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Published: December 16th 2006
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OWS entrance
A rainbow at the entrance to OWS - just before it poured down! Those monsoon storms are something else! Phoenix - again?
Hey ya'll!!! After a great delay here comes the begining of Part 2 of Nick and Mel's most excellent adventure! A big hello to all our Phoenix friends who are joining the blog - we miss you guys!
From Tucson we headed back to Phoenix and the scorching summer heat! When we cruised in the heat was oppressive and we found most of the RV parks were 55+ and didnt want young hell-raisers like us!! Needless to say we were feeling a little dehydrated and rather despondent when we rolled into Orangewood Shadows RV Park (another 55+ park). Nick asked if we could possibly set up camp for a couple of days, Nancy at reception was suitably charmed by him and let us stay - just for a couple of nights though. The 55+ RV parks are something else! All the oldies cuise in, in their RVs or travel trailers escaping the winter in the colder states. These parks are fully equipt with gyms, lap pools, spas, pool tables, and of course the american favourite - shuffle board. They even have a social events co-ordinator! Even luckier retirees own or rent 'park models' little pre-fab houses,
OWS friends
Here we are with our friend (and security guard) Bob! in the complex.
Nick settled in to his sales job working out of either our trailer or the cards room in the communal complex when that was available. But it was hardly all work and no play! We found a great group of friends and the social calander was full! In the pics below you will see the team posing after having finished a community service project cooking a meal at a home for street kids. This was all good fun - well, except for poor Kellye (not pictured) who discovered a seafood allergy the hard way! We made ceaser salad, potatoes, and bacon wraped shrimp (in NZ terms that would be bacon wraped prawns). The fun didnt end there... we went to Andrews house and hung out with Mandi, Tim and others. We went to a bar/restaurant called BJs and after a yummy dinner discovered the 8th wonder of the world - Pizzookie! ALL girls need to know about this. Pizzookie is a pizza cookie - a pizza sized chocolate chip cookie topped with scoops of icecream! Well, my Dad always said 'they think big those yanks' and when it comes to cookies it seems he is right!
OWS park models
An example of the park models in the OWS RV Park. Pool parties are a must in a climate like that - Thanks to Mandi and Heather for organising them! Lazing around by the pool eating, drinking and generally being merry, you get the picture! I even introduced the american lot to bacon wrapped prunes - I think they are a bbq must personally!
We all got together every second Wednesday for dinner for dinner and conversation which inevitably went on long past some of our bedtimes! There is a pic below with most of the crew. Cheers to the fabulous Amy and Lucas for opening their home to us all!! And Adralyn deserves a mention too for co-ordinating the food - Nick Knudson's amazing salad has not been forgotten, it even had raspberries in it, would you believe?!
We had a fun night out in Tempe with Amy, Lucas and Karyn. We went to a Piano Bar called 'The Big Bang'- hmmm now how do I describe this place.... they call it 'duelling pianos', on the stage they have two pianos and the pianests play requests from the audience, the lyrics are sometimes adjusted to suit the crowd and the pianests play off each other really well.
OWS Lounge
This was the communal lounge at OWS, however, with it being the 'off' season it was practially all ours! Sometimes some of the staff end up on the stage dancing too - one of the bartenders looked so much like Natasha Beddingfield you would SWEAR you were looking at her twin! Anyways after a bit of Greece-lightening and other favourites we headed off to a bar and enjoyed some 'curly fries', french fries that are (as the name suggests) curly - like spirals!
But no blog about our adventures in AZ would be complete without mentioning the boys night / girls nights. While us girls were out either watching a chick-flick or at Kellyes place chatting and eating, there were some pretty serious games of poker going on in the boys camp! While the guys made an impressive effort they were no match for my man who soon had them all out of pocket (and he started having thoughts of a career change to professional poker!) Don't worry guys I have managed to keep him out of pro gambling but I would make sure you are well practised before challenging him to a re-match!
One night we decided to venture out from the confinds of OWS (yes we did end up there for a little more than
2 nights, closer to 2 months actually!) We headed out to Tempe and paid a visit to an American institution - Hooters. That's right boys and girls and guess what? Apparently they are coming to NZ! Dont get too excited though, although it is something you have to do once (it being an American icon and all that) the food really isn't that great despite the fact the chicken wings are supposidly almost world famous. To finish off this healthy meal we went to Coldstone Ice Creamery, man this stuff is goooood! Imagine your choice of icecream with chunks of any candy you can imagine - snickers bars, gummy bears, oreos - you name it they will chop them up small and mix them in with your icecream! For our Kiwi friends wanting a similar experience I think Kiwistone Ice Creamery at 277 in Newmarket do the same thing although I havent tried theirs to be able to give you a comparison.
Another day we ventured down to Queen Creak which was quite a drive from where we were staying. This was a case of some serious good luck as I had been searching online the other day and
stumbled onto a site for Candace Cameron - you guys would know her as DJ Tanner from 'Full House'. Anyways it turned out that she was on a speaking tour and was going to be in Queen Creak that weekend, her only stop in Arizona! As you can well imagine I HAD to go!!! And you will see below I got my picture taken with her, well worth the drive!!!
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Cameron Jones
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Girls in the Pool
got any more pictures of the girls in the pool?