On the Road At Last

It's a blustery morning here in Desert Hot Springs. There were strong winds all night and this morning, but that is not unusual for the desert. The hotel workers keep apologizing for the "cold wind" as though it was their fault. I simply tell them that I don't think it's cold at all because I'm from the Lake Tahoe area. That seems to make them feel better. In fact while it's a strong wind, it's quite warm, in my opinion anyway. The locals are freezing. Haha I love the desert in winter.

This morning - for the third time in a week - someone said Frances looks like a coyote. In her 12+ years I've never heard that comment, and now I've heard it three times in a row. Considering I have begun a writing project where a Coyote is the main character, I find that interesting. Maybe Frances wants to play the lead role and is trying to look like a Coyote!

I made it to Desert Hot Springs last night. It took 10 hours, but some of that included stopping here and there. It's between 525 - 550 miles. I'm not exactly sure because I made a couple of wrong turns and I ran some errands at home before hitting the road. I'm sitting here in my room this morning enjoying the mountain view and drinking coffee. I spoke with Betsy about 15 minutes ago. She anticipates hitting the road around noon today, so I expect her here around 10:00 or 11:00 tonight. I was worried about her pushing the envelope since she is not completely over her bug. But she assured me she slept well last night. We don't have to check out of here until noon tomorrow so she can sleep in. It's only about 450 miles to Nogales, Arizona tomorrow so it's a shorter drive than the first leg.

Here's a bit of a recap of my journey yesterday, February 18, 2010:

I stumbled out of the house around 7:30am - before my coffee! - dragging a couple of things to load into the car. A fat robin flew across my path at breakneck speed and landed on the white picket fence. As any crossword puzzle book will tell you, Robin is a "harbinger of Spring" and new beginnings. Time to hit the road.

I pulled out of Betsy's driveway in Camino at 9:25. First stop - Placerville - my favorite drive through coffee joint where they fill up my giant mug with the best coffee in town for a buck and toss in a doggie treat to boot. While making a quick stop at the post office, it became apparent that I needed to repack the back seat. Frances was being buried by sliding luggage and dog food bags. That accomplished, I realized I had enough room for my new favorite board game - Tayu - so I swung by my storage unit and picked that up. Then one last stop in Cameron Park to return some borrowed videos. At 10:30 I pulled out of Cameron Park as my car odometer rolled over to 313,000 miles.

Oh! My big toe is black and blue but not broken. The pain is mostly gone and the range of motion is about 80% as of this morning. It looks bad but should be back to normal very soon and should't hinder any of my activities. It just feels kind of fat.

El Dorado County was gorgeous and sunny as I left this morning. Once I got to Sacramento it was overcast. This is common in January and February. I took Highway 99 South of out Sacramento. By the time I got to Stockton there was a dreary light gray haze which remained through Bakersfield. I can see why so many central valley folks get depressed in the winter.

Many of the various fruit orchards are in full bloom and were pretty to look at. Around Atwater and Merced there are some intermittent stretches of highway where the wide median has been seeded with California Poppies which are now in full bloom - so there's this 8-10 foot wide stretch of bright orange for miles at a time. That was nice.

I would advise that if you ever travel down 99, NEVER stop in the little town of Pixley for gas, food or ANYTHING! And my drive through Fresno did nothing to change my life long opinion of that town. A large billboard in Fresno proclaimed in giant ominous letters: FOG KILLS! Hm. And what exactly am I supposed to do with that information? Nuff said.

In Bakersfield I turned East on Highway 58 which goes into the mountains and starts to become desert. It heads towards Barstow and Las Vegas. I didn't take it that far of course. A few Joshua Trees starting to pop up here and there. At last the sky began to turn blue again. I like this highway. It's the second time I've taken it and it's a pretty drive.

96 miles later I turned south on 395 for about 45 miles - the last 10 miles included some traffic signals. 395 then became Hwy 15 which I took for about 16 miles. It then split and I went South on Hwy 215 for another 15 miles and finally spilled out onto Interstate 10 in San Bernardino.

I had to chuckle at the San Bernadino Airpot signs. "SBD Airport". hahaha

Once on I-10 it was about 50 miles to the Desert Hot Springs exit. 9 miles thru town and I'm at the hotel. I met my friend Jenifer for dinner at a Mexican Restaurant around the corner that also serves a full King Crab for $12.00. We each had that. I haven't had crab for many years. I think you burn off as many calories trying to crack the crab legs as are in crab.

Jen and I hope to get together again tomorrow evening after she gets off work. In the meantime I will swim in all eight of the natural spring pools and hot tubs here and make sure I have some food here for Betsy when she finally arrives.