When I was a boy, every day I would take note of the weather page in the New Glasgow Evening News. One place captured my imagination – Yuma Arizona. I don’t know why exactly it was one of the few US cities on that simple weather page in the early 1960’s, but it offered plenty of heat and sun, so I always wanted to go there. And so we have spent the month of December here! It claims to be the world’s sunniest city with at least 350 sunny days a year. It is brutally hot in summer but most of this month we have enjoyed temps in the low 70’s F – low 20’s C. Pretty much like early summer at home. That’s not the only thing we love about Yuma.
We checked into Riverfront RV park on Nov.29 and immediately liked its location right beside the Colorado River and adjacent to a beautiful park and miles of bike trails along the river and canals. We put our bikes to good use and biked everywhere. My knee feels like new and I walked at sunrise every morning – must be the dry weather.
We knew we needed to have something to do – you can’t just sit around all day and do nothing. We don’t golf, so we found Crossroads Mission to volunteer at. It is a homeless shelter and drug rehab centre for hundreds of people. They put us to work each Saturday looking after their booth at the local farmers market. We filled in for the lady who runs it as she went home to Saskatchewan for Christmas and she lent us her truck for the month. That’s how the Lord blesses! There are many Canadians here and they have a reputation for serving. We helped on Christmas Day (it’s the first time Glenda wasn’t sick to death watching me wash dishes!) as they served about 1500 meals. It was held outside on the warmest Christmas I’ve ever seen.
We also found a great church to attend – Grace Bible Fellowship. One of the blessings about being a Christ-follower is when you meet them in other places, you just become friends because we all love Jesus. The church has been around for over 100 years and has quite a mix of people. The pastor’s name is Tom Sawyer and he and Carolyn were very friendly and gracious to us. They reach out to many native people and migrant workers.
Yuma has lots to offer. There was a Christmas Tree lighting the first Saturday night and a ton of people were out. Then the next Saturday night a marvelous Christmas parade that was 2 hours long with a huge crowd. For my birthday Glenda took me to the Yuma Theatre for an evening of Christmas music with local orchestras. We visited the notorious Yuma prison, which was closed around 1909 and in 1911 became the home for 4 years for the Yuma High School which burnt down. The school teams became known as the ‘Criminals’ and still are today. The prison was then abandoned but was home to many people travelling through Yuma during the depression and subsequent years. You can see their inscriptions on the old cell walls. It has been largely restored.
We enjoyed the Colorado River Museum and learned all about how they have tapped into the Colorado and Gila rivers to irrigate the area for farming. The Yuma area supplies 90% of the North American market for lettuce and greens during the winter. The Colorado River flows from the Rocky Mountains and has several dams along the way, so that when it gets to the Mexican coast south of Yuma there is only a trickle left. The engineering work completed over 100 years ago to supply Yuma with canals is simply amazing. The water is over-allocated though.
We are so enamored with Yuma that we even looked at seasonal rental places. There are so many offered – it is a business in and of itself. Not sure if we would do anything in that regard, but it was interesting to look! We took in some sites like the Imperial Sand dunes and the original wooden ‘Old Plank Road’ into California, hiking Telegraph Pass, visiting date groves, the Mexican border and a ‘Wall’ that has been there for years, plus some great Mexican restaurants. But the bbq feast we had at ‘Famous Daves’ was the most memorable. I love the daily flyover of F-35 fighter jets from the local Marine Air Force base. The air force located here after a pair of Yuma pilots flew a plane nonstop for 47 days in 1949 to demonstrate how favorable Yuma is for flying. It took off on Aug.24, 1949 and didn’t land until October 10. Lol.
We spent Christmas with the church and mission, but we were certainly lonesome for home and family, especially Ben and Ally. I spent considerable time making family collages, of past family Christmas’ and with our family and Jenny. There are many single RV guys who are here alone – something I wouldn’t relish. I wonder about their family situation. We are so blessed – there is no place like home!
We plan to leave Yuma on Dec. 31 and head east. We will stay a few days in eastern Arizona and southern New Mexico and Lord willing will arrive in South Texas by Jan 13. It looks like some cooler weather is east of us, so we will miss sunny Yuma even more. As 2018 ends, we express our thanks to God for guiding and blessing us on our trip!
Let's Do The 180! 