You See L.A.

On the fourth day of driving we set out from a hotel a little west of Phoenix headed for Maya’s grandparents’ house a little south of L.A. With only 350 miles to travel it was the shortest distance yet (we planned it that way). However, the day would end with navigating through a veritable thicket of highways and avoiding the millions and millions of other vehicles in the world’s 12th largest urban area - Los Angeles.

Gas in Arizona had been fairly cheap, at least compared to what we had been paying in Florida. The least we paid for gas on the whole trip ($3.65/gal) was in Tuscon, AZ. Apparently, we weren’t thinking about that when we got to the border with California. We decided to get into the last state of our trip before stopping for gas. In Blythe, CA we bought the most expensive gas of the trip - $4.59 a gallon. After we got back on the highway Maya noticed that she had a message. When she checked it, it was Grandpa calling to tell us to get gas in Arizona as the price really jumps once you cross into California. No joke! So remember to fill up before you get to California.

In California the speed limit is set at 55 MPH for all vehicles while towing. Since crossing into California from Arizona happens in the Colorado Desert, we thought this was just a desert thing – to cut down on the number of engines that overheat while pulling trailers up the Little San Bernardino Mountains when it’s over 100 outside. As it turns out, all of California limits trailers to 55 MPH. Not that we were really doing much over that in the first place, but after Matt had finally gotten used to the trailer (after 2000 miles), to be limited in any way chaffed a little bit. For those of you that are true Bugs Bunny aficionados we also passed through the Coachella Valley.

Proof of California’s Progressive Stance on
Conservation and Climate Change #2:
After coming through the Colorado Desert we passed through a gap in the mountains. There was a lot of wind coming through this gap. We had met a lot wind on the journey, especially in the plains of Texas, but this sea-breeze-pushing-into-the-desert wind was the most intense on the trip. It seems like a good a place for a wind farm. The Proof is that there was indeed a wind farm (or maybe more than one) filling the gap and moving up the hillsides. The total number of these things is hard to guess at, but we guessed there must have been a few thousand. They were all sizes, pointing in all directions, and literally everywhere. It was a pretty incredible sight.

We made it to and through the Los Angeles area without mishap. There weren’t even any slowdowns or anything.

We spent a week at Grandma and Grandpa’s. We slept on their hide-a-bed and were generally lazy. We didn’t have a lot of motivation to go out and do stuff because after our trip it was nice to not have to go anywhere. We did a little bit of shopping at a place called 99¢ Only Stores. Matt found a still-in-cellophane copy of Heavy Metal from 1983. That’s on VHS! He considers this an amazing find. Maya’s big find was her favorite lip-gloss. It’s called Save-Ex and she’s only ever found it at this store. Mostly however, we just visited with Maya’s family. We played lots of card games - mostly Hand and Foot. The house rules out here are to play with 36 decks simultaneously! There is a lot less shuffling during the game (but a lot more afterward) and you are almost guaranteed to get your seven cards for a canasta. However, you can’t pick up the pile (Maya, the ultimate pile-taker, dislikes that rule). There were other differences too, making altogether a very different game. Apparently, our coming shook up the routine because the boys usually lose to the girls. Of the 10-12 games we played while we were there they ladies only won once! Matt is good luck in California, it seems!

The only tourist thing we did was to go see The Huntington. We have seen the house and library before. This time we went just to see the gardens. Having just come through all those miles and miles of desert, we found ourselves most attracted to the Desert Garden. It’s amazing! They have every kind of yucca you can imagine accept for joshua trees – they don’t have those. They do have golden barrel cactus and a tonne of different aloe plants in various shaped and sizes. The botanical collections include other themed gardens such as the Japanese, Chinese, Australian, Rose, Palm, Jungle and Shakespeare gardens. A neat place!
Lastly, a note about Asher. He loved Los Angeles. Grandma and Grandpa’s yard has this real thick, short, spongy grass. We have no idea if this is typical grass for southern California, but Asher loved to run on it, dig at it and eat it. After so many days in the car he seemed quite happy to be left alone in his cage or let out on his leash in the yard. It seems all of us are going to like California.