Meanwhile it's Friday. Day before yesterday, Wednesday, we drove from Kanab, UT to Los Angeles, CA. Packed up most everthing the night before, so we were on the road soon after dawn, 7:15. De colors in the sky are gorgeous when the sun comes up behind you: light blue at the horizon, above that lavender, then pink, peach, sandy cream, white, lightblue again, and medium blue. Doesn't last very long, then it's regular blue all over.

We decided not to take route 89 because of the tunnel thing ;) so from Kanab we first drove a bit south on 89A. We crossed back into Arizona again, switched in Fredonia to rte 389 west, then 9 to 15. Nevada. Direction Las Vegas with more and more traffic, but we made good time. It's an excellent road, first it's two lanes each way but gradually increases to five by the time you're in Vegas. Then it goes back to three and a long time later back to two.
First the landscape was still full of mountains and canyons/mesas with pines and junipers, but as we went along it got drier and flatter, with creosote bushes, occasional cacti, and scattered yuccas. By lunchtime we were in California and passed the Mohave Desert NP where we visited before. We drove by along the north side of the preserve on rte 15. Route 40 goes by its south side. We could see the singing dunes at Kelso in the distance.
In Barstow 15 and 40 join. We wanted to stop to visit the train museum, but it's closed for the winter already, so we went straight on until Victorville. If you stay on 40 you end up on the busy super-multi-lane highways of L.A., so we turned left on a minor state route to go north behind the San Gabriel Mountains: rte 18, lots of traffic lights at first but once we were out of town it was a decent and very straight road. Then rte 138 until Palmdale, traffic lights again but here you can get unto rte 14. This brings you directly to Santa Clarita. A few miles on rte 5, hop onto rte 126 and there was the RV park. Yeay!

We sent word a few days ahead so they knew we were coming. Nice to see the familiar faces, and I was teased right away with the Pats not doing so well this year... Our spot isn't ideal, very close to the busy road, but next week some better sites should open up, said Louise. We put the RV down, took the Prius off, and drove to town for a bite to eat and a stop at WalMart for some quick groceries. I would like to make it to Trader Joe this weekend for the good stuff. We did bring a little tubbie of Ben&Jerry's "all but the", to celebrate our arrival. 3500 miles with the Prius, 700 with the RV, enough reason for ice cream in our humble opinion!

Yesterday morning I started unpacking and organizing, but not too much, Opa was on the phone and computer and I didn't want to make too much noise. That's my excuse and I'm sticking with it. After lunch finally off to the Dixons! We got there just after 2, plenty in time to pick up the boys from school at 2:35. We didn't see Hailey yet, she stayed because of the 6 week after-school ballet program. It was the last week and there was a little performance. Hailey is comically unelegant - don't tell her, she looked so serious... I thought she was beautiful and wonderful anyway and I teared up. I always do. At the end the whole audience sang "Happy Birthday" to her, and we could go home. When we went to an italian place in Venice Beach for dinner, everybody there sang "Happy Birthday" to her again - this time in italian and with some nice deep tenors.

Today I really started the organizing. But now I'm first going to have a little lunch and then a walk. It's in the 70's with a lovely breeze, so I'm off with the backpack to Ralph's for buttermilk, juice and hummus. I did that by bike before, Henk did bring his bike this year but I didn't bring mine. We'll see how long the walk is. It's good for me anyway, I spent too much time sitting the last two weeks!

Early next week I expect I'll do one or two more posts, because it's going to be lots of fun with Hailey's birthday party and various Halloween festivities. Which should deliver a few choice photographs ;).