The long cold drive home

We started out early on Thursday morning, heading west across the desert.  We had originally planned to stay in Gallup, but decided to press on in hopes of getting home in two days, to beat the cold weather. Cynthia continued reading Lonesome Dove aloud.    A long day of driving brought us to an RV park in Albuquerque.

Friday morning we did not get an early start, for a variety of reasons.  This meant that we would have to spend one more cold night out.   We ended up stopping in Trinidad Colorado, partly because the high winds had closed the road north of Trinidad, at least for high profile vehicles.  We walked around in downtown Trinidad, but did not stay long, partly because there was little open, and partly because it was bitterly cold.  We headed up to the campground in Trinidad Lake State Park, where we were the only camper.  

Saturday morning the thermometer read zero.  When we tried to dump on the way out of the campground, the valve had frozen shut!   (The valve opened up later).   We headed north to Denver, where I dropped off Cynthia and then headed back to Boulder.   A long hard drive home from Phoenix, but a successful trip.

Arizona

On Saturday morning, we got up early and got on the road by 8 AM, heading West on I-8.

The drive was uneventful, just mile after mile across the desert. Cynthia read Lonesome Dove to me to make the time pass. It got dark and we kept driving. Finally we got to our destination in Green Valley, south of Tucson AZ. We were greeted by Cynthia's friends Cynthia and Tony, old friends from Denver who have retired in Arizona. We parked the rig in front of their house. They had a beautiful dinner waiting for us.

On Sunday morning we went to mass at the historic and beautiful San Xavier del Bac mission church, on the Pima indian reservation. The mass was well attended, and was in both English and Spanish.

After mass, we headed to Tubac to wander through the shops and galleries. There were some interesting things there, and Cynthia bought a metal boot. We had dinner in Tubac with Cynthia and Tony. They love it in Green Valley, and have decorated their house eclectically, with fabulous finds from estate sales. We chatted more after dinner, and went to bed.

Monday we headed north, and decided to hike and camp in Tucson mountain park. We set up in Gilbert Ray campground, and went for a hike through the Saguaros. This is a somewhat greener desert than Anza-Borrego in California, some of the same cactus, but looking healthier. The photo of Richard is from our hike, while the photo of Cynthia is essentially the view out our rear window. Very beautiful, in the desert way.

On Tuesday we headed up to Phoenix to visit Eileen and see more art. We learned that Eileen's friend Barbara would be visiting as well. We headed out to the galleries in Scottsdale. We saw some amazing art, of all different genres, but especially Western art. We particularly liked the Russia gallery, where the owner told the story of going to Russia right after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and buying art from artists who really did not understand the art market.  We also visited the Contemporary Art Museum, where we saw a piece of installation art of an old trailer filled with red sand, a commentary on the housing boom.   Eileen fixed dinner for us and Barbara.

On Wednesday morning we learned that the weather in the next few days would be colder than we had expected. It might have made sense to head for Colorado immediately, but we were not ready to go. We headed back to the galleries in Scottsdale, and saw more excellent art. In the evening we all went out to the fancy El Chorro restaurant.

San Diego

On New Years Eve, we got up for a guided nature hike. We did not find the organized hike, so we hiked it ourselves. This hike was up a wash to a “palm oasis”, where there were palm trees indigenous to Anza-Borrego. These are shorter palms with wider trunks than the usual palms that we see in the movies.

It turned out to be a relatively long drive to San Diego, through a mountainous desert area where gas stations were few and far between. We stopped at the California Welcome Center, where we picked up some brochures and maps. The GPS got us the rest of the way to Campland on the Bay.

Campland on the Bay was a bit of a trip, with kids everywhere and a New Year's Eve party atmosphere. The adult party started at 9 PM. We went out for dinner to a nice restaurant in the area, where we saw many young ladies dressed in their glittery outfits. We were tired and went to bed when we got back, but the loud music continued until after midnight.

On New Year's Day we headed north to the famous La Jolla. It was indeed very beautiful, with cliffs and sea lions and lots of upscale shops. After lunch, we continued north to Oceanside, to meet Terrie, one of Richard's metalworking friends from the internet. We had a nice visit with her, and headed home.

January 2^nd had us headed for Balboa Park, the home of the famous San Diego Zoo and lots of museums. We tried to follow the signs for the Zoo, but ultimately had to stop and ask for directions. We should have used the GPS, which has been working very well for us on this trip. We finally found the Zoo, and then we could head south to the museum area. Balboa Park is huge. We started with the Timken Museum, where we admired the Russian religious icons, the Rembrandt, as well as 20^th century American painters. Then we went to the Spanish Village, lots of small galleries but kind of a letdown after Rembrandt. We had a light lunch in the sculpture garden and then went to the wonderful Mingei museum. 

The Mingei museum was listed as a folk art museum, but almost all of what was there was made by highly skilled craftsmen or artists. There was a special exhibit on the color indigo, including two fascinating videos on the process of making indigo, which involves fermentation and an elaborate process to get blue die from green plants. We stopped by the supermarket on the way home and Richard got a much needed haircut.

On January 3rd we drove to Carlsbad CA to meet Erik and his new wife Leah.  Erik is the grandson of Cynthia's deceased husband, John.   Erik is studying to be a minister, in graduate school.

Our next stop was the impressive Maritime Museum, which consist of many historic ships, tied up to the dock.  The Star of India is the oldest active sailing ship in the world.  We also toured a US submarine.  

We closed our day with a visit to Coronado Island, and the Coronado Hotel, including watching the sunset from the beach.  We had dinner on the island, and then drove back to the campground.

On Friday, we headed back to Balboa Park to visit the San Diego Museum of Art.  We then took a very interesting tour of the Marston house, an example of Arts and Crafts dating from 1905.  We closed the day by visiting Old town San Diego, where we mostly gawked and wandered through stores.  There were several very old adobe buildings.  

Saturday morning we will get on the road early for our next stop, Tucson.

Anza-Borrego

Cynthia took the last flight from Denver to Las Vegas on Christmas day. I picked her up at the airport at 10:40 PM, all went smoothly there.

On the 26^th, we made a big grocery store visit, since we needed to stock up for the desert. Between getting to bed late the night before, and the shopping, we did not get on the road until about 10 AM. The drive south had us going across a vast desert, essentially vacant except for roads and railroads. At one point we stopped at a parking area for a long dead business to have a bite to eat, as it was one of the few places one could pull over. The drive was made more tolerable by a book on tape, Killing Lincoln, so we spent the trip immersed in the civil war.

As it got late in the day, we finally saw the Salton Sea, and passed through the town of Mecca. We kept driving south, with the moon sparkling on the Sea, until we turned west. It was fully dark, and we kept driving. Finally we saw the sign which marked our turn onto the dirt road to find our camp. Tom was waiting for us and led us to a large flat area, with a 360 degree view. We were glad to stop.

We slept in on the 27^th. Tom and Joan brought their own lawn chairs and joined us, basking in the sun and chatting. We decided to go to the village of Borrego Springs, eat lunch there, buy gas, go to the park visitor center, and see some of the metal sculptures around the area, which were quite interesting.

On the 28^th our main activity was a hike to an ancient indian site, where you could see the metates, the worn in depressions in the rocks, that they used to grind grain. We also found the one and only century plant that was blooming. We headed back to Borrego Springs to see more sculptures; there are approximately 200 metal sculptures, all by the same artist. We were impressed, especially when we considered how many sculptures there were, and how quickly he must have worked. We invited Tom and Joan to dinner.

On the 29^th we went jeeping. We were in an area with more jeeps, SUVs, and off road vehicles than we could imagine. It had a bit of Mad Max feel to it. From one overlook we estimated that we could see 200 Rvs of various sizes, with accompanying off road vehicles. We even heard an ice cream truck working the camp area. The jeeping varied from flat plain to bumpy rides in dry creek beds, to full sand dunes. We almost got stuck going up one sand dune, but Tom was able to back down. With the sand, you needed to keep your speed up, and we hit some pretty big bumps. When we stopped for lunch we saw fluid leaking to the ground, near the right rear tire. The brake line had been sheared, apparently in one of the big bumps. We continued, a bit more cautiously, and went up Carrizo wash until we got to the signs that said “Area closed. Unexploded ordnance.” We headed home and hosted Tom and Joan for drinks and hor d'oeuvres.

On the 30^th, we said goodbye to Tom and Joan, who were starting their drive home. Cynthia and I  went to the appropriately named St. Richard's Catholic Church for Sunday mass. After a grocery store visit, we went back to the camper to pack up for Agua Caliente park, where there is electricity that doesn't come from a generator, more or less unlimited water, and hot pools. A bit of civilization to get us cleaned up and ready for the big city of San Diego. The hot pool was crowded during the afternoon, so we came back around 9 PM, when we ended up having the pool to ourselves.