Finally to the Desert!

It started to rain about 7 AM this morning and it poured! That Pacific storm they'd been talking about finally caught up with us. We had only unpacked what we needed for the night and had left Toad II hooked up, so we were ready and on the road by a little after nine.

We drove along Hwy 99 most of the way right through the heart of California's agricultural country. We saw lots and lots of rice fields, nut and fruit orchards and then we began to see the grapes.

We drove by thousands of acres of grapes. Some of the fields looked kid of funny with these coverings on them. I'm not sure if this is protection from birds or what? Seems like birds would fly right underneath...

And we finally started to see groves of citrus trees. We went by the huge packing plant for the little tangerine oranges you get at Christmas time.

WE finally turned east at Bakersfield and headed out of the flat farming country into the Tehachapi Mountain range. This range of mountains probably has more windmills per square foot than any place else in the country --

There weren't too many of them turning today...

California Highway 14 took us into Mojave. We are spending the night at Sierra Trails RV Park where we have stayed before. It's just as you start into the great Mojave Desert. It certainly wasn't raining here on this side of the mountains -- the owner of the RV Park says they average about 4 inches of rain per year and they'd already gotten their forty drops this month...

With our early start this morning, we were able to settle in a little after three PM, so Forry got a nice nap before dinner!

Still Heading South...

It took a while, but we got going by noon this morning. Forry had that recalcitrant ever slow leaking tire to top off again and we needed to go to the dump station. We were both moving a bit slow this morning, but we're doing much better than yesterday.

We continued south on Interstate 5. We went by lots and lots of groves and orchards. I can recognize the olive trees, but there must have been nine or ten other kinds of trees we went by. My friend Leslie sent me a link to an internet site that told about the agricultural trees of Northern California. All kinds of fruit and nut trees are grown here. There's a portion of Grant County in Washington State where the farmers put the names of their crops on the fences along the freeway. I sure wish the California growers would do something like that!

As we went further south, we began to see more fields covered with water --

You could see the dikes around the fields where they were growing rice --

The further we drove, the hazier and smoggier the skies got. You could just see the buildings of Sacramento through the haze --

We cut off onto Highway 99 near Sacramento. The highway medians are planted with oleander shrubs. When we come back this way in the spring, they will be all colors of white, red and pink.

We came as far as Delhi this afternoon to the Merced River RV Park. It is right along the riverfront and has nice 50 amp pull-through spaces. New this time was the pleasant surprise that the park is now honoring the 10% Good Sam discount.

From Desert to Fertile Valleys...

Today we traveled out of the desert areas of California into the fertile irrigated valleys. We saw many signs that said, "Food Grows Where Water Flows." I suppose they are in reaction to water rationing (you can only water your lawns twice a week...) in the cities who then complain about all the water going to farms.

From desert:

To mountain pass wind farms,

To juniper forests,

To fruit trees,

and vinyards:

All as we travled north on Hwy 99. We stopped to get diesel and saw this load of lovely red onions:

We stopped near Delhi, California at the Merced River RV Resort this afternoon about four pm and I immediately took a nap. I had only driven a couple hours of the trip, but I was tired! I think the past 2 1/2 months are finally catching up with us...