More detours on the road - it's all part of the adventure!!

A tsunami, a rock slide, and a massive winter storm – all in one week in California! When the tsunami hit we were in Palm Springs ( no problems there) , when the rock slide occurred, our route was blocked on the Pacific coast highway and then a massive winter storm hit the Sierra mountains (2-4 feet of snow) on our way to Yosemite, Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Parks. It didn’t take us long to decide Rose would have a tough time in even 2 feet of snow ( and so woud the rest of us!) so we changed our plans and bypassed the three national parks for this trip (we hope to see them next year on our NW trip)and headed to Death Valley National Park and warm sunny weather! It was really quite a nice surprise- a great variety of interesting natural and human history too! Death Valley gets 2” of rain a year – we had rain AND snow the day we were there!

Next stops were Hoover Dam and Zion National Park.

We went through Vegas but didn’t stop – we’ve been there before and we need to conserve our money for diesel for Rose! So far the highest price for fuel was in California - $4.49/gallon – YIKES! Thankfully Nevada is under $4 a gallon – never thought we’d be happy to get fuel at $4 per gallon!

In Zion we had two pretty days and two days of non stop rain -  they only get 12" of rain  a year and we think they got most of it in those two days!



At the campsite…..

• Another casino parking lot - "Terrible's Town Casino"

• A beautiful spot in Zion National Park ( at least it was pretty for 2 of the 4 days we were there)

Highlights:

Death Valley National Park

• Amazing variety of colors in the rocks

• Lowest spot in the Northern Hemisphere and the salt flats

• Site of old borax plant and the “twenty mule team wagons”

• An oasis in the desert - they even have a golf course!

Hoover Dam

• Tour of the power plant and learning about how and why the dam was built

• Seeing the new memorial bridge that spans the Colorado River over the dam

Zion National Park

• Great hikes in the park

• Beautiful scenery of the sandstone canyons

• Desert Big Horn Sheep

• Time to chill at our campsite and take Molly for walks ( dogs aren’t allowed on National Park trails)

Next stops:

Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef, Arches and Canyonlands National Parks – we’re hoping for warmer, drier weather since we’re in the desert…right now, it’s snowing at Bryce so who knows where we'll end up next!!!!