Day 7

Boy, is there a lot of desert out west! As we approached Laughlin Wednesday evening the sun was setting so the mountains were hazy, beautiful sillouettes. We had been in pretty high altitudes for a couple of days but most of the climbing had been gradual so it didn't seem extreme.....until the decent into Laughlin. Just as it got dark, we dropped about 3000 feet in 12 miles. There was a 6% downhill grade and our gas mileage registered about 120 miles per gallon. It was so cool but a little scary. Mark negotiated the mountain curves like a pro. We stayed at a casino on the CO river. Laughlin is a very nice place but at 106 degrees, we decided not to stick around too long. As we continued into the California high desert. the land became very desolate. We decided to stick to the interstate as much as possible because of the exreme conditions. We tried to re-join the route a couple of times but it was missing. One of the adventures of this trip is trying to find existing sections of 66 in some parts of the country. We did take a couple of the better loops but after Barstow we gave up. There was a cool little diner/coffee shop in Ludlow but we weren't hungry so we moved on. We saw a huge solar collection field near Daggett, CA. Impressive!! We travelled through mountain ranges named Dead Mtns, Sacramento Mtns, Piute Mtns, Clipper, Marble, Bristol....you get the picture. All of these ranges surround the Mojave Desert. after Victorville, we started the downhill into San Bernadino. Knowing that the ocean was so close, we clipped along the rest of the way straight to Balboa Peninsula. It was decided that the LA section of Route 66 needs to be attempted seperately over a few days. Too much congestion to slow down and look at anything. We will visit part of it today but have decided that it merits another trip....going west to east to see everything that we have missed. We spent the afternoon on the beach at Balboa and then met mom & Bob for dinner on the island. It was a perfect ending to part 1 of our adventure. Today we will head up the CA coastline. After all of that barren desert, it will be heaven to follow the ocean for a few days. Don't misunderstand, the desert has it's own powerful beauty. But it is a threatening environment and there are signs everywhere (especially on the route) of those that tried to make a go of it there and failed. 78 degrees with sand ending in water is much more our style!