June 13 - 15, 2025

Friday the 13th! Hanging out on the deck after sunset with the Martin's. The bats were coming in for bugs, Stef and Charlie were scared (as usual). Brian kept noticing a strange sound, something was under the deck. Is it a VAMPIRE? We think its bats under the deck, or maybe its a mouse in the downspout. We all hear it. Sound is located as coming from a bucket that's on top of the storage shed on the deck. We take a video inside the bucket to determine what's inside and whether we release or kill it! The scratching noise intensifies, we watch the video, its BATS. 2 bats stuck in the bucket and they are not happy. Brian grabs the bucket and dumps them over the railing and away they fly. He calls himself 'the Batman' and after the previous bat incident in NY, I must agree! We take Imogene on a quick night ride to see Joe. He's got his foundation ready and a great little camping spot with good shelter. We hang out for a bit and then Imogene's battery is dead when we go to leave. After a ride home to get jumper cables and a ride back to charge her, Imogene gets home safely, just a little later than we'd intended.

Saturday is Walker Day complete with a rummage sale at the fire station. We pick up Jeff and Nancy at the bus stop at 10am and head into town for a fun outing! Hot dogs, hamburgers and lots of Walker Swag. Louie convinces us to buy the old chair, it's $50, for a good cause, and it fits in Imogene! Clyde tell us the Fire Station now has liquor license and they sell Lazy G Brews (Jeff was wearing a hat from the brewery). Clyde seems Irish and turns out to be the person selling all the properties in the area! Galbo sells us the 50/50 tickets for the fundraiser, they use a deck of cards and just tear each card in half! Clever way to do it. We drive home via big bug mesa - I'd never been that way. It's bumpy ride with lots of different views of Walker cabins. We stopped at the Charcoal kiln on the way. The "Oprah" house is for sale $2.6 million!

Gutters cleaned out and other cabin putsin'. Visited Martin Manor to see their progress, lots of decisions to be made and lots to do but it's very exciting and looking amazing. The forest is happy and healthy - lots of new growth. From the little blue spruce that's our heart tree to the oak on the stairs, the flora is thriving!! Jay's gonna have some work cut out for him next time they are up. The mimosas are everywhere and looking beautiful. We find out they are called New Mexico Locust - I'll have to look back at why we called them Mimosa's -- it's a good nickname nonetheless!

Sunday morn abut 5am we awake to a fire notice, Knapp Gulch is on fire. We can see the blaze from the deck. A brush fire was called in around 2:45am and the Walker fire crew was right on it, by 11am forward progress was stopped! Thank you firefighters. Please be smarter people.

We have a heavier haul home than usual because we are heading to NY in a few weeks, won't be back to RoseCampAZ until August. We're giving RoseCampNY a test run, how will it compare? The blog for that adventure to come soon...