Headin' to California!

We left Tucson on Tuesday with a couple big days of travel ahead of us. Our next destination Yuma…in the middle of nowhere right on the border of California, Arizona and Mexico. With our commitment to try any food item sold at road side stands we pulled off at the town of Dateland for their self proclaimed world famous Date Shakes…thankfully, they offered free samples (which none of us liked!). We ended up with some pretty nice ice cream cones instead and continued on our way.

Wednesday began with dreams of southern California beaches…but first we had to cross the mountains one more time. We climbed from the desert floor at 27 feet below sea level to just over 4000 ft and received a very unexpected welcome to California – SNOW! Thankfully it didn’t last long and we reached the thundering waves of the Pacific by early afternoon. Although the weather is not as warm as Arizona, we were happy to find temperatures in the 70s. It’s great to be back on the Pacific Coast again after 19 long years!

On Thursday, we made our way to the San Diego Zoo.
What an amazing place! According to our tour guide, it is the only zoo in the world that is also a Botanical garden. It is so green and lush everywhere you look! They have a new elephant exhibit, which is incredible. As well, they have re-created many of the extinct animals of Southern California in life size models, and then placed the models next to the closest living relative. I had no idea that lions used to roam southern California…and they were at least 25% bigger that today’s lions! All of us could have ridden on his back. They also had a sloth that was bigger than a grizzly bear.


Later that night we had our first “real” campfire of the trip…weather, fire bans and facilities have limited our fires to date and the boys were certainly eager to pull out their roasting forks. Thursday night we had a great one at our camp site on the beach with roasted marshmallows and spider dogs all around!

Friday, we spend the day at the beach. After receiving some good advice from some local parents, we bought “the kids” a couple boogie boards and hit the waves. I was the only one to catch a ride on a big one, but we all had fun trying!

Today, we have arrived in Anaheim and are spending the next five days checking out Disneyland and Disney’s California adventure before heading to Hollywood on Thursday. After the dessert and the beach, it should be an exciting change of pace!

Shawn