RTR 2019

We left La Mirada, CA on a Monday morning and headed to Boulder City, NV to spend the night in a hotel.  We had some things we needed to do at our storage garage there before going to Surprise, AZ to pick up the RV from the repair shop.  All of those tasks went well.  We picked up the RV and headed to White Tanks Mountain Regional Park to spend the night.  We arrived after dark which is not ideal but we got pulled in to our pull-through site just fine.  We went to hook up to the electric post and found out our electric cord was missing.  😭  We purposely paid for a site with electric and we couldn't use it.  The RV repair shop accidentally kept our electric cord.  Bummer!  Oh well, at least we had the battery.  We connected the water and settled in for the night.  We had a lot of items to organize since we last spent time in the RV before Thanksgiving.  We had a beautiful site at the campground at White Tanks Mountain.

Someone refurbished a public bus into a camper.

The next morning, we went back to the RV repair shop in Surprise, AZ to get our electric cord and then stocked up with groceries.  We then headed west on I-10 to Quartzsite, AZ.  There was an event there called Rubber Tramp Rendezvous (RTR) and we were meeting friends there.

RTR is in it's fourth year and put on by a guy named Bob Wells.  He lives in his van camper and has been putting together an event every January for more specifically others who live in van campers but he welcomes all RV's.  The event has been growing exponentially over the years and this year was very well attended.  Bob is another YouTuber and he put out an entry on the coordinates to find his event on YouTube.

The GPS coordinates to RTR 2019

We planned to meet another couple, Joie & Mike of @OurMobileBackpack, that we met last fall in Albuquerque and then connected with in Amarillo, TX and caravaned to the RV NomadFest in Wellington, TX with them. They arrived at RTR the day before us and saved us a spot. 

We found Joie and Mike and got set up.  They also met up with a couple that follows them on Instagram, Kelley & Wes of @RoadHoundAdventures.  So the three of us formed a nice horseshoe at RTR.   

Our "street" at RTR

Our horseshoe arrangement

Al made some yummy soup and Red Lobster biscuits!

Sun setting on the desert

Desert sunsets are spectacular!

Check out this guy in his flying contraption!  Looked like fun!

The big dip in the road into the RTR area (so glad we set up outside the camp)

Every day there was a schedule of topics that were presented to the group for those interested.  We attended the solar and boondocking/dry camping talks.

Bob Wells giving announcements

The crowd for a topic talk

Joie's sister and brother-in-law tent camped with us for one night.  Brave souls!

Al playing Frisbee golf with one of our neighbors.

One day we drove over to the location where a couple, Sharon & Bobby of @PhoenixRamblers, were camped.  They bought an old Rambler RV for like $300 and remodeled the whole thing.  It's beautiful and they also have their own YouTube channel about their adventures.  Such a nice couple and Bobby's enthusiasm for the RV lifestyle was contagious.

The Phoenix Ramblers YouTube channel:  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2dShwJG0x4cXafpg5TmmTA/videos

People with YouTube channels have subscribers.  When they arrive at a location, they sometimes post their location or GPS coordinates so people that want to meet them in person can find them.  It's been interesting to meet people we've watched their YouTube videos as we were preparing for our adventure. 

Thanks Joie and Mike for saving us a spot at RTR and it was so nice to meet Kelley and Wes.  We enjoyed our time at the RTR but it was time to move to a new spot in Quartzsite.