October 13 Tucson Arizona

Our choice of RV "park" in Tucson has turned out excellent. We are at Voyager RV which is very modern and definitely full service. It is a Very Large (1200 space) gated community with space for overnighters such as ourselves, plus permanent stick built homes, modulars, park models, etc. They have 2 laundramats, beauty/barber shop, medical clinic, massage, tanning, savings and loan office, library, three swimming pools, excercise, wood working shop, craft lab, classes, ball room, movies, full service restaurant, motel rooms,...did I say this was FULL service. All this and it was really no more expensive than any other place we have stayed (...well OK, I guess it was more than the free nights at WalMart). It has been very well located for where our friend Jess lives and also lots of the sights we wanted to go see.

We have gone driving each day with Jess and visited a sampling of the local sights/sites to get the feeling of Tucson. He shared with us the old traditional part of town as well as the ancient chapels and yesterday an awesome horse ranch .

More important than the sight seeing has been our quality time with Jess as a person. He is extremely special to us as he is the president and founder of TOP (Tour of Peace) Vietnam Veterans. He is the one responsible for the quality, moving, life-changing experience we had when we went to Vietnam in March. His commitment to the Vietnam Veterans is total and very admirable. We are committed to doing whatever we can to help support his efforts which we totally believe in.

I have volunteered to take on the challenge to assist in locating information that can possibly lead to the return of recovered dog tags to the families of deceased Vietnam Veterans.

We are also working on leprosy bandages for the leprosy villages in Vietnam. I have started knitting them by hand (which is very time consuming) but hope to figure out how to do them on a simple knitting machine I have ordered. In fact Gary wanted me to teach him how to knit them and I am hoping the knitting machine may work for him to help out on them. Our Vietnam Veteran's group on the Oregon Coast posted an item on their website regarding the leprosy bandages. I have already gotten an inquiry from a woman in England who is working on these custom bandages and will be sending them through us for delivery directly to the people of Vietnam. Amazing what impact the internet can have!

Another project that is very near to our hearts is the sponsorship of wheelchairs for the crippled young people in Vietnam. TOP has a resource in Vietnam that will produce a high quality wheel chair for just $110. They have a steering wheel type handle that they pump back and forth to propel the chair forward. Jess says there is one young man who even travels a couple miles each day in his to and from school ! They have pictures of them on the TOP website...if you look for them watch for the picture with two yellow chairs in it. What a lasting gift these are to these young people. We hope to sponsor a couple chairs ourselves and also get the word out to others who might be interested in donating to the cause.

Tomorrow we will go with Jess to have dinner with some of his family as well as another of the TOP volunteers...a husband and wife who adopted a Vietnamese daughter.

Next stop after we leave here on Saturday will be a visit at the home of my sister, Karen, in Casa Grande.