going there today. There will not be any action, just maybe an opportunity to talk to a driver or two. Here are a couple of videos of the practice. sort of up close and personal.

While we were there I got a couple pictures of other drivers. From what we hear some of the drivers grab a hand truck full of tires to sort of slide past the fans so as not to get bothered. I would think that fans are a bit of a pain for these guys. But there do really do try and spread themselves around.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. He seemed to be a bit upset.

Juan Pablo Montoya

After all the excitement of the pits we went back to the Track Side club and had lunch. Then we found our seats and watched the Nationwide Race. Carl Edwards won. Kyle Busch spun out almost in front of us. Here is a picture of a bit of the race, all the motor homes out in the lot and our friend Pat.

Pats Wife Diana had left to go back to their motor home, but before she left I took a picture of her nails. She is a real NASCAR fan. She and Pat had been to a breakfast thing with Jeff Gordon on Friday morning so she had her nails done up for the event. Hope the picture does them justice.

l

After the race it was back home to visit with the neighbors. Everything around here is very friendly. Sat out and visited before dinner. Today its the big race. I'll surly have a report on that one tomorrow.

l

!!!!!WOW!!!!

All we can say is WOW !!! What a friend Pat Dennen turned out to be. In case you don't recall, he is the Fire Chief of San Bernadino County, California. He also knows lots of folks from NASCAR. His crews do a lot of work for safety for the Fontana race. Anyway he got us Garage Passes. We thought they were going to be what is called cold passes, but when they handed them to us they were HOT. The difference is that with Cold passes you have to get out when the cars are moving. But with the Hot passes you just get to stay there. Cars come and go right next to you. You have to be careful to stay out of the way. Check out the video and you will get an idea of how close we really are.

We checked into our race site at the Track side Club about 11 am. Little more about the club thing in a bit. Anyway they provide regular pit passes and also a golf cart ride to the pits. So we jumped on the cart and were off. We then went into the garage area. They have sort of a dress code. No shorts, No open toed shoes and must have shirt sleeves. I'm sure this is for safety. Other than that in you go. Sue and I sort of went AHHHHH!!!!!!. How did we get this lucky. These passes are really hard to get. So we walked around and watched. Here are a few of the drivers we say. Most notably was The King himself Richard Petty. He is one of the first five in the new NASCAR Hall of Fame.

Richard Petty

Greg Biffel. a Washington guy from Vancouver

Ryan Newman, He ended upside down at Talladaga two weeks ago and had to be cut out of the car.

Kasey Kane

Kasey is Sue's target. Kasey being the local boy from Enumclaw, Wa., besides being a great driver is also too good looking. Up close he seems really small. Sue has some #9 hats that she is trying to get signed. One down two to go. Its all a mater of timing. We were there just before practice, so they were in a hurry to get into their cars. Today we will try and get there after practice and hopefully the drivers will be more available. Here a few pictures of the track and stuff.

Phoenix International Raceway

No 24 Jeff Gordon

Don't know who this guy is but the car belongs to Kurt Busch

The Track side Club. That is our home base for racing. It is located on the backside of the track between turn tow and three. Its basically a big fancy tent. They have redone it this year with all new tables and chairs. There is even a lounge with couches in the center. Outside in the front are nice seats. The back three rows even have a counter in front of the seat. The front ones have nice theater type seats with cup holders and all. We are about 50 feet from the track so it is really loud. That's why we have our head sets. With those we can talk back and forth and listen to the NASCAR radio broadcast of the race. If I push the right buttons on the radio/scanner we can listen to the drivers. This is the view from our seats last night looking at turn two with the trucks starting.




So, its Saturday morning. We are snug in our traveling home. Charlie is still traumatized from all that has happened to him in the last few days. We will head up to the track around noon and have lunch at the Track side Club. (By the way, if forgot to mention, with the tickets we get breakfast, lunch and dinner and beer and wine for the weekend. ) Head for the pits and the watch the Nationwide race this afternoon. That starts at 2:00 pm. So, I will leave you with the number three race fan in the house.