In order to avoid Los Angeles and all its busy freeways, we took the long way around – through the San Bernadino valley and across the Mojave dessert. While much of the drive was somewhat boring, we did find some interesting tidbits along the way. Through the valley we saw mile after mile of vineyards and wineries. This is a newly developing wine region of California and will probably rival Napa and Sonoma. Then we passed through hundreds of acres of almond groves – assuming that’s the collective term for a group of almond trees. On both sides of the road for as far as you could see there were neat rows of trees. Having seen all those trees, I don’t understand why almonds are so expensive. The next section was orange trees – so many that you could smell the oranges in the car! Big open spaces taken up with large industry.

There were a few other interesting things about today:

• we passed the corner where James Dean was killed in a car accident in 1955
• we passed Edwards Air Force Base (really in the middle of nowhere)
• we went through the town where Merle Haggard (musician/songwriter) was born
• we kept the tradition of dinner at the Olive Garden at least once while in the US

Sorry, no pictures today. The camera stayed in the car.