Borrego Springs has Sprung!

Hello all... we are trying to get back on track now that our Blogger Problems seem to be behind us. Thankfully!

Judy woke up early this morning...(7:00) and was dressed and heading out on the trail.... I stayed back as someone had to make the coffee!

After her hike, we enjoyed breakfast outside in the desert and it was starting to get warm by 8:00 this morning! By 9:30 we were on the road with the motorcycles and ready for the day! We headed up to Octollio Wells. This is a very small Town in the desert that has a state park where you can bring your sand toys and let them RIP.... dune buggy's, ATV's, dirt bikes, you name it, you can do it! What a spot... there was no one there today but on the weekends I am sure they are packed! This is part of the area they let her rip in...

Yesterday after we arrived here in the desert, we went for a hike right from our RV. We are about 5 miles east of Borrego Springs on the Yaqui Pass Road. You can just pull off here and camp for free... no charge. We were the only ones here last night at 3:00 when we pulled in, but two other motorhomes, and two cars joined us over night.

We went for a hike in the desert and found the desert is in BLOOM! Check these shots out. Here is a barrel head cactus....

This is an octillo cactus, and there are lots of these, and you will see another one yet!

There is all kinds of flowers blooming all over the desert... afraid I don't know all their names....
These do not normally have a purple haze to them...

Check out this incredible bloom on what I call the "beaver cactus"....

Note the body of the cactus resembles a beaver tail....

This is the bloom on an octillo cactus... some appear orange, some red!


This bloom is on a Teddy Bear Cactus.... all the cactus plants are in bloom...

Errrrr.... maybe this one was the Teddy Bear Cactus.... ooooppppssssss......

As we walked out the trail yesterday, this was the view of our rig in the rear view mirror.

This was the view from the top of the trail we took from our RV... a great view.... we could see about 30 miles away....

So enough of yesterday, and now on to today. We rode up to Octillo Wells to look around, and then went into Borrego Springs to the Rangers Visitor's Centre to pick up some tourist stuff. We decided to go on a hike, and picked Alcoholics Pass Trail.... hhmmmmmmm.... anyways, here is a view of the road we had to take to get out to the trail head... about 2 miles of dirt road, lots of lose sand....

The desert was in full bloom and we had to stop for these pictures of the octillo cactus plants... they are awesome!

Check out this shot.... as I walked up the trail I saw movement in front of me, and caught up to this guy.... he was trying to hide under this stump but we could see him! He did not seem to mind me taking his picture.... we left him to his business and carried on!

Of course, there was lots of these on the hike today, here is a double double....

It was a tuff hike, we climbed up over 700 feet and walked in over 1/2 a mile.... you had to stop for a rest...note I have all the gear, hat, camera, hiking stick, GPS... nobody gonna mess with me!

Need I say more about this beaver tail cactus....

Throw in a few of these....

Remember before I said that nobody was going to mess with me.... well there was one guy who did mess with me... and messed with me big time! As we were nearing the top of the mountain we were climbing, we were about 100 feet from the top and all was going well! All of a sudden, out of the frigging blue, some U. S. Marine in his F18 Tomcat, SCREAMED over the top of the mountain, RIGHT OVER OUR HEADS, with no warning.... He was only 100 feet above the MOUNTAIN.... I could read the manufacturers date on his missiles on each wing! I absolutely freaked out.... tried to get my camera for a picture, and then realised that I was scared S_____sss and dove for the ground... Judy did not know what to do and dove for cover too! Of course when I got my wits together and grabbed the camera, 3 seconds had gone by, and he was about 3 miles away! He screamed up Coyote Canyon at about 300 feet, and twisted and turned and then shot up in the sky like a rocket! All we could do was look at each other and ......WOW~

Here is Judy having to take a rest after all the excitement!

How many different flowers can you count?

That is it! No more pictures.... we headed back into Town for a few groceries, and back to the RV by about 3:00 p.m. Too hot to sit outside, so we fired up the generator to do the blog and recharge about a zillion different electronics we have that need charging.... We love it here in the desert... it must have got to over 85 degrees F. today! Lots of people out checking on the desert thought... looking at all the flowers out here....

Till tomorrow.....