Bakersfield, California
We pulled away from our friends, Irene and Doug, about 830 this morning. Made a stop in Quartzsite and let it rip. Teri stopped at the post office but the line was too long to wait.
Crossed the Colorado river at PArker and into California, where gas price jumped one buck. Glad I filled up in Parker.
So, we found this post office. Pretty neat. Teri ran in and mailed the post cards from here and I grabbed a couple of pictures. Reckon Wyatt Earp was ever in this post office?
The pictures are not loading properly again so I have no idea what they will look like when I finalize this.
Needles California. Must be the nation's highest fuel right here. Was about 4 dollars a gallon. I did not slow down except to get on I-40 and roll toward Barstow.
Interstate 40.
Teri wanted this picture with the Joshua Trees in it. I hope it loads.
See those clouds?
We drove right up and into them near Tehachipi, Ca.
Almost like looking down from an airplane at 4,000 ft. the temperature dropped from 65 to 44. It was cool up there.
Oh, I wanted to stop and grab a hand full of these oranges. Just before we got into Bakersfield.
Oh yea, there is oil out here. My mother's brother came here to Bakersfield back in the 40s and worked the oil fields til he died. I have kin here somewhere.
The real thing. Home to the late Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, and Dwight Yokum.
We eased on up 99 after taking an hour to find where they moved Walmart. What a trip. Anyway, we filled up here at Flying J and they told us to park it back here with the big trucks. We are here right between 2 big boys. We are just about 3 miles south of 46 and we will jump on that when we pull out. We want to run over to 101 and up into the Bay area. Will be our first time across that route. I beleive that is the road James Dean died on back in 53, before my time.
We had a blast in Quartzsite. Hated to leave but it was time. Doug and Irene were heading to Yuma today so we said goodbye to them. Our plan is to visit them when they get home. Not far from San Francisco. Very good people.
Today's ride was great. We could not have picked a better day to run 400 miles. The GMC did not miss a beat and pulled that long grade out of Needles like it was not there. In fact, we pulled several mountains today but that one was the biggest. I always enjoy flying down the Tehachipis, just east of Bakersfield. We dropped about 3,000 feet in 10 miles. I just let her rolls.
Hope you checked the tracker. If not, take a look. You can see just where we were and where we are now. Will drive the last 250 miles tomorrow. I love these 2 lane roads.
Dan
Life Has Been Great in Quartzsite.
After church today Teri and I headed out for some last day bargains. Our plan is to pull out of here in the morning if the weather is ok. Some chance of rain. If it is raining we will hang around til Tuesday.
Teri caught me going for more m&m candy. Oh boy, I love chocolate.
Crowds have really thinned out today. Most of the folks where we are parked were gone when we got in from church services.
150 dollars for this race rc car. Good price on this particular setup with a big displacement gas engine. You can see the 100 dollar electric hellicopter under it. Lots of good deals here.
Bison tubes. We hide geocaches in these. Teri was buying a handful of these when a lady asked her husband, "what are those?". The husband said "those things hold their cocaine". Oh boy. That did not sit well with Teri. I thought it was funny, she did not.
My favorite shopping partner.
One of our competitors. She was selling some pretty good lights. I bought a recessed light holder from her.
Another competitor on the right. On the left, a man I met yesterday and became friends with him and his wife. Great folks. We make lots of friends everywhere we go and many of them are long lasting friendships. Teri and I had pizza for supper with this couple last night. He has written two books on the New Madrid earthquake fault. Of course, Teri and I live right there.
Here is a picture of some lights we sold. Amazing stuff. They replaced the 18 inch flouressant tubes in this fixture and draw about 1/2 amp. The two 18 inch tubes drew over 2 amps. These lights are as bright, at least my eyes think so, as the 18 inch tubes we replaced.
Teri and I have been dry camping for almost 3 weeks in the desert. We do not rough it because we have outfitted our motorhome to be self sufficient. I don't run the icemaker when dry camping but that is my only sacrifice. Solar and on demand hot water are great.
Watch the tracker as we travel toward San Francisco.
Dan
Slab City
If you are an avid RVer then I suspect you have heard about Slab City.
Oh yes, we were there today with our friends Doug and Irene. It was 130 miles over and 170 back. Wanted to head up to Indio so we came back the long way.
This is the shower for the folks who live at Slab City. It runs all of the time. See the ladder that goes down into the concrete shower stall.
An old bus that I thought was cool.
Oh, we went through the dunes on our way. The rvs and off roaders were everywhere.
Community bulletin board. Folks drag up old rvs ,or make one or two themselves, and move in. This is an old military base. No rent just squatters.
Typical Slab City home. You should see the people who live in here. Not sure they have found the shower I showed you.
Had to get a picture of the old VW bus.
Here we have three geocachers at Slab City.
Teri is smiling because this is our 600th find.
This block must have some kind of ordinance as they were pretty neat and orderly.
Someone dragged an old Scenic Cruiser up here to live in.
More of the same.
Say, have you ever wondered what a tatoo on a nice looking 20 year old girl will look like when she is 70 plus? Well, wonder no more. It will look just as you have it pictured in your mind. I could not post the picture. Just did not have the heart. It ain't pretty.
The Salton Sea from the east side. We were about 100 feet below sea level here.
Two hot babes on the beach.
General Patton museum. We stopped here on our way home. There about a dozen tanks but I did not get a picture.
Life is good. We had a great Friday with our friends Doug and Irene. I promise to stay off the road this weekend.
Dan
Life in Quartzsite, After The Big Show
Here is my partner in sales this week. Our booth in the Big Tent RV Show. I was able to see a lot of smiles as folks came through.
Yesterday was laundry day. Lots of nice folks inside as they were all RVers.
But, here is the very nicest lady in the entire building. She did my laundry.
This is an unbelievable place. Never have mail forwarded here during January. Lots of frowns here. We happen to hit this place when the line was inside and only waited 30 minutes to buy stamps. I have seen the line wrapped around and all the way to the street. Imagine, 500,000 rvers having mail forwarded to this little post office. Naturally, they have only 2 workers behind the counter and they are not in good moods.
Teri loves games, I love Teri.
On the left is Doug. He is the friendliest and most helpful guy I know. He is always busy assisting someone. Here he was helping Hoss with his solar.
Well, I thought you might want to see what I was selling so here are a couple of shots. These lights are amazing little critters.
This morning as some of our dearest friends leave us. teri and I are undoubtedly the most blessed couple when it comes to friends.
There they went. Just Doug and Irene remain here with us. They, and us, will pull out probably Monday. My work in the Big Tent is finished. Life was good to us here this year. Saw lots of good friends. Teri and I plan to head west and north to San Francisco from here. We certainly want you to ride along. Watch the tracker Monday to make sure we get gone.
Dan
See those clouds?
