Tucson

We left Albuquerque last Sunday, October 13^th, and overnighted in Las Cruces. On Monday we drove to Tucson to Davis Monthan Air Force Base to spend five weeks at their Family Campground. They don’t take reservations, but we had called ahead and were told that there were plenty of camp sites open.

The campground seemed about half full when we got here, but snow birds have been steadily rolling in all week. We could only register for 21-days and have to check back at the office on our 21^st day to see if we can extend our stay. We're allowed to extend in our site, provided no one is waiting in overflow (with no hookups). If anyone is waiting in overflow, we have to leave our site and move to overflow. Then we could rotate back to a hookup site when the next camper reached their 21^st day.

On Thursday I saw in my newsfeed that the Union Pacific historic Big Boy steam locomotive No. 4014 Big Boy was in Tucson. It is touring the Union Pacific system throughout 2019 to commemorate the transcontinental railroad’s 150^th anniversary. 25 Big Boy locomotives were built between 1941 and 1944. Of the 25 built, only eight survived and are on static display at museums across the country. One of them, No. 4014, was re-acquired by Union Pacific and restored to operating condition over two-years for the 2019 tour. It is currently the largest, heaviest, and most powerful operational steam locomotive in the world.

The Big Boy Tour is on its way through New Mexico to Texas with stops in El Paso, San Antonio, Houston, and Marshall. Then it stops in Little Rock and Kansas City, on its way home to Cheyenne, Wyoming.  

Steve & Julie Cornelius