Today, we had planned to go to the desert in a motorhome and join our son and grandson and friends in the Anza Borego State Park.  However, it got canceled at the last minute, so we decided to take the car and spend several hours with everyone.

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It was an easy drive!

We stopped at Salton City to grab a burger before heading to the campsite.

The food was quite good, although a little expensive for a hole-in-the-wall!

We all had burgers except Robin, who did the BLT.

The waitress was super; very friendly.

Longitude and Lattitude described the location; there are no streets nearby!  We are in the desert!  As we got close, we called, and Joe met us at the Salton Seaway to guide us into camp.

Did we say desolate?

Joe showed off his rebuilt sand rail, which looked pretty snazzy, thanks to a lot of labor provided by him and the kids!  It was pretty beat up when he first got it, but now it could win a contest!

Snazzy, although it needed a Genuine Plastic bobblehead Jesus on the dashboard to make it perfect!

Joe said, Let’s go for a little easy ride.  I, of course, jumped at the opportunity!  Thinking he remembered I was his Dad, making me nearly 80 years old, so I thought he would go easy.  Well, that was proven incorrect!

I am holding my teeth to keep them from falling out.

My son (now officially ex-son) took the old man on a hair-raising ride (I only have one hair, to begin with).  We went from sea level to 10,000 feet up a 90-degree grade in a little under two nanoseconds.

There is sand on (and in) my body in places where sand should not be!  Contrary to anything Joe might tell you, I did NOT scream like a little girl, and my grip on the sand rail steel tubing did not leave permanent fingernail marks.

The passenger seat stains are something that I will have to admit to!  Was it a rough ride?  Now, I can scratch my knees by reaching under my arm.  My bladder has since notified me it is going on strike due to organ abuse!

Four generations!  Paul taking the picture, son Joe, Grandson Zachary, and Great Grandson Remington

I guess it runs in the family.  Look at Lilly, all eight years old, zip off on her motorcycle.  Go, get ’em, girl!  The movie is just 15 seconds long.

After allowing my body to redistribute all the organs from where they were originally located, we went for a safari (desert talk for going on a ride).  The masked bandit is the grandson, Nick.

Hang on there, bro!

We made it to the gas domes.  The Gas Domes are yet another unique geologic feature of the Anza-Borrego area.  These two small mud pots remind us that Anza-Borrego is still geologically active.

The Earth’s crust is particularly thin here, and as underground water passes close to the hot magma just under this crust, it percolates up and creates these Gas Domes.

It’s pretty interesting, as it is in the middle of nowhere!

Mary loves the outdoors and she jumped out of the Jeep and headed for the sign which described the local area.

Mary reads the signage.

I asked Joe to slink down so I would not look like a midget, but the truth is out!  He outgrew his papa!

I must say that my heart swelled up in pride after Carmin, our Jeep captain, described how much Joe was such a smart, caring, and super gentleman, always available to help others and be with his family and friends!  We are proud of him, and I guess I did OK bringing him up!

My wonderful son and I are watching the world go by!

All the guys are together, thanks to Captain Mary, who got us organized, much like herding cats.  That’s me in the center, surrounded by three grandkids: Charlie, Alex, and Nick!

The guys asked Mary’s permission to leave the formation!  She trained them well!

Just us!  Mary loves the outdoors and being a Desert Rat, so we will go along with the gang next time they go out, but we will definitely have a large motorhome.

We allow our bones to resume their normal position before we jump back in the Jeep for the trip home.

We rode in the Jeep belonging to Joe and Amy’s friend Carmin.  It was air-conditioned, had GPS, and had springs.  It also had an air-filtered cabin, so bring on the dust; we were clean.  The baby dog enjoyed the ride and went to sleep while Mary and I were hanging on for dear life!

“Mommy!  Mommy!  Go faster!!”

We returned to camp just before the sun was about to set.

Joe’s was one of about six rigs that circled the central campfire.

We scampered down S22 to the Salton Sea and grabbed a nibble at Subway!  A little farther down the road, we filled the tank and put the Silver Fox on autopilot, arriving at Robin’s at about 8:00 pm.  We did a fly-by and went home because Scout had been alone all day, and we missed him.