Traveling is coffee for the soul.
There are many astonishing and wonderful things in the world, and I like to travel and see them. I am a middle-ageish man and I live in Northeastern Europe. My wife often travels with me, voluntarily. All pictures are taken by me, unless otherwise indicated.
I usually suck at nature photography, so I was happy to capture this hummingbird on my camera on the hills near Paso Robles.
"We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold...", begins the gonzo classic Fear and loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson. As we entered California, crossing the Colorado river from Arizona, I thought that someone might have spiked my dinner with hallucinogenics. The outside thermometer of our rental car showed 102 Fahrenheit (39 Celsius) even though it was more than an hour after sunset. As I stopped the car outside our motel in Needles, CA, and opened the door, I realized there was nothing wrong with my senses or the thermometer. The June in Californian desert is hot, even at night.
The other distinctive feature of the desert are the freight trains. They can be seen in New Mexico and Arizona, too. Apparently they mostly transport goods from China onwards from U.S. west coast ports. I didn't manage to take any useful photos of them, but I captured the video below on my phone somewhere between Barstow and Paso Robles. Here, too, I missed the engines, and actually this was one of the shortest trains we saw.
The are two separate traffic history museums on the old Barstow Railway Station, Western America Railroad Museum and Route 66 Museum. I dare to recommend them to those who generally enjoy such museums. The museums are run by enthusiastic volunteers, with low resources, and it shows at times. Best part is the outdoor area of the railroad museum with mighty diesel engines. I would have enjoyed it more in a less extreme heat.
There is, of course, a Ford model T in the Route 66 museum.
Santa Fe company's FP45 diesel engine from 1967.
It probably is a little stupid to complain about heat on a desert, but the temperatures really were extreme. A malfunction in the car's air conditioning would have been literally life-threatening. It was impossible to spend more than very short period of time outdoors.
On the hills between the desert and the Pacific Ocean in Paso Robles, a wealthy, pleasant American small town straight out of a Hollywood movie. There are a lot of vineyards in and around Paso Robles, like many other places in California. During last two decades or so wine tourism has developed into a big thing around the state. I am not an expert on wine, but the Paso Robles varieties we tasted were good. There are a lot of tasting rooms around town and many vineyards around it are open for visitors. Visiting them provides an excellent opportunity to spend a lot of money in a short time.
There's an actual Wild West saloon in Paso Robles, the Pine Street Saloon in a building that dates from 1857, Naturally, it is haunted.
For a few years now, the state of California has suffered from a drought of historical proportions. The situation is so severe that the governor proclaimed a state of emergency in January 2015. Around Paso Robles it was not hard to believe that the situation was indeed exceptional. Of course, I don't know what the vegetation normally looks like in June, but I would imagine there would be some green instead of brown and gray.
California is one of the world's most productive agricultural lands, and the drought has obviously hit the farmers badly. We saw many roadside signs demanding politicians "do something". I have to say I don't really know what, say, the governor of California could do, perhaps he should perform a rain dance?
We visited the Californian Desert and Paso Robles June 19th to 22nd 2015.
East of the Grand Canyon's Northern Rim the landscape changes rapidly. A Nordic like pine forest soon transforms to a hot desert, where strange sandstone formations rise over otherwise flat landscape. Less than two hours' drive from the Canyon is Navajo Bridge, the first bridge over the Colorado River east of Hoover Dam. The first bridge was built in 1929: before that, the river could only be crossed by a ferry, known as Lee's Ferry. Today there are not one but two bridges, the original one and the new bridge, built in 1995. Cars cross over the new bridge, the old one is used by pedestrians. Here the Colorado River is the border of Navajo Nation.
The New Navajo Bridge, picture taken from the old one.
A short distance northeast from the bridge, by route 89, lies Horseshoe Bend. This is one of the many natural phenomena in Arizona that are hard to believe in, even after seeing it with one's on eyes. The Colorado River makes a 270-degree turn around a sandstone rock. It's definitely worth stopping, if driving past. There's a parking lot by the route 89, and about half a mile walk to the bend itself from there. It's not a great distance, but feels much longer at least in the heat of June, climbing over a steep hill in soft red sand. By the way, most of Navajo lands seems to consist of that fine sand, and after your visit you will find it absolutely everywhere, including but not limited to your shoes, clothes and luggage weeks after returning home.
A fish-eye lens view of the Horseshoe bend. With conventional lenses I could not get a full view. I suffer from vertigo and there was absolutely no chance to get closer to the edge of the cliff..
A lizard runs away from the photographer in red sand.
Some twenty more minutes drive from Horseshoe Bend is yet another astonishing place, whose existence seems to go against reason and laws of nature, namely Antelope Canyon. Actually there are two of them, Upper and Lower Antelope Canyons. We visited the upper one. The lower one looks quite similar, if the pictures I've seen are to be believed. Both are administered by Navajo Nation parks. They can only be visited on a guided tour, and prices are a bit steep: the two of us paid almost 100 dollars.
Entrance to the Upper Antelope Canyon.
It was well worth the price, though, as the Canyon is very impressive. Not surprisingly, it is also very popular, and I have to say that it was a bit too crowded. With fewer visitors - a lot fewer - it would have been far more enjoyable. Of course, it's rather hypocritical for me to complain about it, as I was a part of the crowd. I strongly recommend timing your visit outside of holiday season, to a weekday and early morning, if at all possible.
The crowded Canyon.
Anyway, the light and shadow was an incredible sight.
Sandstone formations seemed surreal.
They say the light in the canyon is very different in the morning than in the evening - makes sense. Our visit was in early afternoon.
Our guide Shanderee Laughter demonstrating how the sandstone formations and Antelope Canyon came to be.
There's a far less pleasant landscape within sight of the Antelope Canyon, an enormous coal plant, the Navajo Generating Station. The plant and Kayenta coal mine are economically vital to Navajo Nation, providing money and jobs to a region suffering from high unemployment. On the other hand, the plant is the third largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in all of United States. The mines have caused, and continue to cause, serious environmental damage. Many think that the wealth and problems generated by the coal business are not distributed in a just and equal way.
The gigantic chimneys of Navajo Generating Station.
Below, a document about the Navajo coal business.
We visited Horseshoe Bend & Antelope Canyon on June 14th 2015
