Day 59: Dinner in Tombstone, AZ

Saturday, June 1, 2019:Our goal was to make it to Tombstone, AZ today. Fred has been taking about Tombstone for almost 2 weeks. It is one of his favorite movies. He can rattle off dialog like he is reading from the script. Everytime he finds the movie on TV, he has to watch it, no matter how close to the end it is.Google mapped the drive out for us at 249 miles or 3.5 hours. Fred was so excited to get there that we departed our camp site at 10:15am today… We shaved an hour off our usual departure time.We stopped for gas about 30 minutes into the drive because we saw the prices creeping back up towards $3.00/gallon as we continued west. We wanted to get one last tankful at a reasonable price.I grabbed the window squeegee and started to scrub the bugs off the windshield while he pumped the gas. Fred quickly saw what I was doing and took the squeegee away from me. He said, “I got this.” He refuses to let me help him when it comes to his vehicles. Damn manly pride. (So not true. Fred)Once back on the road, we saw way more billboards for “The Thing.” I couldn’t wait to show Fred the kind of silly Americana sights he has been missing with his past road trips.We hit another time change as we crossed into Arizona. I was so hungry and waiting patiently for Fred to stop somewhere so we could eat. I had prepped a taco feast this morning before we left Las Cruces, and I was getting a little cranky. 1pm neared and we still had not stopped. I mentioned it and he said he would pull into the next rest stop. As we pulled into the San Simon rest stop, the cell phone clock rolled back to noon and Fred smuggly said, “That was my plan all along.” I wanted to poke him in the eyes, Three Stooges style.We turned on the generator and the A/C and I prepped us some tacos in the microwave. I love traveling like this! Every road trip should have a microwave.Fred napped for a bit after lunch and then we hit the road. We stopped to see “The Thing.” I was so excited to be sharing this experience with Fred. He was pretty poker faced about the attraction but happy for me that I was excited.The whole road side exhibit is completely different than it was when I saw it last 20+ years ago. It has a Hollywood plot now, legit props, and a real museum with A/C. I was shocked!Last time I was here it was a few trailers and canopy covered exhibits. I won’t spoil the ending for you but it’s very Ancient Aliens themed and covers the history of the Earth, world civilizions, and American History. Oh, and there are several dinosaurs. I loved it and it only cost us $8.00 to get in.When we got back to the RV and I went to turn on the RVi Brake, the darn thing wouldn’t work. This piece of crap has been nothing but headaches lately. It took about 20 minutes of fiddling with it in he hot sun to get it to work again. I don’t think I would endorse this product. I don’t know how crappy the competition is, but this one certainly stinks.Once on the road, Google took us on a cute little tour of Benson, AZ. We were trying to cut over from I-10 to Highway 80 & Google wrapped up in a tight little figure eight in some residential neighborhood. It was a bad day for computer assisted travel that’s for sure.We pulled into the Tombstone RV Park around 4:15pm. I jumped out and hooked us up real quick.Fred took a little rest and then we drove the Jeep into Tombstone for some dinner.As we made our way down to The Crystal Palace, we saw none other than Johnny Ringo walking down the street. His spurs and red sash caught our attention. Fred was pretty thrilled at that sight.We grabbed seats at the bar order up some drinks and burgers. Then Johnny Ringo walked in… Fred had to grab a photo.After dinner, we grabbed a chocolate milkshake and walked the streets. Just about everything was closed except the saloons. But it was still awesome to wander through some place so historic at sunset. Fred was like a little kid in a candy store. I’m so glad we got to share this experience!We headed back to the RV and had a pretty relaxing evening reminiscing about the day.