Campo
We left Yuma although Cal Tran (California Transportation) had only reduced its wind closure of I-8 to a warning. The wind was no where near what we drove in front of from Show Low.
Yuma seemed to be one RV park after another, tastefully interspersed with RV Dealers. Lots of small housing developments, lots of strip malls. Maybe there is a downtown, with a park. Maybe being warm and dry is enough. The water is so full of minerals you can’t wash anything with it, or drink it.
Next event on the way west is the Imperial Dunes, great sand dunes drifting over the road. Where are the camels? Twining through the dunes is the All American canal, a 30’ wide channel of blue water. We passed other canals, and soon the great open air greenhouse of the Imperial Valley was on all sides. Big hay fields, other fields of unrecognizable vegetables, some corn and cotton. We are at or slightly below sea level here, and it is flat flat flat. No need to contour either the ditches or the fields , so it is all a big Mondrian painting of different greens, with some browns of newly plowed areas. We can see people running machines or just hoeing, or waiting for the next job.
In the distance, a solid chain of mountains draws closer. They look impressive, and they are really big, we climb to nearly 4,000 feet. These are the Valecito Mountains, almost entirely piles of roundish rocks, some smallish and some elephant sized. The rocks are all sandstone and have weathered smooth. It looks like a gravel pit belonging to giants running trucks and conveyors and crushers that we can’t see. Part of the pass is called Devil’s Canyon, a common name, but I would say that this place in 115 degree heat would be enough to reform any sinner.
After our climb, we stay up pretty high, 2-3000 feet, and our new home has rocky hills and some nearly green valleys. It is pretty hot and dry, and there are very few people. What towns we pass along 94 are hardly more than a gas station/post office store, and glimpses of some homes.
Campo is a big depot center for the Border Patrol. We see a lot of their vehicles, white with a green slash (sort of like the coast guard slash) some are pickups with tall caps on the back, a few are vans and there are a lot of jeeps in the yard. There is also a big county highway CalTran depot here. Other than that, we have a post office (and a PO box of our own) one rather dismal store, a gas station down the road, and that’s all I’ve seen so far. I love it already, we really are in the absolute middle of nowhere.
The railroad museum is a vast collection of aged steam engines, cars, a crane and absolutely everything that a railroad buff would want to collect. The museum is the end result of fundraising and collecting by a group of train besotted San Deigoans. They crank up trains on the weekend to go 10 miles up and 10 miles back. The rest of the time they are closed. The people here all the time are Bill, a volunteer RVer who works off his site, Robin a hippie Santa wannabe who runs the gift shop, also in an RV, and a lady in the farthest trailer who is the docent of the museum building. She is terrified of the fire and has left. Her trailer isn’t going anywhere, Robin’s looks like he is here permanently.
We are parked on a rise overlooking a big field, probably the campo (field in Spanish). The little depot building is to our left, and the big tin museum and even bigger machine building are away out of sight to our right. We only have to put in 10 hours a week, and have full hook up. I suspect that our presence here, watching the place is the most important part of the job. Getting my trailer in was a trick, and getting it out will not be easy, but with Darth in 4wd it will be OK.
We drove into San Diego to do some shopping. The highway goes over rocky hills and down and back up to 4,000 feet and down again, big peaks, all stony with a minimum of bushes on them. As we get closer to town, the hills are still there, with more and more people’s houses on them, and the highway still goes down down, curving around the hills, and leaping the canyons. Then we join more freeways that braid themselves in the air and then we are at the Pacific where finally things settled down, hill wise. We go up to La Jolla, where the cliffs meet the ocean in postcard fashion. There are sea lions sleeping on the rocks, and because it is Halloween, a lot of grownups in costumes. The strangest thing is the trees and shrubs that have been planted here, Australian pines, blue gum trees, and other plants I have never seen before, tropical, exotic. Bougainvillea and plumbago are tumbling all over the place, and oleanders. At the foot of the path by the sea, masses of ice plants, elderly jasmine trees, and other plants some even flowering on Halloween. And of course palm trees of every imaginable type. I have learned that there is a native CA palm tree, and they are here.
We visit Old Town, where some of the original Spanish style buildings and some reconstructions are set in a state park, lots of restaurants and gift and craft shops, only a few interpretive buildings. We have lunch at the most famous of the restaurants, in the classic courtyard with fountains and vines and shaded by canvas strips on sticks. Lots of good places to look for Xmas presents!
Shopping is still shopping, although I do get to visit Trader Joe’s a big favorite of mine that I have not been anywhere near since I left MA. Sort of a cross between your local health food store, and your local coop store but with someone looking for serious bargains in food to pass along. They are all out of the ginger granola that I adore, but we stock up on some other treats.
Back up into the hills again to the quiet and remoteness of Campo. There are people who live here, and in the small towns and villages nearby, but it is very isolated and peaceful.
Yuma seemed to be one RV park after another, tastefully interspersed with RV Dealers. Lots of small housing developments, lots of strip malls. Maybe there is a downtown, with a park. Maybe being warm and dry is enough. The water is so full of minerals you can’t wash anything with it, or drink it.
Next event on the way west is the Imperial Dunes, great sand dunes drifting over the road. Where are the camels? Twining through the dunes is the All American canal, a 30’ wide channel of blue water. We passed other canals, and soon the great open air greenhouse of the Imperial Valley was on all sides. Big hay fields, other fields of unrecognizable vegetables, some corn and cotton. We are at or slightly below sea level here, and it is flat flat flat. No need to contour either the ditches or the fields , so it is all a big Mondrian painting of different greens, with some browns of newly plowed areas. We can see people running machines or just hoeing, or waiting for the next job.
In the distance, a solid chain of mountains draws closer. They look impressive, and they are really big, we climb to nearly 4,000 feet. These are the Valecito Mountains, almost entirely piles of roundish rocks, some smallish and some elephant sized. The rocks are all sandstone and have weathered smooth. It looks like a gravel pit belonging to giants running trucks and conveyors and crushers that we can’t see. Part of the pass is called Devil’s Canyon, a common name, but I would say that this place in 115 degree heat would be enough to reform any sinner.
After our climb, we stay up pretty high, 2-3000 feet, and our new home has rocky hills and some nearly green valleys. It is pretty hot and dry, and there are very few people. What towns we pass along 94 are hardly more than a gas station/post office store, and glimpses of some homes.
Campo is a big depot center for the Border Patrol. We see a lot of their vehicles, white with a green slash (sort of like the coast guard slash) some are pickups with tall caps on the back, a few are vans and there are a lot of jeeps in the yard. There is also a big county highway CalTran depot here. Other than that, we have a post office (and a PO box of our own) one rather dismal store, a gas station down the road, and that’s all I’ve seen so far. I love it already, we really are in the absolute middle of nowhere.
The railroad museum is a vast collection of aged steam engines, cars, a crane and absolutely everything that a railroad buff would want to collect. The museum is the end result of fundraising and collecting by a group of train besotted San Deigoans. They crank up trains on the weekend to go 10 miles up and 10 miles back. The rest of the time they are closed. The people here all the time are Bill, a volunteer RVer who works off his site, Robin a hippie Santa wannabe who runs the gift shop, also in an RV, and a lady in the farthest trailer who is the docent of the museum building. She is terrified of the fire and has left. Her trailer isn’t going anywhere, Robin’s looks like he is here permanently.
We are parked on a rise overlooking a big field, probably the campo (field in Spanish). The little depot building is to our left, and the big tin museum and even bigger machine building are away out of sight to our right. We only have to put in 10 hours a week, and have full hook up. I suspect that our presence here, watching the place is the most important part of the job. Getting my trailer in was a trick, and getting it out will not be easy, but with Darth in 4wd it will be OK.
We drove into San Diego to do some shopping. The highway goes over rocky hills and down and back up to 4,000 feet and down again, big peaks, all stony with a minimum of bushes on them. As we get closer to town, the hills are still there, with more and more people’s houses on them, and the highway still goes down down, curving around the hills, and leaping the canyons. Then we join more freeways that braid themselves in the air and then we are at the Pacific where finally things settled down, hill wise. We go up to La Jolla, where the cliffs meet the ocean in postcard fashion. There are sea lions sleeping on the rocks, and because it is Halloween, a lot of grownups in costumes. The strangest thing is the trees and shrubs that have been planted here, Australian pines, blue gum trees, and other plants I have never seen before, tropical, exotic. Bougainvillea and plumbago are tumbling all over the place, and oleanders. At the foot of the path by the sea, masses of ice plants, elderly jasmine trees, and other plants some even flowering on Halloween. And of course palm trees of every imaginable type. I have learned that there is a native CA palm tree, and they are here.
We visit Old Town, where some of the original Spanish style buildings and some reconstructions are set in a state park, lots of restaurants and gift and craft shops, only a few interpretive buildings. We have lunch at the most famous of the restaurants, in the classic courtyard with fountains and vines and shaded by canvas strips on sticks. Lots of good places to look for Xmas presents!
Shopping is still shopping, although I do get to visit Trader Joe’s a big favorite of mine that I have not been anywhere near since I left MA. Sort of a cross between your local health food store, and your local coop store but with someone looking for serious bargains in food to pass along. They are all out of the ginger granola that I adore, but we stock up on some other treats.
Back up into the hills again to the quiet and remoteness of Campo. There are people who live here, and in the small towns and villages nearby, but it is very isolated and peaceful.
posted by Thistledown24 at 10:03 AM
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