Blog

San Diego to Barstow

Woke up earlyish on the 12th to a cool gray morning and packed everything up, then headed off on the Interstates for the San Diego Wild Animal Park. Got there, paid $9 for parking in the middle of nowhere (*#%#!?!) and made our way into the park. After about 5 minutes of walking past shops and cafes and bookstores we saw some animals.

First up was aviary with some ducks… hmm… and a few other odd birds. We then worked our way over to the cheetah enclosure for feeding time, which was very popular.

 

The cheetahs were quite patient waiting for their lunch, and knew to wait on their little concrete pads. Oh and there were 3 of them there; not bad for a solitary animal. The keeper was in there with them too, handing out their chunks of meat; good luck seeing that at Orana Park!

After that was over we went on a safari tour on a weird snake train bus c...

San Diego Zoo & SeaWorld

Had a lot to do on the 11th. First up was the zoo. Didn't take too long to get there, but boy was the car park impressive! Cars and cars and cars and cars. Was as bad as the A&P show in Chch! Had quite a walk and there was a queue not just at the ticket booths, but also at the entrance! After 5 minutes or so we got in and headed in the quietest direction. As luck would have it we found the Tiger Trail and soon came across the tigers themselves, who were cuddled up to each other and sharing a log. One got up and the other quickly grabbed its log and paraded very proudly around with it. They then followed each other around, showing off their log. At one point one dropped it into the stream, but rather than leaving it it quickly scampered down to the bottom and waded in to rescue its log. It then emerged very proudly holding LOG, as Ren & Stimpy would say.

  Cuddled up / Sitting watching

LOG

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Gila Bend to San Diego

Things are rapidly drawing to a close over here. Goal for the 10th was to drive to San Diego. Long drive. Woke up saw a few UP trains trundle past, then hit the road and headed for Yuma. Long slog on the i8. Not much scenery wise, just more desert (and not even that interesting). Yuma was biggish, main interest for me was the big stack train we passed on the way through. Then it was back on the road to San Diego. Here things got a bit more interesting. Unbeknown to me we passed within a mile of the Mexican border a number of times. What I was aware of were these things…

US Border Patron compulsory checkpoints. Note the large portable floodlights all around and the plethora of patrol cars all lined up ready for anything exciting. I wasn't sure what to expect here, but we actually got flagged right on through; apparently we weren't suspicious enough, and Angela was under strict orders not to flash anyone in a uniform!

Sen...

Tucson to Gila Bend

Another day, another phone call to the rental car company. Like I said, got my account credited so the amount charged to me should now match the amount I was quoted. Amazing how complicated such a simple thing can be. Passed some interesting characters on the car; motels like these seem to attract interesting types.

Here's the motel in all its early morning glory; out of sight to the left and right are the half dozen pickup trucks and motorbikes that seem standard fare around here.

We hopped on the highway and headed… oh so slowly thanks to all the traffic lights and road works… towards Oracle, AZ, just out of Tucson. What's there you ask? Well suppose a very wealthy Texan built a very large hot house and then sealed 8 people and plants and everything they need inside for 2 years to see how they did…

… you'd end up with this. It's called Biosphere2 (#1...

Tucson

First thing for the 8th was to swap the car. Phoned up and quickly got something sorted out. Went off to the Tucson airport to swap the car. Had to fill up the tank and gave the foot wells a quick vacuum to remove the inches of dirt that have worked their way in there. Then off to the airport. Got given a red Suzuki Forenza which was intended to replace our midsize Hyundai Sonata. In theory the Suzuki is a midsize car too, but it wasn't any bigger than the compacts next to it, and it drove weird; almost like it had a delay. Plus it was scratched up something rotten, had a chip in the windscreen, and the interior was pretty rough. Asked for a different one; they had two whole rows of cars after all and it seemed we'd been given the worst of them all. Well, it turns out they could only give me the Forenza or one of the compacts, as all the American (read: real) cars are only for local use. Grrr. So I got a brand new blue 2010 Hyundai Accent… mmm nice. Until I drove it. No elec...