This morning was even colder than yesterday morning. When we left the park at around 8 o’clock the temperature in Serena was 19 degrees. Fortunately none of the hoses froze but there were plenty of little icicles hanging from the bottom of the trailer; it’s definitely a good time to be heading out of New Mexico and into the warmer weather of Arizona.
We headed south from Gallup and made our way to Cottonwood in Arizona. The drive wasn’t too bad and not too long, but the ‘scenery’ wasn’t very exciting and, as with travelling through Texas and New Mexico, it was almost like we weren’t moving because the landscape didn’t change, just lots and lots of desert.



Our surroundings changed quite dramatically right around the time we got to the turn off for Flagstaff, then there were trees in every direction as far as the eye could see. At this point we headed south proper on I17 and dropped around 3000 ft in elevation.





We got to the park just after noon and got checked in. The ranger on the gate wasn’t the most helpful of folk, he didn’t know the answer to any questions that Mike asked – just the kind of person to have checking people in! There was quite a long drive from the front gate to the actually RV spaces and the road was quite steep, but we managed to find a decent space with lots of room around it without too much trouble. The park itself is in a valley with mountains all around so it’s quite sheltered from the weather; I guess that’s why there are so many people who are staying here for the entire winter.

Mike: If you don't like your job, do something else.