Yesterday (Tuesday) we were too pooped from our previous days to do much of anything so we did some laundry and just enjoyed relaxing and reading. Today the weatherman said is was going to be cloudy and windy so we decided to avoid the wilderness and go shopping. The closest town with the outlets that we wanted (Petco and Costco) is Prescott located about 40 miles away over Mingus Mountain.According to Wikipedia the name Mingus comes from either a couple of brothers who established a saw mill at the base of the mountain in the 1880s or a pioneer prospector who mined in the mountains in the 1870s.

There are a couple of routes to get to Prescott but we have never driven over the top of the mountain so we took that route. It is an extremely narrow and curvy road that climbs from Cottonwood (at about 3000' elevation) up through the small mining town of Jerome (now an artist and winery colony) to a pass that is over 7000' in elevation.

Then down the other side to Prescott at about 5000' elevation. We didn't stop to take photos because it was so cloudy and hazy - probably some other day. Using our GPS (thank you Atkinsons) we found Petco and Costco (plus stopped and had our Yukon's oil changed) and spent some money on food for Abby and food for us. We stocked up on meats (rack of lamb, baby-back ribs, salmon, and New York steaks) and picked up a few snacks and clothing items (plus a couple of jugs of the Kirkland Cabernet) - YUM!

We had never toured around Prescott before but we know it has  large population of retired folks. It didn't take us long before we both commented about our negative reaction to the place (quite contrary to their promotional materials on the internet). We have never seen anything quite like it - an endless hodgepodge of doublewides and small, cheap prefab homes. Plus odd things like a wedding chapel wedged between a large Texaco station and a Dollar Store - strange. We saw a quasi-mini-mall wrapped around a gravel pit (not just a temporary one but one with years of use). We were soon ready to leave but instead of driving over Mingus Mountain we drove around it (which is a longer route but takes about half the time). 

We have no idea what we will do tomorrow - probably depends on the weather. It is supposed to be nice so we'll see.