This morning we are expecting some rain around 9:00AM. So rather than risk getting stuck, we pulled out of our FREE campsite around 8:30AM and began our further travels west on Interstate 8.
We still have nearly a full tank of our $2.39 Costco Gas, so we passed on the opportunity to fillup in the first town we came to. The price of gas in Gila Bend, AZ was $3.09 today.
Our original idea was to make a short 80-mile travel day of it and stop for the night in Dateland, AZ. Across the street from the Dateland Travel Center is their original gas station, which today is just a small abandoned building and a roughly paved parking area, plenty big enough for RVs and travel trailers to park overnight.
I asked them to add a little bit of Hershey's chocolate syrup to my $7.99 small-sized shake.
In case you missed it, the price of gasoline here in Dateland, AZ is $4.59 today.
The Medjool Dates are more expensive than the gas, $58 for this pair of 2-lb. bags.
Since we left so early to avoid the rain this morning, we are now at our stop for the night at 10:00AM, way too early to come off the road.
So what do we do? We just skip this stop and head to our next one.
By 12:30AM we had arrived at our "tomorrow" destination in the Kofa National Wildlife Refuge just 20-miles south of Quartzsite, AZ.
It's nice not to have "set in stone" reservations all the time, so we can "switch gears" at a moments notice. Now we'll have a "bonus day" here at the Palm Canyon Road campsite.
Palm Canyon Road is a 7-mile long gravel road that leads east from U.S. Highway 95 up to the base of the mountains in the background of the photos.
Our campsite is only 1½-miles from U.S. Highway 95, so there's a lot more to see here.
Tomorrow we'll head to the end of the road, without THE POD, to check out all the campsites we could have stayed in, plus maybe do a short hike into the canyon to see the Palm Trees this canyon is famous for.
PALM CANYON HIKE
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First a couple of early morning photos from Tricia's walk.
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As you can see we've got mountains on both sides of us.
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Well it's time to drive the other 5½-miles of Palm Canyon Road.
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We are getting close to the end of the road now.
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Time to get out of the truck and start the hike to see the palm trees.
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The mountains here are made out of Rhyolite, a fine-grained, silica-rich volcanic rock.
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We are about halfway there at this point.
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At the end of the trail you can spot the Palm Trees, thanks in part to the signage.
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These palms are not supposed to be here, yet they are thanks to bird poop and coyote scat.
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The only explaination is seeds were deposited here in animal scat.
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These trees have been documented as being here for over 100-years.
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Nothing to do now but turn around and head back to the parking lot far below.
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I didn't make it all the way to the end (maybe 2/3rds), but Tricia did.
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Tricia also got to see this petroglyph on the way back down.
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From my waiting spot I spied this lone 100+ year old saguaro cactus high up on a cliff.
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Must have been that animal scat at work again.
The laundromat parking lot wasn't large enough for ROVER and THE POD, so we went to just outside of town at another BLM camping spot. There we disconnected THE POD and took ROVER back into town to do laundry.
I waited with THE POD while Tricia took ROVER to do the laundry. I'm sure glad Tricia got her license back while we were in Florida or we wouldn't have been able to legally pull this off.
For our last night in Arizona we're going to head over to the Cibola National Wildlife Refuge and hope to score one of the sites with a view of the Colorado River.
In order to get there we're going to have to briefly enter California, only to cross back over the Colorado River to the Arizona side just before we arrive at the site.
We got our first glimpse of the California gas prices. At the intersection of Interstate 10 and the Colorado River (the border between CA and AZ) there are gas stations on both sides.
The Arizona side has gas for $2.69 a gallon and just on the other side of the river in California the price was $4.69 a gallon. When we leave here tomorrow, we're going to take a 15-mile detour back into Arizona and put every single drop of gas that we can fit into ROVER's tank!
We first visited Joshua Tree National Park back in December of 2022 on our way back home from Alaska. We spent most of our time on the north side of the park nearest to our campground.
This time around we'll be concentrating on visiting the southern half of the park.
Soon after we left I-10 behind we were on the 8-mile long South Entrance Road for Joshua Tree National Park.
By 1:00PM we had just finished squeezing ROVER and THE POD into our tight campsite. We had just enough room to still be able to open THE POD's door and at the same time still be able to extricate ourselves from ROVER.
Well after 4-days of cold, windy and rainy weather here, I'm embarassed to say that not once did we feel the need to get out and brave the elements to explore the park.
During our week long stay here back in 2022 we visited all the must see locations in the park, so not getting out there this time around doesn't leave us feeling like we missed anything too terribly important.
Does anybody else remember the 1972 song by Albert Hammond that clearly states "It Never Rains in Southern California"? I forgot the song also contains the lyrics, "It pours, man, it pours".
Also noteworthy is the fact that during our exit from the park we achieved a new record of 80.5 MPG. We basically didn't touch the gas pedal once and rode the brakes for most of the 8-mile distance.
After exiting the park instead of turning west onto Interstate 10, we decided to take a short cut down to Interstate 8 in El Centro, CA. By continuing straight out of the park we drove the 16-mile long Box Canyon Road. There was a little up and downhill sections in the canyon, but when we came out the other end we found ourselves at an elevation of -30'.
That's right, 30' feet below sea level and our gas milage was still above 50MPG. We still had roughy 75-miles to go before we reached the town of El Centro where we planned to fill up with $3.79 gas from Costco, grocery shop at the Walmart and refill one of our 30lb. propane tanks at the Tractor Supply. All three of these businesses are located at the same intersection, Bradshaw and Waterman Avenues at an elevation of -68 feet.
Regular unleaded gas here is $4.98 IF you purchase their $12 car wash.
No carwash, the price is then an astounding $5.48 a gallon.
Don't forget, I just purchased gas 3-miles north of here at Costco for $3.79 a gallon?
BOX CANYON ROAD
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The northern entrance road to Box Canyon.
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The entire canyon resembled a giant wash with steep cliffs on both sides.
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This went on for the entire 16 miles.
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At the southern end of Box Canyon Road is a view of the Saltan Sea.
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Also you can see the San Jacinto Mountains in the background.
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After leaving El Centro we had a squadron of jet fighters fly close by overhead.
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The Blue Angels are in town, practicing for an Air Show over El Centro on March 14th.
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While we were in the mountain pass on Interstate 8 we saw multiple fields of wind turbines.
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Once we turned off of Interstate 8 at an elevation of 4100' we began seeing snow.
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The farther we went on the Sunrise Highway the higher we went and the more snow we saw.
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Still heading upwards, now at about 5000'.
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While we were seeing rain in Joshua Tree, they were seeing snow up here in the mountains.
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Three miles from the campground in this little cafe, with very little usable parking.
OUR LAGUNA CAMPGROUND SITE
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Our pristine site before we moved in!
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Tricia scraped away the ice and snow from our tongue jack's contact point.
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I hope we tucked ROVER back far enough if anyone comes sliding around that corner.
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I think we've got the best view of any campsite here.
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There's zero cell service up here, but we've got Starlink up and running.
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