Monday, February 19: The day dawned sunny and bright. Carl and his family, Trish, Judy and I were going to head out to the Castle Dome Mine Museum. It is what remains of a silver mining town started in 1864 that lasted until 1979.

We left shortly after 10:00 and it was about 35 miles away. Well, we didn’t know that the last 10 miles were going to be on a washboard gravel road. I didn’t get a picture but there was a big white blimp on the ground out there. Judy said it was a border patrol blimp but it must have been too windy to get in the air today. I have never seen one that was totally white and it seemed kind of spooky looking.

The mining town was quite interesting. Lots of preserved buildings and artifacts. It was especially fun seeing it with Waylon and Sydney. Seeing things through a child’s eye is always a good way to view the world. The Castle Dome mining area was established around 1864 and continued until 1979 when separating the silver was more costly than the silver itself.

It is also known as a ‘ghost’ town and I think that is because they have so many manikins dressed in period costumes. Those could be kind of creepy. When we went into the barber shop there was a manikin in one of the chairs and two women sitting at a little table playing chess. At first, we thought they were manikins too but they were real humans.

Carl and Waylon’s favorite. This was behind a curtain in an old travel trailer in the 1970’s portion of the museum.

We then stopped at the tiny church along the road. Reverend Carl and Reverend Waylon held the service.

Bill had suggested we go to Martinez Lake for lunch. Not sure what we were expecting but it certainly wasn’t the place we found. Not sure how to describe it but after clearing away a table full of half empty wine cups (plastic was the order of the day for all drinks, plates, etc.) we ordered lunch. They mostly had burgers, grilled sandwiches, and fried stuff, but they had at least one salad. I had a green Chile burger and it was fair, the burger was kind of crisply overdone. The fries and onion rings were pretty good. Sara tried the salad. It was ‘okay’ but the lettuce looked like a head had been torn into a few large chunks.

It had been windy when we left in the morning but it had picked up even more while we were out. Trish drove her Escalade and the wind was pushing her around on the road. It was even hard to get the door open at one stop because the wind was pushing it back closed. It was also pretty darn cool. It only got to a high of 63 which just seems weird for being in the desert and after the 80 degrees the day before.

When we got back I let Misty out for a few minutes but it was too windy for her so she came back into the camper. The camper was shaking and rattling every vent and loose part around. I lay down and watched the USA women vs China curling. I still just don’t get curling! It was quite boring as the USA was ahead 9-3 but it was a way to just relax and do nothing for an hour.

We were having potato bar for dinner as Trish had bought a big bag of potatoes for something but they didn’t get used. I had some hamburger in the freezer left over from spaghetti sauce so defrosted it in the microwave and put it in the Instant Pot and browned with some onion, garlic, and jalapeños. I also had some dried chilies that I soaked and put in the Bullitt blender with a can of Rotel tomatoes and chilies, then added that and a handful of pinto beans to the Pot. Twenty minutes later I had chili for the not so faint-hearted to add to their potato. See why I love my Instant Pot so much? Thirty minutes and dinner can be done. It took longer to cook the potatoes!

We ate in the Bryant’s place since it was so windy still. Trish had also brought some big Costco hot dogs so I had a chili dog on a half of a potato instead of a bun. Sure was good! Judy had bought Key Lime Pie for Mexican night but forgot about it so we had that for dessert. A good time was had by all.

The wind stopped suddenly around 8:00 or so and was calm all night. Made for much easier sleeping in the camper without all the noise and movement.