We took our first casualty of the trip this morning. Poor old Mark’s sinuses finally gave up the ghost after days of battling against changing pressure and altitudes. His affliction –eustachian tube-induced sickness and dizziness – meant he had to forgo a full-on, free breakfast but wasn’t quite serious enough to subject the family to me driving them across the desert. He dosed himself up, supped on fruit and yoghurt and bravely drove the family west towards our destination of Malibu, California.
We waved goodbye to Priscilla and Elvis and the delightful staff of the Las Vegas Embassy Suites (I highly recommend this hotel chain to anyone travelling in the USA; they are consistently clean and reliable, give a generous military discount and offer a fantastic cooked-to-order breakfast and free evening drinks reception every day) and set off on the I15. Our route took us across the roasting hot Mojave Desert which appears to be awash in military bases. I had one of those spooky moments reading the last few pages of The Junior Officer’s Reading Club just as he gets posted to the Twentynine Palms Marine Corps base in … the Mojave Desert.
Our first stop was the ghost town of Calico, about 90 miles out of Vegas; a recommend from Jowan’s book Haunted Highways: Ghost Stories of Route 66. Calico is an old mining town that boomed in the late 1800s due to the rise in silver prices and then crashed a decade later as those high prices fell. The population fell from a high of 1,200 to 80 in just under two years. In the 1950s it was resurrected as a tribute to those miners and their lifestyle with the original buildings left restored to their glory and a few others added in for good measure. For a mere $20 bucks we were able to spend an enjoyable couple of steaming hot hours reliving the Wild West and the pioneer lifestyle; panning for gold, trudging through the mine shaft, drinking sarsaparilla out of jars and enjoying the rocking chairs in the shade of the wooden porches.
After exhausting Calico, fully stocked with sepia pix on the children’s cameras and a fridge load of magnets, we headed back on the I15 for the last three hour stretch of our day’s driving. Malibu, California - here we come!
Nearly four hours later, hot, bothered and starving hungry but without supplies, we arrived at Malibu Creek State Park. There was just enough daylight left to get the car unloaded and the tent up. About 8pm Merryn and I dashed into Malibu, to the Brangelina’s local shopping plaza to find a quick supper. We searched high and low through the Ralph Lauren, Juicy Couture and Mac corner stores only to stumble across a supermarket nearly an hour later. We would have asked for directions but most of the people we saw looked like they’d never stepped inside a supermarket in their life! Luckily, a friendly security guard took pity on us and pointed us in the right direction. I wasn’t sure how I’d manage to pluck up enough courage to locate a much-needed Laundromat tomorrow!
Today’s Tune: California Girls by Katy Perry
Wildlife Watch: Three mule deer grazing in the dusk at Malibu Creek
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