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.