November 12: The Pacific

Spent Sunday night at Outback Pizza in Quartzsite - only place with a live band after 6pm (all the old people go to bed early...)

Monday, 4pm they were going hard at BeerBellies (see old people comment above - if you are going to be in bed by 7, you need to start early).

The plan was to drive through Joshua Tree NP again - it is just beautiful - and try and find an open site in one of the campgrounds so that I could do one or 2 hikes.  Unfortunately nothing was available - the whole first-come-first-serve approach in some of the parks really suck.  In any case, stayed for free at the Tortoise Rock casino just outside the park, but no hikes for me.

The view from the casino

On the way to the coast - evidently the youts have too much time on their hands

 AND THEN I GOT TO THE PACIFIC - the end-point of the trip.

My people - the pelicans

Spent 2 nights at Point Mugu State Park after persuading the Park Ranger that my 33ft RV was really the same as a 31ft one (the limit they have).  The park is really just an old road right on the beach with parallel parking spaces for the RVs and it ends in a dead end with no turn-around place - hence the length limit.  You need to be able to turn around your RV in a very small space.

The only 3 die-hard surfers out

I think the Germans think they are crossing Africa... they ship their custom RV's from Germany kitted out for something a bit more serious than the PCH

Weird terns - looks like a cross between a seagull and a tern, but is actually called an Elegant Tern - thanks LindaP.

Water was cold and the wind was up to 40knots, but I got a few swims and some body surfing in - was exhilarating.

Then the biggest luck of the whole trip hit.  I could not find anywhere else to stay on the coast as everything was booked for the weekend, but I decided to drive up to Carpinteria to just look at the coast.  Got as far as Rincon Parkway - where there is a campground that was closed by CalTran so that the PCH (Pacific Coast Highway) could be repaved.  I was driving down the PCH and saw one or two RVs parked in the campground (the campground is also just parking spaces next to the PCH).  I stopped and asked them if it was OK to stay there overnight and they said that CalTran (California Transportation dept) had decided the previous night that they were opening up this campground again as they repavement project had been delayed (yea for bureaucratic inefficiencies).  End of the story was I could book 3 nights in one of the most amazing campsites I have stayed in.

An abandoned oil terminal - there a quite a few still working offshore oil platforms here

Having fun on the beach

Even got the waveski out for a surf in the beach break.  Was nothing epic, but 1 great ride and one sinus cleaning wipeout - so par for the course.

The best part was sitting on my stoep/deck watching pelicans, dolphins and seals meandering by - was blissful.

Check the crowds out there - everyone surfs....

Kelp beds everywhere. Funny part was that there were these kelp strings attached to rocks. Seems what happens is the kelp starts growing on a rock, and then the kelp gets too big and lifts the rock and they start moving down the coast

Dolphin in the background - they are a lot darker than the east coast dolphins

Met some really nice people as well - Greg and Loretta who live in Burbank (an hour away). They have an old RV that they use to come camp here the whole time.  They invited me to dinner in Ventura on Sunday night and we had they best evening discussing the state of America.  Was lots of fun.

Greg going for a swim

November 5: Back down to Quartzsite

 Left Las Vegas after staying another night due to high winds and slept over in Bullhead City, Arizona. Its on the Colorado river, so Arizona on the east shore (with cheap gas) and Nevada on the west (with huge casino's) 

Note the goats on the island - and the ferry that takes the gamblers over to nirvana

The Colorado Belle has unfortunately fallen on hard times and was closed, but still looks good

It is amazing - the price difference in gas between the 2 states is more than a dollar a gallon.  The city is also just downstream of the Davis dam, so the water in the river is crystal clear, but it also changes level multiple times a day as they release water to satisfy California's thirst.

No water

Same spot - tide is in - water is crystal clear

The RV campground

Next 2 nights was at the Lake Havasu State park - great site.

Pork chops and a sunset

Vark tjoppies

 So the story about Lake Havasu is fascinating - see this wikipedia link - this guy bought the land by the lake from the government for next to nothing, put the bridge up and sold the land for millions a few years later...

London bridge with palm trees

and the obligatory tiki boat

Naturally there is also a ferry over to the casino on the other side (California) which for $4 was a bargain.

Had to rehydrate after my crossing of the lake - view of the bridge

Lake Havasu City from the other side

California has more palm trees for some reason

 Lake Havasu also has a name as the spring break spot, so I had to go and sample the nightlife - the country music was pretty good and the bar was great.

 They also had a cactus garden in the park that had all the different cactusses/cactii identified - too many to post, but great to walk through. 

This guy started and maintains the garden - knew everything there was to know about cactus

 From Havasu I moved on further down the river to Parker.  They were having their annual boat drag races (I never even knew there was such a thing) - which meant lots of people with sds and very very loud boats.  The bars on the river were great.

And on Sunday arrived in Quartzsite and moved back into familiar territory - the Holiday Palms campground where I stayed in February.  Also managed to collect Gina's snake plant that I had left there with someone.

Read what is one the back of the car

Took a nice long bike ride on Sunday afternoon to some abandoned gold mines close by.

Old mine that went in a long way - I did not get to the end of the tunnel - too claustrophobic

The mine opening is just behind the bush. See the quartz seam going up the mountain - that is where the gold is

Old miners leftovers

Some weird stuff - but then, it is Quartzsite

The old miners cottage

Lots of open abandoned mine shafts everywhere - there must have been some gold here

October 29: Viva Las Vegas

Inside rugby world cup joke...

Well, the object of the exercise was to get somewhere to store the Whale for Thanksgiving through to the New Year while I went home, so on Monday I rented a car to go have a look at a few places.  Found one in North west Vegas - not too bad and cheaper than what I paid over the summer in Phoenix.  With all that sorted out before lunch, I drove up to mount Charleston just west of town.  Beautiful drive - but most of it was still closed due to the rains from Hillary in the summer.  I basically drove from 2000ft above sea level to over 6000 ft in 20 minutes, and I could feel it in the drop in temperature...

Wild horses at Mount Charleston

Las Vegas in the distance

Crazy rocks

30 minutes from Vegas

and back on the strip

Drove over to the Red Rock canyon - which is really less than 30 minutes from the strip.  Crazy rock formations and according to the locals the mountains constantly have snow on them during the winter - weird to think that while you are standing in the desert.

Spent the rest of the week fixing/resealing the roof of the Whale + taking off the black dome for the satellite dish and the TV antenna which is never used.  Took a while, but the results look good.  Funny part of the RV park was that just before I arrived on Sunday, someone drove their car through the laundry and took out the bathrooms as well.  He then tried to drive away, but a number of park residents got enough photos and he was caught by the local police shortly after.  Did not help that we did not have a laundry or external bathrooms...

No more satellite dish or TV arial

Smash burgers with a water view...

On Saturday I Uber'ed into the strip to go find a pub that would show the Rugby world cup final.  Finally found Ri Ra in Mandalay Bay.  Naturally there were a few South African's there in full spirit - they were from Cape Town and in Las Vegas for a drag racing convention - had no idea drag racing was even a thing in South Africa, and naturally there were a few disheartened Irish supporters as well.

The Indian restaurant with a difference - a robot waiter/waitress??  Unfortunately I think the Biryani  tasted as if it was made by a robot as well...

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Only in Vegas on the street

Them South Africans are everywhere

Irish lassie doing the Guinness thing (funny thing is the blog spellchecker insists that Guinness is spelt with a capital C)

End of the story was South Africa scrapped through 12-11 against New Zealand (who had their captain sent off half way through the game) - but the Springbok defence was exceptional. 

Go Bokke.