The town of Nowhere in Arizona Territory. It's a poor town, and since the townsfolk can't afford horses they take turns giving each other piggy-back rides to wherever they have to go.

When you're driving south on I-17 in Arizona, it's an easy drive, but in the winter, it's pretty chilly because you're close to Flagstaff, which gets a fair amount of snow. But when you arrive in the tiny town of Camp Verde, you're facing a pretty steep mountain climb on I-17 as you drive through dense pine forests, which are common on the north side of the climb you're facing.

But after a dozen miles or so, you crest the top of the mountain, and on the way down the other side, the landscape changes from pine forest to desert, and if you're looking to your right, you will see your first Saguaro cactus. I always look forward to seeing that cactus because I know that when I get to the bottom of the mountain, I'll be done with those 45° temperatures on the Flagstaff side of the mountains, and it will be about 60° when I get to Phoenix.

I don't know what kind of geology causes it, but it's almost always that way, and I can take off the winter coat I've been wearing since I left Colorado, and a light jacket over a T-shirt will be all I need now.

Why did I mention any of this? It's because I last came that way on my winter travels a few years ago. Because now, I usually go through New Mexico and spend time there because of their bargain-priced boondocking in New Mexico when I buy their annual pass.

But now New Mexico is in the process of doing away with their annual parks passes, both resident and nonresident, and raising their boondocking fees to $20 a night and $10 more for utilities. I've mentioned several times in this blog that the New Mexico nonresident park pass was the best bargain in camping that I've ever seen, and RVing Baby Boomers that have been around for as long as I have know that something that good cannot be allowed to exist.

It will take them a while to implement the new ripoff prices, so maybe I'll get one more winter of bargain-priced camping. My current New Mexico sticker expires the end of March 2024, so hopefully, I can buy a new one, which, with any luck, will be grandfathered in, and I'll have one more winter that I can boondock in New Mexico.

But after that, it will be adios New Mexico, and hola Arizona, which will be where I spend my winters. And I hope the geniuses in New Mexico's government have considered the unintended consequences this will have on the little towns near the State Parks that used to depend on people like me buying gas and groceries.

Theboondork

The whole town of Nowhere turned out to watch the first hanging of the week. 

He was an evil man. He turned people against one another, declared who was good and who was bad, made good people stop doing things they enjoyed, coerced people Into giving him money with threats of unending violence, and forced people to sit for hours without moving.

Loved by few, rejected by many, he will probably be the last Preacher the town of Nowhere ever sees.

This is the young widow Mrs. Grubb, she was devastated when she lost her husband of three months, the late 78-year-old Mr. Claude Grubb, and even more devastated when the sheriff found him tied up In her closet.
But by then she was learning to enjoy widowhood so she lost her husband once again.

Now she spends her days talking on the only cell phone in Arizona Territory... Mostly to herself because she has the only cell phone in Arizona Territory.

The way stores used to be.
Back in the day in places like Nowhere Arizona, doctors, and stores came to you.
if you were sick and didn't feel like getting dressed and saddling up your neighbor to ride to a doctor's house...the doctor came to you.

And the grocery stores did to. If you didn't have time to go shopping and were to busy hoeing, digging, burrowing and beating the kids, to take a day off,  somebody invented door–dash and your groceries magically appeared...and a lot faster than the doctor did.

The "Hole in the Wall Tee Pee Mart" just outside of Nowhere Arizona was the very first Indian trader to set up a store in Arizona Territory. The giant Tee Pee did a good business, with piggy-back riders coming and going all day, but when the store owner, chief "Hole in the Wall" tried to put an advertisement in the local paper he found out they didn't have enough letters to print the name of his store, so to get the ad printed he had to shorten the stores name to Wall-mart... Hey! This is history, don't blame me if you've been misinformed.

there will be over 700 contestants at this year's championship cowboy shoot, and this week will be spent weeding out the weak and the frail, so by next weekend only the strong will be competing, so the weekend is when all the important action will be happening.

There are a dozen or so of these shooting scenarios stretched out over the firing course, so the cowboys and cowgirls use these carts to carry around the guns and ammunition needed for the different shooting scenarios....there's a lot of walking involved.

I moseyed the 3 miles from my boondocking area back to Ben Avery this morning. I didn't get there as early this time, so everything was open. I only come here for the "End of Trial" to see the costumes and talk to the people. Watching the competitors shoot is a waste of time, especially if you're trying to get a picture.

When someone is on the shooting line with a gun in their hand, there are so many people standing around them that you really can't see anything. Standing next to everyone while their shooting will be a person with a timer, a judge, a safety man, and usually several friends, so when you consider that I'm relegated to stay behind a rope line since I'm not a shooter and with that many people within an arm's length of the shooter, it makes it almost impossible to see somebody actually shooting.

So, I don't bother; I mostly take pictures of the participants in their costumes. And I think that may interest me because when I had restaurants in Cripple Creek, Colorado, I always wore an 1800s businessman costume with a brocade vest and a derby hat, and a lot of shooters here are dressed like that, so it brings back old memories.

I noticed a dozen or so people were riding their horses around the mounted shooter's arena, but they weren't having a competition; it looked like they were just practicing a little for a future contest, when that will be a have no idea, I guess I should've walked over there and asked because I really enjoy watching the mounted shooters galloping by and shooting at balloons.

I drove through the Shooters campground this morning, which is a mix of full hookup and dry camping, and there were a lot of empty dry camping spots. So I could get a boondocking spot if I needed it, but so far, staying at this trust land is working out just fine, and I can be at Ben Avery in seven or eight minutes.

theboondork.

The cowboy shooters build a temporary old Western town while there here, so they can walk down the dusty streets and duck into a saloon where they might run into Jesse James, Wyatt Earp, or maybe even Matt Dillon or Roy Rogers.

but if they really wanted this place to look like the 1800s they would get some of the mounted shooters to hitch their horses over here so the horse could add some western town ambience to the dirt streets.

I believe the cheapest thing people can do if they want to look like somebody from the 1800s is forget the costumes, just lose 50 pounds.

I may be old, but at least I remember how to put on a pair of glasses. I sure hope somebody doesn't give this lady a loaded weapon.

when practicing for the various stages of fire, it's beneficial to run through the stages without a gun just to build up muscle memory....on the other hand, considering the average age of the various competitors, this lady may have forgotten her gun, or worse yet, doesn't realize it's not there.

This mounted shooter is just running around the arena, I guess she's just showing her horse the course, because of course the horse has to know the course, or the horse will be off course, of course.

I think this blog post proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that I'm capable of multitasking, as long as the tasks are no more than two, and there really easy. Just as in this case where I'm writing about the weather, and yet I'm spending the day watching the "End of trail" cowboy shoot.... That's multitasking in my book.

Now, where was I? Oh yeah, weather and boondocking.

Living in RV parks or any other "controlled" areas, the only weather problems you have to worry about are dangerous weather, such as tornadoes, or large hail. For most other hazardous weather phenomena, you will probably get warnings from those in charge of these RV parks that the weather problems may be on the way, and you must act. In other words, there are others you can depend on to warn you, or help you if you have any weather-related problems.

But when boondocking, you not only have to be responsible for your own weather warnings, you also have to be able to save yourself if there are any serious weather-related risks. And in the desert, the most common weather problem would be flash flooding.

Fortunately, if you pay attention to what you're doing and have a preplanned escape route that avoids large dry washes, flash flooding is only a minor problem. However, it still requires that boondockers take responsibility for themselves.

Another minor problem is Dust Devils. Dust devils are tiny little tornadoes that can come out of a clear blue sky, and even though the part that's on the ground may only be 10 or 20 feet in diameter, it still has the power to rip an open awning off of an RV and relocate your lawn chairs into the next county.

You can do nothing about these tiny tornadoes except realize you shouldn't leave your RV with your awning open, lawn chairs and solar panels sitting outside while you go shopping. If you're in an RV Park you will have neighbors who will probably try to throw all your stuff under the RV and hold your awning down till the dust devil passes over. But it will be expensive if you're a boondocker and make such a mistake, especially with a bunch of solar panels sitting on the ground. and yes I've seen that happen, and I've seen the aftermath.

So the whole point of this is if you plan on being a boondocker, you are not only going to be challenged, but you will be the only one responsible for meeting all the various challenges that are thrown at you, so it pays to keep up with what the weathers doing.

So how do boondockers do something about the weather when others just talk? Very simple, we take advantage of our most powerful resource.... The ability to leave. We have wheels, and boondockers aren't afraid to use them.

Theboondork

I got here pretty early this morning, the contestants were already shooting, but most of the shops hadn't opened up yet, and the weather couldn't have been more perfect.

I'm a lot like this dog, except smarter. every once in a while I'll just lay down in the middle the road and relax... But I'm hoping a UPS truck will run over me and I can sue for millions.

There's nothing like the tasty, tantalizing, tacos at a visiting roach coach.

I took this picture a hundred and fifty years ago when Ben Avery gun range was still desert wilderness, and only a few hard-bitten Mule Skinner's, and Indian fighters roamed the area.

These were mainly manley men that lived manley lives, until one day a merchant put an air conditioner in his tent which attracted women to this mainly manley area. The women then closed all the bars, and made the manly men go to PTA  meetings on a work night, and ice cream socials.....whatever that is?soon there wasn't a single manly man left in all of Arizona territory

The End

The merchants at the End of Trail have everything you need to look like, live like, and feel like, you're living in the Wild West during the 1800s. You may come here looking like a tenderfoot city slicker, but you can leave looking just like Doc Holliday.