Our month at the park in Tucson is up, and rather than extend we've decided to head west to California for a few days. We'll go back to Tucson later, after I finish the magazine and take a littlIt e vacation time.

Buying a month at a time in a campground is a new experience to us. Generally when you do that, the campground charges extra for electricity. We used about 384 kwH in the past month, which came out to $45 for the month. I was a bit surprised it was even that much, since we were gone for about 12 days. Still, it was less than our deposit, so I got $5 back upon departure.

It was a long pull along I-8 to Borrego Springs, CA, 386 miles in total. Much of I-8 has little to recommend it, but there are bits of scenic beauty to be found, especially as the route heads into California. Our route took us into the heart of the Imperial Valley, where incredible amounts of vegetables are grown in the desert courtesy of massive irrigation projects and canals. Brawley is a small city in the center of this farming valley, which looks like a decent place but seemed to have a constant smell of cow manure.

Around 5 pm we pulled into Borrego Springs, a town surrounded by the very large Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. This is one of our favorite places. You can see our blog entries from last January for more information about the park; just scroll down to the Archives in the left column and click "January 2006".

Rich C is here, as well as our friends Bill and Larry in their new 23-foot Safari, and a few other folks in Airstreams. We had a quick bike ride through the park, and then a very mellow get-settled dinner courtesy of Larry this evening, and wrapped up by sitting outside watching the stars. The air is very clear here, and the stars are bright. Emma spotted Orion's Belt instantly, and then the Big Dipper, and I showed her the Milky Way -- something the folks in Palm Springs or San Diego probably never see due to light pollution in those cities. Anza-Borrego is a special place for us and it's great to be back.