RV Park Review- Saddle Mountain RV Park- Tonopah, AZ

Saddle Mountain RV Park

Check- in Date: 03/12/17
Check-out Date: 04/08/17

Type of Accommodation: Deluxe (more spacious than standard spot) Back-in

Price: $380 + Electric (ours ended up being $115)= $495 for the month

Amenities: Swimming pool, exercise facility, library, basketball courts, tennis courts, pool tables, ping pong tables and more. They also had a "free table" where you can put items you no longer want and take items others have given away. We purged a lot of items on that table.

Wifi/Cell Reception: The cell reception was great. The only FREE wifi in this park is in the clubhouse area. We paid an extra $50 for wifi coverage and it was excellent for streaming!

Favorite places to go/eat in the area:

It' s about a 35 minute drive to any grocery stores, shops or restaurants. Most of these are in neighboring cities.

• Oregano's- amazing salads, deep dish pizza, margaritas and desert.
• Saddle Mountain Brewing Company- Great beers and Chris LOVED their fish and chips.
• Skyline Regional Park- free park with beautiful desert views, picnic areas and lots of hiking trails.
• Desert Diamond Casino- I enjoyed the slots machines, there is NO alcohol on the premises and no table games.  
• The Goodyear Farmers Market
• The Apache Trail and hiking South Mountain in Phoenix, AZ
• Haus Murphy's- delicious german food and beer.

Here is our blog post with more in depth information on these items and more.

Recommended: After a month here were are surprised by our answer...Yes! If you can handle the occasional chicken coop smell and flies.

**WARNING** This RV Park is near Hickman's Egg Farm. It smells ok most of the time but there were certain times of day when the smell hits hard and it smells like you are in a chicken coop. It's pretty bad! There are also lots of flies which was pretty annoying. They kept getting in our rig. The RV Park doesn't allow cancellations so if you get there and can't handle the smell you don't get your money back.

Sign across from the post office

Our trip to Carlsbad Caverns

This past Saturday Chris and I took a trip to Carlsbad Caverns National Park with our full-time RVer friends Rockin' The Road with Mike and Kat.

When we first arrived at the caverns we were trying to figure out how to get a picture of the 4 of us with the National Park sign. That is when the Nature's Head Composting toilet that has been sitting in our trunk for the past 5 months finally paid off.

Cousin Eddie aka Chris with our lovely toilet tripod.

Hey if you look at the above picture it didn't come out too bad. haha Okay now back to the caverns.

When we arrived we decided we would do the 1.25 mile self guided tour of The Big Room. There are two ways to get there. One is by taking the elevator down 750 feet or you can do the steep hike down 1.25 miles to the natural entrance. We decided to take the elevator.

Mike and Kat heading into the cave

There are so many cool textures and formations

It's hard to capture the height and depth

The Big Room is the largest known natural limestone chamber in the Western Hemisphere. The area of the cave is comparable to 14 football fields. It is pretty amazing. This is our third cave tour and hands down the best we have seen. It also had the best paved walking trail. Most are super slippery.

There are a couple markers through out the trail with information or you can rent an audio guide for a minimal fee at the visitor center.

Chris next to the "Rock of Ages"

Mike and Kat

The caverns were beautiful and we had a great time exploring.  Have you been? If so what tour did you do? We would love to hear about your experience in the comments below.

Full Time RVing with Dogs

First, let me introduce our pups. This is Remus. He is our almost 6 year old Boston Terrier. He loves nothing more than sunbathing and eating. 

He usually has this Grumpy face all the time too

This is Samson. He is our feisty rescue pup who loves nothing more than playing ball. He will chase that thing all day if you let him. He will also try and bite you if you take his ball away. Yeah... we are working on it.

When we decided to hit the road we of course had to stop and think how it would affect our spoiled pups. Part of the reason we chose a motorhome over a fifth wheel was because Remus hates riding in the car. We thought he might adjust to all the time in the car better if he could lay in his bed comfortably. It ended up being the right decision. 

They just sleep in their bed between our seats as we travel.

Samson and Remus tend to go to the vet more than we go to the doctor. When we first got Remus we found out he had a heart problem and a joint problem. He was only a couple weeks old. Then, with Samson we found out after we rescued him that he had heartworms.

This is what it feels like sometimes

We have had to take the dogs to the vet in quite a lot of places as we have traveled. Samson got poison oak while we were in New Market, VA and had a stomach problem in Springfield, MO. Remus has also had his fair share of rashes and stomach infections. We also took them to the vet or to get annual shots in Santa Fe, NM, Kerrville, TX and Houston, TX. We normally just do google searches for vets in the area and look at Yelp.  Every place we have gone so far has been great.

Samson's poison oak

As far as getting their food, treats and etc. while travelling we normally order everything from Amazon (helps when you are moving slow) or find a Petco or Petsmart in the area. We keep their food in a large 25 lb. pet food container and some of their treats in mason jars.

A lot of the places we have stayed in the past year have had dog parks or dog runs. I think our dogs get out more than they did before when we lived in an apartment.

Our first stop when leaving Houston was Kinder, LA and they had an awesome dog park.

Chillaxin outside

Life is rough for an RV pup

We have had some issues with parks not having great designated areas to walk your dog to relieve themselves like the one in New Market, VA where Samson got poison oak. Or some don't have good lighting at night which sucks. But for the most part we haven't had too many issues.

We don't do much boon docking (no hook ups) so that might make it harder and normally when we leave to go on hikes we keep them at home. They are very quiet while we are not there so we haven't had any complaints about them barking. Then, we always get to come home to our adorable welcoming committee.

We haven't had any issues finding RV parks with our pups because they are under 25 lbs and are not restricted breeds but sadly if you have a large dog or certain breeds you may have issues.

Do you travel with animals? If so how has it been? Any questions let us know below.

Thanks for following along on our journey!

Meow Wolf's House of Eternal Return in Santa Fe, NM

Today Chris and I went to Meow Wolf which is a multi-use Art Complex located in Santa Fe's Midtown Innovative District. It was previously a bowling alley that was purchased by George R.R. Martin in 2014. It is home to the popular interactive art experience, House of Eternal Return.

When you first walk in you see the front of a Victorian style house that you are able to wonder through and explore.

While you are walking around you are also trying to solve a mystery of what happened to the Selig's( a fictional family).

Chris looking through some of the Selig's paperwork

It almost feels like a chose your own adventure. You walk into one room and then there is a secret passage way to another one.

Chris coming into the kitchen through the fridge

Another secret passageway through one of the kids bedrooms.

There are things lying around in the different rooms you can look through like photo albums and diaries.

 There are some pretty trippy rooms. There are actually 70 total that were created by over 500 artists.

Seriously, if you go make sure you open doors and cabinets. Really look around because you never know what you will find in there.

I am trying to share enough photos so you can see how cool it is but trying to not ruin the fun of seeing it for yourself.

One of the things we both loved was that there is a free arcade inside with some old games. We played some Simpsons, Mario Kart and Street Fighter II together.

We thought the whole experience was awesome.

 It was $37 total for the both of us to get in which may sound pricey but it was definitely worth it. We were probably there for about 2 or 3 hours.

It is not just for adults either it looked like the kids and their parents were both really enjoying themselves.

Have you ever been? If so what did you think?