River Lodge Resort

We are staying for about a month at River Lodge Resort along the Colorado River that separates Arizona and California. We are on the California side but we use Arizona Time, which is an hour earlier, since the AZ side of the river has all the businesses and shopping. The facilities in this place are a little dated in that many of the amenities are old but functional however the price as we will discuss is reasonable. We are still looking for the bar and grill as mentioned in this sign but we have only been here a few days and that part of the facility maybe hiding. The Colorado River runs right by the Resort. The RVs and other structures we will discuss stretch along the river for about a mile. This is a large resort or RV park.

In general terms the longer you stay in your RV at a given place the cheaper the price per night becomes. That is true for private parks but the state parks do not offer any weekly or monthly rates. At state parks it is per night and per night only with typically a 14 day maximum stay and in Arizona a typically nightly rate is $30-$40 a night. Here at River Lodge it costs $50 to stay one night, $250 to stay a week ($35.71 a night) and $330 a month (31 days equals $10.65 per night) for the site we are in. Quite a difference in prices the longer you stay. The monthly folks pay .18 cents a KWH for electricity while it is included in the other rates.

We have chatted with many people who are staying here. There are lots of folks that have been coming here every year for the past 15-17 years. That is a long time to be coming back to the same place. Many are Canadians as well as many from Montana, Wyoming, Washington and other northern climates. The longer term visitors typically get here Nov 01 and depart April 1st staying here for 5 months. In front of the RV you see here is the Colorado River so this is a prime spot and commands a higher price than we described. However we were surprised when we found out that they only pay $370 month. These spaces also have a waiting list of 5-6 years or longer. People keep them for a long time.

The Water - Don't drink the water. The water in this part of the desert is terrible. Very high in mineral content, very hard and basically undrinkable. People will either use a water softener, as seen in this image, (if you are staying of several months you just rent one of these from the Culligan Man), buy bottled water for drinking, or buy water from the water station which is a reverse osmosis machine and it produces decent water. The water from the machine costs $1 for 5 gallons and many use it for coffee or drinking. You need to use about twice the amount of shampoo when washing your hair because of the hardness of the water. You just don't get the suds.

What you see in this image is called a tiny home. They are basically park model homes that you can buy. There are many of them here at River Lodge and more going in. The model with a loft cost about $70,000 all set up and ready to go. Once you buy the unit you pay $415 a month to River Lodge for rent and then .18 cents a KWH for electricity. Since this is really BLM land you never own the land but lease it for a long, long time. Most of the Tiny Homes are right along the river and have direct access to the water. You can see the personal water craft and other items they keep here. This person may come over for the warm summer months or has not arrived yet for the winter season.

Before you get out your checkbook keep in mind that this is hot desert country in the summer. It will commonly get to a 110 degrees and stay there for several days and the people who live here said it got to 129 one day this summer. That is hot. However when you talk to folks that live around here they shrug off the hot weather as if it is no big deal. Heat is here and you just live with it.

As mentioned this is BLM land and the wild burros that walk around here are protected. You cannot harrass them and you are asked not to feed them. In this image the golf course folks have trimmed the palm trees and the burros are eating the green fronds. We made a mistake the first night we were here and left the garbage bag hanging outside. One of the burros came right up to our door and stuck his nose in the bag looking for something to eat. So far they appear to be fairly docile and will just wander off. Not much bothers them. They do however leave their droppings, the processed palm fronds as it were, everywhere. Some piles have been cleaned up but it is not clear if that is park staff doing the cleanup or folk who are staying here visitors.

This is a view of part of the golf course. Over the winter the burros have done some major damage to the course and it is in need of a lot of repair. If you are staying in the park, there is no charge to play the course. It is a short 9 hole par 3 course with two holes about 200 yards in length each and the rest much shorter. Many of the people staying for five months play golf daily. Certainly with no green fees that is a big draw. They ask for a donation of either money or time working on the course. It seems fairly loosely organized and we have been told that the owners don't play golf and don't care at all about the course or fixing it up or maintaining it.

This is a view looking west down the Colorado River. We are fairly close to the river and walked about 100 yards to get this view to the west. Nice sunset.