theboondork's RV blog

it looks like I'll stay awhile

2/28/2019

I walked around the old closed up rodeo arena and actually found it kind of a sad place. There was a couple of years in my life when I spent enough time at rodeo arenas to realize that there's a lot of blood, sweat, and tears, on the dirt floor of an arena like this. And a lot of lives were altered in rodeo arenas just such as this all over the country with folks competing and sometimes risking their lives for nothing more than pride and a belt buckle.

Today was the first day in a long time I've been able to spend most of the day wearing a T-shirt instead of a light jacket. And the weather forecast for the next 10 days looks like it's going to stay that way. There's even a couple of days in there where it's supposed to get to 80.... I can't wait!

I've had a chance to talk to a few of my neighbors here at the roping arena outside of Ajo, and they tell me that there's no one in charge of this boondocking area around the arena. There are no officials coming around, there are no length of stay rules because no one's checking on anyone, so you just boondock where you like and stay as long as you want. That sounds like a good deal to me. Because even though I don't want to stay any longer than two weeks I still like the sense of freedom I feel when there are no length of stay rules.

Last night was peaceful and quiet and I didn't even hear any generators running. I think the RVers that know of a place like this are probably more serious boondocker's and have some solar power and/or quiet generators. So since my first night went really well I gave this boondocking area my seal of approval by unhitching from the Arctic Fox this morning and settling in for possibly a two-week stay.

I went into town this morning and filled up with diesel at $2.99 a gallon, that's a lot more than I paid at Cave Creek the other day, but Ajo is out in the middle of nowhere so I can understand why it costs more to get fuel here than it would near a big city like Phoenix.

I went to the grocery-hardware store across the street from the gas station just to check out the prices and I would say that everything was about 20 or 30% higher than most other big-city stores on most items. There again I don't begrudge them the higher price because I'm quite sure the store pays a lot more for the product than a Safeway or a Walmart would. But they were well-stocked and had most anything you would need.

theboondork

I wonder how long there will even be rodeos? They've been under attack for a long time from animal-rights groups, and insurance companies that don't want to sell them policies. It seems like anything that represents American's history is under assault from all sides.

I think this used to be a concrete barbecue. But I was never here when the arena was still open and being used so that's just a guess.

This is the chute they use to get the livestock in and out of the semi trailers.

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A NEW VIEW, aJO ARIZONA

2/27/2019

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Boondocking at the roping arena outside of Ajo Arizona.

I had an uneventful 120 mile drive from Ben Avery's gun range to Ajo Arizona this morning. This was the first drive that I got to use my new wired rearview cameras and oh what a pleasure it was to be able to see behind me clearly, and consistently, without the cameras blinking on and off whenever they felt like it. If I hadn't been so lazy I could've had them working a looong time ago but I had been without them for so long I'd forgotten how useful they were.

I'm currently boondocked at what is known as the roping arena a few miles outside of Ajo. I've never stayed here before so I don't know what I'm supposed to do so I just pulled in and set up camp. It's supposed to be free and if it's not I guess somebody will let me know sooner or later.

There's about 10 other RVs here and half of them have an ATV of some kind so it looks like I'll have to unload the Beta 250 and run around the desert a little bit. It already feels warmer here than it was at Ben Avery's so doing some outdoor things will be a lot more fun.

From what I understand the roping arena is closed for good, and this boondocking area that I'm at now used to be the camping area for the rodeo riders, and I believe this whole arena deal is run by the County.

for anyone interested I have full bars of Verizon signal so my MiFi is giving me high speed Internet.

theboondork

I've never boondocked here before so I thought I would give it a try. There's a lot more places In Ajo to boondock if this spot doesn't work out,

The gadgets that replace my brain while I'm driving, my Garmin GPS, the camera that watches my motorcycle, and my rearview camera.

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Looking forward to a new view

2/26/2019

2 Comments

Winter range at Ben Avery's gun range Phoenix Arizona

A nicely dressed young lady.

I went to Walmart this morning and picked up a few things for my trip to Ajo tomorrow. I got to Walmart at 9 o'clock and it wasn't busy at all so I was in and out in no time. I topped up my tank with diesel at $2.79 a gallon, I don't know why fuel is always so high in Arizona, there's probably a lot of tax on it. On second thought, fuel prices always go up in the summer because people are traveling and going on vacation so maybe fuel prices are high in Arizona because winter is when people travel in Arizona, I can't imagine anyone wanting to be here during the summer.

It looks like I'm not going to get to see any of the black powder guys shooting. I drove over to where they were supposed to be shooting and didn't see anyone, and I only see a few old-fashioned tents set up that the buckskin guys like to camp in, so maybe it all starts tomorrow and I'm going to miss it.

If it wasn't for Ben Avery's really dumb two-week stay limit I would stay here a couple days longer and watch the black powder guys shoot. But a while back Ben Avery came up with this two-week stay rule and made a lot of people angry. You can actually stay longer than two weeks but you have to fill out a paper asking for permission which rubbed most people the wrong way so a lot of shooters stopped camping here at all.

But since Ben Avery's gun range is run by the state of Arizona decisions regarding how the ranges and campgrounds are run is done by big shots in offices in Phoenix that probably aren't shooters or campers and couldn't care less what's actually going on unless it affects them personally.

Oh well, need a new view anyway so I'm looking forward to getting on the road. I'm just hoping Ajo isn't crowded. Used to I didn't worry about things like that while boondocking, I could see that the campgrounds looked full but that didn't affect me, there was always room out in the sticks for boondocking, but now I'm never sure until I get there.

theboondork