Day 11: September 28, 2001
Phoenix to Joshua Tree National Park

We're starting the last stretch of the trip, so our only real event we had planned for the day was to visit the Joshua Tree National Monument. We checked out of La Quinta Inn in Scottsdale around 9:30 and headed out. When we had been wandering around looking for Cold Stone the night before, Walendo had noticed a dramatic patriotic display in one of the stores, which he told me about after we got back. I wanted to get some good shots in this area, so we decided to head back there, and then make our way out of the area. When we got there, it turned out that you couldn't see the display at all because of the glare on the window. So we were oh-for-two in hunting down things in that mall. Oh well. We got back on the freeway, but I still wanted to get patriotic shots from the area, and I was determiend to see if there was any downtown part of Phoenix at all, so we got off again at Chaparral Road.

Patriotic house Scottsdale, AZ

After going just a few blocks, I noticed a house just to the right that had painted their garage the American flag. I pulled over, and it turned out that nearly every house on that cul de sac had some sort of patriotic display, so I took pictures of all of them. What a find!

We continued on for a while and meandered our way through the streets heading toward downtown Phoenix. Again we were struck by how much this place is just an amalgamation of shopping malls. And it's ridiculously hot. It's amazing that anyone lives here. As we were driving along, Walendo noticed a laundromat with a sign that said "free dryer." He commented, "no wonder it's free. They probably just hold the clothes out the window for a minute and they're dry." For some reason, that tickled me and I giggled away for a while. We did find some good flags, though.

Middle Eastern Deli Phoenix, AZ

We saw a Middle Eastern restauarant with a flag (which was great), and a Chinese restauarant and a Mexican place. Excellent. At one point, we passed a sign store that had some gaudy American flag sign on the wall. Walendo got out with me and went into the store to see if he could buy one. They had a placemat sized one for $20. For some bizarre reason, he bought it. I guess he just got caught up in the moment, cuz a few minutes later when we walked back to the car, he was wondering what the hell he was going to do with it. It was funny.

Ugly patriotric sign Phoenix, AZ

Eventually, we did come to a downtown area with some tall buildings, whick seemed to take up maybe 10 by 3 blocks. For such a huge suburban sprawl, it's a pretty puny downtown. This is a strange place. We got on highway 10 heading west toward California. We stopped at one point to get some lunch and more ice. (Two bags in a cooler had melted over night.) We stopped in Fry's (the grocery store) and Walendo got a pre-made turkey, ham, and roast beef sandwich on a good roll for $2.00. He was really psyched about it cuz it turned out to be pretty good and it was so cheap! We wished we'd gotten one for me and one for Libbby! Walendo said that was at least one reason to live in Phoenix, cuz of the good cheap sandwiches at Fry's.

Chollo Cactus, Joshua Tree, CA

The drive along Route 10 is pretty dull, so we mostly listened to Angle of Repose. We were coming to the end, which is sad. We've been enjoying it. Eventually we reached Joshua Tree National Park. It's not very well marked off Route 10. There were no "coming up" signs, it just showed up. We turned in, and we were surprised at how incredibly dry, rocky, hot, and downright ugly it was. We know some friends who go there a lot and really like it, but we didn't see what there was to like. We didn't even see many Joshua Trees. The pamphlet said there were two deserts in the Park, one low desert (where we were) and one high desert, so we figured maybe the high desert was better. We stopped once at a spot where there were lots of chollo cactuses. They're very weird looking but in a pretty way, especially when lit up from behing by the sun. I got out to take pictures and after a shot ways I accidentally walked next to a little burr that had fallen off one of them. Man, those cactii are mean! It attached itself to my sock and dug its sharp thorns into my ankle. When I tried to pull it off, more thorns tore off the main ball and dug into my fingers.

Joshua Tree National Park, CA

Ouch! I finally had to rip the burr off of my ankle with two rocks. Then I carefully pulled out the thorns that we still dug into my ankle. After that little adventure, I finally went about taking pictures of them. They're still pretty. We also stopped quickly to pick up some sand, so now we have some red sand from Arizona, brown sand from the Colorado sand dunes, and gray sand from Joshua Tree. (Should have gotten some from NM.)

Coyote in Joshua Tree Park

After a short while, we suddently moved into the high desert area because the terrain changed quite a bit. It also got cooler, so it was much more pleasant to drive again. Now we started to see the Joshua trees we'd expected. We stopped so I coudl take some shots. I wasn't feeling that inspired so they probably won't come out that well. After a little more driving we started to see whole forests of Joshua Trees, set against the Alabama hills type of rocks. That was neat. We stopped again so I could capture the scene, and as I was shooting, I noticed a coyote walking in the distance. I had my 320 zoom on, but still I wished I could get in closer. I was far enough away that it didn't feel threatened, and in fact it lay down in the shade facing me. I shot off a bunch of shots, hoping some of them would have the right depth of field and exposure. Just as I ran out of film, another coyote came along. I tried to change film as fast as I could, but I wasn't fast enough. Just as I got set up, they both took off in the distance. Oh well. It was neat to get a few shots anyway.

Big Joshua Tree

We continued driving and enjoying the Joshua Trees. We agreed that it would be a nice place to come and camp. It's a fairly primitive National Park. There isn't much in the way of facilities, just some camping sites. I'd like to come here sometime to camp and absorb the feel of the desert. We didn't feel like staying a long time, so this felt more like a scouting expedition more than really seeing the park.

Libby in Expedition in 'passenger mode'

We came out the other side to the town of Joshua Tree and then onto Yucca Valley to get gas. We weren't sure where to stay for the night. We considered stopping in Big Bear, but Walendo said it wasn't that interesting and as we start getting close to home he starts to get antsy to be there. He even suggested driving home tonight, but it was 5pm then, and we were still maybe 8 hours away. Too much for me! So we decided to aim toward Bakersfield and then tomorrow we'll head toward the coast and drive up Big Sur, which we haven't seen in a while. I'd like to extend the vacation that much more, although it will be nice to have time to relax at home for a few days before going back to work.

As we were driving in the middle of nowhere, we got a call from Bob on the cell phone. He was just calling to check how we were doing. Walendo was driving so I chatted with him for a bit. Then we switched drivers and about a half hour later, we got another call, this time from George to say hi and see how we were doing. How strange. We hadn't gotten calls from any of our friends, and then two call right after one another. Walendo chatted with George, laughing a lot. We stopped soon after in the town of Victorville, a non-descript town, to get dinner. We got a quick bite at Jack in the Box and then, of course, noticed some diners up the way. We stopped again to get dessert and I had a not very good hot fudge sundae and Walendo had a not very good apple pie. Oh well. Onward ho.

Bakersfield Best Western

Along the way to Bakersfield were the towns of Palmdale and Lancaster, which is where Walendo bought land as part of his IRA funds during his young and gullible days. I expected it to be more deserted, but it seemed to be mostly shopping strips. It was dark by the time we got there, so it was hard to tell. Who knows, maybe someday it'll be worth something. (Yeah, right.) Anyway, we spent the rest of the drive listening to what turned out to be the end of Angle of Repose. It was quite a good story, and very well written. We both enjoyed it a lot. Finally we rolled into Bakersfield at about 9:30. We called ahead to the Best Western, which once again takes dogs. We sure like this place. We also had another coupon from that book we picked up the first night, and sure enough, it saved us $25. What a deal. While checking in, the guy said they had been doing great business since the terrorist strikes, which is the first time we've heard that. He said lots of people are driving between LA and SF, so they stop there along the way. He said his parents live in Las Vegas, and although they laid off about 10,000 people the first week, they've hired them all back as people are taking their vacations domestically. He also said a certain car dealership sold 20 cars in one day as people couldn't fly home and all the rental cars were gone. So people bought cars, drove home, and then sold them again. I knew some businesses would be doing well from all this.

So now here we are in our hotel in Bakersfield and I'm finally caught up with the journal.

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