mini road trip

So this last weekend was pretty lazy for us, pretty bad weather (cloudy & 65) so we mostly just lounged around the apartment. But the prior weekend (Memorial Day weekend), we decied to escape from gray May and go inland for a mini-road trip. It didn't take long until the temperature registered 101 degrees (thank goodness for A/C). At first there were a lot of rolling hills and we could look over into Mexico (we saw the border fence too and lots of border patrol). Our first stop was at a diner that was supposed to have the best fish 'n' chips in San Diego, but if you ask me, their food, service, and atmosphere pretty much sucked. The fish 'n' chips were okay, but not great (certianly not as good as JJ's) and there was a little girl there who asked to pet Abby (I said no). The next stop was some random candy shop on the side of the road where I got some chocolates and candy (they were good). Then we gained alot of elevation and ended up at the what's called the devil's rock pile. It was amazing to see these enormous mounds of rock that stretched on and on. We took a pass through here, went about 30 miles past our turn, turned around and went back to Ocotillo, with a population of about 300, where it turns out, we should've gotten gas. From here we entererd into the badlands where there were freakishly very little people (hardly anyone was even just passing through). We also saw the Southern Emigrant Trail (kinda like Oregon trail but for southern california). Heading north, we finally hit some green vegetation once again but were still in low populated areas. This is where we realized that we desperatly needed to find a gas station and it looked as though there might not be one for some time. Chad was very nervous and my cell phone didn't even have service (yikes!) not to mention the fact that we had no cash (like who was going to take a credit card in exchange for some gas? - well maybe the ENTIRE card!). On somewhat of a whim we decided to go a different direction than that of the route and we lucked out and found a gas station about 7 miles down the road. Whew, we had been on empty for quite some time! After getting gas and going potty we piled back into the car, turned the A/C back on (we turned it off to save gas altough it was not quite as hot here since we were out of the desert), and headed back to our route. Our next stop was this scenic lake with a large campground next to it and lots of campers for Memorial Day weekend. Continuing on we finally saw a gas station about 15 miles from where we turned off, who knows if we would've made it or not. We were now surrounded by orange groves and fields of avocado trees. According to our original plans, we were going to drive all the way out to Hwy 101 and then head home, but once we hit highway 15, it was already really late (like 6:30 or 7) so we just headed home. Everyone was happy to get out of the car, but we were happy to have seen a bunch of new things. Here are some pictures from that day and a video of Jamie making Abby laugh in the car:



Mexico in the distance-


















Devil's rock pile, next 3 photos:


























































A wierd dessert plant-
















At a lookout point, I fed Abby and Chad and Jamie took a short walk. Chad was just joking around and said "let's go find some snakes" (cuz I was worried about it), and for the rest of the trip, everytime we stopped Jamie would ask to go find snakes ("bind nakes, dada")









































Jamie is just like his mom, very rosy cheeks when he gets hot!

















Chad is so relieved to have found a gas station!

























The lake, and me!