Time to leave San Diego, our month is up and we have new places to explore. A common affliction among RV owners is called ‘hitch itch.’ We don’t really have ‘hitch itch’ which implies that you move for the sake of moving. We just like to see new places and, just beginning our travels in our RV, have lots of places to see. What ever you call it, we are moving from San Diego to Las Vegas today.
Now, that’s just 337 miles which, in a car, is not even a day’s journey. But, in a motorhome, it seems much longer, especially when you hit construction on the interstate which narrows 3 lanes to 2, eliminates the shoulders, omits a warning and places 10’ walls right on the lane lines. A warning that this was going to happen would have been nice. Placing the walls a bit further out would have been nice too. But, the highway department thought a slalom course on the interstate would make for some interesting sights.
Gary handled it all well and we were on our way. But it was a bit of a harrowing drive for a bit.
We actually started out fairly early today. We had spent the month in a back-in campsite. Normally, leaving from this type of space, we would need to pull out and then hitch up the car. The campground allowed us to move to a pull-through space yesterday where we pulled in the slides, unhooked the water and sewer and hitched up the car. That meant that Gary only had to unhook the electricity and we could be on our way. We saved a lot of time this way.
The drive itself is interesting - going from the lush countryside around San Diego and San Bernardino into the deserts between San Bernardino and Las Vegas on the other side of the rain-blocking mountains. This is the second time we’ve made this journey but the first time in a car. If you like a desert-scape, this is the drive for you.
Joshua Trees abound around in the area near the Joshua Tree National Park and here is a forest of them.
Here’s one of the more unusual road signs along the route.
Curtis Springer filed some mining claims in this area on federal land and used the water from the springs on the land as bottled water for travelers. He also had a ranch in the area and to attract tourists here he also imported some animals. He named the area Zzyzk in 1944 but that is all that remains of his footprint on the land. But there is still an exit here for a Desert Studies center operated by California State University.
Besides being a beautiful drive, this road is also historical. Originally it followed the Old Spanish Trail from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles, skirting the southern boundary of Nevada stopping at Las Vegas Ranch. This route was called the Arrowhead Trail and was the first all-weather route between these cities. Oh, lots of people had traveled this route - it began as a Native American trail but the pioneers and lots of others had followed these. And, when cars were in their infancy, many traveled by this route - because they could. When the US began a numbered road system this was called Route 91 and finally, it was called Interstate 15. Of course, the Interstate doesn’t follow the exact trail but pretty close. And we followed Interstate 15 from San Bernardino to Las Vegas. We actually saw one of the Arrowhead Highway markers later on 2/26 when we went to the Valley of Fire.
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