An Oasis in the Desert

Sunday, May 29th – Joshua Tree National Park – South to Dripping Springs State Park, California - Day 108

We relaxed in the morning. We gradually got packed up and out. Just as we were packing up, we saw this massive rectangular RV pass us pulling a jeep. It was a behemoth.

We headed towards Palm Springs. A swim shower and resupply was necessary. Palm Springs was a green oasis in the desert. It was a beautiful town with gorgeous roadside gardens. We did some shopping and decided to head to the pool. The pool was closing soon but we enjoyed every minute we could before we were kicked out. It was so nice, we decided to take our blanket to the park next door to hang out. We met a couple that was travelling for their daughter’s tennis tournament and they gave us watermelon. Delicious.

We were looking for campsites around San Diego. They were expensive. Dispersed camping was very far outside of the city. We found a regional park website; the Tijuana River Regional Park had plenty of availability, $25 and was 20 minutes from downtown San Diego. We left Palm Springs and drove across the Sao Jacinto mountains. A gas stop provided a $12 meat lovers pizza, add in leftover stew and a picnic table and we had dinner. We finished crossing the mountains.

At this point we phoned Tijuana River State Park and they informed us that there was no availability that night despite what their website says. We had no place to stay and pulled over to discuss our options. We decided that we would check out the nearest National Forest to find a pull out.

On our way, we dropped in at Dripping Springs State park. The host wasn’t available but there were several spots that weren’t occupied. A neighbour let us know that a site had been reserved all weekend, but no one had shown up. At his point it was 10pm on the Sunday of a long weekend, we figured we would chance it. We set-up and I spent some time with the neighbour chatting by the fire. No one showed up.

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Meow Wolf and O

Wednesday, May 25th –Lake Mead National Recreation Area to Las Vegas, Nevada – Day 104 We woke up in our roadside turn out and got ready for the day. Our plan was to go for a swim at Lake Mead, see the Hoover Dam and head back into Vegas. The morning was stifling hot, we were looking forward to the swim. We drove to the visitor centre at Lake Mead Recreation Centre. We could see Lake Mead on the way. The water was well below the high-water line on the rocks. At the visitor centre we got our passport stamped, filled our water bottles, and received junior ranger booklets. The air conditioning was so nice we set up the kids to work on their booklets and hung around. The kids finished up enough activities that they were sworn in by a very nice ranger before we left. We decided to go see the Hoover Dam first. We dropped the trailer in the parking lot. We heard it might need to be opened at the security checkpoint and we couldn’t be bothered. The H...

Canyonlands is Another Planet - Pt 1

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A Desert Forest - Part 4

We finally decided to move to our last destination before the sun set. The Arch Rock Nature trail was next. We reached the parking lot and saw the rocks in the distance, we were debating what we wanted to do. We just started moving and once we did, we found ourselves racing down the trail to the rocks. The kids wanted to play monster and once they started running, everyone else was running as well. We had another poo-mergency with no restroom in sight, the evidence is buried in the desert. There was more climbing on the rocks. We took pictures of the sun setting and took a quick look at the Arch rock before starting back to the car. Gen was behind the wheel, an hour later we were leaving the park’s south entrance. We stopped at the Ranger station to freshen up in the bathroom and fill our water bottles before heading to our campsite. Luckily, the site was the overflow campsite for the park so was minutes from the outside of the park....

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