Made it to Valley Verde

On Sunday we left the Grand Canyon behind and headed south and a little east.  When we got to Flagstaff we hit a thunderstorm with lots of heavy rain.  When we turned south we could see blue skies ahead!  We are camped at a Thousand Trails campground.  We are about 8 miles west of Camp Verde near the town of Valley Verde and Cottonwood, Arizona.  Sedona is only about 15 miles away.  It is a bit warmer here than at the Grand Canyon.  It's been in the mid 90's in the day and high 60's at night.

Yesterday we had quite a rain storm with lots of thunder and lightning and things cooled down.  It started just before we were scheduled to go have a little wine and cheese and hear a Sky Med presentation.  Both Ted and I had been thinking about a Sky Med type of program because of our traveling, but had not mentioned it to each other.  Sky Med is a company that provides medical transportation and more.  For example, if something were to happen to Ted or I, we would call 911 and probably have to go by ambulance or by air medical transport to a hospital that will meet our needs.  Our insurance may or may not cover all of the costs.  We call Sky Med and they take care of what our insurance doesn't.  But not only that, if we have to go to another State, they will provide a bonded driver to drive our truck and RV to whereever we are going.  They would also fly whoever we require, such as our nephew, to us by commercial airlines.  They also provide medical transporation globabally if we are on a cruise or a trip somewhere out of the US.  Anyway, we signed up for it for our piece of mind.   There were 14 people signed up to attend, but we were the only ones who braved the rain and showed up  We brought home two bottles of wine and cheese that he had opened!  We also got 2 Dairy Queen gift cards!  Such a deal!

Today we drove over to Sedona and had lunch.  The red rock in Sedona is unbelievably beautiful.  Unfortunately my pictures don't even begin to do it justice.

We walked around some of the shops, Ted bought me a turquois neclace to go with the earrings he got me in Tombstone, Arizona in May.  We had a nice lunch and then headed back toward the campground.  We made a detour through historic downtown Clarksville and up to mile high Jerome.  Jerome was a copper mining town and when the copper ran out the mind just closed down and the town died.  Eventually people started coming back and it has a cute little "artsy/fartsy" town.  It is built on the side of a very steep mountain with tiny roads and is not a place where you want to have a big truck driving around it!

Tonight we will be playing "card bingo" here at the campground.  It is a lot of fun!

Beautiful red rock mountains..."Ain't Life Grand!"