USA 2005

Wednesday 27th July 2005 - Departure from Joshua Tree National Park and the drive into Arizona

We woke early to a strange sound. Jack was getting out of the tent just as Martin was getting up. Jack said "road runners!". It was true that a scratching and a chirping sound had been heard by our tents. Sure enough a flock of small birds were nearby. We thought they were road runners and were very excited by this, and followed them for a while trying to get a photograph. Later we found that in fact it had been a cuvvey of quail. OK, not road runners, but impressive nevertheless.

At about 07:30 we left in the 4WD and headed for the north entrance to leave the park. On the way we stopped at Skull Rock.... which looks just like a skull! We stopped also at the visitor's centre and bought a few more things. By the time we were really on our way it was getting on for 9 a.m.

We drove 300 miles from JTNP to a camp site near Williams in Arizona. The flash floods of the previous days had closed the interstate freeway that we had intended to use to travel into Arizona. Consequently we travelled across country via the "Amboy Road". Amboy turned out to be the place where the US had performed early nuclear bomb experiments in a 6000 year old volcanic crater! We stopped to take photos at various places, including Bristol Lake, a salt water lake from which salt is "harvested", at the aforementioned level crossing waiting for a simply enormous freight train to move and to take a "souvenir photo" of Route 66.

The camp site was just what we wanted, with very nice facilities including hot showers, laundry and a good shop. Just the thing after camping in the desert with no running water!

We had a fairly disastrous evening meal, the alcohol based fuel that Martin had bought in L.A. not really burning at a high enough temperature. Still, no-one went hungry and no-one was poisoned! After the meal, when it was dark, Martin lit a campfire in the fire pit. The kids toasted marshmallows and in the process, Bekky accidently invented the campfire cullinary classic, the "Flaming Mallow"! This involve putting your marshmallow (on a stick or fork) into a particular hot region of the fire (not in the flames themselves of course!) and waiting a few seconds until it bursts into flames! You then withdraw your mallow and wave it around until the flames go out and there you have it, a flaming mallow. Crisp on the outside, soft and sweet on the inside!

Click on the photos for full size versions

Early in the morning and we awoke to the sound of these birds. Jack was really excited, thinking they were road runners. It turned out they were quail. Cool nevertheless.