Into The Valley Of Death

This was our third foray into Death Valley. The popular legend for the name is that one of the few seeking a short cut to the gold fields that made it across the wasteland looked back and said “Goodbye, Death Valley. We crossed it from Nevada our first time and from Lone Pine the next time. I thought we would enter from the south this time to be different.

While there are valleys here, there are more mountains. It takes two mountains to make one valley the way I see it. And you cross three ranges in the park. That ignores the majestic Sierra Nevada to the west and the several ranges in Nevada. All of which can be seen from the park.

By 7:30 we were on the road and shortly we passed through the almost defunct Boron mining town of Trona. Next we stopped at the junction to the ghost town of Ballarat and debated on unhooking and taking the Jeep in. There was a lot of traffic on the dusty road so we decided to continue on to the campground not far ahead and come back later. Then the wheels of my plan came off. First, the highway went to washboard gravel which slowed us to 15mph. Then when we regained the blacktop, the road leading to our campground was closed. This provided the explanation for a discrepancy we had noted. Three new paper maps said the campground was 9 miles ahead. The GPS said it was 90 minutes away. Hmmmm, Grumble.

We followed the approved route which took us to the road I wanted to avoid, 190, the one that climbs the Panamint range to 5,000 feet and promptly descends into Death Valley. Then we turned back south completing a loop to the campground. 55 miles vs 9 miles. Who do I see about this?

Anywho, the campground is pleasant enough. Very quiet. I selected it because it’s at 4,100 and so much cooler than in the valleys. After nap, we took the road to the end. There is a great campground with access to the trailhead to Telescope Peak. That CG is at 8,100 feet and was a delightful 66 degrees. Regrettably, only small vehicles can access the CG. There is a fantastic view of Death Valley to the east from there.  I am sure there is an even better view from the top of the peak at 11,100. No one was hiking it as we had to drive through snow and ice to get to the CG. Still winter.

 

These two signs are side-by-side and both places can be seen from them, even though Panamint City is 12 miles away and up 5,000 feet.

 

 

Ten kilns designed by Swedes and built by Chinese to make charcoal to smelt silver. The charcoal was hauled 30 miles to the mine.

Yet more trivia – somewhere in the past I heard the phrase 23 Skidoo. Well, there is a mine site here named Skidoo and the water was piped in from 23 miles away.

Tuesday – February 17 – I asked the park employee who came by to pick the trash if the closed road was really closed. (These guys are always excellent sources of information. They know all of the park and have no agenda to steer you away from sensitive places) He said not at all, tho the road is washed away to one lane in two places, it was legal to use. We wanted to see what Ballarat was all about without driving the 55 mile loop. Ballarat is nothing – two old buildings. While we were there we took the Pleasant Valley Canyon Road about five miles to the first canyon. An interesting drive, but nothing special. Only needed 4WD High to turn around over some deep loose rocks. There were several marked mining claims, but no indication of recent activity.

After our nap, we did the Aguereberry Point Road. More than a decent view, don’t you agree?

Along the way

Jojobo Hills

San Diego may be the ideal city for hiking and biking.  Most of the major roads have bike lanes on both sides of the road. Hike/Bike trails are everywhere. San Diego is green because of condensation. It’s still desert, but with a green tint. I had forgotten that.

We are back in the desert near Temecula. 80+ in the daytime. 40/50’s at night. Full hookups. Five 4G bars.

Stopped at Dudley’s Bakery on the way up. I wanted to buy one of each type of bread they make. Settled for three types and a huge Apple/Walnut Strudel.

Jojobo is a nice place. An Escapees RV park. Everyone is extra friendly. Dozens of activities. The members do most of the maintenance, but they also employ a paid staff.  There are over 20 LD’s there and we met a few of the people.  Our last night in the hookup sites, we were going to host a cocktail party, but the Santa Ana winds came in and someone did not want to get their do mussed so our friends, Bill & Carolyn, had all of us at their rig.  I brought the food, etc. and a good time was had by all.  I love entertaining.

Our home for a week. Full hookups, plus cable, pool, etc. $23 a day.

Temecula surprised us. It looks like the whole city was built in the last few years. Well, it was horse country 25 years ago when Jojoba was built. Miles and miles of stores now.

We wanted to tour the area a bit. Driving the loop around the Palomar Mountains won out over going to Palm Springs, Indio, etc. And so we did. The north side, the Jojoba side, is around 2,000 feet. The observatory is at 5,400 and the valley on south side of the mountains is only 500 feet. Which explains why they grow oranges only on the south side of the mountains.

The map showed that we could get down the mountain two ways – both twisty curvy roads. One went through the state park, so I choose that one. Perhaps not the best choice. That is the Nate Harrison Grade Road, which is maintained only as a fire road. Downhill 17 miles on a mostly decent dirt surface. 

It was well after lunch when we reached the black top that went through orange groves and nurseries. The first commercial place we came to was Jilberto’s Taco. It did not look great, but we were hungry. Inside, the decor and furnishings were sparse. There were a few locals, no other tourista’s. We both ordered the Chile Relleno plate. It seemed to take forever to come to the table. When it came, the plate was overflowing with two of the largest peppers we have ever seen. Of course, there was salad, beans and rice and HUGE homemade tortillas'. The peppers were stuffed, I think, with Oaxaca cheese. Devine. We waddled away. Back at Jojoba, we had a short nap and went to the pool.

Remember the steel sculptures in Anza-Borrego? Well, here are more at the artist’s place near Temecula.

And the serpent. Please note this is not my picture. 

We did provisioning the day before we left Jojoba. Our stops included BevMo!, Winco, Costco and Petco. Do you see a pattern? We have been to BevMo’s before, but this one had everything. Dorothy had some wine on the 130-foot yacht in San Diego that she said was the best she had ever had. She bought a half-case at BevMo! for $9 a bottle. Winco is discount grocery store that has an excellent selection. The only reason we stopped at Petco was that is was next to Sprouts, where we bought more produce, and the humane society had lots of puppies for adoption there.

We had lunch at La Cocino which has been recommended to us. I could not understand everything our server said as she really rolled her r’s, but she explained the special dishes with such enthusiasm that I wanted them. I understood one was salmon and Dorothy loves that so I got that for her. It also had shrimp over rice. I really did not know what the second dish she described, but the words were so enticing that I ordered it. It turned out to be carne asada with the most divine sauce. To me, sauces are what turns food into a memorable experience. Oh and the appetizer was 16 small tortillas stuffed with shrimp and another divine sauce.

Southern California counties are huge. Consider that Rhode Island is 1,200 sq miles. Consider that San Diego county is 4,200, Riverside is 7,200 and the largest in the state, San Bernardino 20,000 square miles. You determine how many Rhode Islands will fit into San Bernardino county.

Sunday February 15 – We are on the way to Death Valley. We broke the trip up by over-nighting in Inyokern. [Combines the names of two counties, Inyo and Kern] We could not believe all the dirt worshippers along 395 south of here. It’s dead flat BLM land and nothing scenic, but all manner of dirt bikes and quads are out there in the dirt making dust.

So far this trip has been in civilized areas. Now we ready to get off the grid.

On The Quay In San Diego

If you don’t do something stupid once in awhile, you will not have many amusing stories.

This is a true story. As much as I can remember of it anyway. The fellow like me likes to locate and drive remote roads. This road was in South Africa. You know the place that has large kitties. He does not have 4WD. He prefers late 1950’s cars with huge fins, like a Cadillac or Desoto. Perhaps not ideal an vehicle for dirt roads.

Skipping to the part of the story where the rear frame is resting in the soupy dirt. It’s late in the afternoon, he figures it will take him until dark to dig it out, so he decides to wait and see if someone will come along and help him out. So they have cocktails, a one-pot dinner and bed down for the night.

The next morning he attacks the dirt with the only thing he has that will serve as a shovel – a tire tool. He does not want to soil his pants so he takes them off and lays down in his red underwear to begin work. Bugs want to get in his ear, so he puts toilet tissue in them. To keep the sun off, he coats his arms in mud. Three hours later, he making some progress, when a car appears. German tourists in a rental. Ideal. So he approaches them in his red undies, tissue in his ears and tire tool in hand. Their eyes are big. Fortunately, his wife is German and she is able to convince them they will not be harmed and all they need is a tow.

 

Remember the couple in our last post that were camping in the desert in a Caddy? Well we were their guests on the S/Y Kaori last night. 

 

Dorothy, Cathie and Kiki

Yohan, the skipper, and Dana

Kaori, built by Palmer-Johnson, 130 feet overall, is for sale. The price is just north of six million. The skipper says she is a sweet sailor and with 20 knots apparent, she will do 12 knots.

 

A 240 footer parked close by. The mast is the most expensive mast ever made. 20 million. Note the three fore sails.

Our view from our hosts home

Birds of Paradise

Q and Anza-Borrego

Tuesday – January 13 – Dorothy has wanted to attend Q [Quartzite] for some years. Thousands of RVer’s come to this location in SW Arizona in January to wander around the hundreds of booths selling everything that might appeal to the RV crowd. They even sell RV’s. It’s quite the deal, Some opt for public campgrounds with hookups, most boondock in the desert. We are in the latter group, parked with 20 other Lazy Daze in what the organizer calls Roger’s Half Acre. Cocktails are at 4:30 and a campfire follows. We wandered around some of the booths this morning and bought the following treasures: a pair of Crocs each, a Rada knife, some tent stakes that should prove difficult for me to bend, mini clamps, t-shirts for Dorothy, a hiking stick for me since I forgot to load mine, a Kokopelli carpet runner to replace the thread bare one we had, a Kokopelli outdoor mat, (been looking for one for six years), two LED light bulbs and six pair of socks. About $200 into the roving cash economy. The Big Tent opens Saturday. I thought we would be gone before then, but Dorothy wants to see it, so San Diego will wait. It’s shorts weather after 10am, except today, the breeze is a stiff 20mpg.

Tried to find Dripping Springs. Failed. The instructions said it was difficult to locate because of all the trails. Did see all manner of cacti and a reached a vista point where we could see thousands of white dots of RV’s covering the valley floor.

Pictures taken by talented LD folks

Wednesday – Friday – More of the same.

Saturday – The Big Tent opened. We walked around for two hours. We expected more RV gadgets and less of the non-RV stuff. It’s worth going to once every few years I suppose. We dropped another hundred on a fanny pack that Dorothy will wear on her tummy, a stove top grill, which she says will allow her to grill bone-in pork chops on the range, and a jar of pink goop that cleaned all sorts of grease from carpet and fabric at the demo.

Had our last happy hour and fire. The group will get larger over the weekend after we are gone.

Jim, Bev, Merlin and Mike 

California

Sunday – We drove to Bonita, CA and parked in our friends “RV park”. Well, they do have two RV’s and a sail boat lodged close to their home. It overlooks a valley. I will have to remember to take a picture of the view – all the way to Mexico. He made dry rubbed ribs for dinner. Yum. Gary and Diane joined us.

Monday – Foraged for supplies at Sprouts, Walmart and Costco.

Tuesday – We toured the USS Midway in 2008. Dana volunteers there and took us on a tour before the masses arrived. Included was a tour of CIC, [Combat Information Center], which was where I served 50 years ago. It’s in the process of being restored and is not open to the public yet.

Dorothy and Dana 

Wednesday – Off to Anza-Borrego. We had spent two or three nights there in 2008, but did not see much. Dana and Cathy took us on some of the backroads. They have been camping here since they were kids so they know the place from A to Z. We are parked at Arroyo Salado.

17 Palms – One of numerous stands of Date Palms in Anza-Borrego

In the Pumpkin Patch

The view of the badlands from Vista del Malpais

 

The Viewers

Thursday – Another trail, today to Coyote and Sheep Canyons. I thought it was thoughtful to put the prey and predator canyons adjacent to each other. We did not spy either mammal, but the scenery was worthwhile. Even needed to put Rubi in 4WD high up a rocky trail.

Some of the ocotillo's are greening up after the storm two weeks back, but we only saw a handful in bloom. There are more ocotillo's here than anywhere else we have been. Large ones too.

Some of the critters we saw in Anza-Borrego

A Happy Dance? 

You have no doubt used Avery labels at some time. Well the owner, bought a lot of land here, populated it with steel sculptures and left the land for the enjoyment of all.

Anza-Borrego is one of the largest parks in the US. Mostly you see desert, but there are springs and where there is water you see palms and orchards. We bought 8 grapefruit for $3. That’s a bargain.

Most CA parks charge $30 to park on asphalt. Here it is free. Yes, there are private, county and state parks with amenities for a fee, but there are more enough state and BLM land for dry camping.

Badlands, Yes. But is it SD or CA?

Saturday – We moved to a campsite in the southern part of the park. It took about 90 minutes of slow driving to get there. At the end we were 20 miles from where we started. The mountain road wanders all over the place.

On the way south we stopped a the wild life preserve to photograph some of the large critters with KoKo.

 

We were the only ones in our new campsite until close to dark when a 59 Caddy parked a 1/4 mile away from us. I had to meet them. He is from South Africa, she is German, they bought the Caddie in Las Vegas and it has Utah plates. I invited them to our campfire tonight.

Turns out he is the skipper and she is purser of a 130 sail boat in San Diego. He invited us to come aboard this weekend.

 

Sunday – A morning drive through first one wash and then another. The deep arroyos reminded us of pictures we have seen of Petra in Jordan.

Look like we took a wrong turn. Hollywood and Vine.

Tuesday – Today we drove back to San Diego. Laundry, foraging for food and getting Verizon wifi will highlight the next two days.

West Bound

We made it to Arizona Sunday and are in short sleeves. This blog is about getting to Arizona.

We finally were able "to get on the road again!" We originally planned to leave December 28, but, we had colds and then rain. In a round-about way we will be continuing our trip that was cancelled when I fractured my wrist last September. 

A cold week, so we opted for the Interstate and hookups.

Monday, January 5 - Our first stop was Roosevelt State Park in Morton, MS. $13. We have stayed there several times.  It's okay and it has electric hookups.  We decided to leave on the coldest week of the winter and need to use our electric heater.

Tuesday – Minden, LA - Fairgrounds Free

Wednesday – Our planned destination was scrubbed when Dorothy realized she left her laptop at a Dairy Queen in Tyler, TX. We were an hour west when she made the discovery, so after reversing direction, we pondered how to find the DQ we were in – there are nine in town. We stopped at one of the Dairy Queen's and it was my hope to get the phone numbers of the others and call to see if one of them had found it.  The clerk didn't know her way around Tyler or the other stores. That's where my bad day turned into a great day.  A young man came in and said he would help us. He was with DQ corporate in Tyler. We described the store and he made a call, but it was not at that store. He had direct numbers to the store managers and they answer the phone when he calls. He called a second store, and sure enough, they had my computer.

We only made it back west one hour. Lost two hours travel time and $40 of gasoline. Stayed at a PA park in Canton, TX $20.

It was 17.6 outside this morning. Good thing for the point 6, otherwise it would have been really cold.

Thursday – Lake Sweetwater Muni Park $10. It looks much like the hill country east of here. There was snow/ice on the north banks along the Interstate west of Abilene.

Friday – Van Horn, TX There was a 10 minute edition of wintery mix around 6am, but it did not cause any problems. Not having wifi on board made it most difficult finding a propane dealer. To hell with the cost and our getting free of our addiction to surfing, we will order wifi next week. We are spending way too much time stopping for free wifi.

I have been informed: Walking can add minutes to your life. This enables you at 85 years to spend an additional 5 months in a nursing home at $5000 per month

Saturday – There were a few short stretches of light rain as we climbed in elevation from Van Horn to El Paso. As we closed on New Mexico the sky showed faint traces of blue. We stopped at St. Claire Winery in Deming and stocked up on sweet wine. Found a delightful PA CG on the road to Rockhound SP. A few dollars more than the SP, but we got half decent wifi.  By 3pm, the sky was clear and the temp in the 50’s. Nice after weeks of rain, overcast and cold.

Gasoline was as low as $1.73 around Dallas. Unleaded is 87/88 octane until you get to west Texas where it changes to 86. A steady diet of that gives our Triton engine indigestion. So “out west” we have learned to pay up for mid-grade 87/88 octane. So while Unleaded is about $1.90, mid-grade is $2.15 or so. Still much less than last year.

Sunday, January 11 – We accepted Glenda’s routing from Deming, NM to Apache Junction, AZ [near Phoenix]. We were concerned about being The Old West Highway for some 100 miles. Where is that road on the map? It turned out to be US70 and it was a slightly scenic road, a lot better than the Interstate we had been on all week.

We passed through Stafford, AZ – a farming community – yes, there is water in this small area of the desert. We noted the town was quite prosperous. On the west side of the town we found out why, when we saw a Mormon temple. They know how to create and maintain wealth.

We landed in Adult [55+] RV park for the night. Friendly folks. It was shirt sleeve weather when we arrived and we took advantage of the hot tub. There must be hundreds of RV parks in the area and it sure is better than the Texas Valley to our way of thinking.

Tomorrow we make a short jump to Q for a few days and then to San Diego.

Delayed Departure

Christmas Morning – No grandkids this week as we don’t want to infect them with whatever we have. We did spend last weekend with them at a mini-family reunion.

We planned to leave here Sunday morning. First, I got a cold and of course I passed it along to Dorothy. Plus after four months of dry and temperate weather the winter rains have arrived. We just do not care to drive in the rain for days while feeling poorly. So we will wait until we feel better and the cold air arrives. And so it goes.

It will be a fast paced, for us, trip to the Pacific coast. We have 8 stops planned – most will be one-nighters, some could turn into two nighters.

Each year, we leave in a little worse shape health-wise than the year before. Really good that we retired at 60 or we would have missed a lot. 55 would have been better. Dorothy wanted to make sure her hiking boots were in the Jeep. I silently rolled my eyes.

Dorothy has been mentally ready to leave for weeks. If she was not still in PT and that she feels it necessary to spend Christmas at home, I am sure we would have already left.

This trip will be different than any previous one, as we will be spending part of it near major population centers with friends. Of course, there will also be some boon-docking in the outback.

Running Necked

Now that Millenicom is history we are going to leave home without a “guaranteed” on-ramp to the web. Since we were home during the transition to Verizon, we had the plan on vacation. Why pay $90 for limited slow service, we had 10x times faster unlimited cable service for $25?

So we lost the lower conversion rate and would now have to pay the full rate and probably under a contract. Since the next trip is only going to be about 4 months, a contact does not make any sense at all. Plus Verizon only allows a vacation of three months, so we would be paying for a service we would not use most of the rest of the year.

On our last trip, we said we would not surf so much. We failed. Most every morning we spent 90 minutes goofing off. This time, without the temptation, we can get up, get dressed, enjoy a cup of Joe outside and get to our morning activity much earlier. Just like the first two years we traveled. Those trips are filled with some great memories.

Free Internet access is available so many places now. I think we will be able to get by just fine. But, just in case, I will have the modem and router with us.