No covid vaccine requirements! No covid pre-tests to take! And best of all . . . no facemasks! – not in the airport, not on the plane, not in Hawaii!
I have a list of projects I want to accomplish. I have contacted my septic tank contractor to arrange for him to get started. I have ordered more concrete and lumber and some more guttering to be delivered on the Thursday after I arrive.
I have ordered a low voltage refrigerator, and it should be at the post office waiting for me to arrive.
Traveling from Arizona to San Antonio, Texas for another High School graduation requires us to travel through the bottom corner of New Mexico.
Just across the Arizona/New Mexico border is a “ghost town” called Steins. We stopped here on the way back from attending a high school graduation in San Antonio and I have created a seperate post for this.
One of the things memorable about New Mexico is the openess, the empty spaces, and the isolation.
Another memorable item is the extent of government waste. Such as this Border Patrol check point – Millions of dollars spent to create this checkpoint, and it is not even being used. There are barricades across the entrance!
I guess that is better than what we witnessed at other Border Patrol checkpoints where they stop each individual car and ask if everyone is a US citizen. You simply say yes, and they wave you through. I have wondered what they would do if you answered “Si” or “Ja” or “Jawohl”! What is interesting about this is the fact that none of the big rigs, the commercial trucks pulling a 45 foot cargo trailer loaded with hundreds of illegal aliens are stopped. No questions asked! They simply drive through!
We also saw many dust devils, whirly winds, mini tornadoes, heat created wind twists.
A few miles to the west of Las Cruces, New Mexico, standing on a bluff overlooking the highway, is a very large statue of a roadrunner.
This statue is made from pieces of trash. It looks very impressive from a distance and it is only after stopping at the rest area behind the hill and walking up to it, that you can see the individual pieces of trash.
Very well done.
Unfortunately, the only coyotes we saw were roadkill along the sides of the highway.
A few miles east of the Arizona/New Mexico border along interstate 10 is an old town called Steins, New Mexico. It is privately owned, and is touted as a “ghost town”. currently, it is nothing more than a dump.
I’m not going to go into the history of Steins, as you can do that by researching it on the internet.
What I am going to do is post some pictures of what we found when we pulled off the interstate to satisfy our curiosity(OK, to satisfy MY curiosity). At about mile marker 11 in New Mexico, there is a billboard (that looks like it has seen much better days) inviting travelers to stop and explore Steins. I didn’t get a picture of the billboard, maybe next trip!
But when you get to Steins, you find a much different reception!
You are met with a mixed reception – one of welcome
and one of “Go AWAY!”
At opposite ends of what used to be the old town, are residences set up for the people who live there. It looks like there are two residences on the east side that center around RV trailers,
and at the west end, there is a manufactured home.
There is a fence around the town intended to keep out the inquisitive travelers. (like me).
Pictures on the internet show the buildings when they were in a little better condition, but now, they are just boarded up and deteriorating.
I for one, was a bit disappointed by my visit to Steins, New Mexico.
Another grandchild graduated from High School. This if the fifth. . . Not possible!!! I’m not that old!
The first Grandson graduated four years ago here in Phoenix. He graduated from a large public high school with somewhere near 400 other kids. The next year, the oldest Granddaughter graduated from a small school on base at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio. I think there were something like 25 other graduates. She was the youngest of her class as she was graduationg after her Junior year.
Last year the second Grandson and the second granddaughter graduated. Again, they had a large graduating class of around 400 other kids. The Grandson’s graduation was limited to only the graduates and their parents, while the Granddaughter’s graduation was totally a podcast – on line only! Both of these were as a result of and in the middle of, the Covid Pandemic!
As opposed to his older sister, this Grandson decided to attend a large public High School. He wanted to be anonymous.
The restrictions placed on the public due to the pandemic have been lifted, so we drove to San Antonio for the Graduation. We left Friday morning at 7 AM and arrived in San Antonio at 11 PM. The Graduation was the next morning at 9 AM at the Alamo Dome.
Another large graduating class.
As the graduates were filing in, I leaned over to my son-in-law and said, “Sure is different from when his sister graduated!” (a class of around 25 students)
And he replied, “And the parking was easier then, too!”
His name was called.
He walked across the stage, shook hands with the principal, got his diploma and walked off the stage. And that was it.
After everyone got their diploma, they tossed their caps in the air, and left. Outside the Alamo Dome, everyone congregated in a mass of humanity.
After lunch at my daughter’s house, we headed back to Scottsdale. We didn’t do it in one long drive, but broke it up by spending the night in El Paso. We also passed through Fort Stockton, Texas once again – I have made a seperate post about Fort Stockton – and drove through the bottom corner of New Mexico. (another post about New Mexico and a ghost town named Steins, NM). There is a third post about New Mexico and a giant Road Runner!
As we went through Tucson the next day, we stopped at McDonalds for a hot fudge sundae – basically a cup of soft serve ice cream with a little chocolate syrup on top, and a few chopped peanuts. We used to get these in Gila Bend, AZ on the way to San Diego, when we had a sailboat in the harbor there. We paid around $1.25 for them. McDonalds in Tucson wanted $3.10, and no peanuts! I guess that since one person in every 40 million people has a peanut allergy, that nobody gets peanuts anymore! Those who have this alergy cannot simply say, “No peanuts, please!” Instead, the other 99.99% of the world gets no peanuts!
I really should not complain about the higher price, because the kid making the ice cream sundae is earning $15.00 an hour now! I feel soooo much better that high school kids are earning a living wage, even if that living wage will not buy half of what the previous wage would have bought. Two years ago, kids making $7.50 an hour could afford to go to McDonalds. Now it is too expensive for them even with a living wage of $15.00 per hour. Basic Economics 101!
While waiting in line at the drive thru, we decided that we didn’t really want a cup of ice cream, so we drove away without paying, and without the sundaes. A mile away, we saw a QT convenience store. They serve soft serve ice cream cones. We stopped there and got two cones with three times the amount of ice cream we would have gotten at McDonalds – and only 79 cents each! Capitalism in its finest hour!
While on a trip to Cabo San Lucas in 2005, I saw a tree that I really liked. The tree was quite large, with an overhead canopy some thirty feet high.
The lowest limbs were four, five, even six feet off the ground. The leaves are small, oval in shape and arranged in a feathery fern type pattern on stems that are about a foot long. At certain times of the year, there are red or orange flowers growing at the tops of the branches, almost displacing the green leaves.
Some of the trees I saw had so much flower that it was almost totally red. Hanging from the branches were brown beans that were 12 to 16 inches in length, 1/2 inch thick and about 3 inches wide. Inside these beans, there are individual seeds.
Then when I went to Australia a few years later, I saw the same type of tree.
Then I saw this tree in the Bahamas.
On Grand Bahamas IslandNear Nassau, Bahamas
On a subsequent trip to Cabo, I even saw a few that had yellow or orange flowers.
I have seen them quite often in Hawaii.
I’ve collected seeds from Australia, Fiji, Florida, California, the Bahamas and Hawaii.
I learned that this is called a Royal Ponciana Tree. . . sometimes called a flame tree. It grows in tropical locations with lots of sunshine and rain.
I liked the tree so much that I gathered some of the brown beans and brought them home (smuggled them in). I broke the beans open and took out the seeds. There are around a dozen seeds in each bean or pod, depending on the size (length) of the pod.
Then I planted half a dozen of these seeds in to a pot. I kept them wet and warm and in the sun. It took over a month before they germinated and started to come up. I ended up with four fern like plants. When they got to be about a foot and a half tall, I transplanted them to bigger individual, pots. Three of them died immediately. Probably more as a result of my transplanting skills than anything else, but one survived.
At the time, we were redoing the front yard landscasping. – getting rid of the grass –
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and I created a small planter – just an indented area about 2 foot by three foot surrounded by a concrete curb totally under the ground surface – and planted the one remaining tree there. It struggled and I babied it. During the winter, around the end of November, all the leaves fell off. It liked like a couple of sticks. I built a frame over it and covered it with a light sheet and put in a night light for heat.
Come March, I was ready to give up on it as being a lost cause and removed the sheet, framework, and the night light . I did some research and found that the Royal Ponciana survives in USDA Hardiness Zones 10 thru 12. Hawaii is Zone 11 and 12, Puerto Rico is totally Zone 12, the bottom 1/4 of Florida is zone 10, as is the very southern tip of Texas, Southwestern Arizona around Yuma, and Southern California from Los Angeles to San Diego. The Phoenix Area is more like zone 8 or 9.
Just as I was ready to cut out the two little sticks remaining, I saw some green on one of the sticks. A few weeks later, there was a few small green buds on one of the sticks. I started another dozen seeds in a pot inside the house. Slowly, the one planted outside grew leaves and branches. By the end of May, it was fully covered in leafy fern like fronds.
It grew taller and bushier. In August, three little plants came up in my pot. By October, the one outside was almost three feet tall. I rebuilt the frame work around and over the small bush. In November, I began covering it at night. In December, I started with the night light – basically just a single bare 40 watt incandescent light bulb. All the leaves fell off and it was just sticks.
In March, I removed the framework. The ponciana was just sticks. It wasn’t until late April until the buds started to come out. and I had three plants growing in the pot inside the house.
This third winter, it was over four feet tall and it took three sheets to cover it. Come springtime, I transplanted two of the plants from the pot into the small planter.
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The fourth winter, I began covering the main trunk and branches with newspaper. I would wrap two or three layers of newspaper aroung the branches and tied them in place with string. The framework with old sheets was over six feet tall, and I had added a second light bulb.
The fifth winter, I did not include the night lights, but insulated the trunks and branches with newspapers as before.
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The sixth winter, I only insulated the branches.
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This is what happens to it in December and January each year.
The 9th year we got a few red flowers, and the tenth year, we even got a small single bean – with no seed inside.
It has been 12 years. The canopy is over 25 feet tall, covers much of the front yard and now, in May, almost a fourth of the trees top is covered in red flowers.
I plan on planting some of these seeds in Hawaii. I just haven’t decided on where.
The end of april saw me headed back to continue with what work I could do in Hawaii. And of course, to go to the beach/ocean!
Arrival at Kona
The major project I wanted to concentrate on was the outdoor kitchen area/Gazebo. On the last two trips, I have been raising the original 12 x 12 deck to make it the roof over a gazebo. I have built 16″ square columns at each corner 4 feet tall with a concrete cap. Bolted to these are metal brackets I had fabricated in Arizona to hold 4 x 4 posts.
Each post at one side is 30 ” tall while the two at the other end are 27″ tall. This will give a slight slope to drain the rainwater in one direction for easier collection.
Results of my last trip.
At the end of the last trip, I had the columns built, and the posts cut. I had installed two of the fabricated metal brackets and one new beam to replace the original double 2 x 6 beam I had created for the deck. My first chore was to install the second beam, remove the original double 2 x 6 beams, install the other two metal brackets and the wood diagonal bracing.
I also installed a row of blocking between the joist in the center of the roof.
In order to lighten the deck to make it easier to control as I raised it, I had removed the 2 x 6 decking. Now I needed to reinstall it. Since I had painted the roof joist, I wanted to paint the decking. As it was going to be a different color, it would be easier to paint it before I installed it.
Painting the roof decking before installationAll roof boards installed
Because I want to use this as my outdoor kitchen (instead of under the tarp) I needed to make it waterproof – or at least make it so that the water didn’t come through the ceiling. To do this, I decided on tarpaper and rolled roofing.
The shaded area is where i have installed tarpaper so far.
Once I had the roof completed, I installed a gutter across the lower edge of the roof with a downspout. I placed a bucket under the downspout and one afternoon it rained for about an hour –
filling the bucket.
At this point, the floor under the gazebo is just gravel. Between the posts/columns I have poured concrete and stamped it with a pattern I created to simulate lava. I have poured three small slabs on each of the four sides with 13″ wide gaps between each slab. I’ll fill these in with colored concrete.
I also wanted to design a layout of the Hawaiian Islands in the main section of the floor.
First, I had to layout the shapes of the islands. Then I needed to create forms to hold the concrete. To do this, I cut flattened corrugated roofing into 4″ wide strips.
Then I used these as forms for the islands. I could bend them to create the shape of each island.
Each “island” shape was supported on the outside of the form with sand.
I do not claim to be an artist, but I think I created a close enough simulation to get the idea across. These, I filled with black colored concrete. Once they cured, I removed the sheetmetal forms and the sand.
I tried to make them out of black concrete by adding a black color into the mix.
Ingredients I used for the black concreteThe black concrete with the empty forms shaped somewhat like the Hawaiian Islands
There isn’t any sand on the property so I had to go get some. In fact, I had to make multiple trips as my transport for this kind of thing is rather limited.
But sand isn’t the only thing I haul. I picked up these pallets to use as miscellaneous building materials. I will tear them apart for the 1 x 4’s.
I also took a short trip past Naalehu down to the shore. The wind was blowing across the Pacific Ocean causing a bit more wave action than normal.
This created quite the show of water crashing against the rock shelf and casting geysers into the air.
The power of the waves here is amazing. I could watch it for hours.
I also own a lot on a different street. I went to check it out, but in accordance with the environmental sensitivities of the people and government of Hawaii, the road is blocked by about a dozen junk vehicles – all leaking untold amounts of oil and gasoline while they rust and deteriorate. (My sarcasm is intentional!)
But this is not unique to my subdivision. As you drive along the highway between South Point and Kona there are numerous vehicles left along the side of the road to simply rot.
Many of these have been there for years.
But vehicles are not the only thing that gets abandoned. There are many buildings that are simply left to their own devices as the jungle quietly takes back the land.
For instance, is this old abandoned school in South Kona.
Also, there is this abandoned visitor center at the Punaluu Black sand Beach. The last time I was here, the buildings were all hidden in a crush of overgrown weeds and fallen branches. But the signage at the beach is clearly visible.
Back at the property, I took a break from the Gazebo to do some clearing for the septic tank location.
I ran much if what I trimmed through the chipper.
And no trip to Hawaii is complete without some papaya –
Even if someone has beaten you to it.
Then of course, there is always coconut.
Sometimes there is the possibility of a good breakfast of eggs, spam, and mushrooms
One day, I picked up a plumeria tree that someone was selling. I hope to keep it growing and I transplanted it in to a larger container.
Next, it was time to pour the colored concrete in the 13″ gaps between the small slabs I had poured. Not only did I want to color the concrete, but I also wanted to embed some large flat stones into the surface.
In order to do this, I needed the stones. For these, I took a walk out to the crescent rocky beach of Kawa Bay on Highway 11 about half a mile past Whittington Beach. It is probably a quarter of a mile walk along a gravel road out to the bay. There is an iron gate keeping vehicle traffic out as it is a culturally sensitive area. Twice I have seen a 15 passenger van parked along this gravel road for a group of college age “researchers”. They must know the proper prayers and incantations to mutter to appease the Hawaiian Gods for trespassing on these sacred grounds with a vehicle – that or they have a key to the lock on the gate!
Kawa Bay loking to the rightKawa Bay looking to the left.
I have seen humpback whales just outside the bay on other trips here, but not this time. On the cliff to the left overlooking the bay,
there is a rather large ruin that consists of large rock walls surrounding a large flat open area. At the entrance is a sign asking people to stay out of this “Ancient Hawaiian Sacred Place”.
Next to the entrance is a pile of “offerings” that others have left.
Leaving the cultural site on top of the cliff, I went back to the beach and collected the flat rocks I needed. These I used to pour concrete in four of the gaps.
The next day, I poured the other four.
One of the last things I did on this trip was toprepare for pouring a concrete landing to the south of the gazebo.
I had to reinforce the rock walls using concrete, fill the area with the sand I used to support the forms for the islands,
and set some forms.
My flight back to Arizona went through Sacramento. We flew over San Francisco Bay on the way to Sacramento.
For two years we have been dictated to and fed the same line he used when he said “Follow the science” but now it’s up to us as individuals???
When boarding Air Force One to go to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, President Biden was wearing a mask – an hour earlier, White House press secretary Jen Psaki had said that the White House was going to continue to encourage people to wear one when traveling – but when he returned from Portsmouth, he was not wearing one. ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS!
When in Portsmouth neither he, nor anyone in his entourage was wearing a mask even though they were obviously not following the 6 foot CDC guideline.
His actions do not follow his words. If he believed that masks are important, why was he not wearing one?
When asked if the White House was going to appeal the judge’s ruling, he said that he had not been briefed by the CDC! Just WHO is in charge of our country? He had not been told yet what to do????? His handlers, . . . his babysitters, . . . his care givers, had not yet told him what they wanted him to say?????
The only plausible answer is that the USA may have a President, but we do NOT have a leader! For 47 years, Joe Biden has been a follower. He still is!
I took my checked luggage to the airport today to weigh it on their scales. 48.5 lbs! And none of the airport workers were wearing a mask!!!
Good to go. Now I just need to remember to not add anything to it!
Also, Hawaii has run out of money to maintain the “SafeTravelsHawaii” website, so no longer are we required to register so that the government can track us!
No more mandatory vaccination cards! No more mandatory shoving a Q-tip up your nose! No more questions when you arrive by someone whose expertise is snorkeling!
A Federal Judge declares that the CDC’s mask mandate is not lawful, and suddenly, over 100 destinations that were level 4 (the highest risk of contracting Covid) were no longer on the list!
Do we need any more evidence that this entire pandemic was a made up lie?
There is a humingbird that keeps flying onto my patio , under the patio cover, and close to the windows.
Have you ever tried to take a picture of a hummingbird?
It appears as if he/she/it is looking for something. A way inside? A place for a nest? insects? or plain curiosity. I really don’t know.
The other day, I was out on the patio and this hummingbird (OK, I don’t know if it was the same hummingbird or not) came flying towards me and stopped in midair about 5 feet away.
“Well, Hello, there little hummingbird!” I said.
No reply
“What do you want?” I asked.
Again, no reply. It just hung there for almost a minute. Then it darted around on the patio , . . .back and forth, left and right, out from under the roof, and back under; over to the windows, and then it left.
Hmmm! I wonder what that was all about. Then I noticed that the hummingbird feeder at the end of the patio beam was empty! So, I filled it with one of those packets of powdered humming bird food – of course, I added it to 16 ounces of water before I put it in the feeder. Then I hung it back up.
Today, a hummingbird came to my patio and under the roof, then over to the feeder.
So, now I can add to my list of abilities – Humming bird Whisperer.
TropicalCastaway 