06/15/11

Why are there no coffee shops in the rest of the country???!!!

I get to the desert around 10:30 am and find the ranger station.  Well, it’s closed but there are some kids working on pulling up plants nearby…can you tell me where the trail starts purdy please?  No one seems to know where the trail starts.  Really??  How is that possible?  Even if you are just volunteering, shouldn’t you know where the main trail is?  One of the kids tells me to go ask “that guy”.  I turn around, turn back to the kid and say…um…there ain’t no one there, hon.  Are you feeling ok?  AAAAHAHAHA!  Ok.  That got a smile.  Phew!  They are human!!!  The ranger tells me where the trail starts (oh and this ranger is maybe 21.  Maybe.)  I would like to be a ranger please.  He gets really excited that I’m going to hike it.  (snarf) perhaps they don’t get many hikers up here in the desert!

Here I am hiking and it’s flat and you have to walk around what is called “Hole in the Wall”.  I discover some wild animal poo!  YAY!  What is this??  It’s all braided and loopy and piled ever so neatly!  Hmmmmmm…I turn a corner and BAM!  The rock is AMAZING!  It’s huge and looks like swiss cheese!  WOW!  The trail leads right into the center of it!  Aweshum!  So I’m exploring all the little crevices and such and looking at all the birds flying in and out of the holes in the rocks up top when…I loose the trail…’cause it’s rock, see…and there aren’t any signs or apparent trails.  Ohhhhkay.  I’ll walk this way!  I know I have to loop aboot to get back to the ranger station which is this way…right?  Up some rocks, into this wee lil’ cavern area (I had to put my camera away because it was so small and I needed both hands) and then???  A WALL!  Kind of…with…metal loops sticking out from the side.  Oh.  Um.  Ok.  I see, it’s this kind of trail, huh?  Now I’m mountain climbing!  YAY!!!!  So it’s only like 8’, but it was AWESOME!!!  I got so excited!  Like a small child who just got to ride the tea-cups for the first time!  Luckily no one was there twirling me about!  That would have been difficult for climbing!  Now I’m in what looks like a real trail, still rock, but at least it looks like it goes somewhere…around this corner and dead end…with ANOTHER wall with metal loops!  AH!  UP! UP! UP!  Best hike EVAH!!!!  The most amazing thing about Hole in the Wall is that a volcano erupted 18 million years ago (8?)—well darn.  I’ve forgotten now, but I labeled one of my pictures with the correct date, so it’s somewhere here…18 or 8 million whatever it is, that sure was a long time ago!  Anyway!  This volcano erupts and ash goes flying everywhere…’cause it’s a volcano…them are big!!!  The lava stops a few miles from the Mojave Desert BUT!  The ash lands here…and…you should sit down now…the ash lands here at Hole in the Wall and FORMS THESE GIGANTIC FORMATIONS OF “ROCK”!!!!!!!!!!  WHA???!!!!  Yea, it’s true.  This is all ash rock stuff.  Unbelievable.  I just had to sit down again. 

Nature—you sure are mind blowin’!!!

Alright, so now I’m going to take the back loop in the desert to see the sand dunes!  Before I leave I ask the ranger what sort of wild animal poo it was that I saw.  (snarf)…wild COW!  HA!  Of course, Amber!  You take a photo of wild cow poops!  AAAHAHAHAHA! 

I’m following the map.  It’s easy see…it just does a loop that’s about 10 miles at most…driving on pavement…and then…there’s a gate (it’s open) and the road looks a bit different after the gate.  There are 3 men on the side talking and it looks like they are wearing official t-shirts so I stop.  I ask them if I’m on the right track here and if the road leads to where I wanna go.  Yep.  Just follow this road and take a left at the end.  You can’t miss it.  I look at the road and ask if my Element will be ok.  Oh, yea!  They just graded the road!  You’re all set!  Phew.  Thanks!

Alright now.  This you see is NOT a road!  It’s the actual desert and at parts, well wind happens and sand blows and GOOSH!  You’re driving on loose sand!  WHHHEEEEEE!!!  Which is like snow, really.  You just have to be aware and accommodate for the no traction part.  YIKES!  It’s ok.  Imma really wanting my Jeep right now though!

In the distance I see a huge brown thing.  Is it????  Naw, that’s just a water tower, it’s way too big to be…AH!  It IS!!!!!!  It’s a frickin’ WILD COW!!!!!!!!!!!!  Holy crap!!!  And he’s all big with horns, so I slow down to get him on video tape.  I should really get out of the car though so it’s not so bumpy and get a good shot of him.  Oh.  But now he’s staring at me…um…and this is the point where Amber thinks (and says on video), do cows attack?  Is he gonna rush my car?????  Why is he staring at me like that?!  AHHHH!!!  Ok, so I’ll keep driving.  AND WOW!  I just saw a COW!  In the DESERT!  WHA??!!  And…………MORE!!  There are like 20 of them all walking and eating and off the side of the road with no fence.  And poof!  They go down into a crevice which you can’t even see.  It looks all flat, but obviously there’s something there that dips down because all the cows have “disappeared”.  Oh, great.  Yea.  Now I sound like a completely crazy person with cows in the desert and them disappearing and…nooooooooo, they didn’t talk to me or fly over my car.  And yes, I’m hydrated and just had a V8 juice, so I’m pretty sure it was real.  Um……..yea.  Yes.  It was real, promise!  I’d tell you to look at the video as proof, but I just watched it and the “cow” looks like a bug smashed on my windshield.  Humph.  Well, you’re just gonna have to believe me.

And now I’m at the turn off for the sand dunes.  You thought that first road was bad?  This one you can’t drive over 5 MPH because it’s so frackin’ bumpy.  I get half way down the road and decide that since I saw the Great Sand Dunes in Colorado, I don’t actually need to be up close and personal with these.  So I turn around (barely), take a couple pictures and creep my way back to the paved road again.

I was just told (because it’s late June now) that if you climb up the sand dunes there, strip down to your birfday suit, and slide down, the sand dunes make this BOOMING noise as you go!!!!!!  WOW!  Wha??!!!  Ok, next time.  I’m totally doing that! 

Now?  San Diego!  GO!  Mariano Lorde lives in San Diego and since I missed Jose, I NEED to at least see Mariano!  I pull into a gas station and text him that I’m about ½ hour from the city!  Hold tight, Amber…let’s see what we can do.  So here I am sitting outside of a gas station having another tailgate party, which consists of me drinking Vitamin Water and eating a cheese stick, when I realize that the sun is getting pretty low and that there are an awful lot of big trucks just slowly going through the parking lot…um…ok.  I need to get out of here.  But before I leave I would really love it if one of you cruised by blasting Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise.  Please?  Yes?  HA!  YES!  There it is!!!  AAAAHAHAHAHA!  Aweshum!!!  K.  Bye!

8:30 pm:

Hotel Circle off the highway (oh, hey!  That’s convenient…betcha I can find a hotel here!).  Mariano and his wife, Erika are too tired to go out tonight, so we make plans for tomorrow.  Which is totally fine, since I hiked in the desert today and then drove to San Diego, so um…Amber is a bit “ripe” as they say and also tired. 

SAN DIEGO CALIFORNIA!!!  WOW!!!!!!!!!!