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September 8, 2010, a Wednesday
near North Rim, Arizona, USA
— Went to "town" and gave a lost hunter a ride
We took it easy this morning after such a tiring day yesterday. I had my normal breakfast then downselected the images I took last night. I processed two images for the blog then worked up a blog entry. We packed up our computers and left in the Jeep around 11:25.
We went to the Kaibab Lodge around noon to have lunch and to use their free Wi-Fi. I had a Kaibab Burger (a basic cheeseburger) with sweet potato fries and J had a BLT with sweet potato fries. The food was OK and the Wi-Fi connection was slow. We left around 1:00 and ...
Went to the North Rim Country Store across the street. I filled up the Jeep at $3.199/gal, then we parked near the store and used their Wi-Fi. The Wi-Fi connection was much better than at the Kaibab Lodge and I was finally able to get things accomplished online. We left around 2:55.
On our way back to the RV, I discovered that our Garmin eTrex Venture HC GPS had died. I tried putting new batteries in it, and it was still dead. :( This has happened before, and I'm tempted to buy a new handheld GPS.
Combine all meatball ingredients in a gallon-size Zip-lock bag. Use your hands to squish the bag and mix the ingredients well. Take approximately 1/4 cup of meatball mixture and form into a meatball, then place in the sauce. Repeat for remaining meatballs.
Bring all to a simmer. Continue to simmer, covered, for about 15 minutes. Turn each meatball and then simmer, covered, for another 15 minutes. Remove the cover and let the sauce simmer for another 15 minutes to cook it down.
Serve in bowls. Optional: Serve over cooked egg noodles in the bowls.
Serves 4.We stopped because a bow hunter flagged us down. He was lost because his GPS had stopped working, and after we talked for a while to give him directions back to his truck, J suggested that we could give him a ride. He happily accepted the offer and we headed back towards where he said he had left his truck. After driving a mile or so (about 2km) down a two-track road along some power lines, both J and I wondered if he'd pull a gun on us and try to off us. We were both especially alarmed when he answered J's question about what he did by saying, "I don't want to talk about it." However, our minds were quickly put at (relative) ease after he explained that he was a full-time firefighter and had been a volunteer firefighter before that. His truck was further along the two-track road than he thought, but we finally found it and dropped him off.
Because we had gone so far on the two-track road (about 5 mi or 8km), I decided to just keep going because, if I remembered correctly, the power lines should cross another good road not too far away. Before we reached the good road, we came across a downed tree across the road. I was able to pull part of it off the road, but the larger piece was too heavy for me to move. So, I got the tow strap out of the black hole in the back seat of the Jeep, wrapped it around the lower wishbone of the front left suspension, and then hooked the two sewn-together loops around a branch near the tree trunk. J backed up the Jeep and pulled the tree far enough off the road so that we could get by. After we got underway again, J said she thought I was crazy to have messed with the tree. We popped out onto a good road not too far after that (about 1 mi or 1.6km after dropping off the hunter), so I was quite happy that we had removed the tree instead of heading back along the long two-track road.
We stopped to watch about six Blue Grouse right on and by the road. The light was backwards for us to photograph them, so we just watched for a while.
We returned to the RV around 5:05 — much later than we had planned. J started to make a batch of her Porcupine Meatballs. They're called "Porcupine" because the rice sticks out of the meatballs and the chili gives them a bit of a kick. I started to work up a blog entry after we decided not to go photograph sunset because it was so windy and there weren't any clouds.
We had dinner around 6:30 of J's Porcupine Meatballs, a garden salad, and fresh cantaloupe for dessert. The meatballs were good, especially with some fresh ground sea salt and fresh ground pepper.
J did the dishes while I fixed some things in the RV: a spring-loaded strut pin had broken on one of our cabinet doors, and the switch on one of our living room ceiling lights had become flakey. Then I worked up a blog entry and did some computer work.
We went to the Kaibab Lodge around noon to have lunch and to use their free Wi-Fi. I had a Kaibab Burger (a basic cheeseburger) with sweet potato fries and J had a BLT with sweet potato fries. The food was OK and the Wi-Fi connection was slow. We left around 1:00 and ...
Went to the North Rim Country Store across the street. I filled up the Jeep at $3.199/gal, then we parked near the store and used their Wi-Fi. The Wi-Fi connection was much better than at the Kaibab Lodge and I was finally able to get things accomplished online. We left around 2:55.
On our way back to the RV, I discovered that our Garmin eTrex Venture HC GPS had died. I tried putting new batteries in it, and it was still dead. :( This has happened before, and I'm tempted to buy a new handheld GPS.
J's Porcupine Meatballs
Sauce
- 1 1/2 tsp chili powder
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 2 tbs seasoned salt
- 2 tsp molasses
- 1/2 tsp ground cumin
- 1/2 tsp dried oregano
- 5 cups V8 juice
Meatballs
- 1 lb lean ground beef
- 1 tsp prepared mustard
- 1 cup quick cooking brown rice
- 1/2 cup finely chopped onion
- 1/2 cup finely chopped green pepper
- 1/2 cup finely chopped celery
- 2 tsp sea salt
- 1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
- 1 egg
Combine all meatball ingredients in a gallon-size Zip-lock bag. Use your hands to squish the bag and mix the ingredients well. Take approximately 1/4 cup of meatball mixture and form into a meatball, then place in the sauce. Repeat for remaining meatballs.
Bring all to a simmer. Continue to simmer, covered, for about 15 minutes. Turn each meatball and then simmer, covered, for another 15 minutes. Remove the cover and let the sauce simmer for another 15 minutes to cook it down.
Serve in bowls. Optional: Serve over cooked egg noodles in the bowls.
Serves 4.
Because we had gone so far on the two-track road (about 5 mi or 8km), I decided to just keep going because, if I remembered correctly, the power lines should cross another good road not too far away. Before we reached the good road, we came across a downed tree across the road. I was able to pull part of it off the road, but the larger piece was too heavy for me to move. So, I got the tow strap out of the black hole in the back seat of the Jeep, wrapped it around the lower wishbone of the front left suspension, and then hooked the two sewn-together loops around a branch near the tree trunk. J backed up the Jeep and pulled the tree far enough off the road so that we could get by. After we got underway again, J said she thought I was crazy to have messed with the tree. We popped out onto a good road not too far after that (about 1 mi or 1.6km after dropping off the hunter), so I was quite happy that we had removed the tree instead of heading back along the long two-track road.
We stopped to watch about six Blue Grouse right on and by the road. The light was backwards for us to photograph them, so we just watched for a while.
We returned to the RV around 5:05 — much later than we had planned. J started to make a batch of her Porcupine Meatballs. They're called "Porcupine" because the rice sticks out of the meatballs and the chili gives them a bit of a kick. I started to work up a blog entry after we decided not to go photograph sunset because it was so windy and there weren't any clouds.
We had dinner around 6:30 of J's Porcupine Meatballs, a garden salad, and fresh cantaloupe for dessert. The meatballs were good, especially with some fresh ground sea salt and fresh ground pepper.
J did the dishes while I fixed some things in the RV: a spring-loaded strut pin had broken on one of our cabinet doors, and the switch on one of our living room ceiling lights had become flakey. Then I worked up a blog entry and did some computer work.