We like deserts. Which is fortunate really, because there are lot of them to explore in south west USA. Mojave, Joshua Tree, Anza Borrego, Death Valley etc… etc… etc. Here are our tales of overlanding deserts, featuring dune-climbing, a balloon festival, dinosaurs, aliens, an international forest of cars, movie sets, struggling through snow (yes, in the desert!) and catching up with lovely friends.
Mojave Dunes and Joshua Trees
Our new year 2022 kicked-off in the Mojave and Joshua Tree area of California. These two parks aren’t far apart, but they’re on quite high ground. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not always warm in deserts and these two can get a bit nippy in winter.
One of the many attractions in Mojave Park is the Kelso Dunes. If you have never climbed large dunes, we can assure you that those little suckers are deceptive. They lure you in. Oh, they look all nice and soft and gently sweeping slopes. But actually they’re tough to climb, particularly when you’re starting at an altitude of around 4,500 ft. Every step upwards feels like two steps backwards as your feet sink into the soft sand, sliding back down the bit you thought you had just done already. Having lived in the Middle East for years, we knew of the hard work to climb a dune. We knew it. It just slipped our mind. It seemed such a good idea at the time… just pop up to the top of the 700ft highest dune before breakfast. At least there are spectacular views from the top as a reward.
An hour’s drive down the road from Mojave Park, we do a return visit to Joshua Tree Park. Of course, you may well think, one would go there to see forests of the endlessly attractive and photogenic Joshua trees. Well yes, they are naturally there. But here’s a little factoid: there are actually more Joshua trees in Mojave Park than there are in Joshua Tree Park 😂 Even Bono didn’t go to Joshua Tree Park for the cover-photo on U2’s iconic 1980s album!! (that location is actually a bit further north near Death Valley).
Anyway… after a bit of hiking in the pretty but cooler heights of these parks, we pined for the warmth of the lower desert. Down to Palm Springs and Anza Borrego Desert.
Anza Borrego Dino-land
Can’t say we really clicked with Palm Springs. It’s a sprawling, flashy desert town with lots of high palm trees, glitzy signs and expensive malls. We did some obligatory re-stock shopping and some drive-by site-seeing then hit the road tout-suite on to Anza Borrego – a new desert for us.
For lovers of overlanding deserts… which, you may recall, we are… Anza Borrego is a great place to hang out in the warm southern California sunshine for winter. At first glance it seems like yet another bog-standard bare wilderness desert. But no. This is no ordinary desert. This desert is punctuated by a series of stunningly beautiful oases: groups of palms huddled around small natural water springs. The intense green of the tight clumps of palms stands out like an emerald against the backdrop of beige scrubland and rocks. The Ranger helpfully explained that these oases exist in such numbers around here due to the San Andreas Fault: the earth’s crust is cracked and allows water to fill spots that would otherwise be dry as a bone. It’s a very cool place.
When we arrived at Anza Borrego we were chuffed to meet up with Swiss overlanders Monica and Igor who we hadn’t seen since British Colombia, Canada around 18 months ago. They have a fabulous and huge rig. More like a mobile apartment really (check them out Kamion Travel) .
A few days later, we made some new friends in Anza Borrego. Driving down the road we spotted a truck-camper that appeared to be stuck. A lovely guy, Steve had got his wheels into a bit of bother in the soft sand, so Cuthbert winched him out. He and his friend Dena were out from San Diego for a camping trip and we got on pretty well. For now… just remember these two names… we’ll come back to them later.
In addition to the oases, Anza Borrego is also famous for its dinosaurs. Its what? Yup. Its dinosaurs. There is some long culture story behind how these critter sculptures came to be, but the up-shot is that these huge metal creations dot the landscape around the area. And not only dinosaurs. There are monster-sized serpents, insects and camels too. Totally bizarre, but we’re used to seeing wonderful random odd-ball stuff at the roadside in North America.
Lake Havasu Balloons
In early February we checked out a balloon festival. Trivia geeks may know that Lake Havasu City is that place famous for its London Bridge. It’s a bonkers story of a wealthy American in London being sold the unremarkable bridge ‘blind’ and shipping it here to rebuild in the Arizona desert. To save face, he swore he got what he wanted, but secretly he must surely have thought he was buying the much more impressive Tower Bridge 🤣)
We went to the festival for the whole four days and it’s a good thing we did go from the start. It turned out to be so windy that the balloons could only fly on the first day. It was a real shame for people arriving on days two, three and four who saw no balloons flying at all. But at least we got to see one fabulous day of the most spectacular and colourful hot air balloons launching and flying.
La La Land
As we left Lake Havasu we received a message from our great friends Clive and Christine in France. They were coming to Los Angeles on a business trip and wanted to meet up with us. Oh yes… so excited to see them again. We have been friends since we were neighbours in UK in the 1990s so it was a great excuse to drive over to the coast to meet up with them for a lovely night out reminiscing. Also whilst in LA, we couldn’t miss stopping by the SpaceX HQ for, what we think are rather cool, photo opportunities.
It was also lovely to be by the seaside again. It seems a lifetime since we last saw the ocean back in Labrador, Canada. We took the coastal road from LA down towards San Diego. It’s a pretty drive with lots of trendy communities. But to be honest, much as we love being by the ocean, that particular bit of coastline is not… shall we say… our cup of tea. Too many people. No space. Nowhere to park-up. And ridiculously expensive. A family in Mexico could eat tacos for a week for the price of four tiny, crappy little fish tacos by the ocean in Orange County!
Film Set Deserts
Moving on… back to our desert theme of the season. We looked around for a few more spots to explore. A bit of googling and… aha! There are some deserts to the north of us that have featured in many Hollywood films. Sounds fun to check out. We cruised up over the San Bernadino mountains and down to the Trona Pinnacles on the other side. This is a very cool spot, featuring in films such as Planet of the Apes and StarTrek V. Great fun exploring around there for a couple of days.
Next, onwards north a bit more to Alabama Hills (no, not in Alabama). This desert area of huge boulder-rocks at the eastern foot of the Sierra Nevada has featured in more movies and tv series than you can shake a shakey stick at. From the earliest 1920s black-and-white pre-talkie days, right up to the 21st Century ‘Django Unchained’, hundreds of top-notch cowboys have been coming here to make westerns. It’s not hard to see why.
The sheer beauty of Alabama Hills is hard to leave behind, but we were drawn back to explore the parts of Death Valley desert that we missed a couple of years ago. Cruising up the backroad towards the Charcoal Kilns, we saw a truck camper coming towards us. Arms were waving like mad out the side windows and it pulled to a halt in front of us. What is this? Some kind of roadblock or emergency? Nope! By bizarre coincidence, we had met again with the lovely Dena and Steve (you remember… them of the winch rescue back 500km away in Anza Borrego a month ago!). How bizarre is that, eh?? That made for lovely reunion evening with a delicious dinner cooked by Dena and Steve. Oh… and the Charcoal Kilns of Death Valley are pretty cool to visit too!
Taking the high-way
Another bit of Death Valley that needed our attention was the far north. Rough dirt roads lead up past Eureka Dunes and into the very scenic Sylvania Mountains. As we cruised upwards along trails through Joshua tree forests, we realised we were slowly reaching the snow-line. At first it was just a bit of drift snow on the trail and we could easily push through. But gradually it got deeper. There wasn’t enough snow to stop Cuthbert completely, but it was getting increasingly difficult; he started skidding around a bit on the track. Have you ever felt 5,900kg of uncontrolled momentum sliding sideways diagonally across a sloping trail? It’s not nice. Marcus was enjoying the challenge and wanted to push through, but he eventually (reluctantly 😉) conceded we should turn around and take the low-road to Nevada.
ET Highway
Into Nevada and more desert. This time, a desert (allegedly) frequented by aliens. Ooooh… meeting a real live alien would certainly be an overlanding first for us!! En route to meet with the little green chaps, we stopped off at Goldfield to see yet another of the many whacky roadside attractions of North America: the ‘International Car Forest of the Last Church’. Don’t ask… I have no idea. But there are some random cars planted in the ground there. Maybe they’ll grow into a forest. Or maybe they won’t.
As an aside to the ET tale… we have mentioned in previous missives about our discovery of Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet system as a way to stay in touch whilst we’ve been overlanding deserts of North America. Well… around this time as we entered Nevada, we realised that Elon was evolving the system from a purely static ‘use at your registered/home address’ system, to a more mobile ‘roaming system’. This really is starting to become a game-changer for internet on the road (click here for detail).
Anyway, we didn’t let Starlink or the car forest distract us from our mission of hunting aliens on the Extra-Terrestrial Highway. State Route 375 gained a connection with alien life in the 1980s/90s. A chap called Bob Lazar went public and admitted he had repaired a spacecraft for aliens that would otherwise have been stranded in the desert. There doesn’t seem to be a record of what he charged them, but we would offer the same advice to aliens that we offer to other overlanders… learning to fix your own vehicle saves a fortune and makes you self-sufficient in remote places.
After Bob made the headlines, alien-based tourism followed to the highway and the nearby mysterious military Area 51. So many people came that the route was officially renamed the Extra Terrestrial Highway in 1996. Now there are fabulously weird spots to visit along the way, where enterprising folk are ready to relieve you of a few $$$ for alien drinks, alien burgers, alien beef jerky and other random (mostly green) souvenirs. There’s even an Alien Trump who, for a dollar in the slot, will recite words of wisdom for his fans to live by. It is all massively cheesy, but we love this random cheese. It’s this cheese that, amongst other things, makes ‘merica such a fun place to visit. You’re not breaking the law by passing these cheesy places. If you don’t like the cheese… don’t stop by the dairy. Simples.
Affordable Tacos
So after the alien cheese and a winter spent overlanding deserts, we’re back in Yuma: the spot where California meets Arizona meets Mexico. Ah yes, Mexico… we haven’t been there for a while. Maybe we should pop over and check that, unlike in Orange County, we can still have tacos on the beach without taking out a mortgage 😉. Check back soon… our intrepid reporters will update on the hardship of beaches on the Sea of Cortez.