Friday, March 02, 2007

Day 59: Swap Meet purchase/Olive Mill

Here I go again!!!!! Oh yeah......it was one of those fabulous Arizona days.....brilliant blue skies, bright warm sun, and a very gentle breeze moving across the desert.......WOW!!!! Love it!!!

Today.....we were up a bit earlier to prepare to leave for Mesa(Phoenix east)....and the weekend "swap meet"....not quite a flea market operation as almost all of the thousands of items in the 1600 stalls/booths are new and not used. But....having been there on this past Sunday....we knew EXACTLY where we needed to go which saved 2-3 hours of walking through the buildings.

When we arrived the cars were lined up to locate a parking place. Since we knew the location of the stall we wanted, we managed to park not tooooooo far away from that area. What were we looking for?????? An area rug for the den in our traveling HowserHouse.......one that we had seen in our friends rv a few weeks ago....and we fell in love with it then. We saw it last week, but were not certain if the size was to wide, so we returned to TheHowserHouse and measured the distance between the heating vents in the floor.

Yep....it would work, so that is why we hurried back up there today. And......they had three of them, so after a short bit of bargaining, I managed to get the same price they had charged our friends.....$125.00. The price on the sign was $150.....but I talked him down and also got him to drop the sales tax! I reminded him that he had done it for our friends.....so it left him without much room to keep it at $150. He rolled and taped it up for us and off we went to the truck.

Then it was back to Queen Creek, several miles south of Mesa. We located the Queen Creek Olive Mill, parked and purchased our tickets for the "tour". The olives are picked between Oct and Dec, so we didn't get to see them "crushed" and milled, but we did get to learn about it from a very good tour guide. It was really interesting.....and I learned alot about olive oil and how it is produced.

Then....it was back into the gift shop.....and LOTS of tastings.....from various stuffed olives to all kinds of olive tapenades to various olive infused oils, dipping oils, and other goodies!!!! GREAT way to end the tour....!!! We purchased a couple of large bottles of the dipping oil, a baquette to eat with the oil.....and thoroughly enjoyed this experience!!!!!! If you are in the Phoenix area.....make a trip to Queen Creek Olive Mill!!!!!!

Leaving there we went into the town of Queen Creek and had a bit of lunch....actually more than "a bit"!! It was toooo much.....and I must say just "average" food. Serrano's Mexican Restuarant was the place......a new building, lots of tables, below average service, and food that was not bad....but just nothing special about it. I had a shrimp enchilada with rice and beans and washed down by a Corona/lime. No.......to answer your question, I would not eat there again. There are other places that are mucho better than this place!!!

On southward and back to Casa Grande and the Sunscape RV Park east of town. Lots of traffic on the two lane roads as we crossed the desert on very straight roads.....passing by sooooooo many new "communities" that are being built in the desert......all new housing at high prices. Can't begin to imagine how many houses we have seen being constructed......unreal!!!!!!

We unrolled our new area rug.....a 5x8 size....and it works beautifully!!!! LOVE IT!!!!! I'll get a pic of it for tomorrow's post.

This evening the 1st Lady went with some of her friends and played cards at the Clubhouse......a game called 31. I began to search for RV parks and available ones in Las Vegas......Williams....and Flagstaff as we begin to think about the return journey with LOTS of stops along the way for sight-seeing.

And so.....as I said at the top of this......it was a gorgeous day.....and another enjoyable one!!!! Sooooo what do I say????? It can be nothing but.....

Life is GREAT.....and I hope it is for all of you, also!!!!!!

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