Got that taken care of

I headed out early for Los Algodones to get more meds. Tecate was closer, but my research had me thinking the border wait might be annoyingly long. I'd much rather be driving for four hours than standing in line for two. I was in and out of Los Algodones in five minutes. Got some lunch and cheaper Arizona gas and I was on my way back.

The surprise was the rain. An occasional drizzle. It kept it from being 110°. Instead it was about 85° and 85% humidity. Whee, I was in the jungle instead of the desert. Go figure.

Night creeping

The moon lights up some clouds

Another opportunity to straighten up the van

Since I'm going to Mexico tomorrow, it would be wise to get out my passport and have it handy. So I opened the box where I keep important documents and... the passport wasn't there.

Okay, it's somewhere else in the Rolling Steel Tent. So I started a search. Other boxes? The cabinet? The pocket of my overnight bag? (Okay, there's the photocopy of my passport, but I want the real thing.) A jacket pocket? The storage cubby on the engine cover? The backpack? The boxes inside the boxes? I got more worried as I ran out of places to look.

Pause a moment. Gather my wits (what I have of them). Start over.

I looked in the document box again. There it was. It had somehow slipped between the folds of other papers. Okay. Problem solved, anxiety level down, van neater.

At least I went through this exercise in the pleasant surrounding of the campground instead of in the border parking lot in 100+ heat.

Dang, I forgot my horse

When I selected a campsite at Sweetwater Summit Regional Park online, I looked for one with room around it, away from the playground but not too far from the restroom and showers. I didn't know it was among the sites for those with horses. So I have a small corral in addition to the usual amenities. And some scattered hay, both before and after having passed through a horse. But I'll take horses over ATVs any day.

Sweetwater Summit is east of San Diego, north of Tijuana. It's a suburban park with camping. I'm guessing that a few decades ago it was way out in the boonies.

Today's temperature was at the upper end of comfortable. A breeze kept things nice. A marine layer will probably drift in during the night and not burn off until mid-morning— your typical coastal Southern California summer weather pattern. It brings back memories.

Oooo, a view of the suburbs

For educational purposes only, not for camping

Bugs

This past winter, Lou and I had started the process to get Burning Man tickets. Then he calculated the rough cost of extending his trailer and decided he couldn't afford to go this year. I didn't want to go alone, so...

Now the Playa is infested with bugs. Some are stink bugs, others want to suck moisture from your skin. They're everywhere. It's an annoying mess. It's not a plague of biblical proportions, but add the insects to the usual awful heat and dust, and it looks like we lucked out.

Meanwhile, in a more pleasant part of the country, a spider or two made dinner out of my left earlobe and right hand. The lobe has swollen to about the size of a grape. The hand is puffy, too. Not as bad as the bee sting I suffered this spring, but much itchier. The insects are out to get us.

Yay

Oil prices are falling again. Now, maybe, I can allow myself to run the air conditioning while I drive. I mean, I like driving with the window open whenever the weather allows. Fresh air is better than what comes through the vents. But sometimes (like during my upcoming drive to Yuma and back) I just need to get decadent.

Mistaken for homeless

I'm in a grocery parking lot, having just stocked up on food. The side door is open and I'm online. A couple of minutes ago, a guy walked up and said, 'Hey guy, you want some snacks?"

"No thanks, I'm fine."

"It's some cookies, chips and stuff."

I figured he might be roaming the parking lot giving away promotional samples. "Uh, (shrug) okay."

He dropped a crumpled up bag of things on the floor of the Rolling Steel Tent and wished me a good day.

Oooo, Milanos

Oh! I get it now. He thought I was in need, that I must be in bad shape living out of a van and all. Well, I guess it made him feel better. Can't go criticizing good Samaritans.

Momento of more financially flush times

These markers are every mile or two along US101 (where I spent several hours driving today). They're on both sides of the highway. That means there are hundreds of them. They were originally placed by the El Camino Real Association which must have had funds burning holes in their pockets back in the 20th century. At least they saved a few bucks making the bells from cast iron instead of bronze.

The bells were prone to theft, so the state decided to step in as caretakers, replacing bells whenever they went missing. Imagine a state legislature today saying, "Sure, why not. We'll allocate funds every year for something nonessential." There must have been some heavy-duty lobbying to make that happen. At least the replacements were made of concrete to save money and make them less attractive to thieves.

Furthermore, claiming US101 follows the historic El Camino Real is playing fast and loose with the facts. As this article explains:

The message implied by the presence of the mission bells -- that motorists' tires trace the same path as the missionaries' sandals -- is largely a myth imagined by regional boosters and early automotive tourists.

What? Businesses making things up to attract customers? Unheard of!

Starless star photos

Overcast + city lights + long exposures

A gloriously noisy campsite

I knew there was race weekend camping available at Laguna Seca. I'd been there before for Superbike and vintage car races. I didn't know camping was available all other times, too, until I stumbled across it while searching Monterey County Parks' site.

WOO! Thank you Internet.

And what luck! I got a site overlooking Turn 6, where they blast up the hill, full on the throttle, into the back straight.

BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-bwip-bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!

The view from the Rolling Steel Tent. No telephoto lens necessary.

Today some Ferrari owners are having a track day. Some are showroom stock, some are tricked out, and there are a couple of vintage race cars to put the others to shame.

All the noise stopped, then a wrecker and EMT truck came by. Some rich guy must have run off course and messed up his toy. That's racin'. Now they're back at it.

Oh, and the weather is perfect, too.

Things change

Back in the days I lived in San Francisco you handed your toll for the Golden Gate Bridge to someone in a booth. And you cursed those in front of you who didn't have their toll ready to go. Now, I discovered, the process is all digital. There are several ways to do it, none of which I knew. There were no instructions except NO CASH ACCEPTED, and traffic kept rolling through. So I rolled through, too. Whether I was supposed to or not.

Well, no cops gave chase. I assumed a photo was snapped, though. I assume all vehicles are photoed in this post-9/11 world. If they know I didn't pay, what would they do? I'm an out-of-stater. A tourist. An old fart. I'm not savvy to the ways of contemporary San Francisco. I should get a break, right? I mean, the bureaucratic energy that would be spent sending me a ticket and trying to collect on it would exceed the amount of the toll. Can't make money that way.

I imagine they do let a lot of out-of-state vehicles slide by. But my natural guilty conscience and my abiding civic pride as a former citizen of The City drove me to get online and find out what the deal is. Now they have my $7.25 and I can sleep without fear of being rousted by bridge cops.

Sponge hat

My cotton canvas Eddie Bauer hat is odd. It acts like a desiccant, sucking moisture from the air, even though I keep it in a dry place. It's not just the bill that's damp. The crown is, too. Maybe the hat has sweat glands.

Mendocino coast star photo

Sometimes I know what to expect with a star photo. other times I'm pleasantly surprised. Such was the case last night. I've been wanting to do a star photo by the ocean, but it's rare to have the necessary conditions, which mostly means no fog or overcast.

The fog hadn't rolled in yet and the Milky Way was high in the sky. I set up on the edge of the bluff, hoping to get some sort of ocean image in the shot. It was really dark. Too dark, alas, for the water to show. A little moonlight wold have helped. But the Milky Way looked terrific.

Then in the middle of a 25-second exposure, a car came down the highway. What would that do to my shot? This:

Sometimes I get lucky

Farther down the coast

Back when I lived in San Francisco, rode motorcycles and drove nimble cars, Highway 1 was fun. And a spectacular view. The view is still great, but driving it in a van is not that enjoyable. But I did it anyway because I wanted to get to Westport-Union Landing state park—a strip of primitive campsites on the bluff between the highway and the ocean.

The view from the Rolling Steel Tent

Besides the spectacular location, an excellent thing about Westport-Union Landing is that it's a first-come-first-served, no-reservations campground. So if a spot is empty, it's available. There were quite a few to choose from. Also, the narrow, twisty nature of Highway 1 tends to keep the big RVs away. Yay.

And, of course, sunsets

Give me land, lots of land

Samoa Boat Ramp county campground, across the bay from Eureka, California, is a big parking lot. That's just fine after the crowd at Clam Beach. In fact, it's excellent. I only wish I really was the only one here.

This is far enough away, though, to satisfy my privacy and solitude requirements. Don't need no stinkin' picnic table or grill or place to pitch a tent.