Sacremento to Hell (L.A.)
We set off about 10 am, and the drive south from Sacramento was actually pretty nice until we got into the Sonoran foothills which was pretty boring for us, but pretty scary for the hundreds of firemen fighting a wildfire down there - what I thought was a wall of smog over the foothills was actually a gigantic fire on the other side of the hills.
Things stayed pretty uneventful until we got about 100 miles north of LA. I’d moved out into the fast lane to overtake a truck when suddenly my Ranger lost all power and died. I coasted it over onto the shoulder by an exit ramp and Sally pulled in ahead of me. We look around for a gas station or anything but there’s nothing, we’re in the middle of nowhere. Sally tries to call AAA but we cant get any signal on the phones. A cop goes by and doesn’t even stop, despite the fact I’ve got the hood up, checking fluids etc in the engine.
I try & start the car several times and every warning light lights up on the dash. Were chatting and Sally mentions something about the road being pretty bouncy back there from all the heat cracks, and I think “Bouncy? Oh nuts, I know what the problem is!” My Ranger has a problem with the fuel cut-off trigger (the thing that cuts off fuel to the engine, and stops you burning alive in the event of a crash). It’s overly sensitive and triggered on me once before in a parking lot. ‘Course that time, I wasn’t doing 70 on the freeway! Anyway a quick push on the reset switch and the Ranger lives again - yay.
The next 100 miles of road is the bumpiest, crappiest road I’ve ever driven on so now I’m completely paranoid that my car is gonna cut-out again. Then, as if that wasn’t bad enough, we drive into a massive police sting operation where there’s at least 20 police cars pulling people over for speeding, like tigers through a herd of gazelles. At one point I thought a cop was after me or Sally, but he pulled over the guy next to me instead - phew! I decided to find the slowest vehicle on the road and follow it for a while so the next 10 miles are spent following U-Hauls, minis towing boats, etc.
We hit L.A. at rush hour and it sucks big time, the traffic is crawling. We only just make the turn-off for the I210 East as cars keep pulling in-between my car and Sally’s. Luckily we had walkie-talkies so we could talk to each other and pass directions around. We crawl along for 44 miles before turning off for CA-57 South and then onto I10 East. By this time its probably 7.30 in the evening and we haven’t taken a break for hours, but now we have all the suburbs & satellites of L.A. to contend with before the traffic eventually starts to thin out again and we can find a rest-stop for a much needed break.
We decided to carry on as far out of L.A. as possible so we wouldn’t have to deal with it in the morning. Were getting really tired, Mo is not happy at all, but we push on east past Palm Springs which is where things start to pick up again. Firstly we see the wind farm in the desert (pictured above), which is so tranquil and relaxing after L.A. that we start to feel good again. Then we pass some gas/food stop that has giant dinosaurs all around it, it’s perfectly cheesy road-tip fun. Then, the biggest moon I’ve ever seen starts to appear over the desert hills, and its blood red - I don’t know why it was red, but it was incredibly cool looking. (1)
Its got dark by now and were trying to find a hotel but there’s surprisingly few nice ones in the desert, its all Motel 6 junk and were not quite that desperate yet. We find a Hampton Inn and go to check it out. Firstly the parking lot is packed, then we walk in the door and the lobby is packed with people from a convention, then after waiting for 10 minutes to get any service it turns out they don’t allow pets. Mo insists we hit the road again, as she likes a king size bed as much as we do.
We carry on driving to Indio CA, which is on the south border of Joshua Tree national Park and find a hotel there. Its now well past 10 pm and were exhausted. The receptionist guy is the nicest guy we’ve ever met - Does he have a room? Only the exact one we want and cheap too. Do they allow pets? Sure and its only $10 extra. They’ve got a wall full of DVDs for us to borrow & watch in our room, and best of all, the swimming pool is open 24 hours a day. We dump our bags in the room and head out to the huge swimming pool. Its 11 pm, its 80 degrees out, were surrounded by palm trees and at the south end of the pool hangs that big full moon I mentioned earlier. Life is good again...
Total Drive Time so far: 19 hours.
Mo status: She got unhappy during the day at one point, but again, she gets out of her crate and explores the hotel room and has a bite to eat and all *seems* good.
(1) Just reading a magazine I picked up and it had an article about the red moon phenomena - it “occurs even in perfectly clear, haze free air and is caused by the preferential scattering (by air modules) of the shorter wavelengths of light (violet, blue and green), leaving the redder light to make it through best of all”
