Moving Roadtrip: Death Valley

On our first day of driving from California to Virginia we hit the Death Valley. The trip started with us leaving the Bay Area and driving down through the center of California and into Nevada. The further we drove from the Bay Area, the browner the landscape became and the higher the temperatures rose. Our day had started happy-go-lucky with cool temperatures and warm coffees in our hands. By mid afternoon we hit the Death Valley and it was bad. BAD. The temperature had reached 122° F, yikes mamma!! Our air conditioning had been running full blast most of the day and when we hit the highest temperatures it stopped working. All of a sudden our vents were blowing warm air. We were hot, the dog was hot, and relief couldn't be found anywhere. We finally stopped for Dairy Queen Blizzards (of which our dog loved!) and that brought some relief. The heat was bad though, I have never experienced that kind of heat before and hope to never encounter it again. By the end of the day we had reached Las Vegas and were more than happy to enjoy the icy cold casinos with a pro-gambler friend of Andy's.

(Temperatures began to climb mid-day and hit peak at about 4pm.)

(Happy pup in the backseat.)

 

 (We stopped at a desert oasis for lunch.)

 

 (Picnic lunch with the pup.)

 

(We had In-N-Out burgers one last time. Delicious!)

(The lovely Death Valley. Not much to see...)

 

(We saw a pretty cool desert storm before driving into Las Vegas.)

 

Palm Springs

Last weekend Andy and I headed south to Palm Springs. We had an unexpected 3-day weekend (Presidents Day), so we opted for a spontaneous trip. On Thursday night we quickly planned it out and made reservations at a hotel. We got lucky with hotel reservations because once we were there we found out everything had booked up really quickly due to the holiday weekend. Lucky us!

Andy left work at 4pm on Friday and we started the 7 hour drive. Most of it was in the dark, so we had no idea what the surrounding landscape looked like. The next day we woke up to crisp clear blue skies, and a plethora of palm trees. Palm Springs is truly an oasis in the desert.

We did some slot canyon hiking (more in a future post), and relaxed by the pool. We also visited a date farm. We thought it was a palm farm, but it turns out that dates grow on palm trees. I had no idea! Did you know that? There was a great date center with information on how they are grown, samples of dates (12 different varieties!), and a restaurant full of date dishes. We decided on their famous date-shake and enjoyed it outside among the green lawns and date trees, aka palm trees.

It was a fantastic weekend! Taking this spontaneous trip to Palm Springs was the best idea that we have had in a long time. It was neat to see the California desert and the oasis in it, not to mention all the relaxing we did there and the fun that was had.

He's always willing to pose for a picture...just not in the most graceful way. :)