By now it was time to pack, pay the bill and leave for the cooler climate of the coast, the California coast, that is. The hard part of leaving Las Vegas is getting to the freeway. Traffic is a mess at any time of day. Fortunately the GPS receiver knew the way, and we were soon on the road.
Yvonne snapped this one as we crossed into California.
It's probably Ivanpah Lake, which is marked as "Dry" on
the map. Well, it's pretty obviously dry. Especially as I-15
runs right through it. We planned to stop at the Rest Stop
adjacent to the Mojave National Reserve. But somehow I
missed the entrance, and so we continued until Daggett,
which is a little north of Barstow (mentioned in the song "Route 66").
Daggett itself seems to be past its prime. However, we (or
probably more like I) came to see this - a solar power
station. And, as it is mentioned above, this photo was taken
from "Old Route 66" - there's a sign painted on the roadway.
But I didn't think of taking a photograph.
A closer view of the solar station. The silver objects on the
ground are mirrors which redirect sunlight to the tower,
where it heats up and that heat is used to generate the
electricity via some sort of turbine, I presume.
From Daggett we continued on through Barstow to Mojave.
Although the freeway bypasses the city, I wanted to stop
in and see these old planes. All these passenger jets sitting
there. I presume this area is chosen because it's dry,
thus reducing corrosion.
This shows some of the larger (747, DC-10) planes, parked in another area of the airport.
It looks as those these two planes are being redecorated.
Both of these are old planes - the 737 is the first design,
and the other plane is probably a DC-10 rather than an MD-11,
though it's not obvious from the photo. While taking this
photo, Yvonne discovered the cafeteria was open, so we then
walked over to it, only to discover that it had closed!
We missed by a few minutes. Oh well...
From Mojave we continued on to Bakersfield, for a rest stop and a fuel stop. The GPS then directed us towards Santa Maria via California 166, which was a very scenic journey, on a road which I had not travelled before. If I remember correctly, Santa Maria became well known as the location of the Michael Jackson trial, although we managed to miss that circus.
In San Luis Obispo I had made reservations at the
Madonna Inn,
a truly unusual motel. Each room is decorated in a different
style. As you can see, I had the "red room", officially
Traveler's Yacht
even to the extent of a red leather comforter on the bed! It was heavy!
Yvonne and Peter had the "green room",
Chestnut Foal,
although I don't have a photo of that.
Yvonne and Peter in front of the building where we stayed.
Our rooms were somewhere near the spiral staircase, I think.
But we were on our way to dinner!
Ah, the happy diners, courtesy of a friendly waitress.
The decor of the restaurant was quite amazing; sadly none of us
appears to have thought of taking a photo.
Although there is a not particularly pleasant
photo
on their website. That photo makes it look much worse
than it is in person.
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