River Cruise on the Rio Grande River

Before I tell you guys about the trip I have to give a quick "thank you" shout out to Kathy, who owns a lot here at Retama Village. For a while I have been told by some people that we did not update our side picture with the Teton and I did not like the way the top picture turned out either. Well, she has this cool program called "Paintshop", which is very similar to "Photoshop", which I used to use at work and now working on pictures has become a lot easier. Thank you so much Kathy!!

Well, we got lucky on Tuesday and the weather was just perfect for a boat ride.

So us and about 40 other people from Retama Village left for an one hour cruise up and down the river. We got to see some turtles sunbathing and some interesting birds. Some of the trees and overgrow reminded me of South Carolina's Spanish moss and then we got to see two immigration boats checking out something on the US side of the river.


I have to admit that I really did not see any differences between the US and the Mexican side, but I'm not sure what I really expected. Here are some pictures of the Mexican side.


We turned around at the dam and we got to see some of the new border wall being built right here in the valley.

All in all it was a nice boat tour and we had lunch at the river afterwards.

Our new hitch!

Well the hitch did finally arrive last Monday and here it is!!


Once we were able to get the old hitch out of the rails with a crowbar and lifted it out of the truck, the installation of the new hitch started. I have to say it really was not as bad as I had envisioned it. There are four major parts; the two pillars on the right and left side that hold the air cylinders and the shock absorbers on the outside, the bar across that links the two pillars together and then the hitch head that mounds on the cross bar. Once everything was assembled in about a hour, we put air pressure in the system and watched the air cylinders move as the pressure built up. It was pretty cool. Since the manufacturer was three weeks late in delivering the hitch to us, we got a cover for free with a letter of apology. I was impressed with the letter, you don't see that to often.

We hooked the trailer up a couple of days later and after some initial adjustments, everything is working well and looks aligned correctly. Now we just have to see if it makes a difference when Doug is towing the rig. Hopefully it will make the ride smoother for him.

Update

Well, two weeks have pasted again and not much new stuff to report. The drastic temperature change of about 40 degrees between morning and afternoon has finally gotten to me and I am inside with a cold. It is slightly annoying to have the sniffles when it is 80 degrees outside, but I am sure I will get over it soon.

We have been doing some little stuff, like Doug inflating the tires of the rig today and I finally finishing up the rearranging of all the cupboards. Our diet is still going strong and the pounds are coming of slowly but consistently. I read somewhere that slow weight loss is a good thing, now I have to learn patience (not my strongest trade).

We finally decided not to buy a bigger truck and just get a stronger hitch. Doug did all the research and we ordered it end of last month. It took the company three weeks to finally ship it. It seems like just another sign of the time of companies struggling to deliver in a timely fashion. I was getting upset, but by now the hitch shipped and should be here by Monday. Hopefully, it will make driving the truck with the rig hooked up more comfortable. So there will be some minor excitement here next week and we also have a boat trip scheduled for Tuesday with our friends from Retama Village. I will make sure to take some pictures so that I have actually something to report. Until then ...

Happy New Year!!!

I know I am a little bit late, but time really seems to be flying down here this time. We spend some time up the clubhouse with our friends on New Year's Eve and otherwise had a pretty calm transition into the New Year. We enjoyed our traditional prime rib roast on New Year's Day and I got to say, this rig truly feels like our home by now. My oven works correctly and there are just so many things that make life more comfortable in this 5th wheel.

I talked two months ago about writing a blog "A year in review". I have changed my mind at this point, since there are so many small things that were special, but hard to put into words back then, and I still don't know how to put them in words now.

One thing that has amazed throughout this year is my husband's ability to find a hometown racetrack with Friday or Saturday night races of the local car race teams. We have enjoyed these evenings a lot.

Another thing that sticks in my mind was seeing a lot of closed stores or businesses going out of business as we were driving through Tennessee at the end of 2007 and wondering what was happening. Who would have thought that this was just the beginning of what was to come in 2008.

But, there was also a lot of things that I saw along the way that brought a smile to my face, like a cute lawn ornament of a boy sitting on a bridge fishing in a small pond on a Minnesota road as we were driving by.

There were so many of these little things, it is impossible to mention them all. All I can say is that we had a great year, saw a lot of things and I am sure we will see a lot more amazing places this year.