Lone Rock Part 5 - Page Balloon Festival, Rock House Valley Road and The Toadstools.

Friday, November 4th

I slept in after having a rough night and did not get up until 6:45 am. Looked out the door ... no wind, the balloon launch will go ahead this morning. I quickly messaged Steve and Dianne ... do you want to come! And of course they never say no to seeing new experiences and fortunately they are usually up early .... so  we all made it out the door shortly after 7 am to go into Page. I left Ray at home as his back was pretty sore from the day before's adventures. Dianne and I were told where to go to get the best view from our nail tech the night before.

Once we parked in Page Lumber's parking lot, we walked to the edge of the parking lot and watched the balloons. Unfortunately we forgot chairs, so Dianne managed to find a power box to sit on and these nice people beside us had an extra chair for me. Bonus! Steve spent the time wandering around. Got some good pictures using Ray's camera which I seldom use, so I was happy about that. We had seen the Pahrump Balloon Festival last February so Ray was not too upset to miss this.

Thanks for the chair.

Seeing the balloons floating in the sky seems so magical, hard to describe with words. Here is a link to the Pahrump Balloon Festival from our Blog from last February.

They are starting to fill with air ... they use large fans to get them inflating before they use the propane fire.

Up, up, and away.

Within 45 minutes the sky was full of colourful balloons. They were taking off behind us, in front of us, beside us. Wow.

Steve and Dianne

Dianne and I

Hatching balloons like a bubble maker! lol

This guy was sitting on a seat for an ultralight with his propane tank and torch on his back.

The balloons all seemed to be able to stick in the same area of the golf course and not go too far. Some came down and then back up a couple of times.

Picture taken by the highway on our way back to camp..

Overall my "picture taking" was not too bad with Ray's camera.

Back home for 9:30 am we were all starved with only 1 cup of coffee and no breakfast. Spent the rest of the day tidying up the rig, getting laundry sorted and changed our bed in preparation to go to the laundromat on Sunday hopefully.

As it was Friday, all afternoon people kept arriving at the beach. We went from almost no one around us to this.

Dianne and Steve were hosting dinner tonight as she gets to try out her brand new InstantPot. Ray had invited some other people to Happy Hour around the campsite. Dave and Cheryl McMechan are from Red Deer, Alberta and Dave recently retired last June so they are now full-timing. They have followed Dianne and Steve's blog and sometimes have even read ours ... small world.

We all had a great chat although Dianne had to pop in and out as she was preparing her dinner. As it began to get colder outside we said our goodbyes and headed into Dianne and Steve's unit for a lovely pork roast and roasted potato dinner. Yumm. Thanks guys.

We ended up staying longer than we had planned as we just had so much to talk about about future destinations.

Saturday November 4th

Up later than usual ... had our coffee and then at 9:30 am, Steve and Dianne came over for today's road trip adventure. Ray wanted to check out Rock House Valley Road towards the Coyote Buttes to see if the topography was as pretty as what we had seen on the other side of the highway, Paria Canyon, Johnson Canyon and Cottonwood Canyon. As it turned out the clouds came and it was not as spectacular as we had previously seen after driving only 9 miles so we turned around at the Wire Pass Trailhead that they say on Wikipedia "is the gateway to some spectacular scenery and hiking, including The Wave and Buckskin Gulch."We were not hiking into the canyons so the views were not too inspiring so not too many photos. The road was not great either. Ray and Steve managed to take a couple of pictures on the way back though.

Rock House Valley Road

Rock House Valley Road

Rock House Valley Road

Far views from the trail head parking, you can see the colour starting on the other side of the ridge.

Driving back on the highway towards Lone Rock Beach we all decided to stop at the "Toad Stools" which is a fairly easy walk up a wash to the formations. They were very cool. Freya had a blast as she loves running in the sand but kept barking trying to keep her "pack" together. The wind was sure blasting us though with all of the sand in the wind. Both Dianne and Steve, with contacts, were having some trouble with the blowing sand.

About Paria Rimrocks Toadstool Hoodoos

The Paria Rimrocks are an amazing collection of hoodoos, badlands, and other interesting rock formations found in the area located between the Cockscomb Fault and the southern section of Cottonwood Canyon Road just north of US 89. (Trip Advisor)

Off we go

You guys coming!

Almost back to the parking lot.

On the way up the Lone Rock Beach Road we saw some horse wranglers getting ready to separate some of the cows.

Back from our walk it was time to go home for some lunch. The wind was not blowing when we arrived back at the motorhome, but within an hour we were blasted with sand so spent the rest of the day inside. I made Navajo Tacos for Ray and I for lunch, That is what supper was supposed to be at the Balloon Glow event tonight in Page.  Dianne, Steve and I were supposed to attend but we bet it was cancelled due to the wind, hence the substitution. As it turned out they did the Balloon Glow without the balloons, only the torches played to the music so we did not miss anything.

Navajo Tacos with Indian Frybread.

Later Dianne and Steve came over for Happy Hour and so did Dave and Cheryl for a gab session. We were inside hiding from the wind. Everyone had lots of info for Dave who diligently wrote it down in his notebook ... ahhh newbies ... good luck with the flood of information!

Me, Cheryl, Dianne, Dave and Ray. Picture by Steve.

Sunday, November 5th

Woke up at 6:15 am (we did not do a time change last night as Arizona does not have daylight savings time ... we had changed our clocks to AZ time last week anyways.) The plan today was for me to go into Page and tackle three weeks of laundry. Ray and I quickly had a shower and changed into clean clothes so the rest of the towels and stuff went into the laundry basket. After loading out multiple baskets of laundry into the car I was on my way at 7:45 am with Dianne in tow as she had some laundry to do as well. I was hoping to beat the rush at the laundromat being that it was Sunday. We ended up with just enough machines for us and more people kept coming in. We managed okay with the dryers too and by 9:45 we were done. Over to Walmart for a few groceries, through the car wash for the car and lunch at Rotten Ronnies (MacDonalds my treat) and back home just before noon. Glad that is over with!

The rest of the afternoon was spent putting laundry away, dishes, blogging and relaxing. Tonight Dianne and I have decided to have an appetizer party for the 4 of us instead of cooking dinner. Hoping the wind will go away later so we can all be outside and have a campfire. We shall see ... it might be an inside night again.

Dianne and Steve went out for the first quad ride in this area to check things out. We have been so busy touring, there's not enough hours in a day for Steve to use all of his "toys". lol Shortly after they left the wind came up that it was a sand storm again. No more outside for us today!

Steve and Dianne came over about 4:30 pm where we all proceeded to stuff our faces for the next hour and a half. Great chicken satay Dianne.  About 6:30 they left so Ray could lay down as his back was still pretty sore from our exploring in the car. To bed early for both of us.

Yup we ate well!

Voila!

Monday, November 6th

Hard to believe that we have been here 10 days. It has all gone by so fast. Today will be pack up day in preparation for heading out tomorrow morning. Unfortunately there may be a little shower in our trip further south. Destination is the Cottonwood area. Hopefully the wind will not come up again today to make packing up stuff a little harder, especially the mats. So with this I will sign off now until our next adventure.