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We ended up staying at the Plomosa campground until March 12th, mostly soaking up the sun and I think I finally perfected my guacamole recipe. 

We rode our motorcycles a few more times and Whit went through some more off-road riding lessons. She has improved tremendously this winter and I think it will really show when we ride some Colorado trails this summer. We went to the Desert Bar which was about 40 miles North of us on the 10th. It was a very large sprawling place with lots of desert rats there and great live music. Oh, and the chili cheese fries were awesome! On the other hand, the beer selection was not so awesome.

The owner built this metal church. 

We had a great winter down in Southern AZ, but were ready to move on. We enjoyed our last desert sunset on the 12th, wore the dogs out, and then headed out early on the 13th. 

When we drove in to Southern AZ we took the Southern route on I-10. It was relatively flat and boring. This time we decided to take the mountainous route on highway 60. It was a beautiful drive. There were saguaro cactus sparsely populating the Quartzsite area, but just outside of Phoenix in Tonto NF there are literally 
forests of them.

Some of them were huge.

The drive through Tonto kept going up and we soon left the desert behind. There was still lots of snow up in the mountains, but it was melting fast. Nala found her new favorite spot to ride in the rig.

After the long drive through the mountains, we stopped in a little place called Pie Town. They have a free campground and we were the only ones in it that night. Nala got to chase some deer and we found one of the biggest Alligator Juniper trees I have ever seen.

 The next day happened to be Pi day (3/14) so the Pie-O-Neer cafe was open for business so we had pie and coffee for breakfast. It is not called pie town for no reason, they know how to make pie! We moved on a few miles down the road to Datil, NM and stayed at the Datil well campground. It was a beautiful campground and only cost $5 to stay. We got there early in the day so we took the dogs for a nice long hike. The trail had several viewing seats along the way. The dogs enjoyed the rest and Nala especially enjoyed the shade.

We made it to the Rocky point overlook and had a great glimpse of the VLA which was over 10 miles away. 

I decided that since we were around our first real trees in a while that I would take advantage and set up the hammock. It turned out to be a great place for napping (Who knew?).

The next day we headed towards Socorro, NM with a stop at the VLA for a look around. Whit had never heard of it so it was a nice learning experience for her. Also, just outside the VLA there was a herd of antelope that we got some great shots of.

I got too close and they started running away.

They had all of the dishes close together so we got almost all of them in one shot.

It is hard to tell how big they are from far away, but standing right next to one they are not your average satellite dish.

We made it to Socorro later that day and stayed at my Aunt's house for a couple of days before heading back North to Denver. We went to the Buckhorn and had their wonderful award winning green chile burgers while we were there. Definitely worth a stop if you are ever down that way. We made it safely back to Denver and will be working for the next ~3 months. I will not be updating the blog as often since we will not be on the road for now. We will take off again in July. It is supposed to snow for the next couple days with highs in the 20's. Not exactly spring weather, but that's Colorado for you. Hopefully it will warm up after that. Hope everyone has a great spring!