Happiness in the Dunes

All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.     ~ Martin Buber

As many of you know I’ve quit my job, sold my house and am traveling across the United States towards my appointed start date of February 26th to do a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail (AT) from Springer Mountain, GA to Mount Katahdin, ME (2189 miles).  This is another post from the road.

I’ll be posting later today and tomorrow about my experiences over the last five days at Anza-Borrego State Park in California, but this morning I wanted to write about a surprise I got yesterday as I drove from CA to AZ.

Anza-Borrego is located in the Colorado Desert and is typical shrub land, sandy and rocky desert with creosote and lavender bushes, ocotillo and a number of different cacti.  Here are a few photos I shot there over the last five days.

While camping in Anza-Borrego, a friend who happened to be camping in the same campground, mentioned to me that after Christmas the area became full of off-road vehicle enthusiast. It was a piece of information I didn’t pay much attention to at the time. However, while driving down Highway 78 I started to get a full understanding of the scope of what my friend was talking about.

First I hit the Ocotillo Wells off-road vehicle recreation area as my friend had mentioned there were already little RV encampments and lots of off-roaders tooling around on motorcycles, sand rails and off-road trucks.

The sights at Ocotillo were impressive but was nothing compared to what I would find another half-hour down the road at Imperial Sand Dunes area run by the Bureau of Land Management and the Glamis Sand Dunes   I pulled off on an overlook and damn near got my vehicle stuck in the sand, but took the following photos of the dunes and the riders.

It’s amazing all of the little sub-cultures and areas of the United States that exist, one of the reasons I love traveling so much are these little surprises. So go out and find something new today and have a happy day my friends! ~ Rev Kane