Sea to Shining Salton Sea

On Thursday, while the royals were primping no doubt, Ray was laboring away in the garage in Cayucos readying the SUV for the trip to Santa Fe.  He washed, he dried, he shined, he vacuumed.  This was after buying new tires for trip.  The car looked fantastic.  Like new, really.

So, yesterday (Friday)probably after the royals had kissed twice (we didn’t watch), we gathered our belongings into the car and we both jumped in and I said “Well, here we go!” and Ray turned the key and all we got was a ratatatat sound.  Ugh.  In disbelief he kept trying to start the car to no avail.  The battery was dead.

Well, we had to get to Borrego Springs and we would not be deterred for long.    So, after the jumper cables were applied we were off and running.  Except that Ray wanted to find a place that sold batteries so that he could turn off the car and if it didn’t start again, we could buy a new battery.  That’s the cautious side of Rayman.   So we went into San Luis and found a place and turned off the car.  It started right back up…so we fled the scene and headed south toward Borrego Springs.

As we were passing through Santa Maria, I asked if he had packed the Arizona/New Mexico maps.  No he hadn’t.  Neither had I.  We then decided we should stop in Santa Barbara at the AAA office.  That in turn got me to thinking about cupcakes.  Maps, cupcakes.  There is no logical explanation.  Except all this driving around was making me hungry…and we know a great cupcake place off State St.  So cupcakes it was.  I got the chocolate-chocolate.  Ray got the Cosmos complete with a candied lime hanging off it and pink icing.  Should have taken a picture.  Drats.  Before we started up the car again, the cupcakes had disappeared.   YUMMY.

The rest of our drive was predictable until we called our friends Al and Charlie (they live in Borrego Springs).  We called them as we transitioned onto the 10.   Charlie said, “oh, dear, you should have taken the 15 down to Temecula.”  Well, too late for that.  We had chartered our course thru Palm Springs.  Little did we know that it’s faster and easier to go “that other way”.  So, recriminations started and culminated in …well, I’ll be discreet.  It wasn’t as pretty as it should have been.

So, while traveling way out of way (around our elbow to get to our thumb), Ray announced we had a quarter of a tank of gas.  So, we decided to stop at an Indian reservation gas station.  The price was right…however, the none of the pumps was open.  So that was an inconvenient detour.  The second place we stopped was open and had gas.  And they were across from the Salton Sea…So, Ray gave them $20 and left me with the pump.  I ran it up to $10 and promptly stopped filling.  Then I remember that he had said $20.  So I tried to restart it and that didn’t work.  Ray went in (it was that kind of place that you had to pay cash to the cashier inside) and was just going to get his change.  However, that necessitated finding a supervisor, getting a form filled out…OMG…so we just got the pump restarted.

We arrived in Borrego Springs.  Did I mention that it was out of the way.  A desert oasis miles and miles from anything.  A community of 2500 people with a private country club, an Ocotillo Cafe, and lots of streets with few cars.  Quiet and alone.  We liked it…off the beaten path.  Al and Char had invited 4 other people for dinner and lucky for us we got there in time to partake.   Mixed grill, fresh salad (lettuce from the garden), risotto with fresh home-grown chard…and plenty of wine and merriment…good for the digestives!!!

Their bicycling friends are at the table with us in the picture above.  From the left, Wayne, Al, Louise, Louise, John, Charlie (yes, she is a she), Marsha and Rayman!!

After dinner and frivolity we hit the floor.  Well, not quite.  They had a futon that was at least 3 inches thick and it sat on a tile floor.  What a hoot struggling up to visit the necessary room in the middle of the night.  Equally a hoot to struggle to get “out of bed” or “off the floor” in the a.m.  Where’s that Advil?

The next morning they had to pack their RV for a trip so we checked out the town and the state park.  Quite an interesting part of CA…and the stars at night were spectacular!!!  No trouble seeing the Milky Way.

 




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