San Felipe

Our first Mexican highway and we made it in one piece. Drive into town, find our little camping zone, right on the beach with two-story palapas. What a spot! Mexican families all around, ranchero music eminating from every car stereo vying for our foot-tapping. We're here! But why is it so damn hot? We swim in the warm waters of the Sea of Cortez and it's only slightly cooler than the air. It{s a beautiful spot, but obviously set up for the US college crowd. A small malecon, but no Zocalo (town square). Lots of little hokey stores and the standard kids with gum. But a great view and a few days to relax and catch up. We meet some wonderful folks like Jose' (pic). But it's so hot that we spend most of our time sitting in the shade of our palapa. And this isn't Vegas hot, it's 105F and 90% humidity.

Borders

Funny thing about borders, they really are just a line on the map.
So we head off from Calexio, all excited, a little bit stressed. We get to the border, get the green light and we're in Mexico. So... what about our tourist cards, what about our vehicle importation permit...? Mexicali is a busy crazy, messy introduction to Mexico. We find a place to park and walk back to the border to get all of our documentation. Everyone is sweet as pie and gets us all straightened away and off we go.
on to San Felipe...

Parker, AZ

Spent our first night out of Las Vegas on the Colorado River near Parker AZ. After our first flat just north of Lake Havusa. What a crazy night, stormy heat lightening all around with that kind of funny rain that seems to fall in giant drops, but never quite gets the ground wet. Regardless, the powerful smell of wet desert rose around us all through the night.
Waking at 4AM so that we didn't have to drive in the heat, we head off to Yuma to look for a new tire. It seems the big hunk of metal that flattened our tire could not be fixed as it had cut through too many of the cables that hold the whole thing together. Knowing we were heading into the back roads of Baja in a few days, we found a spot in Yuma that had a new one.
Calexico-
After a yuma morning, we drove on to Calexico. Planning to spend the night in a hotel, we bought our insurance got back to the car, looked at the clock and said- what the hell, it's only 2 hours to San Felipe, let's go!

Las Vegas

8/12/06

Oh boy! Now we are in Vegas, what a town, everything is shiny and new, you can sure see how how 4% of the worlds population uses 25% of the worlds resources... Excess is the norm.

Staying with D's sister Jesse and her partner Pete, super cool people in an 1950's neighborhood in the heart of town, everybody knows every body, parties and swimming everyday, one house or another, something is always going on here. It has been hot, 100+ every day but it's a dry heat... We are going to Lake Meade to rent a boat on Sunday, then on to Baja... We plan to cross at Mexicali and head down the east side of Baja, to San Fillipe and Puertocito...

Jackass Canyon

8/4/06

Now here's a scary place... We drove down the east side of the sierra, across Owens valley and up into the Sweetwater mountains. Started up the jackass canyon rd, notice a "road closed" sign lying down at the start but figured that since it wasn't standing up it must mean the road is open... 1/4 mile later we crossed the arroyo in the canyon bottom and discovered why the road had been closed, a huge flash flood had swept thru, recent, the mud was still wet... The road had been regraded, we could still see the bulldozer tracks, Must have been 2 or 3 days ago... We kept going up, figured we could always turn around... Did I mention the massive thunderheads that where gathering in sky above us? The road such as it was kept going up the canyon, crossing the arroyo every 1/2 mile or so, we could see where the flood had scoured a 15 ft deep slot in the old arroyo bed... Came up to an old mine and the reason for the flood... An enormous fire had wiped out the whole valley, burnt to the ground, turned the stumps to charcoal and left white disks of ash where the trees had been. Must have only been a week or two ago, now with no vegetation the rain had just roared down the slopes like a lahar flow... OK. I am scared of fire and flash floods. Both in a week is really bad. Did I mention the thunderheads? We crossed into the next valley and it was a different world. Green, calm little creek, lovely. Found a place to camp near jackass creek, we set up camp and started to talk about the creek, how high it was and what we should do if it really started to rise. We decided to move camp, scouted out a place a few hundred yards up the canyon that was 20 ft above the creek, packed up the bus and moved. We looked around, saw more thunderheads in the little bit of the sky we could see from the canyon floor and decided to just pack up and head to Vegas! Way too scary.

Kenner creek

8/3/06
On the east side of the sierra now, still around 8000 ft. Camping amidst the boulder fields. Spectacular country. D and I went for a walk down Kenner creek near our campsite, 4 ft tall lillies and cougar tracks, then bear tracks, fresh, 30 feet from the bus... Glad we have the bus! Dinner is on, rice and beans, a scotch, the sun is going down behind the ridge, D writting to her mom, pens scratching on paper and the breeze in the trees... Sage scent and bats flitting by.

High Sierra

8/2/06
At 9000 ft in the Sierra Nevada just past ebbits pass, that perfect high sierra landscape, granite boulders and bonsai like trees, hot, dry, smells of sage and dust. We camped at "High lakes" for the last two days, 8600 ft. Hiked up to 10,000 ft, covered in flowers,Mariposa lillies, like a California poppy but a soft warm white with purple black spots. we climbed over a saddle and into an astonishing meadow, carpeted in wildflowers. Then bushwhacked all around the ridge above the tree line, Darby loved it...
Great to be back on our own, a few weeks of the eastern Sierra then Las Vegas. Now it's just the sound of the wind in the trees, these sureal twisted, stunted shapes, bursting out of the stone in a display of perseverence and fortitude. Life at the edge of endurance.

gold country

Visited my Sisters "cabin" in Murphy, up in the gold country at the base of the sierra nevada, on the western slope. Looking at our maps for a place to hike we noticed a way to get down to the river, 5 miles of dirt road and we found an amazinf swimming hole, house sized granite boulders and ice cold water... Laying on the hot rocks like seals and cooling off in the river...

So we continued on to Ebbetts Pass and found an exceptional campsite just east of the pass at 8000 ft. More hiking, reading and contemplating our navels, it was lovely... It's the happiest I've seen Nick since we headed out.

Higher and higher

From Murphys, we continued east to highlands lakes in the high Sierra. It's just now summer here and the flowers are in full force. Delphiniums so blue it makes your eyes hurt. Soft white lillies that look like poppies, bobbing in the breeze. The trees are small, hard twisted trunks and stiff needles with that ancient knowing look. Two days of hiking all over and marveling at the sights only made us want more.

Murphys

Ahh, the Gold Country! So typical California, every turn looks like a postcard to me! We drove several hours east up to Erin and Khalil's new "cabin" in the hamlet of Murphys. Fantastic country and a fabulous house. As soon as we walked in we both said, this is the "grown-up" house. Exquisitely decorated with Erin's touch on every piece. I can tell she had a wonderful time putting this all together and it looks great. She should've gone into interior decorating! We stayed the first few days ahead of everyone else and explored some of the country. We took a little dirt road we saw on the AAA map and ended up at the best swimming hole I've ever been to. Right on the Stanislaus River, huge rounded boulders and deep clear pools of cool water. So we took Erin, Khalil, Angelina and Cassie there when they came up. I think it was a great find.

SF

Yup, my favorite City. If only we could afford it. We spent a beautiful day hanging out with Mark, Nick's friend from childhood. We had some fabulous Dim Sum on Clement Street then headed to Baker Beach for some sunshine and ocean viewing. How I love this City. We took the requisite photo in front of the Golden Gate, and toured the new public/private Presidio (Lucasfilms being the premier tenant). Satiated with urban memories we headed back to San Carlos and joined our niece, Lena, in some clowning around as she prepared for hip hop day at the daycamp where she works...

San Carlos

Boy, it sure it nice having sisters, especially ones with pools! It's a heat wave in California, rolling blckouts and the whole bit, but lucky for us, we're sitting in the pool with icy margaritas to keep us going. This picture is Erin and I living the California dream!