We Zooma through Yuma

Milky Way Dairy 'Farm'
Milky Way Dairy ‘Farm’

We woke up early again today. No plans. A ‘day off’. What should we do? Maybe we should take a drive to Yuma. It’s supposed to be hot, but cloudy — might be a good day to drive. Okay, let’s do that. Sue suggests that we be gone by 9am.

And so the day begins. I quickly shower, put on one of my golf shirts, throw my golf shoes into the van with our clubs. Maybe we’ll find a nice golf course in Yuma and get a bit of golf in. I also look up the address for that humungous feedlot in Maricopa, and the “Milky Way” dairy operation that my friend Ed Peters said was even bigger than the big feedlot.

Another view of the "Milky Way" dairy lot
Another view of the “Milky Way” dairy lot

We drive down to Maricopa first. We can smell the dairy farm long before we see it, thanks to a strong west wind. Of course, we can’t really drive IN to the farm — so we stop on the road and I try to take a couple of photos. The photos don’t really put the size of this operation into perspective.

We continued our drive to the southwest corner of Arizona. We passed acres of solar mirrors at Gina Bend. Around 2000 acres! Sue grabbed the camera to take a photo. Click, click, click, click. Stop it! One photo is enough. I’ll have to delete about 20 of those…


I kept ‘the best’ photos — you may be able to make out the solar farm in one of those photos. I’m not sure how many pictures of the armrest and Sue’s right knee I need to keep.

As we neared our destination, signs for services appeared along the road. It was 12 noon, time for lunch. Hey, how about we stop at McDonalds and make this into a ‘real’ road trip? Oh no, we should go to one of the golf courses Sue listed on her notepaper and eat at the clubhouse. Okay. So it was probably 12:45 when we stopped at the first course on our way into Zuma. Apparently it was a course designed by Arnold Palmer. Really? We park in the parking lot. There are golf carts lined up waiting for golfers. The clubhouse has a few people sitting at tables. I check with the pro behind the counter. Yes, you can golf here. How about at 1:30? $35 for 18 holes, $25 for 9. Well, how about that? I’ll check with Sue when she gets back from using the washroom. Sue says we should eat first.

When the lady working in the ‘kitchen’ makes her appearance, Sue asks if they have anything to eat. Well, we have hotdogs or I can make you a sandwich. Rudy: I’ll have a hotdog and one of those Amber Bocks on tap. Sue, who is becoming a bit of a food snob and will not eat ‘processed’ pig parts, doesn’t want a sandwich now either, and opts for a more ‘healthy’ choice. We sit down at one of the tables and eat our lunch. Sue explains to me what the purpose of this trip is. We didn’t come here to golf! We want to get an ‘overview’ of Yuma — go to all the golf courses, get a scorecard from each, maybe look at holes one and eighteen, just to get an impression. No golf. I finish my hotdog. Sue’s finished her Snickers bar. On our way out Sue stops to talk to the golf pro to find out where we might find other courses. And she picks up a scorecard.

And so we’re right back in the van. Driving into Yuma. Hundreds upon hundreds of RV and Trailer parks, separated by the occasional RV parts store. Oh, and big baptist mega-churches and Navajo casinos — and it’s not always easy to tell the two apart. Our GPS leads us from one golf course to the next. At each one Sue goes in for a scorecard while I look at the parking lot. The rates are very affordable, but the courses all look a bit tired. Few trees, fairways flat and boring, not very green. And all of them can get us a tee time ‘right now’! But we didn’t come here to golf.

We check off each course on our list (and one extra one, when the GPS leads us down almost into Mexico to a dilapidated nine-hole course) and then it’s time to head back home. We got what we came for. Yuma is one giant trailer park with about half a dozen ‘cheap’ golf courses!

It’s close to 6:30 by the time we stop at our corner Chinese restaurant, The Great Wall, to pick up the supper we ordered enroute. We ordered ‘extra spicy’ — and today it is EXTRA spicy. But good.

After supper we begin yet another of our TV series we have in ‘our list’ — the third season of “House of Cards” is now on Netflix. We begin watching Chapter One. It’s a little confusing — Sue notes that two of the characters in the show ‘died’ last season — what are they doing back in the show? Eventually we realize that we’re watching the ORIGINAL chapter 1 from Season One! Click, click, click, the remote. Back to the main menu. Select other seasons > Season 3. The first chapter is now Chapter 27. Okay, this makes more sense. We watch a couple of chapters and then Sue wants to switch to the “At Issue” panel on the CBC News. So that’s what we do.

After another “Daily Show”, Sue is off to bed. I’ll join her after I’ve written my journal.