Day 18: Zion to Tehachapi, CA ; many miles in the desert.

We bid Zion farewell after breakfast and drove through the beautiful multi-colored hills of Utah to the freeway. Once we were on I-15 we passed through St. George and soon we were in Arizona again passing through the Virgin River Gorge.  The highway cuts across the northwest corner of the state.  It is beautiful country with no development -- like passing through a natural reserve.

We were looking forward to some warm desert weather before heading back to the lands of recent torrential rain.  The rain has probably gone in California, but it is still raining in WA (and probably will be raining until July.)

Soon we hit Nevada and civilization on steroids.  Casinos, hotels, golf courses, and palm trees.  Just outside Las Vegas we spotted our first Joshua trees.  We passed right by the strip with a tall gold building labeled "Trump."  There was a building with what looked like a carnival ride on the top many stories above... not for me.. Huge hotels, castles, etc went on and on.

We went right through with no problem and stopped at Prim which is a Nevada border town.  It is a small town but managed to sport two huge casinos, an outlet mall, various fast food places, a huge rolly coaster, and a monorail to get you over the traffic congestion.  We managed to get gas, find McDonald's for some lunch and get out again, but it wasn't easy.  It was like a mini-Vegas. R noticed that they even had city-wide wi-fi.

Once we were into California, we soon came to the Mojave National Preserve and turned  off onto Cima Road.  If yoo want to see Joshua trees, I recommend you take exit 272 off I-15.  The world's largest concentration of Joshua trees grows on the slope of Cima Dome.

Joshua trees can grow to be 40 feet high.  They are not really a tree, but a species of yucca.  We also found a number of banana yucca (I renamed this plant: "spear-you yucca" because of the sharp, pencil-thick spikes on the plant that will stab you if you accidently bump into them.)

The desert also boasts many strong-scented creosote bushes.  These bushes are said to be the world's oldest living things.  Some colonies in the preserve are over 11,500 years old.

We spent some time in the preserve enjoying the nature and taking pictures.  We visited the train station/visitor center in Kelso and then turned north and traveled by sand dunes and lava domes  as we made our way back to the highway.

We turned off I-15 onto highway 58 at Barstow and stopped for the night in Tehachapi.  It is a very nice small town surrounded by more than 4,500 wind turbines.  They advertise that the town has "four seasons."  I guess that means we are finally out of the desert.

On to the Santa Rosa area to visit with relatives tomorrow.